The Valentine’s Day snowstorm that caused massive trouble for JetBlue—hundreds of canceled flights, ten-hour delays, finger pointing, and “voice cracking” pleas for forgiveness from JetBlue’s chairman—spurred Senator Barbara Boxer of California to propose a “Passengers’ Bill of Rights” to protect passengers, and especially “infants and the elderly,” because “no one should be held hostage.”
The Washington Post would seem to agree, editorializing that more regulation is “a fair approach.” The Los Angeles Times, on the other hand, believes that it is a terrible idea: “the market will fix the problem better than any legislator.”
In fact, one might see Senator Boxer’s initiative as an example of the dangers of a Democratic Congress, and especially of the party’s core belief that government can fix problems better than markets can. “If there’s anything more dangerous than a blizzard at an airport,” warns the Los Angeles Times, “it’s legislators who react to it by proposing new laws.”
A law like Senator Boxer’s already exists elsewhere. The European Union has an “Air Passenger Rights” act that entitles delayed passengers to compensation of $350 to $800, depending on the length of the delay. The problem is that delays are often created by circumstances beyond an airline’s control, like a snowstorm. So instead of delaying flights and putting themselves at risk of violating the law, carriers in Europe are now simply canceling flights. Surely the majority of passengers would rather be delayed six hours than be nowhere at all.
And cancellation still causes havoc, as European airlines are not necessarily obliged to compensate passengers for delays caused by “extraordinary circumstances.” Who defines what those are? Judges, lawyers, and litigation. Boxer’s short statement does not mention financial penalties for airlines, but even if exact dollar figures are not incorporated into her law, litigation against the airline industry by its “hostages” would not be long in coming.
That’s when there’s trouble on the ground. When there’s trouble in the air, passengers would be truly at risk. For instance, two years ago, shortly after the European regulation became law, an engine of a British Airways Boeing 747 caught fire following takeoff from Los Angeles. After contacting BA’s control center, the pilots were told to continue the eleven-hour flight to London instead of landing the plane—which would have caused a delay of at least five hours and cost BA $200,000 in penalties.
The risk BA took was small: flying on three engines is considered safe. But it takes just one miscalculation to cause a tragedy. As compared with that prospect, being “held hostage” in a plane for six, or ten, or even eleven hours—especially in this age of mobile phones and in-seat entertainment—seems like a tolerable fate after all.
What element of the left is asking for “war crimes” trials — the Socialist Workers Party or Code Pink? If Obama agreed, the fury erupting from that Pandora’s Box would consume his administration and doom it to the futility of the one it replaced.
@1Reading the referenced article would be a good place to start
Jennifer writes: “as [Obama] moves to the White House he will also lose the luxury of remoteness and inactivity.”
While you, I and most rational people think that would be the case, we must unfortunately deal with the “Obama-oblivia” of his supporters (or shall we more accurately say, his followers).
We will hear that his very remoteness and inactivity — part of his coolness that his followers say they admire — are, naturally, desirable qualities, indeed a new paradigm for the new leader. And, given the fact that he has no desire to actually do anything internationally (except perhaps impose trade barriers and participate in UN and other international meetings), I expect that all we will hear from Obama is some sort of escalation of his rhetoric — at first, he will be “disturbed” by Iran’s obtaining a nuclear weapon, then he will be “dismayed” by its threats to use it against Israel, and then he will of course “share the pain” of those in Israel who were killed or maimed by Iran’s nuclear attack. Good grief, all the man will give us is zombie diplomacy.
I don’t believe the Bush administration committed war crimes, or violated the Geneva conventions. I do think water boarding is torture, and as far as I’m aware it’s illegal for any US citizen to torture anyone, anywhere, for any reason. The administration has admitted to water boarding at least three people. See where that leaves me? Someone in the administration should be facing felony torture charges if we are to enforce the rule of law.
Brian Macker:
Congress has declined to consider waterboarding torture. Therefore, it is not illegal. Your opinion on the matter is irrelevant.
