Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

Au contraire -- you just turned two masked guys vandalizing a car into "the radical environmental movement."

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

It's time to send the neighbors to Gitmo for a little "conversation".

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

Yes. I'm sure they are actually two Cheney thugs who were told to make it look like radical environmentalists by scratching "for the environ[ment]" into the side of the car.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

And lock them in a cell with some minks?

Idiots on parade
 

Fine. Then couch your posts on it in those terms.

It's when you suggest that it eclipses or is on par with all the other issues regarding our foreign policy that you lose me.

Exploiting it for moral high ground and trying to make it more than it is in the bigger picture won't make your desire to see it on the front page every day a self fulfilling prophecy. You'll just come off like a person with limited big picture arguments trying to win the debate by hammering one little hot button issue.

You realize that's exactly what Bill O'Reilly does, don't you? He never speaks generally. He grabs one little thing where he can take the moral pedestal and rams it down his opponent's throat over and over.

Engage Slave on the totality of our foreign policy. You might even get me as an ally in that debate.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

Hey, take it to the FB.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

Don't be disingenuous. Just because they said something about the environment does not make them part of the "environmental movement," or even the "radical environmental movement." See, e.g., murdering doctors who perform abortions and the overall pro-life movement. Or, those wackadoos from KS or whatever who protest at funerals for soldiers (because they deserved to die because America doesn't condemn homosexuality or whatever), and whatever movement they claim to be a part of.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

My theory is that they were neighborhood activists upset about parking in AU Park, and were carving "FOR THE ENVIRONS" into the side of the car when they were scared off by headlights.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

Are you saying that you think they abused the Hummer because he had a popped collar? Because to me it seems clearly they targetted it because they don't like hummers, and they don't like them not because they're ostentatious showings of wealth but because they perceive them to be particularly harmful to the environment.

I'm not saying that some larger movement condoned the action, but that's generally true of many radical environmental approaches (PETA aside). I'm talking about the methods used not whether those methods are part of a choreographed plan.

Idiots on parade
 

You've lost me. When I post about torture, it's because I think torture is wrong. When I post about the outlandish theories of executive power, it's because I think that they're wrong, too. In both cases, the Bush Administration backs them, but I don't bring the issue up simply to to bash it. You may be that cynical -- I'm not. Actually, my fear is that the next Administration, Democrat or Republican, will fail to change things. For example, I suspect that Hillary is a big fan of executive branch power.

Now, in addition to thinking that torture is wrong, I think that this Administration has been particularly slippery about trying to normalize torture while denying that's what they're doing. There's a pattern of the Executive Branch just doing things that people don't know about, and using that secrecy to avoid discussion and review. This seems to me a particularly Bushian brand of gutlessness, and it's what those high-school students were calling him on. Slave at least is pro-torture. Bush lacks the courage of those convictions. This stuff is underground because -- on some level -- he knows that not even the outlandish theories of presidential power could save it from popular condemnation if it was all public.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

Interesting theory. Because now that parking space will be taken until he can get the thing fixed.

Idiots on parade
 

Now, that's not fair. He's against torture, he just defines torture in a narrow fashion.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

I didn't say they were bright.

Idiots on parade
 

I don't view the issue as trivial. We've ceded the moral high ground that we were able to effectively use as a negotiating point with other countries. I remember reading an editorial a few years ago by a conservative who loved the Miranda law because all the cop movies and tv shows, shown around the world, recited a list of rights to criminals. People living in repressive regimes could see that in our country even criminals had rights that the average citizen in their shithole did not have. We've blown that.

A bright, shining city on a hill.
 

I was talking about the United States.

And you raise a false choice -- we don't have to choose between a "strong leader" (a man on a horse, eh?) and sharia.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

I think that the guy was an ass, on top of/in addition to having an H2. If it were purely the H2, there would be a spate of vandalism against H2s, with similar methods. So I think this was more of a "what a goddamn motherfucking jerk who hates the environment" and less of a "radical environmental movement" thing.

Now, if this is just the first of what becomes a wave of vandalizing ONLY H2s, and scratching environmental slogans on the sides, I will come around to your way of thinking.

Idiots on parade
 

I disagree. I think you'd be pretty upset at the nation's reaction if all the torture was made public. I'd say 70% of people would applaud it. And those 70% would span a lot of different backgrounds.

Bush has to be slippery on the issue not because the country is anti-torture, but because his political enemies are brandishing the issue as a weapon he can't guard against. He can't come right out and say "This is not an issue of morality anymore. This is a conflict between us and them and we have to do immoral things to survive." The global community would willify him even further. His only move in this political game is to keep everything a secret.

I can;t help but think people taking your position are cynically exploting the issue because to me, it seems crystal clear that this is not an issue about the Constitution or the Dec of Independence or our freedoms so much as a simple matter of us doing the ugly things we have to do to keep an enemy under control.

