Haunting Account of Gitmo Forcefeeding (Warning: Graphic description)

This was hilarious, thank you! Recognition of basic human rights makes a country deserving of leading 200+ sovereign nations. Fantastic.

 

Gitmo and the handling of it by GWB and BHO is inexcusable and history will judge.

 

You're having difficulty with basic logic. (Not A -> Not B) =/= (A -> B). In other words, you're mischaracterizing what I wrote.

Deserving or not, the US has been in a leadership role on the world stage for a long time. In some circumstances, that can be a good thing, as we've shown from time to time. For that to be the case more consistently, it's necessary (but not sufficient) that we uphold principles of human rights.

 

I do want to discuss it, so I do. I addressed the legal argument in the very next sentence of my post, which I know you can't have missed because you responded to it.

I'm surprised to see you admit these guys are prisoners of war. In that case, their current treatment violates the Geneva Conventions, which is why the US government hasn't designated them as POWs.

But to answer your question, Article 9. Article 10 is also relevant to this discussion, as it pertains to treatment in captivity.

I actually don't have a problem with tribunals as opposed to trials, but they have to be fair. It can't be some kangaroo court where the defendant doesn't have a chance regardless of his innocence. The tribunals in the last couple of years have fallen short of this standard, IMHO. Here's an interesting article on this topic. http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Justic...ntanamo-prisoners-challenging-their-detention

 

I have difficulty with basic logic yet you are the one acting as though there is any legitimate reason for a bunch of sovereign nations to have a leading nation. Gotcha.

Here is what I should have said more clearly: there is absolutely nothing in the world which could legitimately make any country deserving of leading other countries except maybe explicit and direct democratic approval from all of those countries. There is no collection of behaviors by another country which would convince you to voluntarily have your country being led by that country, and the rest of the world is no different than you.

There is no part of the US national character or belief system which would make the US more or less deserving of leading the "world", just like there was not for every other superpower/empire in history. The only thing the "US" deserves is to serve its own people, and if it decides that in the interest of its own people to forcefully interfere and influence the sovereignty of other countries and other people, then let's call a spade a spade, shall we? Cool.

I agree with the bigger picture you were painting though. After the marketing that has gone into making the US appear to be the sole definer of freedoms/rights, we have now come to a downside. Today, there are pockets of people in certain regions seeking to at least seek those same standards, but it is slowly but steadily becoming impossible to do so by pointing to America as an ideal example. When conservatives in this region argue with me about the need to bypass basic rights and ignore due process in the case of (for example) a foreign invader, they are locked and loaded with the argument that the US has gitmo among other secret torture/investigation facilities outside the scope of US and international laws. There is Bradley Manning. Illegal war in Iraq. Lies about Afghanistan. Terrorism via drone attacks. Stolen elections. Infiltration of foreign militaries. So on and so forth. There are plenty of things which really makes it difficult to argue the case. Now that's not something which the US ever planned obviously, but it is an unfortunate consequence of all this especially for those who are trying hard to improve things.

 

You do realize if the US weren't the main hegemonic power it would be someone else... right? In no world will there ever be a point where no nation will attempt to extend its influence beyond its own borders. It happens.

 

I don't think we disagree on anything worth arguing about. As you wrote, the way we've conducted the war on terror makes it impossible for us as a nation to speak with any convincing moral authority when we criticize other countries.

 

Yeah it certainly won't happen when the world is filled with people like you. But it will happen IMO, way after we're both gone.

In any case, are we supposed to prefer one brand of hegemony over the other? If so, I'll take the Chinese model (for example). Their behavior within their borders is far worse than yours, but their behavior abroad is morally and strategically far superior from all evidence I've seen. Then again, we will never know what it will look like once it's in play full-on, just like we never knew a country based on the struggle for freedom and liberty would be at war for virtually its entire life and ignore due process arbitrarily.

