I wonder what Dick Cheney would think about torture if instead of getting five deferments from the Vietnam draft he had spent five years getting tortured in a Hanoi prison. The experience seems to have convinced John McCain that torture isn’t a good or useful thing. And John McCain isn’t exactly that quick on the uptake. Maybe Cheney would have come out of the experience determined to torture as many people as possible just for revenge. It’s hard to understand the mind of a sociopath. It definitely seems to be a trend with conservatives that they can’t muster much compassion until something happens to them directly.
There used to a line people threw out about how “a liberal is just a conservative who hasn’t been mugged yet.” You can reverse that with “a conservative is just a liberal who hasn’t been denied medical care on a technicality yet.” Or, “a conservative is just a liberal who hasn’t had his balls hooked up to electrodes, yet.” Or, “a conservative is just a liberal whose unwed daughter hasn’t been knocked up, yet.”
You could have fun with it.
a conservative is a liberal stripped of their soul and conscience
(sorry, but I’m done with pretending that the LOT OF THEM are functioning sociopaths)
sorry, pretending that they are NOT functioning sociopaths.
Yup.
assassinated Americans without due process.
This shit is confusing.
Anyway, per your previous post, Obama is going down, through no fault of any damned liberal. And I do believe what you say about the horrors to ensue, but he has been pretty horrifying himself. Problem is, there is no way in Hell he can salvage the financial world. Morgan Stanley alone holds 56 trillion in derivatives. They dropped 10% Friday and another 8% today. I’d be surprised if we even get to 2012.
“
He poses several much bigger threats than not being able to salvage the financial world!
Here’s one of them.
Obama: A disaster for civil liberties
I’m extremely sorry I relented at the last moment and voted for him. I won’t make that mistake again.
will encompass any horror shows imaginable. I hope those young toughs coming up your driveway take care with your civil liberties.
ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.
Oh, I forgot to mention: Now you’ve got me really scared! Wow! Young toughs up my driveway if I don’t vote for Obama. What to do, what to do?
OK, you’ve convinced me. I’m moving to New Zealand.
I’m not advocating your voting for Obama.
Oh, but you’ve got me running scared now with your threat of young toughs up my driveway.
nevermind.
And when the next Republican President gets elected, you can remain virtuous and pure while his new Supreme Court Justices which have replaced Breyer, Ginsburg and Kennedy have said waterboarding and Guantanamo Bay incarceration is legal and constitutional. Don’t worry though, at least your a pure civil libertarian.
Right! And they might also consider it perfectly acceptable to “execute” American Citizens without a scintilla of due process.
Oh….wait….we already have a President who does that.
No, we killed an American expatriate who renounced his citizenship and declared war on America, consorting with Yemeni terrorists giving them information. We killed, he’s dead, and much of America doesn’t give a shit. When we have a President who wants to just kill a random person on the street, then is when it will be a problem for people.
If you don’t have a problem with your “nation of laws” executing people without a scintilla of due process, then you are part of the problem.
PS When other countries murder people they deem “enemies of the State” people like you are the first to jump all over it and call it what it is, but when your government does it, why it’s quite acceptable, isn’t it?
No, since I know the history of this nation as well as others. We’ve killed German-Americans who joined the Nazi’s. We’ve killed traitors who left for the British Army. The “rule of war” uses this very thing. Do other countries abuse it, yes. Is it right, no. Can America stop it, no. It is what it is.
When you have someone born on this soil, who renounces his citizenship and joins a foreign terrorist group hellbent on pulling America to its knees and causing mayhem to millions of women and children, you won’t get many sympathizers to your side on that. Its a sad reality, but it is a reality. America is a kill or be killed nation. Its not new, it always has been since the days the first pilgrims showed on Plymouth Rock. I love your idealism, but it is also a boundless naivety.
True. But we have as a nation killed traitorous individuals who have aided foreign enemies who were American. There is precedent all over history for that one. Look through all the first 43 presidencies. You’ll find it.
………..who were American citizens” Forgot to add that above.
Well, I don’t believe us to be at war. I also don’t see any evidence that this guy did anything illegal. If the government has it, why won’t it produce it? Sorry, I don’t buy it. He was a political enemy.
As the West Celebrates a Cleric’s Death, the Mideast Shrugs
Oh, the Government is just going to release EVERYTHING on this guy. Hell, we still don’t know ALL of the crap Bin Laden did. Plus, this Defense Department hasn’t really divulged into many of these killed Al-Qaida leaders and henchmen, why would they do the same to al-Awlaki. I suspect after 50 years, we will know the full story.