So you don’t really have a problem with trying somebody.
Nothing to try them for.
Brian
So YOU think waterboarding is torture? Who cares what you think? Congress writes our laws and they finally took action in February of 2008.
I have an idea: Why don’t we charge everyone in congress with felonies for NOT passing legislation outlawing waterboarding until 2008. That makes as much sense to me as you being demanding Bush administration officials be charged with things that weren’t crimes at the time they committed the acts
If we prosecuted people based on emotionalism such as yours we’d have traffic violators being shot.
Don’t worry, all ambiguities will begin to be resolved after January 20, and as the scales fall from our eyes, we will gradually remember that we have never legally defined waterboarding as torture, we have always understood that the Geneva Conventions demand that terrorists be summarily executed, and that we have always been at war with Westasia. And it will be good.
In 20days Barry will be the leader of the free world. He can take one of two roads, be a decisive leader or a manager. Bush was more a manager than a leader. That turned out to his downfall (I voted for him twice). Barry on the other hand seem to show he can lead (I voted for McCain) in show of private world positions, but so far not as a politician. So far Barry has tried to walk away from the people who have provided him the most trouble. That just won’t work as president. If Barry can stable the economy ( like let the market fix itself) keep oil prices low (by working with industry, not against it) and stay the coarse on the war of terror (bad people must be punished) he will be good president. Oh one more thing, he needs to smile -), he’s the boss now.
The US has waterboarded far more than the 3 people that were referenced, and no it is perfectly legal. All Navy seals are subjected to the procededure–all wthout a peep from the press.
It seems pretty outlandish (and suicidal) for a new administration to come into office and immediately turn around and start prosecuting the previous administration for war crimes–especially in time of war and economic crisis.
Yet that is exactly what the lefty blogs like Beagle Blogger and FireDogSwamp are advocating.
I think Obama is too smart to fall into such a trap, and will just ignore them. But he’ll take a lot of heat from the left for the first six months.
@11 Yeah – -after all the Bush administration didn’t try to charge the Clinton Administration for Criminal Negligence in enabling 9/11.
Being waterboarded in training with the knowledge that the ones doing the waterboarding aren’t actually trying to kill you is a vastly different matter than being waterboarded by people you know to be your enemies and who may or may not care if you die from drowning.
This vital point is invariably ignored by waterboarding apologists.
I, for one, would enjoy a do-nothing President on the economy. Truly, no more money for bailouts, no more decisions from on-high, telling Congress that insane regulations regarding lending practices with no money down will not be enforced… basically telling everyone that they made these decisions, these are adults and the world makes your bad desicions come back on you. Just sit there and smile, which would give the markets far more stability than deciding who is and is not worthy of today’s bailout.
Sadly, we won’t get that. And yet he is so good at doing nothing…
“Being waterboarded in training with the knowledge that the ones doing the waterboarding aren’t actually trying to kill you is a vastly different matter than being waterboarded by people you know to be your enemies and who may or may not care if you die from drowning.”
So scaring somebody is torture. On the bright side, it can also cure their hiccups.
I don’t know how a person with no discernible core principles or standards (Brokaw and Rose even admit this), and no evidence of any character, can possibly steer us successfully through the grave dangers ahead. Obama is not a man who as president will defend the U.S. and Western democracies because it is the right thing to do, as Bush has, unless he’s literally forced to do so by appointees with more spine than he has (I have my doubts).
As for waterboarding, bring it on. As for Navy SEALs – Menlp Bob, those men are far superior in physical and mental strength and character than any of their many critics on the Left and in the media could ever be. (The fact that their ranks haven’t been feminized and ruined is only 1 reason.)
Regarding Torture:
Here’s a scenario and a question.
Scenario: The hidden nuke will go off in some downtown building in three hours. You’ve got the guy who knows where it is strapped to a metal chair in front of you spitting “I’ll tell you nothing, filthy American pig!”.
