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According to the left it is just HORRIBLE to waterboard a terrorist, but PERFECTLY ok to shoot them in the face. Why is this? Their argument is that these terrorist being waterboarded haven't been proven guilty of anything. Well Progs,,,neither was OBL!
According to the left it is just HORRIBLE to waterboard a terrorist, but PERFECTLY ok to shoot them in the face. Why is this? Their argument is that these terrorist being waterboarded haven't been proven guilty of anything. Well Progs,,,neither was OBL!
It's perfectly ok to shoot dangerous people in military operations. It's not ok to shoot or torture defenseless prisoners. Yes, Virginia, that's exactly what the "left" among many other people are saying and will continue to say.
Neo Progs are incessantly whining about how evil water boarding is, yet they are now rejoicing that Bin Laden took two between the eyes. Help me understand the tortured logic so I don't assume hypocrisy.
So you really can't understand why someone would be glad that Osama is gone?
Defeating an enemy is supported by practically everyone. It's not exactly the death of Osama, it's the defeat of him that is why people of all ideologies are celebrating.
What evasive gibberish. You support shooting a known terrorist in the head but not waterboarding a known terrorist? To what end are these actions done if not for the purpose of defeating our terrorist enemies? So now you're telling us that Liberals are for the most severe response (killing people) but against less severe measures (waterboarding people)? How does this even make sense? Answer: it doesn't. The hypocrisy charge remains.
You resorted to this sophistry because you can't answer the very simple qustion: namely, "How are Liberals not hypocrites for whining about the evilness of waterboarding while at the same time rejoicing in the awesomeness of killing OBL?"
The correct answer is that Liberals have no principles, neither moral or political ones, which is why they can support things which to most people, to conservatives especially, seem completely at odds and inconsistent.
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Waterboarding is still wrong and always will be just as it will always be wrong to kill someone even if they are the worst person alive at the time.
But waterboading isn't wrong. You're just claiming it's wrong, just like I'm claiming it isn't wrong. So who is right? Well, we need an argument, don't we? You should provide one for your claim, not simply assume your position is the correct one and then make a bunch of false inferences stemming from your false assumption.
It's also not always wrong to kill the worst person alive. Sometimes we are morally justified to kill such people. Killing itself isn't wrong. It depends on the circumstances, because the circumstances determine the moral value of such acts.
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The right celebrates BOTH actions by the way, so they certainly can't claim the higher moral ground.
This is precisely why conservatives are on higher moral ground. For one, we are morally consistent. We support both the killing of OBL and the waterboarding of KSM. Two, if you yourself concede that killing OBL was morally justified, then what possible argument could you have for the view that waterboarding KSM isn't justified? You have no such argument. So, it looks like Liberals must concede that waterboarding KSM is justified or accept that they're unprincipled moral degenerates.
The fact that Liberals support something as violent and drastic as bullets to the head but oppose something as relatively benign as waterboarding sure makes them look unprincipled, doesn't it? I mean, had they supported waterboarding and opposed killing, well, then at least they might have an argument. But they've gone and done the reverse, which of course just happens to coincide with the actions Bush and Obama sanctioned, respectively. Big coincidence, huh? Oh you Liberals, how dishonest, disingenuous, and transparent your actions are to people with actual principles. We spot you miles away. Your best response is that you're not hypocrites -- because you have no principles, not inconsistent ones. That would be the only honest response you can make.
Neo Progs are incessantly whining about how evil water boarding is, yet they are now rejoicing that Bin Laden took two between the eyes. Help me understand the tortured logic so I don't assume hypocrisy.
Killing enemies in battle is fine, killing, torturing or beating presumed enemies in captivity, is not fine. Even if we are the ones doing it, in fact, we should be the people that work extremely hard to not do it.
Waterboarding or any other form of torture rarely produces useful information because the victims say what they think their torturers want to hear. Torture also eliminates any chance of the torturers claiming the moral high ground. Torturers are evil no matter the reason.
Killing an avowed enemy either while he is attacking you or asleep in his bunker is acceptable in war. Killing a civilian for the same reason is morally ambiguous. The problem is one of definition. Did bin Laden, for instance, plan the attack on the WTC, and was that attack an act of war or a criminal mass murder. If it was war then hunting him down and killing him was a morally acceptable act. If it was criminal he should have been captured, tries and if found guilty and summarily executed. That execution would have been morally acceptable. Killing him without a trial, while a great feel good for us, is considered by much of the world as no different from his murders at the WTC and other places.
The greatest damage done by terrorists is we have become no better than they. We are attacking unrelated civilians on vague suspicion among other things. We are now the principal terrorists of the World using technology to terrify anyone that crosses us, our bankers or the world’s oil companies. We are now hit men for the mob.
This thread makes me think that some Neo-Cons somehow got stuck in the dark ages. No wonder that most don't believe in evolution: They never experienced any such process.
Alas, our society and our understanding of right and wrong are based on several, deeply-ingrained principles. Here are three:
1.) You are innocent until proven guilty.
2.) If found guilty, you can be punished.
3.) Inflicting physical harm on purpose is not in line with the civilized society we purport to be. (Even spanking a child is frowned upon).
Water boarding is often used on ALLEGED terrorists - violating the first principle.
The death penalty is widely supported by Americans of all political persuasions. Killing someone like Osama does not violate most people's understanding of right or wrong unless they oppose the death penalty on principle (they don't have to be "neo progs" to take that stance).
Water boarding, without a doubt, causes the body to react violently (otherwise there would be no point to it) - thus it violates yet another fundamental principle of our society.
While I think that some people feel less strongly about the violation of the first principle IF water boarding is used on convicted terrorists, I have serious doubt that most are willing to forgo the third principle under any circumstance. And that is why water boarding is perceived as "bad." It goes against what we believe to be: Civilized.
Neo Progs are incessantly whining about how evil water boarding is, yet they are now rejoicing that Bin Laden took two between the eyes. Help me understand the tortured logic so I don't assume hypocrisy.
I don't really know what a Neo-Prog is, and I suspect neither do you.
Put simply, the answer to your question is "yes."
Killing the enemy has always been more morally acceptable than torturing them.
Killing enemies in battle is fine, killing, torturing or beating presumed enemies in captivity, is not fine. Even if we are the ones doing it, in fact, we should be the people that work extremely hard to not do it.
But OBL isn't classified as a an enemy combatant, so there goes everything you just helped yourseft to out the window.
You imply that waterboarding is torture. Again, you're just helping yourself to things you should be arguing for -- here, to the premise that the CIA waterboarding practice as torture. Nobody has successfully been able to argue that case, which includes an attempt by the Obama Administration, yet you're here wanting us to simply accept your position. This isn't convincing in the slightest.
And, still, you fail to understand that these ethical rules don't apply to known terrorists. They aren't common-day criminals and they aren't enemy combatants -- that's why Obama has failed to garner support to try them in our criminal justice system. They are special cases, and nothing you're saying applies to them. If you have a moral argument, make it. Otherwise, get off your soapbox. You're not qualified to stand on it.
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