Letters to the Editor
-
Paul Dirks
Re: defense - yeah, i've noticed that too. When did it become acceptable for Americans to consider torturing, let alone, doing it? I never would have believed that would happen 10 years ago, I would have laughed aloud if someone had told me that.
-
Rich Lowry made similarly assinine statements
A couple of weeks ago I happened to catch Rich Lowry opposite Mark Shields on the Jim Lehrer News Hour. He put forth all the usual B.S. arguments in support of torture. But then he said (I'm paraphrasing from memory) "water boarding amounts to little more than some temporary discomfort". I almost through something at my television.
I sent him a polite email offering to pay for a first class one week vacation if he were the subject of a water boarding demonstration. I would pay for a first class round trip flight and two nights in a five star hotel in San Francisco on dates of his choosing to make it easy for him to participate in the experiment. I promised to hold the demonstration near a hospital and have a doctor on hand. I offered to put a $25,000 bond in the trust of an attorney to show I was serious. Predictably I never got a response.
Maybe shoot(his mouth off)er242 would like to take me up on this offer? But I'll note up front that you do not get to choose the duration of the demonstration, the manner in which it is conducted, or otherwise exert any control over the process. The only thing I promise is that we'll make a good faith effort to not cause any permanent physical injury or death. A guarantee those brown skinned sub-humans (as you no doubt think of them) we've been subjecting to this treatment don't get. Obviously I won't promise you won't suffer psychological damage since I believe the technique we'll be demonstrating constitutes torture. But since you, Mr. Lowry, Mr. Goldberg, and many others seem to think it isn't torture I'm sure that isn't a concern for you.
-
@Valkyrie
And your comment easily segues into an observation that a certain little boy named George was specifically not allowed by his parents to cry for his dead sibling. (This is a matter of record, not speculation.)
Draw your own conclusions about the Hangin' Governor from Texas.
-
a little late for this..
..and someone probably already mentioned it, but it's worth reflecting on the fact that LA Times has been under financial pressure for a long time now. There's been virtual war between the newsroom and the owners for years now, war mediated by a series of long-suffering editors.
I quit following the drama about a year ago, but I'm sure Goldberg's hiring and Scheer's firing were both related to the ongoing devolution of the times into a virtually worthless rag devoted to local boosterism and enough advertising to keep the paper making some profit...or at least solvent.
Just another example of how corporate ownership of old media is slowly destroying that media..or, transforming it utterly so that it no longer tells truth to power, but, rather, supports institutional power wherever it may be.
It used to be that newspapers, and even TV networks (Cronkite on the Vietnam war comes to mind) told the truth to power because it was the right thing to do. Those days are long gone. And unless or until real journalists are allowed to ply their trade again in old media, those days will never return.
I look at our newspapers, our broadcast TV...and I look at powerful members of the current Congress (like Dianne Feinstein), and all I can think is..the fix is in. It was always in to a degree. But now? Now..it's really in. and, to be honest, I no longer see any way out. Unless we can elect true progressives in sufficient number to overcome the power of the corporate agenda. Somehow, I don't see that happening either. If corporate money ever sees itself under threat, that money will engulf whatever progressive tendencies may be left in the body-politic...drown it in a sea of propaganda without end.
Goldberg is a completely congruent part of all that.
-
facile
My favorite defense of torture has to be the good old "I/others do this stuff to myself/themselves all the time, so what's the problem?" I believe none other than David Rivkin, "military law expert," argued as much very recently.
Many have voluntarily fasted for extended periods of time, for political, personal, or religious purposes, so I suppose starving prisoners isn't that bad.
People voluntarily subject themselves to tasering, for training and demonstrative purposes, so shocking prisoners with powerful electrical currents isn't that bad.
Boxers voluntarily enter a ring, knowing that they will be punched brutally in the face and may even be knocked out or permanently injured, so beating prisoners until they are unconscious or brain damaged isn't that bad.
Speaking of brain damage, when did our national discourse get so unbelievably stupid.
-
The only reason JG is "famous"
His mom is a famous gossip columnist who made hay from the Monicagate affair, almost 10 years ago! Talk about hanging on to mommy's apron strings! Go get a real job, OK?
-
@ JBinMO Yeah, but...
Frank Burns had a uniform and lived in a war zone.
Frank Burns was drafted, no?
-
At Least We Know Who The War Criminals Are
Jonah Goldberg is an immoral scumbag who will go along with anything if his Dear Leader demands it.
Its funny, after most illegal wars of aggression the perpetrators go into hiding, but in the case of the illegal war of aggression against Iraq the war criminals are going public!
Well, let's just take those names down so the war criminals and their willing, conscious supporters will always be known as such.
-
@ deering
My brother returned from serving just in time for his 40th birthday party. And he had a wife and kid too. Sadly, it looks like the family unit didn't survive the tour of duty -- he's shortly to join one of those unfortunate statistics.
-
Poobahs and Gasbags
Every few years or so, some Eastern Establishment poobah or Ivy League gasbag makes a thoroughly obscene proposal which in short order becomes our standard operating procedure.
Yeah. If Jonathan Swift were around these days, we'd probably be dining on Poor Irish Children McNuggets.