01-07-2004 00:18									#61
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quote: Originally posted by MosesPresley Nuking them was the humanitarian thing to do. Yeah right.

In terms of WW2-Japan... I think nuking was the right thing to do. There's no telling how many more civilians would have been killed (not to mention American soldiers) if the US would have been forced to invade the home islands.

	01-07-2004 00:22									#62
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quote: Originally posted by Sava There's something wrong with people always making judgements about other people's "patriotism". I guess such people feel inferior and therefore need to label others as "unpatriotic" to make themselves feel better. Discussions of patriotism are basically a big ad hominem and don't contribute anything to any intellectual debate.

It helps them draw you liberals into conformity. That's why we have a one party, oops, two party system.

	01-07-2004 00:32									#63
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Aggie -

quote: There simply isn't any reasonable dispute about it, so it strikes me as odd that O'Reilly should think that patriotism necessarily requires commitment to an obviously false belief.

Bingo!

Imran -

quote: How is this an issue? Of course you can't be considered patriotic if you think your country is a terrorist state. DUH!

quote: That's true. I guess it depends on what the speaker means, which sometimes can be difficult to discern in things like this.

So it's possible to love your country and still recognise and despise that the government employs terrorism?

Kontiki -

quote: I think the bigger question is why does Berz have such a bug up his ass about Bill O'Reilly?

Shall I count the ways? Immoral people who portray themselves as moral do that to me. He's pompous, rude, obnoxious, pretentious, thin skinned (welcome to the thin-skin zone), hypocritical, a wold in sheep's clothing, and deceitful. All this and he criticises people who aren't good role models for children.

DD -

quote: He refuses to put his letters on the air.

Actually he read 1 of my emails on air, but apparently they have a rule where if he reads 2 they send you his book.

MrFun -

quote: . . . . . and Reagan supported regimes in Central America that did just these things you find to be immoral.

Hmm...so if Dinodoc acknowledges that these tactics were employed does that mean he's unpatriotic?

For you guys who think O'Reilly is right, do you deny the US has employed terrorist tactics? If not, according to O'Reilly, you are unpatriotic, true?

Oh, in the past O'Reilly has claimed the far left "secularists" hate Jesus because he was highly judgemental. The irony is that recently a woman was on his show debating "permisseveness" in the US and she quoted Jesus, "judge not lest you be judged", and O'Reilly immediately responded by calling that a "secular" point of view. So Jesus went from being a Bill O'Reilly "traditionalist" who judges to a secularist?

	01-07-2004 00:36									#64
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quote: Originally posted by Sava There's something wrong with people always making judgements about other people's "patriotism". I guess such people feel inferior and therefore need to label others as "unpatriotic" to make themselves feel better.

The something wrong comes in not defining patriotism. Based on my understanding of the word's use I am not patriotic and glad that I'm not.

	01-07-2004 00:39									#65
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Nuking them was definitely in our best interests, but to try to cloak it in terms that it was best for the Japanese people, as MtG was insinuating, is disengenuous. We nuked them because we could and we were pretty sure that they would come to the table afterwards. Some people have said that another reason we nuked them was to show the Russians what we were capable of doing.

When you are the only kid on the block with nukes, you can pretty much do what you want.

	01-07-2004 00:40									#66
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quote: Originally posted by Berzerker Shall I count the ways? Immoral people who portray themselves as moral do that to me. He's pompous, rude, obnoxious, pretentious, thin skinned (welcome to the thin-skin zone), hypocritical, a wold in sheep's clothing, and deceitful. All this and he criticises people who aren't good role models for children.

You mean he's a troll?

	01-07-2004 00:43									#67
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quote: Originally posted by MosesPresley Nuking them was definitely in our best interests, but to try to cloak it in terms that it was best for the Japanese people, as MtG was insinuating, is disengenuous. We nuked them because we could and we were pretty sure that they would come to the table afterwards. Some people have said that another reason we nuked them was to show the Russians what we were capable of doing. When you are the only kid on the block with nukes, you can pretty much do what you want.

yeah, it's definitely a debatable subject... I just lean more towards the "it was necessary/right thing to do" camp.

	01-07-2004 00:45									#68
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"Terrorist is someone, who has a bomb, but no airforce"

From "Rogue State", by William Blum. Gets me thinking, not many books do that.

	01-07-2004 00:56									#69
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quote: Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat It depends on the definition the pimply pedants want to use for "terrorism." It's ok to cause millions of people to starve, if you don't do anything active, but bombing military targets (and there were plenty in Hiroshima) is "terrorism" if you happen to kill a bunch of civilians, or don't happen to like the method, whether or not there is any feasible way to minimize those casualties.