Better yet, should we stop aiming for eliminating hegemony just because you don't think it realistic in your version of the future? If the deal is sealed, what's your problem with terrorism exactly? Why are you so offended by militant foreigners aiming to spread their ideology through vicious force? There is no end game except becoming the leader, however that is achieved. HEY someone is going to forcefully make their way to the top anyway right? If you only approve of your own brand of hegemony, aren't you a terrorist?

Please. Spare me your fake realism crap. Here are some examples of your mentality:

- Someone is going to sell crystal meth, might as well be me.
- Someone is going to prison rape you, might as well be me.
- Someone is going to steal this money I found, might as well be me.
- Someone is going to be America's b****, might as well be me.

Absolutely filthy mentality. People like you are the fuel for the engine which spits out a Romney/Obama race.

"He's better than Romney!"

Maybe you've become so used to not having a real choice, you think that's the only way the world could possibly function. That would be a new level of exceptionalism, though quite common from citizens of past empires as well.

You keep catering to the lowest common denominator. I'd rather be in the minority than sell myself out. Every victory we've had as humans has come from people who are the exact opposite of you. People who would not accept this mentality. Every revolution, every victory of human rights, every scientific development, everything which pushed us ahead as civilized beings. The Che Guevarras, the Martin Luther Kings, the Einsteins. Because they did not ever want to say: everyone is going to do the same stupid **** over and over again, I might as well play that game too.

So ironic. America would not even exist today if the founders thought of things in the way you did. But you insist on making it seem like the only options are: 3rd world hell, what we have today, and unrealistic utopia. Yeah no thanks. I'll stick to my CRAZY theory that American monopoly on hegemony is not the best realistic possibility at the moment - if that's ok with you.

 

Agreed. More important than external criticism though, is the ability of those countries and their people to develop themselves. So IMO it's more essential that that is becoming less and less likely as the poster-boy of freedom, rights, civil liberties becomes tarnished.

 

I agree that GITMO is a blight on our history but I think a lot of people are holding Obama more responsible than he is. Remember Obama tried to close GITMO but was blocked by Congress. Also the Obama admin has tried to send GITMO prisoners to US courts, again blocked by Congress, and to other countries. In many of those case other countries have refused to take them or those prisoners would likely be executed upon repatriation.

GITMO should've never been started in the first place. Once it was it is much harder to get rid of.

 

why? they are.

How so?

 

we tried to set up a tribunal system years ago, the courts blocked it

 

they aren't receiving torture

a feeding tube to prevent starvation is not torture, good grief

THE HAUNTING OF THE FEEDING TUBE, OH THE HUMANITY!

Someone can correct me if I'm recalling this wrong. Only three people of thousands captured were water boarded, and not at Gitmo.

Journalists and actors voluntarily submit themselves to waterboarding and leave unharmed. It's not exactly getting fingers chopped off or bones broken. It might be harsh, but it hardly qualifies as a stain on our humanity, especially considering we were trying to extract intelligence to prevent future deaths.

Some people are just naturally self hating and insist on drawing moral equivalence between us and those that would kill us.

 

The people held at GITMO are specifically not called "Prisoners of War" but "Enemy Combatants" or "Illegal Combatants" and initially the GW Bush Admin argued they were not subject to Geneva Conventions protections. Since then US Courts have ruled they are subject to some Geneva Convention protections.

 

I find this an interesting argument for someone who has taken a very strong stand regarding individual rights. These people are choosing to die and they are being forced to undergo a very painful and degrading procedure to keep them alive. Should these people have the right to starve themselves to death?

The key point there is voluntarily. Many people willing submit themselves to be whipped but if the police did it to a suspect in interrogation I have no doubt people would call that torture.

Regarding not leaving permanent damage again that was one of the arguments that had been put forward by John Yoo that torture only constituted organ failure and permanent damage. Even the GW Bush Admin. repudiated that definition.