What do you do?
Don’t pin too many hopes on Obama. He has no vision, only intellectual chaos and uncertainty hidden by “present” votes, borrowed rhetorical flourishes and abstentions from debate. Some kind of transformation once he takes office into a decisive man of action seems quite improbable.
Isn’t McCain working with Carl Levin to help establish a case for prosecution of Cheney/Rumsfeld?
Obama’s people have been brushing up on the history of the New Deal, so they can replicate its mistakes.
“After all, [Obama] won election by [...] bonding with the netroot base in his party.”
Bonding with them? More like using them…and as they’re already beginning to realize, they didn’t even get flowers and a kiss.
“Congress has declined to consider water boarding torture.”
“So YOU think waterboarding is torture? Who cares what you think? Congress writes our laws and they finally took action in February of 2008.”
That doesn’t bear on whether water boarding is torture or not. Congress has failed on many occasions throughout history to back law written by prior members. Especially when the government was in the party violating the law.
Here is the kind of testimony they heard:
“Jan 30 2008: In today’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) asked Attorney General Michael Mukasey whether waterboarding is torture. “Would waterboarding be torture if it were done to you?” “I would feel that it was,” said Mukasey.”
Ouch. So it’s not just me. One of the guys promoting the use of torture as “legal” understands it’s torture when it’s done to him.
You see they have this notion that if you torture someone to get information then it’s not torture. They think it’s only torture if done to for sadistic pleasure. Silly government officials.
“I have an idea: Why don’t we charge everyone in congress with felonies for NOT passing legislation outlawing water boarding until 2008. That makes as much sense to me as you being demanding Bush administration officials be charged with things that weren’t crimes at the time they committed the acts”
The law I’m talking about was in place long before 2008. It doesn’t separate out water boarding for special treatment, and classifies torture by description. Water boarding fits the description of torture provided in that law. Water boarding is a very old technique and has long been recognized as torture. So they were crimes at the time they were done.
Your idea of charging congress with felonies for not passing laws is absurd.
I also think that handing over prisoners to foreign governments with the intention that they torture them for us is also a criminal act, and my understanding is that Bill Clinton’s administration was involved in that also. Conspiracy to commit a crime is also a crime, so getting some other government to murder, torture, or otherwise do your dirty work is criminal.
“If we prosecuted people based on emotionalism such as yours we’d have traffic violators being shot.”
That’s a pretty emotional leap for someone who is claiming I’m being emotional. It’s just that I read the law and water boarding fits the description of torture in that law.
“All Navy seals are subjected to the procededure–all wthout a peep from the press.”
Yeah, and the TV show Jackass has people voluntarily subjecting themselves to all sorts of nasty painful stunts and no one complains about that being torture either. Do you have a clue why?
“… understood that the Geneva Conventions demand that terrorists be summarily executed …”
I’ve got no problem with that. Unfortunately, we have laws against cruel and unusual punishment, plus laws against torture. So just stick to executing them in a way that fits the law.
“we never legally defined waterboarding as torture”
I disagree, and so does the law.
That law defines torture as including physical or mental suffering. Are all you people arguing “waterboarding is not torture” of the opinion that water boarding gets people to talk by means other than suffering. Do you think it’s pleasurable and the reason they talk is because we are withholding more of the same?
Here’s the law:
Brian Whacker,
even according to the legal examples you provided, waterboarding isn’t defined as torture. There is absolutely nothing “severe” about it, which is why moonbat protesters routinely waterboard each other in public displays of stupidity.
Most Americans support torturing terrorists with real pain, but they don’t support doing so illegally. If you don’t like the law that declares waterboarding isn’t torture, work to change the law. Don’t claim waterboarding is illegal and then move the goalposts when that claim is proved false. Congress has declared waterboarding to be legal, whether you agree with its decision or not. It may irk you that you and your ilk cant have their way on this subject, but that’s just too #ucking bad. Don’t whine because you cant shove your illegal minority opinion down the throats of the law abiding majority.