Were did the issue of OKness enter the discussion? An act of terrorism doesn't magically cease to be terrorism if it's the least bad option in the situation.

quote: Terrorism would have been to drop the bomb over the densest population centerd remaining after the April firebombing of Tokyo.

That would have been maximizing the body cult. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were chosen, partly, because it was thought that wiping out relatively intact cities would maximize the psychological impact.

A basic rule of thumb for terrorism is that it's better to kill ten people spectacularly than to kill twenty in dull ways.

	01-07-2004 00:57									#70
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quote: Were did the issue of OKness enter the discussion? An act of terrorism doesn't magically cease to be terrorism if it's the least bad option in the situation.

It does, though, if your intent is to minimize civilian deaths, rather than maximize.

It's not terrorism if, for instance, we drop a bomb and accidentally kill some civilians, or if we target someone knowing that some civilians will probably die too but try to minimize the civilian casualties.

	01-07-2004 01:00									#71
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quote: Originally posted by Kucinich quote: Were did the issue of OKness enter the discussion? An act of terrorism doesn't magically cease to be terrorism if it's the least bad option in the situation. It does, though, if your intent is to minimize civilian deaths, rather than maximize.

I think "intent" discussion is pretty much a strawman. Intent is such a personal issue, that its really unprovable to say what someone's intent is. Frankly, if someone is reduced to defending the intent, it means they can't legitimately argue other points.

	01-07-2004 01:08									#72
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quote: I think "intent" discussion is pretty much a strawman. Intent is such a personal issue, that its really unprovable to say what someone's intent is.

Not really. Otherwise we couldn't distinguish murder from manslaughter, for example.

	01-07-2004 01:11									#73
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Indeed. Saying 'intent' is a strawman means that you think the entire criminal law is a strawman .

	01-07-2004 01:15									#74
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quote: Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui Indeed. Saying 'intent' is a strawman means that you think the entire criminal law is a strawman .

I don't think I need to point out that criminal law is irrelevant when talking about war... or else (for instance) Bush would be liable for the deaths of civilians in Iraq. But if you are saying Bush is guilty of a crime, by all means I won't object.

basically... apples and oranges...

	01-07-2004 01:15									#75
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O'Reilly is right because what the US is doing isn't terrorism, period. Some people who have found that their arguments from logic have failed choose to switch to rabble-rousing instead and call it "terrorism."

Bah.

	01-07-2004 01:16									#76
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quote: Originally posted by Straybow O'Reilly is right because what the US is doing isn't terrorism, period. Some people who have found that their arguments from logic have failed choose to switch to rabble-rousing instead and call it "terrorism." Bah.

well if it were your homeland that the US was bombing, perhaps you'd see it differently. btw, I wouldn't classify US actions in this case as terrorism (or support of terrorism). But I think the US has proven that it is a nation that in the past has supported terrorism.

	01-07-2004 01:17									#77
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quote: Originally posted by Sava I don't think I need to point out that criminal law is irrelevant when talking about war... or else (for instance) Bush would be liable for the deaths of civilians in Iraq. But if you are saying Bush is guilty of a crime, by all means I won't object.

Do you think, then, there's no moral difference between accidentally running over someone and premeditated, serial killing?

	01-07-2004 01:17									#78
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quote: So it's possible to love your country and still recognise and despise that the government employs terrorism?

Calling the US a 'terrorist state', as opposed to saying this administration backs terrorism, while saying terrorism as a perjorative term is inconsistent with being patriotic. I'd argue that considering your country one of the worst in the world means you don't love it (to do so would be very strange... do you love people you absolutely hate?).

There is a difference between calling your country a terrorist state and deploring that a certain administration uses terrorism. If you refer to a majority of administrations as terrorist then I don't think you can really be patriotic.

quote: You mean he's a troll?

One of the best .

	01-07-2004 01:19									#79
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quote: Originally posted by Kucinich quote: Originally posted by Sava I don't think I need to point out that criminal law is irrelevant when talking about war... or else (for instance) Bush would be liable for the deaths of civilians in Iraq. But if you are saying Bush is guilty of a crime, by all means I won't object. Do you think, then, there's no moral difference between accidentally running over someone and premeditated, serial killing?

There is, but for all intents and purposes, such a discussion is irrelevant because intent is something that is extremely difficult to prove.

	01-07-2004 01:22									#80
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quote: Originally posted by Berzerker Kontiki - Shall I count the ways? Immoral people who portray themselves as moral do that to me. He's pompous, rude, obnoxious, pretentious, thin skinned (welcome to the thin-skin zone), hypocritical, a wold in sheep's clothing, and deceitful. All this and he criticises people who aren't good role models for children.