Because he’s a citizen. Who asked for everything? All we’re saying is, “Why can’t you present one piece of evidence that he was involved with the planning in al Qaeda? If he’s such a bad guy, surely it’s out there.”
I find it odd that this guy leapfrogged over all the other members of al Qaeda and became involved in operations. It makes zero sense.
The drone attacks themselves are on shaky legal grounds (they haven’t really produced actual legal evidence for this when the ACLU asked either), but to use them against American citizens? That’s way over the line.
Hey, Seabe, the Obama administration is going to release thousands of volumes of juicy stuff on Awlaki……on the same day the Bushites release proof that Saddam had WMD’s and worked with bin Laden.
I mean, I’m still going to vote for him because I’m not interested in 4 years of a worsening future (and if the GOP wins in their current state of mind, they will only radicalize).
But, for the god damn life of me, I can’t understand why these cheerleaders stand here and applaud what the government has done. Why were we even protesting George Bush’s civil liberties abuses? I don’t give a fuck if FDR imprisoned Japanese people. Does it mean Obama can do it because there’s “precedent”?
Ha, applauding. Where did I ever say I applaud or agree with this stuff. I don’t. I’m just stating what this is. I also want to state to whoever here that you are not going to change this. Not without blood. As long as every court in the land, including the Supreme Court allows those precedent to be used, it will still be done.
Also, not a lot of those protestors were Civil Libertarians. Yes, they listened to your arguments and chanted your phrases. But, George W. Bush was the target. Didn’t you realize how those protests waned a little after 2005?
ACLU is nothing but a toothless organization. Hell, these people couldn’t even defend a Gay child from bullying down in Florida. Right now, no one in the parties sans a couple people really gives a crap about this in Congress. There won’t be investigations of this, because it will dig up EVERY SINGLE TIME Presidents have done this. And this wasn’t the first time. No court in America would take the case, including the U.S. Supreme Court. America itself won’t care, hell we have a constituent base out there that would love for more of this to happen. I’m not saying its right with all of the information out to us now. But,its U.S. Foreign Policy. It won’t change, even if Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich graced that Oval Office.
Ok, I’m done. This is a useless exercise, especially from someone who considers the ACLU a toothless organization.
Oh, you’re going to run because I told you what you didn’t want to hear about the ACLU. The ACLU could be a very strong organization where every political party in America could quake in its boots whenever one of its lawyers demanded legal documents and Pentagon Papers. The organization, doesn’t do that.
No, not really. More because this is a “pointless exercise” because you’re not going to change your mind, and you continue to move the goalposts.
“He relinquished his citizenship and took up arms!”
State Department disagrees
“The US has done this before, so who cares?”
Shell-game. Go play with someone else.
Change my mind. Lay it out. Lets have this debate. I like debates, its the reason I’m here.
Yeah, right. And George Bush had all kinds of secret information proving that Saddam Hussein had WMD’s and was best buds with Bin Laden.
Yet, he’s dead. And Bush is in Dallas.
When you haven’t got a leg to stand on and you know it,, say something irrelevant.
Which is why you brought up Bush and Saddam Hussein?
Bush and Saddam Hussein were entirely relevant to what you said. Think about it a bit, and maybe it’ll come to you…….or not.
Unless Saddam Hussein was an American citizen who inspired jihad against the United States Citizenry, no it isn’t. Different apples and oranges here. Bush used Iraq as an oil profit venture, disguised as a WMD venture which economically cost us billions + ill will from other countries.
Not surprising that you consider that a valid defense.
“What’s the big deal? I’ve been committing the same crimes for decades while loudly proclaiming to be the most virtuous, law-abiding man on earth. What’s your problem with that?”
Ain’t that American. Sad, isn’t it. Yet, there it is.
Finally, a bit of sanity and reason. Thanks Seabe!
Yes, make a NEW MISTAKE instead!
But for goodness sake, NEVER vote for the lesser of two evils when you can sit idly by, let the greater evil win and declare yourself blameless. That is always the better choice… and cut your nose off, too, while you’re at it.
You may be convinced that Obama is the lesser evil. Not everyone is.
Ok, so tell me how Romney, Perry, Christie, Paul, Bachmann, or Cain isn’t or wouldn’t be? Its either the President or one of them, no third party nutter will ever get the Presidency. I remember this trick, back in 2000, when many said that Bush and Gore were the same.
