small creatures with very sharp teeth

It's those sharp teeth gnashing away.

Langoliers !!!!

Data is for sissies.
- Holly McLachlan channeling the Ticking Vagina Man™ (scathew)

Yes. I can easily imagine him arguing that point.

The last refuge of the numerically illiterate.

You can't risk the links if your don't understand the math. You might inadvertently cross-cut your own argument. It's so much safer to simply make an assertion without the data, especially when you can't interpret what the data is telling you.

HEATHER?

-- Holly McLachlan

I don't agree at all but never mind that. I'm not asking for an elaboration. I'm just wondering what the "HEATHER?" in your title in that comment was connected to.

"... like pliers. Rubber hoses. Ice-picks. Batons in the rectum and/or vagina. Electrodes. Things like that...."

Haven't you heard? The vaginas Steve comes into contact with are already, uhm, occupied.

You know, cell phones, grenades, small creatures with very sharp teeth.....I'm pretty sure that last one was just one of his fantasies.

I said: "Representative of the thinking of all Jews." Your exact words used that day in direct reference to a comment I made about the the above quotes: "these are influential Jewish leaders."

Your clear implication in quoting these fringe extremist ultra-Orthodox bigots is that their words impact all Jews' thinking, in a positive manner. The reality is most non-self-secluding Jewish people make indiscreet snorting noises* when they happen across this sort of smug drivel. These 3 preening wacknuts are not "influential Jewish leaders" except within the narrow confines of their own narrow sects.

From what I read, they are not all narrow sects. Anyway, here again is the double-standard. So I take it we can never quote the Pope, or an Ayatollah, or any Catholic Priest or Evangelical leader or Muslim cleric who argues for genocide or hate or war? Because none of those people or positions represent a large group of people, eh?

Alright, if you say so. Once again – if a Jewish person says or does something good, it represents Jews, but if a Jewish person says or does something bad, it doesn’t represent Jews at all. I get it.

Paul Daniel Ash,

Perhaps I was being unclear. Substitute the word “justification” with the word “moral.” An act may be justified by reason (natural law) or morality (moral law). However, justification does not equal morality. That is what I was trying to say. It may be reasonable to assume all Gazans want to kill you, therefore, you can shoot teenage boys and girls in Gaza. That is a rational justification. But can it be justified on moral grounds?

The same could be argued, and has been here, for torture. It may seem prefectly “reason”-able to torture someone for information (if we ignore the fact that torture has been proven to be ineffective at getting truth). However, can we morally justify torture? I say we cannot.

Just like I say the Holocaust was morally unjustifiable. Or that prejudice against Jews is morally unjustifiable.

So, I am pretty much on your side, when it comes to anti-Jewish bigotry and hatred and persecution. It is immoral, and unjustifiable on a moral basis. You have to be able to see the reasoning behind people’s actions and behaviour in order to disarm them. Change their hearts, change their minds. Otherwise, you will only marginalize them, and make them even more self-justified in their beliefs. Someone should have raised moral objections to the Final Solution. As angry and prejudiced as many Nazis were, I am sure there were many Nazis who were horrified at the Final Solution, but their arguments obviously fell silent. If you want to defeat the horrible manifestations of anti-Semitism, you must be able to see through their eyes. Otherwise, you will only suppress, but never conquer.

Derbig Mooser – thank you for asking.

I believe the response should be a conversation, not demonization. John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt were demonized. President Jimmy Carter was demonized. Norman Finkelstein was demonized. Silencing, marginalizing, demonizing, and destroying people will only strengthen those who cultivate their sense of rage and anger and hatred. Just like Israel’s decades-long persecution of the Palestinians has done NOTHING to lessen the anti-Israel feelings of the Palestinians, so too will this tactic backfire against anti-Semitism. Conversation. Free. Open. Rational. Moral. That is what I am calling for. Acknowledgement. And if you disagree that American media is owned and run by Jews, fine. Have a conversation. Use facts and rational arguments. Instead of calling people haters. (I am guilty of this too, I call people “programmed” who disagree with me. So I am a hypocrite.)

I need to get a life, and stop posting so much. Thanks for listening everybody. I left you all plenty of links to sift through. I urge you to come to your own conclusions. But always proceed from a moral foundation. That is what they tell martial artists who begin to learn how to fight. That is what they tell clerics who begin to learn how to preach and lead. If you lose your moral compass, you will become a monster, and you will be susceptible to advocating another Holocaust, or to advocate torture, or to advocate war crimes. any horror on Earth can be rationally justified. We need morality to save us.

Here is an interesting article somehwat on this topic. Take from it what you will.

The Racism and Anti-Semitism Word Games

https://www.indymedia.org/de/2007/05/885318.shtml

"In politics, you don't have to have brains. You just have to have authority."

-- steveindallas

You read it here ... um ... before ...

"It is difficult to deal with terrorism through non-violence," the Tibetan spiritual leader said delivering the Madhavrao Scindia Memorial Lecture here....

Oh. So we need to burn, blast, and maim 'em all.... Ummmm ... waiddaminnit:

... He said that the only way to tackle terrorism is through prevention.

IC.

Cheers,

I'll repost my reply to a similar question a while back (page 52,59):

The United States signed the Convention Against Torture on Apr. 18, 1988 and ratified it on Oct. 21, 1994. I'm assuming that what you were looking at was out of date. Here's an alternate link:

http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/ratification/9.htm

Whether a ratified treaty is the "supreme law of the land," as Article VI of the Constitution states, is more complex than it may seem. First, the President and 2/3 of the Senate must consent to ratification (which was accomplished here). Second, you need to see if the treaty is self-executing or not. Self-executing treaties have immediate and direct effect as binding US domestic law, while non-self-executing treaties require further action by Congress. Determining whether a treaty is self-executing can be a tricky business, but since the Convention Against Torture was explicitly non-self-executing, we can skip over all that.

The upshot is that Congress needed to 'translate' the terms of the treaty into US statutes for it to have effect under US law. (So far) Glenn has provided links to some such statutes, but none of these seem to translate Article 7 of the CAT, which is the article that imposes the obligation to prosecute. Unless somebody has a link to a statute I don't know about, my understanding is that binding US law does not contain the obligation to prosecute, contrary to the title of the Glenn's article.

HOWEVER, even though Article 7 is not binding US law yet, the US is still legally obligated to prosecute under international law. We have an obligation to other countries to either extradite or prosecute our war criminals. So, if the Obama Administration fails to investigate, it will still be acting illegally. The difference is in the remedy: instead of a US citizen filing a complaint in a domestic court, a State Party to the CAT must file a complaint to the CAT Committee. Not quite as satisfying, I know, but it's not nothing. Hope that helps.