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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jacob Snyder who wrote (125365)	3/1/2004 12:25:30 AM
From: Sig	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

<<< Almost all Americans feel no sense of common humanity or common interests, with Jose Padilla. Or surrendered Taliban prisoners. Or Iraqi civilians. Or any non-Americans. But this is a very impractical attitude. It has some severely negative consequences, for ourselves. The reason is, when we treat Others like their lives and liberty are meaningless to us, the natural consequence is......they reciprocate.>>>> You state that as a problem for Americans? Its minor compared with the Afghan tribes or the family-oriented Iraqis who mistrust all others. Where do you stand on "family values"? Relegated to history perhaps. There are so many exceptions to your statement it is not worth the time to list them all. Do we "know" any of the Iranian earthquake or Honduras mud slide victims. How many church groups are engaged in supporting unknown victims , etc, etc,etc, Sig@wearestillthebadguys.com

To: Jacob Snyder who wrote (125365)	3/1/2004 5:29:04 AM
From: NightOwl	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

And that's precisely why he was chosen as a test case. Almost all Americans feel no sense of common humanity or common interests, with Jose Padilla. Or surrendered Taliban prisoners. Or Iraqi civilians. Or any non-Americans. But this is a very impractical attitude. It has some severely negative consequences, for ourselves. The reason is, when we treat Others like their lives and liberty are meaningless to us, the natural consequence is......they reciprocate. ...Time out Jacob. If you will climb down off that Clydesdale for just a second I'll attempt to share some "attitudes" with you. I don't know anything about WMDs, airplane bombs, military formations, or terrorist plots, but I know quite a bit about prisoners, justice and injustice. I am quite certain of these "practicalities": There is no "justice" system this side of death, which does NOT do substantial "injustice." If everyone being held for terrorist related reasons was hauled out tomorrow and shot at high noon it would present less "injustice" than has resulted from allegations of rape in this country. ...If you threw in all the drug/alcohol related cases you might safely "eliminate" a small country of "suspects" before you ever obtained comparable levels of "injustice." The only way you get justice from any "criminal justice system" is to stay far away from it. Mr. Padilla clearly never appreciated that lesson. But the life and liberty of a "suspected" revolutionary/terrorist - or yours for that matter - has whatever meaning it has, whether I recognize, accept or appreciate it or not. Lord help them ...and you... if this should cease to be the case. <vbg> If Padilla thinks he is innocent and wants to redress this "travesty," then he should be willing to devote the rest of his life to civil disobedience (and the costs associated therewith) until that which he dislikes in the system is changed. Perhaps you and he together will be more effective than Niemoller's protests were. I suspect not. As far as I'm concerned he can stew in his juices. Maybe next time he will stay closer to home. I suspect not, but that's his choice. 0\|0