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Feeling a little sensitive, are we? The only shitbag insanity in your post was the "outing" Valery Plame crap. The rest was actually a reasonably well stated argument. I was referring to the rants of others throughout the four pages of this thread.

But seriously, as Evil so well documented, violence in Iraq is down. Let's hope it drops still further, and keeps dropping. Right?

Here here - or is it hear hear?

Yes, let's hope so.

Of course, a big part of why there's less sectarian violence in Iraq is the result of ongoing ethnic cleansing. That's hardly a "victory" for anyone but those who engage in the politics of fear and hate.

Let's also not hoist the "Mission Accomplished!" banner at a short-term gain that will lead to more long-term violence. An ethnically cleansed Iraq results in a Shiite southern region where the worst elements of Iran can be influential, a pissed off central Sunni region that used to have power and now has little oil where al Qaeda can actually come in and gain influence, and a northern Kurdish region with oil to fund the destabilization of neighbors like Turkey and Iran.

Boy oh boy has the neo-con vision of reshaping the middle east into a peaceful, democratic, Israel and US loving bunch of nations is really paying off. Come Veterans' Day, we can really look into the eyes of the parents, spouses and children of the thousands of American troops who have been killed or crippled in Iraq and say, "Thanks! Your sacrifice is really paying off!"

cynic. things are easy as an arm chair QB after the fact, eh?

tomdarch wrote: Of course, a big part of why there's less sectarian violence in Iraq is the result of ongoing ethnic cleansing.

Where's your reference for this? How does ethnic cleansing lead to less sectarian violence? I'm asking because I haven't heard that, don't know etc. and interested in finding out more.

pigsteak wrote: cynic.

Putting it lightly. Cynical at least with respect to non-left America meaning well or trying to do something good (boy does that sounds loaded - can you even imagine them doing something that wasn't selfish, racist, hatefull, well, you're good with the names so fill in the blanks here). Yet, sympathetic and understanding of those hostile to the US, as if everyone loved us until the current admin and they're now justified in their disdain.

your mother and sister are going to the mall, an FBI sting captures two AQ suspects who having just left the mall are nervous and their vehicle contains traces of explosives and plans detailing bombing several local shopping centers, the FBI was gonna extract the information from the terrorists about their intentions but they are reluctant to talk, they are waterboarded and the informatiom gleaned from their "torture" reveals the location and design of the devices, your mother and sister are among those evacuated and saved just prior to detonation of 1500 lbs of TNT, just kidding, waterboarding is illegal your mom and sister are blown to bits- Merry Xmas

If you only have five minutes to convince someone that torture is wrong, is it o.k. to torture them?

Crankmas wrote:your mother and sister are going to the mall, an FBI sting captures two AQ suspects who having just left the mall are nervous and their vehicle contains traces of explosives and plans detailing bombing several local shopping centers, the FBI was gonna extract the information from the terrorists about their intentions but they are reluctant to talk, they are waterboarded and the informatiom gleaned from their "torture" reveals the location and design of the devices, your mother and sister are among those evacuated and saved just prior to detonation of 1500 lbs of TNT, just kidding, waterboarding is illegal your mom and sister are blown to bits- Merry Xmas

It's unlikely that torture could break a resolute suspect in anything like a timely fashion. And if you did break him, would he give you trustworthy information? Wouldn't his comrades suspect him of being compromised and change all plans? Torture doesn't work very well. Even if it did, by doing it we become what we think we're fighting.

Torture and liberty are mutually exclusive..

My real concern is this: Are we becoming the bad guys in our effort to beat the bad guys? The effectiveness of torture is a debate i really don't care about, but i was raised with an ideal of America that didn't condone that shit. Another, real concern of mine is the erosion of our country's hard earned moral authority and respect worldwide (thanks to our grandfathers' and fathers' sacrifice in WWII and during the cold war). Will we lose this most excellent hammer (to diplomatically smite the real bad guys with- russia and china) to beat a wank ass enemy that is mostly ducking and running these days? And I don't like this constant drum beat of fear. Are we pussies, or are we the badest MoFos on the planet? We all know we are both, and this sucks in my humble opinion. I would prefer a non-pussyish BadAss America.

What do you think of this?


Torturing Khalid Shaikh Mohammed Worked
James Joyner | Thursday, December 29, 2005

The Chicago Tribune ran a chilling piece in yesterday’s edition by John Crewdson bolstering the case for torturing terrorist suspects.

Spilling Al Qaeda’s secrets

Moral and legal aspects aside, conventional wisdom is that torture simply isn’t practical: that someone who is being tortured will say anything to make the torture stop, and that information gleaned through torture is therefore not reliable. Some former military and intelligence officers say, however, that physically aggressive interrogation techniques that some human-rights groups consider torture can be effective in the short term. When asked for specifics, the technique they cite is “waterboarding,â€