We've been torturing people forever. The CIA's done it all over Latin Ameirca for years. We kill and maim children all over the world to protect our interests. It's morally wrong. But speaking in terms of survival and protecting our way of life, "morals" are irrelevant.

I hate the pre-emptive strike stuff. The idiocy of Iraq sickens me. But do I, or should I, care as much about collateral damage abroad as I do about protecting our way of life? No. Not at all.

If its Us v. Them, their rights are simply irrelevant. You think we're not doing worse to these people in the open field of battle? Torture's one of the smallest issues.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

I suspect they would do the same thing to his cigarette boat. And if that guy just tries to pop a collar....

Idiots on parade
 

You're missing my distinction. Criminals in this country are us. People planning to bomb us in madrassas in Afghanistan are not us. The former deserves avery imaginable protection. the latter deserves as many as we can practicably give him when we capture him, and less if he's got information we can use to catch more of his kind.

You're mixing a domestic issue with a foreign policy/international war matter.

Again, this is an Us v. Them situation. Not a "people who believe in the Constitution" vs. "people who do not" issue. But I can see why the Left wants to conflate them. It loses very badly when the issue is framed in its proper context.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

Ty, where's your Venn diagram of asses and H2 drivers?

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

ARGH. I completely agree, but I don't think this was a random enviro-guerilla attack on a symbol of Man's hatred of Mother Nature.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

One of these drunken radicals will get shot by a truck owner pulling this shit in a Red State.

We'll get one hell of a funny criminal trial out of it.

Idiots on parade
 

I'm not mixing up anything. I was making a point about the moral high ground that we've lost.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

Clearly not random.

Do I think these guys were part of a larger organization? No.

Do I think that they thought it was an acceptable means of registering objection to a (supposedly) environmentally harmful object? Yes, as leaders before them have shown dumping paint on furs and releasing caged animals to be.

Next thing you know, they'll insist on sending animals like this out into the wild because nature demands they be able to survive on their own . . . http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...t_IMG_8095.jpg

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

I once had the window bashed out of a 1970 Cutlass convertible I used to own. I don't think it was an environmental statement, though. I think it was because it was parked in a crappy neighborhood.

Idiots on parade
 

...Which necessarily mixed those two very distinct issues.

You bastard. You're making me act like a lawyer. And so are you...

As penance I'm having a drink at lunch. You must do the same.

You're on the honor system.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

How much do you wish you had that car now? Not where you are, of course. But generally, to fire it up and rip down the highway. Just like that Robert Plant video... what was it? "Big Log"?

Great tune. Poorly, poorly titled.

Idiots on parade
 

With anything in particular, or as a general reaction?

I don't doubt that many people think torturing people is wrong. But if the details of what we are doing to people were widespread, there would be revulsion. Which is why all the other evidence of what happened at Abu Ghraib has never been released. If it was going to strengthen the Administration's hand, is there any doubt in your mind that they'd have gotten it out there? That stuff is poison.

Bull. Shit. Bush doesn't give a flying fuck what his "political enemies" are "brandishing." Nor does he give a shit about what "the global community" thinks. For better or worse -- worse, if you ask me, better if you ask Slave -- Bush understands that what people think is not a constraint on him. As long as Republicans on the Hill are unwilling to break with him -- in actions, not words -- he can keep doing whatever the Hell he wants, and he knows it. And particularly with torture, he takes the position that he doesn't need Congress's permission or approval, and for most of the past six years Congress has been all to happy to ignore it. Now Congress is having a hard time just getting information out of the Executive Branch.

(1) Torture is wrong. That's not a matter of politics -- that's just fundamental. I can't believe the so-called Christians who are happy to give the President a blank check. Their beliefs have precious little to do with Jesus of Nazareth.

(2) We don't "have" to torture anyone to fight this war. We choose to. People who defend the use of torture would rather talk about far-fetched ticking-bomb scenarios from 24 than about the uncontroverted fact that most of the people tortured at Abu Ghraib weren't terrorists. It's about their fantasies and fears and posing, not about the real world.

Explain to me how CIA torture in Latin America protects our way of life. This is because Nicaraguan hordes were going to be marching across the Rio Grande? If you believe that, then you can believe the Slave/Hank line that if we don't torture people we'll all be living under Sharia.

If torture becomes part of "our way of life," what's left?

"For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?" Mark 8:36.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

It was the best roadtrip car ever. I was hoping I could keep it taped together until I graduated law school so I could give it the attention it deserved. Instead, the water pump went out on I-45 and it cracked the block. I left it in Buffalo, Texas. I hope some gearhead ended up with it and it's not rusting away somewhere.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

I once lost the window to a late 60s olds coupe. But they also slashed the upholstery with a razor blade and pulled off the rear view mirror. And parked it about 20 miles away from where I'd left it.

It had a McGovern sticker and a psychedelic butterfly decal. I don't think they liked hippies.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

http://bp2.blogger.com/_FBXGhy-QmVw/...20/card832.JPG

Close enough?