The harder traitors like you push to have waterboarding defined as torture, the harder real Americans will push to have torture legalized against scum sucking terrorists. By trying to outlaw an interrogation method that has saved thousands (hundreds of thousands?) of American lives and convicted the mastermind of 911 and most of his living cronies, you are defacto supporting the terrorists, whether you intend to or not.
Hypothetical fantasies like your waterboarded daughter scenario are for retards. They don’t exist in the real world and so have no bearing. It’s just fallacious and juvenile argumentation.
No crime was committed.
#23, “The harder traitors like you push to have waterboarding defined as torture, the harder real Americans will push to have torture legalized against scum sucking terrorists.”
The neo-con default position,denounciation
“No crime was committed.”
I agree with McCain on this one.
hiscross and others,
where the heck are you people seeing leadership in Obama? Not once in his political life has he stuck out his neck to do what’s right unless you are counting having Rick Warren do the invocation. Big deal. Where was he when Grove Parc went to pieces? Where was he when he represented Illinois?
No one really got a good look at Obama during the campaign because there was no real investigative reporting of him. No records from any college, the only HLR editor NEVER to have written anything for publication, voting “present” on almost all contentious issues. The only thing we know about him is that he was the Senator with the most liberal voting record, which tells us something but not that much because he wasn’t IN the Senate for very long before he ran for POTUS.
Electing Obama revealed two horrible derelictions of duty. First, the MSM absolutely refused to vet this man because of their bitter partisan hatred. Second, their BDS over the last six years has been so bad that they’ve convinced the majority of Americans that Bush and his administration are bad, horrible, evil men. This is an outright lie and they KNOW it.
Here’s an anecdote for you. I asked three of the smartest professors in the United States, people of impeccable liberal credentials, why it was that people on their side of the political spectrum hated GWB so badly. These people had all been exposed to him and his governing strategy for almost two decades. I said to them, “it can’t be that he’s a bad father or husband and he doesn’t kick his dogs. What is it that makes you people hate him so deeply?”
I got about two minutes of silence, followed by an agreement that he was a good husband and father. Know what the answer finally was? They didn’t like his “smirk.”
That answer, if given to those three individuals from the opposite point of view (Clinton Derangement Syndrome, to give an example), would have had them throwing away the scalpels to get the meat axes, they’d have been so ready to rip and tear at it. Bottom line, they just hated the man because he wasn’t a liberal. That’s all–just because he wasn’t a liberal.
I’ve known these people for years. I know they’re brilliant and their track records show it. It truly saddens me now, as it did at the time, to think they could be so easily swayed. I lost a lot of respect for those people that night and they’ll never regain it. Pity.
Wow! This sounds like fun! Let’s unlimber the tumbrels with every change of administration and cart the losers off. Show trials can be such entertainment, and we can always find a law that is worded ambiguously enough to justify any convenient definition of whatever we would like to call a crime. Add in the dems predilection for stolen elections and bought offices and we can give any third world dictatorship a close run. Aux barricades, citoyens!
“If you don’t like the law that declares water boarding isn’t torture, work to change the law. “
There is no such law, and it’s quite clear it is torture. They drown you to the edge of survival. Which is clearly a severe form of physical and mental suffering. I guess you’ve never actually been in the position of drowning. I have. I was saved from the bottom of a lake at paradise beach in upstate NY. Not being able to breath in, and when you do breathing in water is a severe form of both physical and mental suffering. Surely not something one would used to discipline ones children, inmates in ones prisons, or employees on the job.
“There is absolutely nothing “severe” about it, which is why moonbat protesters routinely waterboard each other in public displays of stupidity.”
They get to stop when they want, don’t they. They volunteered. They aren’t subject to it for prolonged periods to the point where they are mentally broken. You do understand that the point is to make the person suffer to the point of mental breakdown, right? Suffer, not derive pleasure.
