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• Monday, August 4, 2008 04:14 PM

  @gommygoomy (from way back)

  Er, what's up with that screen name? Does it have something to do with the fact that you write gobbledy-gook?

  The goomster belches:

  I wonder how Mark Benjamin would feel if HIS family was in IMMINENT DANGER, not just of injury, but of death, and the authorities had some of the bad guys in custody? They [jg: the bad guys?] were kidnapped, and would be EXECUTED very shortly. Do you think that he might have a little different perspective on the situation? Maybe not be such a PUNK? How far would Marky go, to have prevented 911? To save his family? He might be such a weak idiological PUKE, that he'ld rather see EVERYONE DIE, if it meant keeping himself pure. It's a tough call. Isn't it. And it takes tough men to make the tough decisions. Let's hope that no Mark Benjamin ever has to make those decisions on our behalf. EVER.

  Let's take this a "point" at a time. I don't know how Mark Benjamin would answer, but here are my answers:

  1. How would I feel if my family was in imminent danger of death and the authorities had the bad guys in custody? Well, I would feel like anyone else would feel. I would be extremely upset and hopeful that my family would be rescued, unharmed. Is there another reasonable answer?

  2. Would this give me a different perspective on the situation? I am sure I would have a different perspective on the situation. So?

  How about you, goober? If you were tortured, do you think you might have a different perspective on torture? Doesn't seem to work for McCain any more, but everyone's different.

  3. What about choosing to be "pure" and let everyone die? Well, it seems that goomy the goom-boy is just (very crudely) glomming, or gooming, onto the old 'ticking timebomb' scenario. You know.

  There is a bomb somewhere, and we have the guy who knows where it is. He won't talk. We want him to talk. So, what the heck, we figure, let's torture him to make him tell because if we find the bomb we will save lots of lives.

  This turns a moral issue into one of mere arithmetic. X thousands of lives is greater than 1 tortured bad guy, so let's torture.

  Let's unpack that scenario.

  First, it is far from clear that the guy being tortured would tell the truth. After all, if the bomb is so imminent, what would stop him from lying about its location, sending them off on a wild goose chase, the frustrated investigators looking on in horror as Metropolis goes up in flames?

  Second, let us assume that torturing the guy would work and would save thousands of lives. I say: do it. But I do not say that we should legalize torture. Let the torturers do their bloody deeds and then throw themselves on the mercy of the court.

  Let a jury of citizens whose lives were saved by the timely appearance of the torture instruments sit in judgment upon the torturers.

  But that is the way the law tends to work. We cannot construct laws that deal in a yes/no black/white fashion for every single possible contingency. Laws are words and words are less complex than life. We do the best we can and that is all we can do.

  When it comes to torture the best we can do is outlaw it and haul those who break the law into court and let the jury consider the circumstances and render a verdict.

  Third, and even more importantly, there is an implicit assumption in booger's silly claims. I will make this assumption explicit: the people that Bush has directed to be tortured are all bloodthirsty terrorists, and torturing them has saved lives.

  But nothing could be further from the truth.

  Hey Barfy! Have you not noticed that most of the people Bush has snatched and tortured are not even terrorists? They keep being let go, quietly, without having been charged with any crime.

  Have you not noticed that we have yet to see a scrap of evidence that any of the torture has saved any lives?

  And you perhaps have overlooked the minor fact that torture is illegal? And morally wrong (minor point to you, of course, but one must try).

  Keep in mind (if you have one of your own) that every dictator who orders people to be tortured does so for perfectly good (to them) reasons.

  That guy is an enemy of the state and has information about the cells that are plotting to overthrow the government. Torture him for the good of the Fatherland.

  This guy has been publishing anti-government tracts. Kill him by hanging him, drawing out his intestines and burning them, and then tying him to four horses going in opposite directions, thereby tearing him into four quarters.

  Dictators and other bad guys do not lack for justifications for torturing people they do not like. Real courage is found in leaders who resist their base and darker callings.

  Cheney and Bush and Yoo and Addington and that bunch are typical right wing chickenhawks; they talk tough, but they are too cowardly to face up, like men, to the consequences of their behavior.

  Back in the old days, when a Democrat was in the White House, we used to be lectured by the right wingers about how behavior has consequences.

  But now - not so much.

  The bottom line, gob-on-face, is that torture is illegal and reprehensible and the people who do the torture and order the torture and think up elaborate legal scams to justify torture, need to be brought to justice.

  —Joel_Grant Read Joel_Grant's other letters
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