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

Yeah, that would make for a good roadtrip.

Well, they can use the beat-up car to run over some minks
 

That was not the best roadtrip. It was late, and it was about a 2 mile walk from the freeway into Buffalo over unlit country roads. I was not sure where I was going, and it's not like I could look for the bright lights of downtown to guide me. When I got into town, the only thing that was open was a cattle aution house, and I waited there a couple of hours for the tow truck driver. And it was a dry county.

A bright, shining city on a hill.
 

It is a false choice.

And I find it ironic that Slave, et al. (if they're wise) are left praying for Hillary Clinton to win the Democratic nomination.

Not for reasons of (un)electability, but because the GOP Administration and leadership have brought things to the point that whoever wins the Dem. nomination will have a big advantage in 2008 -- and Hillary is absolutely the best they'll get from the Dems on foreign policy.

S_A_M

Idiots on parade
 

I relabeled your paragraphs above for this response:

A. Most people would not be repulsed. Remember that big red area in the middle? They'd applaud it. Bush can't release it because the international reaction would be awful, and even he knows that the most agressive elements of our culture are better kept under wraps.

B. Yes he does. He's boxed in, as I explained before. I'm not doing a "yes he is" v. "no he isn't" thing with you.

C. If Shiekh Muhammed who planned 9/11 is being tortured to get info on other plots, please tell me how that is "wrong." If we save lives by making his temporarily horrific, how is that wrong? You don't know that we don't need to toture anyone. You're saying that, but there's no way you could ever prove that. I can't debate that. It's not an argument. You're crowning yourself omniscient there.

D. Maybe it doesn't. I offered it as an example of how commonly we use the practice. Can you offer me an example of how it hasn't protected our way of life? Again, how do you know? Do you have access to those secret files in Langley?

E. The same thing we had left yesterday. We've ben doing it forever and we'll do it forever. So there's some transparanecy about the prevalence of its use. That's a good thing, no?

F. Why would you quote me religious text? I assume that's a joke.

Idiots on parade
 

You seem to think that Americans think torture is great, and that Bush would be open about all the people we are torturing but for his fear about the international reaction. What country have you been living in for the last six years? I'm not kidding. Has a fear of the international reaction ever affected his position on anything? And yet, we still agree that Bush is lying to high-school students when he says we don't torture -- you just think he's doing it for fear of what France will say.

I'm not going to explain to you why torture is wrong, because you already understand that. The question is whether we have any decency left, or whether 9/11 scared us so much that there is no line we won't cross.

This nation is founded on the idea that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, among them life and liberty. A country founded on respect for unalienable rights cannot torture people. It's just that simple. If you think it's OK to torture foreigners (or Jose Padilla, for that matter) to improve our pursuit of Happyness, then you do not believe that all men are created equal with certain unalienable rights. You believe that might makes right as long as you've got yours. That's unamerican in my book.

In World War II, in the Cold War, America's principles were a source of strength, a reason why we won. The people who support torture do not understand, and think that we win because of our will, or our technology. They don't understand what makes this country great, and they are tearing it down in their own image.

So then you tell me that we have tortured people all along. In a sense, this is true, just as America allowed slavery and interned Japanese-Americans during World War II, to take two examples. The city on the hill is closer to heaven, but it's not heaven. However, imperfection is a long way from debasement. If you can't see the difference between what this President has done and what prior Presidents did, you're being willfully obtuse.

Finally, I quoted the New Testament not because of what it is but of what it says. If that line doesn't speak to you at all, that's too bad.

Houston? We have a problem.
 

One of these cities is not like the others -- one of these cities just doesn't belong.

• The U.S. Department of Homeland Security designated the Bay Area today as one of the six urban areas in the country most at risk for terrorist attacks, as it doled out nearly $750 million in anti-terror grants. . . .
  
  The Department of Homeland Security had been criticized in the past by officials from large cities who argued that the government was not living up to promises that it would focus heavily on the risks cities face.
  
  Today, the agency gave 55 percent of the grants to six urban areas --
  
  the Bay Area, Los Angeles/Long Beach, Washington, D.C., Chicago, New York/New Jersey and Houston.

SF Gate

Houston? If you need a sixth city, I would think Detroit would be more at risk.

Houston? We have a problem.
 

RT can comment better than I can, but perhaps it is a concentration of oil refineries? What is at risk in Detroit? Is there even much of anything there anymore?

ETA http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...United_States, I suppose I could do the math, but I don't really want to take the time.

Houston? We have a problem.
 

If Mitt Romney wins the election, then perhaps Detroit will replace Houston as number 6 on the list.

Houston? We have a problem.
 

And it sits right there on the gulf, er, ocean. What about Miami? Does it have much of a port?


(ETA - the fact that they call this area LA-Long Beach leads me to believe that they might just be a tad bit concerned about the Long Beach port)