The amount of suffering has to be severe enough to get someone willing to die for their cause to betray that cause. Sometimes it is easier to die than to suffer, and that is the whole point of torture.
“Hypothetical fantasies like your waterboarded daughter scenario are for retards. They don’t exist in the real world and so have no bearing.”
A law is all about the hypothetical until someone violates it. Your response speaks to your intelligence. The only reason you think it’s not torture is because of who is being tortured.
““The harder traitors like you push to have waterboarding defined as torture, the harder real Americans will push to have torture legalized against scum sucking terrorists.”
I thought you claimed that the torture we are talking about was already legalized. Funny how the administration has dropped the technique. In fact they claim to have dropped it a long time ago. Yet you think that “real” Americans are frothing at the mouth wanting it to be resumed. I haven’t seen any demonstrations calling for this. Or is it perhaps you projecting your own mental states onto other people who don’t share your views.
“No crime was committed.”
There have been plenty of crimes committed in this war. Like that Iraqi prisoner that was wrapped in a rug and sat upon until he suffocated. Most however were not policy. Just incidents that happen due to loose cannons, or poor training. Such is likely when you are dealing with managing large quantities of people.
Water boarding, on the other hand, seems to have been sanctioned policy. It’s clearly torture, as it’s purpose is to induce cooperation via suffering. Or maybe you think that if your daughter was water boarded (drowned) till she agreed to be filmed having sex with a dog that it would be a consensual act.
Don’t pretend it’s not torture. It is.
It is clear that some of you commenters are uninformed about waterboarding. I suggest you read this article titled “Waterboarding is torture … period.” by expert Malcolm Nance.
Here is an excerpt:
“… and we can always find a law that is worded ambiguously enough to justify any convenient definition of whatever we would like to call a crime.”
I don’t think the wording was ambiguous at all. It quite rightly include water boarding as torture.
“Let’s unlimber the tumbrels with every change of administration and cart the losers off.”
Well, only if they’ve actually committed a crime. I guess you are with Nixon in his belief that the president is above the law.
Tom Paine at #17 — that’s a gimme. You let the building blow up, thousands of people die, and then you blame George W. Bush.
Try a harder one next time. At least one that poses a real moral conflict.
Brian Macker,
You still don’t get it, do you? I’ll tell you what’s torture:
1. Brittany Spears’ new album. That’s torture.
2. Reading Frank Rich’s NYT columns. That’s torture.
3. This season’s crop of TV sitcoms. That’s torture.
4. The refusal of Jerry Seinfeld to bring back “Seinfeld.” That’s torture.
5. Watching the Detroit Lions go 0-16 this year. That’s torture.
6. Tom Cruise’s performance as Klaus von Stauffenberg in “Valkyrie.” That’s torture.
7. Listening to Obama as he incessantly purses his lips, whistles through his teeth, talks eloquently about absolutely nothing at his five-questions-and-I’m-out press conferences, and endlessly replaying his “Undercova Brotha in a Tailored Suit” shtick for an fawning, ass-kissing media that really knows better. That, old boy, is T.O.R.T.U.R.E.
Waterboarding? That’s not torture–that’s a frat-house initiation rite.
It’s nerve racking really. I have no idea who we elected. I can’t remember feeling this way about any other President before. Normally you have an idea about the incoming President, granted due to circumstances unforseen a President doesn’t always get the presidency he’d planned for, but at least you had an idea of the guys fundamental beliefs;
a record of how he dealt with a problem in the past and so forth. Obama really is a blank slate. I hope for our sake he turns out to be a great President…but who knows???
Yeah, I don’t get the hissy fit over water boarding. To me torture is things like getting skinned alive. And if someone kidnapped my daughter, the water boarding part would be the least of their worries.
@22 Brian Macker Says:
“Congress has declined to consider water boarding torture.”
“So YOU think waterboarding is torture? Who cares what you think? Congress writes our laws and they finally took action in February of 2008.”