And which one of the Republicans is a lesser evil to Obama. Perry? Christie? Romney? Bachman?
Evil is evil.
Well, good luck being pure because somebody’s gotta win.
Have fun voting for the easter bunny then. I’m sure he’ll make a great president. Or, failing his election, perhaps it will be Perry or someone else who is dying to start another major war in the middle east to bring on the rapture. Maybe it’ll even be someone who wants to use some nukes just to show the rest of the world who the boss is. But, hey if that happens, at least you will have maintained your purity by not voting for the lesser evil.
I guess you haven’t been paying much attention to Obama’s military decisions, have you?
What is it with the Obama apologists? Is that you are so enamoured of his pretty words that you forget to look at his actions?
No, its just that we didn’t push those pie in the sky liberal fantasies on him when he did run like you all did.
Don’t include me in the pie-in-the-sky liberal fantacists camp. If you had read anything I wrote during the campaign you would know better. I did not share their delusions. My expectations were so low I did not think he could disappoint me, and yet he has starting when he signed off on bombing Pakistanis within hours of his inauguration. I made the decision to vote for him at the last moment while I was in the voting booth, and for very silly, sentimental reasons. My vote changed nothing, but I still regret it.
I’ve been paying perfect attention to them. Do you see him invading the middle east on a large scale and killing hundreds of thousands? How does that compare to his predecessor, George Bush? Do you want to see an actual dominionist in the White House? Because that’s what the alternative is very likely going to look like. If you can’t tell the difference between Obama and an end time dominionist, your connection with reality is tenuous at best.
Are you kidding? You don’t see that he has escalated the violence in Afghanistan, broadened the scope and nature of military violence throughout the region, realized the neocon dream of turning Iraq into a Middle Eastern US client complete with permanent military implantations and a 21st century imperial citadel right in the middle of the capital city (and if you think that American soldiers have stopped killing, maiming, and torturing Iraqis then you don’t know what’s going on there), and continued to actively assist Israel in running roughshod over international law and Palestinian human rights (not to mention the human rights of their own “less equal” non-Jewish citizens), then you haven’t been paying attention at all.
And it doesn’t bother you that he feels fine about summarily executing an American citizen who has in fact done nothing more than run his mouth? Even Bush didn’t do that.
I could go on and on, but it’s late and I’m tired.
Where do you think we would be with Iraq today if McCain had won? How about Afghanistan? I’m not at all pleased with where we are on either of them, but if you really believe that there’s no difference between the policies the Obama administration is pursuing there and the policies that would have been pursued under a McCain administration, you’re living in a fantasy world.
It is you who are fantasizing. No one knows where we would be in Iraq or Afghanistan with a McCain administration, but we do know that Obama has escalated the violence in Afghanistan, and has done anything but withdraw from Iraq. We also know that Obama has broadened his military violence to Pakistan, Yemen, Libya, and other places, and has threatened other countries as well. No one knows what a McCain administration would have done, and speculation is worth exactly zip.
Obama is every bit as much a “war president” as Bush was if not moreso.
And at least McCain has spoken out openly against torture while Obama has actively protected those who ordered and committed it.
Not to mention the fact that Obama has deepened and broadened the erosion of civil rights and civil liberties that began under Bush.
Oh my God. Had you listened to ANY of his foreign policy speeches. You know, the ones that said he would probably leave a residual force in Iraq? Where he said that Afghanistan War must be expanded?The policy speech which said our focus has to be more on Pakistan, which by the way, is where Osama Bin Laden and his lieutenants resided.
I’m sorry, but I’m still going to lump you in with pie in the sky liberal fiction crowd, because you just admitted up a couple of posts above that you voted at the last minute in the voting booth. You didn’t want to be left out of the celebrations when President Obama won, so you, like all those other hard left liberals, put your thoughts of what YOU wanted in a candidate and voted based on that. Not because of what you actually heard, read, or didn’t omit from your mind when he said what he said.
Yeah, go ahead and label me any way you like. You have proven one thing here and one thing only so far, and that is that you cannot argue your way out of a wet, half-tattered paper bag.
I love projection and deflection. It tells people when someones arguments have been defeated.
You have become the best cure for insomnia ever. Thanks.
Yet, you keep coming back. Unless your one of those lucky people who sleep while typing.
… has been one of my randomly rotating email sigs for a few years now.
A Conservative is a Liberal who believes having one’s head up one’s ass is an awesome way to live life!