Quote:
Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
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.
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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.
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