That doesn’t bear on whether water boarding is torture or not. Congress has failed on many occasions
You, on the other hand, are infallible?
Of course it does bear! Congressmen and senators,
and their staffers, and their expert witnesses have read the same
laws you have, before coming to their conclusion. But their reading
“does not bear” on the issue – only yours does?
Why cannot you at least admit their reading is a
possible one?
You quote “expert Malcolm Nance” – why not?
However, other experts disagree:
“the Department of Justice has on a consistent basis over the last half-dozen years or so, over and over again in its evaluations, come to the conclusion that under the law in existence during my [Ashcroft's] time as attorney general, waterboarding did not constitute torture.”
So, experts disagree. What should be done?
“Who shall decide, when Doctors disagree,
And soundest Casuists doubt, like you and me?”
I believe that in such a situation, one ought to respect the opposite
opinion, and not try to criminalize it…
The best thing about Obama is that he doesn’t seem to have much of a work ethic. Right now we are at a dangerous time with the government trying to assume the role of picking the winners and losers in the market through regulation and bailouts. Economic activity can not do anything but grind to a halt as everyone tries to fathom just how crazy our rulers have become and how far they are willing to go. No one knows what type of economic activity will be allowed and what will be outlawed. Every grifter out there will now look to Uncle Sugar as their fallback card.
I have taken several steps to insulate myself. I am selling my small business and I am keeping all of my funds in cash. This is bad for the economy but since there is nowhere for the average small business guy to hide the best we can hope for is that either Obama didn’t mean most of what he said during his campaign or he is too lazy to put much of his agenda in place. I didn’t work so hard for so long that I will risk everything on the gamble that Obama is a liar and only said what he had to in order to fool people into voting for him.
The fear in the business community is palpable. There is literally no place left on the earth for someone who believes in freedom and free markets to run.
“You, on the other hand, are infallible?”
You have to be kidding me.
Let me put it a way you guys will understand.
You’d have to be stupid to not understand that water boarding is torture. You’d have to be stupid to believe that congress has actually determined that it isn’t torture. The hearings were a shame as is obvious from the Attorney Generals response. It’s obvious that they just want to be able to torture without calling it that. Cowards. Furthermore they are afraid of holding other politicians responsible less they be held accountable, and most of them are outright crooks.
You guys are probably in the crowd that found it plausible that the government pass a law declaring that pi was exactly 3.41000000… That’s how smart legislators are.
These same stupid idiots are the ones who are screwing up the economy by interfering with it. Alan Greenspan, Bush, Obama, McCain, Barney Frank, and so on. All a bunch of crooks and idiots.
Waterboarding isn’t torture but given the results I would still certainly support it if it were.
On the other topics, I share the cautious optimism of those above who see Barry’s demonstrated insouciance to be beneficial in a chief executive. If we could give one salutory instruction to our beloved gub in these troubled times it would be “Stop!”. Yeah, fat chance. Only when the consensus of the citizenry learns through the crucible of hard experience that doing “something” is not always, and in economic matters hardly ever preferable to a calm application of existing laws and principles will we see any prospect of a turnaround. Ordinarily, I would decry the election of someone without free-market principles but since Bush saw fit to publicly and explicitly renounce same, like Mr. Macker, I am left without representation on a leading issue of our day.
Barry has a rocky road ahead. Don’t be surprised if he trips over a bunch of them.
Banjo Says:
“What element of the left is asking for “war crimes” trials — the Socialist Workers Party or Code Pink? If Obama agreed, the fury erupting from that Pandora’s Box would consume his administration”
I’d argue it permeated beyond that to parts of the KOS/Moveon/Huffpo sets (ie, parts of the dem base) but otherwise I agree with you. It is a nonstarter, would bring down his administration, and that is all probably obvious to him so it will never happen. That aside (re: pure political self interest), he keeps appointing ok people… and not the kind of people from the progressive fringe who would be pushing for it….
