Bin Laden is dead, official

[Dowly]

Originally Posted by joea

Russia Today's favourite American pundit.

Can't open the link for some reason.

This should work if you REALLY care

[mookiemookie]

Originally Posted by August

I wouldn't exactly call it a Godsend but nothing? I wouldn't call putting our people on the trail that eventually led to the most wanted man on the planet "nothing". But whatever, Obama has no problem taking both advantage and credit for something he and you have publicly opposed so I guess I shouldn't be surprised that you would get so upset over a silly political cartoon.

Am I happy Osama is dead? Of course. Am I happy about the trillions of dollars have been wasted, thousands of American casualties, hundreds of thousands of civilian casualties and the existence of a place like Gitmo? No.

[tater]

You don't think in an "intelligence war" we should take prisoners, or do you just not like that it's called, "gitmo?"

Not sure what the total cost of the GWOT has been, but at least we got something for the money. We've spent as much in the red in the last 2 years on nothing worthwhile at all, just pork, and political payback. You can be against the human cost, but since the Obama admin, no one on the left can complain about cost anymore, sorry. The left is unwilling to consider any realistic cuts to get us balanced at this point. A trillion in cuts over 10 years (Obama) when we're spending maybe 1.5 trillion in the red per year?

Obama deserves credit where it is due for ordering Osama's execution, but the entire infrastructure the raid was based on was built by his predecessor in the name of "war," where many of his opponents were calling for dealing with it as a law enforcement issue---notably Senator Kerry. Being upset with gitmo seems to fit that mold---they want civilian trials for people who should not ever have a trial until the war is over. If it's a war, you hold them til it's over, then try them. If you think it's a criminal justice issue, then you try them now.

Note that summary execution is not really compatible with the notion of trials. Bin Laden was killed with no due process (among MANY others ordered by the President, most of whom are "presumed" bad guys), yet some still imagine that gitmo is somehow worse? That boggles my mind. If gitmo is bad, then extra-judicial killing MUST be worse to anyone even a little rational. Make no mistake in talking about gitmo and waterboarding, to be consistent you need to say that Osama should have been captured (which he would easily have been had that been the orders, I have no doubt in the Seals abilities along those lines).

Again, for clarity, Obama will get the lion's share of OBL killin' credit, and deserves it by virtue of being the boss when it happened, period. Still, he stands on other shoulders. Personally, I think that had he explicitly given credit to Bush he'd have bounced higher. Americans like that sort of bipartisanship, and it would not only have been the right thing to do, but also the politically expedient thing to do (a remarkable confluence).

[tater]

Extra-judicial killing.

http://pubrecord.org/world/5801/repo...kes-increased/

The administration has bumped off between 326 and 538 people with drone strikes. These are not all shots at Bin Laden, they are aimed at lesser targets. There are not indictments on these targets, just "actionable intelligence."

Note that the low number is almost 50% higher than the number of people currently held at gitmo. The high estimate is more than twice gitmo's count. That's just the dead, not the maimed and injured. Given the indiscriminate nature of explosives, and the fact that our enemy intentionally hides among women and children (look at the number of men at OBL's hideout vs women and kids for an example), we can assume that many of those deaths and injuries are "collateral." Some are just mistakes, too.

You can't be for drone attacks and against Gitmo and claim rationality.

[Gerald]

The fact that these kinds of attacks are now being published, is not so strange in the water after OBL, the fact is that there is no secret, that stuff out now and then.

You can't be for drone attacks and against Gitmo and claim rationality.

Of course you can, it is those who are in favour of gitmo but are unable to justify it as what it is who lack the rationality.
People like you tater.

[Sailor Steve]

Oh, no, you're the one who's crazy! You can't prove you're not, so you must be!

[Jimbuna]

Not sure what's worse for Osama: the fact he got found and killed, or that he now has to explain to a bunch of suicide bombers where their virgins are

[Growler]

Wait wait wait.

Global WAR on Terror, right?

It's a WAR. People die in war. Sometimes, they're non-combatants. Sometimes they're not.

I love this. People scream to their politicians after terrorist attacks, "Keep us safe!" The politicians, eager to be reelected, do so. And when the press starts printing pictures of blown-up people and prisoners from the other side, they start screaming, "Wait! Keep THEM safe, too!"

We are one seriously bent species.

[Torplexed]

Originally Posted by jimbuna

Not sure what's worse for Osama: the fact he got found and killed, or that he now has to explain to a bunch of suicide bombers where their virgins are

They find there was an error in translating the Quran. You actually get Virgils instead of virgins.

[Gerald]

Originally Posted by Torplexed

They find there was an error in translating the Quran. You actually get Virgils instead of virgins.

Looks like taken from the "The Last Trip"

[TLAM Strike]

Originally Posted by Vendor

Looks like taken from the "The Last Trip"

Or "Deliverance Part II"

[Gerald]

Originally Posted by TLAM Strike

Or "Deliverance Part II"

Right..

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by Torplexed

They find there was an error in translating the Quran. You actually get Virgils instead of virgins.

I wonder which one he'd pick?

[tater]

Originally Posted by Tribesman

Of course you can, it is those who are in favour of gitmo but are unable to justify it as what it is who lack the rationality.
People like you tater.

What is the problem with Gitmo, exactly? They are POWs, and we've very nicely indeed let most go from Gitmo before the war is even over.

I can justify Gitmo completely. We capture people for gaining intelligence so that we can minimize civilian casualties by gaining intel that allows us to discriminate in targeting. They are then held until the war is over, or we decide to try them if guilty of war crimes.

I'm fine with drone attacks, too.

You, apparently, are against gitmo. I assume you think they deserve trials before hostilities end? Maybe just to sort out the innocent from the enemy combatants? I'll accept the latter as reasonable, and even "nice" of us to try and do, but there might have been conscripts in the nazi or imperial japanese militaries who were not willing combatants, or who never actually fired a shot, and they were POWs, regardless, and were never sorted out (many of the latter, and some of the former faced summary execution on the front). Hard cheese for them.

Drone attacks are killings. The evidence used to make target selections is exactly the same as used to grab people up. If 15% of those in gitmop are innocent, then it's a safe bet that 15% of those targeted with drones are also innocent. The difference is that the drone targets often include "collateral damage" targets that are innocent regardless of the status of the target. Drone attacks involve zero due process, and in fact kill innocents (a 100% removal of liberty compared to a XX% removal of liberty for detainees). In fact they have likely killed many more innocents than people are currently held at gitmo.

Please, defend drone attacks using the same rationale that attacks gitmo. I'm open to a cogent argument.