I am not sure what moral equivalency is being drawn here. If anything it is saying we are not morally equivalent than our enemies. We are better.

 

fyi, to the people still feebly protesting that force feeding is not torture---

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/mar/06/pentagon-iraqi-torture-centres-link

http://www.salon.com/2007/12/15/bashmilah/

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentis...justice-department-immunity-bush-cia-torturer

so it's not as if America has the high moral ground on the topic (if it ever did). Let's not preclude the possibility that much worse things are happening than are reported. The American government has no credibility on this topic, and given the tendency to classify rather than to divulge, if your heart is still into defending the American government for torture (even if you deride governmental overreach for taxes (???)), just be aware that there are much worse things going on then even these terrifying "not-torture" acts, and that you are being held responsible for them by certain groups.

 

All excellent points. It is also why I believe the previous congress and administration deserves a lion share of the responsibility. It is very hard to put the genie back into the bottle.

Having said that, I am disheartened by Obama's administration when it comes to liberties.

 

Sure, until they become enemy combatants.

 

King, huh. Martin Luther King Jr.
The Martin Luther King Jr. who opposed the movements of more radical blacks, whose great accomplishment was to make the cause of black civil rights non-revolutionary and non-radical so that normal Americans across the country would not be terrified of some black revanche. That Martin Luther King.

And Mathloon? Take your revolutionaries. Take your demagogues and moral absolutists, your failures such as Michele Bachmann or Che who died in some South American hellhole as a failure and today is part of the capitalist system on T-shirts for idiots, your Lenins and Robespierres. You may preach of the Founding Fathers, though do you understand, for a second, why THEIR revolution succeeded, while the ones in France, in Russia, in China, in Germany, all failed? Because they didn't try to create a new social order - they just tried to reassert and revise the old one that had gradually developed and changed in colonial America for the previous 150 years. That is why Burke supported them but opposed the French Revolutionaries.

Though it is incredibly, ironically hilarious, that you, the socialist who trumps about the masses, praise those individuals with heroic willpower. For what is socialism if not a system which will destroy human greatness, which will destroy the human spirit under the great morass and pathetic catchphrase of equality and the modern weak interpretation of Christianity?

 

Perfect example.

1) King was not only about black civil rights. Radicalism is not the only alternative. King did something that no one else did. He changed the tactics, and that's why it worked. Had he joined the radicalists, he would be their equally inferior ideological brother.

2) I'll take them all (except Bachmann), thank you very much. Those revolutionaries fast forwarded the world into an improved form of civilization. The fact that they didn't finish the job of revolutionizing the world within a single human's lifetime is neither disappointing nor conducive to your point. The founding fathers' revolution succeeded because they made sacrifices to take a different route to their goal. Sacrifices that others weren't willing to make in all the places you mentioned. Again, you are missing the point. If the founding fathers did what every other colonized people did, they would be colonized probably to this day.

3) I'm not a socialist, I don't know where you got that impression. I assume it's from rejection of a few free market ideas and rejection of a few socialist ideas. It may be shocking to you but people can do that and not be socialists. Crazy I know. What's most hilarious is you see very clearly that socialism destroys at least part of the human spirit, but you don't see the say about other extremist ideologies. Also, equality is not a weak concept to anyone. In that field, you are very lonely. The humongous majority of the human race seeks equality - whether through equal opportunities or equal standard of living or equal share of resources. You may not believe in it (which I doubt to be honest), but equality is the goal of everyone except for those with significant authority, even if people choose to seek it in vastly different ways. With all due respect to your views, there is no useful area of discussion for my views and your views, which I gather can be summarized as "best killer wins". I'm also amused at how you must think that you would carry these views if you were anything other than a privileged guest of the empire. Nah. There are people with similar views everywhere, albeit rare when they are insignificant to the overall power structure. The only difference is when they're not on the winning side, they are called terrorists and they murder people and explode buildings with no regard for civilized society, rights, equality, any of that stuff.