“Waterboarding isn’t torture but given the results I would still certainly support it if it were.”
Great, well the law that has been compromised also protects your kids and the rest of your family from being waterboarded during police investigations.
I have a cousin who was with a friend who seemlying swiped some jewlery in Mexico. The “friend” fingered my cousin in order to reduce his charges. The Mexican police interrogated my cousin by placing a plastic bag over his head repeatedly until he confessed. Now he’s facing serious time in jail due to that “confession”. Essentially the technique is the same as waterboarding except without the water.
I hope you look forward to this technique spreading from our military prisons into our police stations. If it’s not torture I don’t see how the constitution would bar confessions made using the technique, or others like it. One is not likely to take the fifth when the alternative option is to be strapped onto a board, and suffocated to unconciousness.
RCARDED,
your meaningless comments are even more worthless than Whacker’s attempts at sophistry.
Whacker,
“There is no such law, and it’s quite clear it is torture. They drown you to the edge of survival. Which is clearly a severe form of physical and mental suffering.”
There absolutely are statutes defining torture, and waterboarding isn’t on them. It’s quite clear even by your idiotic paste/quotes that it isn’t torture–as I already pointed out. Waterboarding doesn’t involve drowning. People who are drowned DIE.
“They get to stop when they want, don’t they. They volunteered. They aren’t subject to it for prolonged periods to the point where they are mentally broken. You do understand that the point is to make the person suffer to the point of mental breakdown, right? Suffer, not derive pleasure. The amount of suffering has to be severe enough to get someone willing to die for their cause to betray that cause. Sometimes it is easier to die than to suffer, and that is the whole point of torture.”
“Severe” is not defined by coercion or volunteerism. The point is to frighten terrorists into talking, not to make them suffer to the point of mental breakdown. Have any of the terrorists subjected to waterboarding suffered a “mental breakdown? Protesters don’t waterboard each other for masochistic pleasure. If interogated terrorists were willing to die, waterboarding wouldn’t work. It’s the fear of death that makes the cowards confess.
“A law is all about the hypothetical until someone violates it. Your response speaks to your intelligence. The only reason you think it’s not torture is because of who is being tortured.”
There is no law against waterboarding and no law is hypotheetical because they all address real situations–not fantasies like hypothetical stories about waterboarded daughters. Hypothetical questions are indeed retarded. (Being quite virile, I have two sons by the way. No XY sperm cells of mine could be outswum by an x-only spermatazoa.) The only reason I say it isn’t torture is because it isn’t–not by physical or legal standards.
“I thought you claimed that the torture we are talking about was already legalized.”
I said waterboarding isn’t torture and that the real torture of terrorists is favored by the majority of Americans.
“There have been plenty of crimes committed in this war.”
No there haven’t been–not that my reference to waterboarding was a blanket statement about the “war” in Iraq. (America is not at war with Iraq.)
Don’t pretend waterboarding is torture. It isn’t. Pasting idiotic stories written by terrorist aiding opponents of the practice doesn’t prove anything but your own stupidity. Refuting your nonsense is an excercize in futility, because you could never muster the integrity to admit you’re full of $hit. Look up the definition of “ambiguous and stop citing a commercial you saw about Ron howard’s Nixon movie.
Even if waterboarding were torture, it wouldn’t matter because the majority of Americans support it, and they aren’t afraid of political attacks on their person like President Bush was.
You’re obviously very young and very stupid. That’s why you’ll never convince a soul to believe your plagiarized tripe.
Whacker,
I don’t know about you, but my kids are not muslim terrorists captured overseas. Your analogy between waterboarding and mexican bag-hats is specious. All the confessions obtained by waterboarding were genuine, AND THEY SAVED AMERICAN LIVES.
Stop pretending you care about American lives. If you did, you wouldn’t oppose the legal waterboarding of genocidal terrorists. You are a terrorist sympathizer, plain and simple. %uck off.
Is there a way to become a content writer for the site?