I'm sure he's all of those things and probably more. But so are a lot of other right-wing windbags on American TV and radio - Rush Limbaugh springs immediately to mind. I'm just wondering why O'Reilly in particular seems to get your goat. It almost seems personal.

	01-07-2004 01:22									#81
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quote: I don't think I need to point out that criminal law is irrelevant when talking about war... or else (for instance) Bush would be liable for the deaths of civilians in Iraq.

No criminal law isn't irrelevant when talking about war because war has its OWN criminal law, which is distinct from domestic criminal law. Deaths of civilians which were by accident or collateral damage doesn't violate that international law, BUT deliberatly targeting civilians does. Therefore intent is preeminenetly important.

	01-07-2004 01:27									#82
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quote: Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui quote: I don't think I need to point out that criminal law is irrelevant when talking about war... or else (for instance) Bush would be liable for the deaths of civilians in Iraq. No criminal law isn't irrelevant when talking about war because war has its OWN criminal law, which is distinct from domestic criminal law. Deaths of civilians which were by accident or collateral damage doesn't violate that international law, BUT deliberatly targeting civilians does. Therefore intent is preeminenetly important.

Maybe important for the lawyers and diplomates... but less important in the world of public opinion. And if you want to get technical about intent in terms of terrorism, by your definition, I don't think Osama bin Laden would be a terrorist. His intent isn't to strike fear. His goal is supremacy of his form of Islam. In fact, most forms of "terrorism" are motivated by political goals, not the desire to create fear.

I can see why you like the discussion of intent, Imran. It's not based on facts, and bloodsucking lawyers can gab until they are blue in the face about intent.

	01-07-2004 01:27									#83
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quote: Originally posted by Kidicious The difference is in the purpose of the act. The purpose of dropping the bombs on Japan was not to diminish Japan's military capabilities. We know this because Japan was already beaten.

Really? Tell that to their leadership, or to the Army, Navy and Marines on Okinawa. It doesn't matter if an enemy is beaten or not (arguably, the Japanese were plainly screwed after Midway), if he either doesn't know it, or refuses to acknowledge it.

The enemy is only "beaten" in a meaningful sense when he surrenders and organized resistance stops. That wasn't the case in August, 1945.

	01-07-2004 01:36									#84
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quote: Originally posted by Ramo quote: Yes, by all means, let's all put on pimply lima delta pedant mode, and ignore the fact that military and civilian targets were inseparable in Japan, or that prolongation of the war over winter would have resulted in mass starvation and epidemics (due to critical shortage of medical supplies) that would have killed millions, or that many of the military leaders of Japan seriously considered complete ethnic and national suicide as a response to invasion. If ten times more people starve and die of disease due to prolonging a war, it's ok, because it's passive and we can all satisfy our neo-leftist limp dicked sense of "morals" rather than taking the only feasible action to immediately and decisively end the war. I didn't address whether it was moral, merely whether it was an act of terrorism.

The whining about terrorism usually stems from a sense that one act is ok (at least in relative terms), while another is not. Unless you want to broaden the definition of "terrorism" to include any destructive act that scares anyone, for anything vaguely related to a social or political reason.

There is nothing significantly different from the bombing of Hiroshima than typical strategic bombing at the time - you attacked targets with military value. Dresden and the Tokyo firebombing were exceptions, because there was no significant military value, but most strategic bombing didn't fall into that category.

	01-07-2004 01:38									#85
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quote: Originally posted by MosesPresley Nuking them was the humanitarian thing to do. Yeah right.

Much better to let a large number of them starve over the winter or die of normally non-lethal illnesses due to lack of medical supplies.

	01-07-2004 01:41									#86
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quote: Originally posted by MosesPresley Nuking them was definitely in our best interests, but to try to cloak it in terms that it was best for the Japanese people, as MtG was insinuating, is disengenuous. We nuked them because we could and we were pretty sure that they would come to the table afterwards. Some people have said that another reason we nuked them was to show the Russians what we were capable of doing. When you are the only kid on the block with nukes, you can pretty much do what you want.

Go talk to WW2 generation Japanese about their living conditions late in the war. Did we nuke them out of a sense of benevolence and love? Hell no, we nuked them to end the war then and there. Did that benefit more Japanese than it destroyed? Yes, by far.

	01-07-2004 01:42									#87
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quote: Originally posted by Urban Ranger Are democracy and freedom thick ethical concepts? They don't seem to apply to certain acts, but there is no doubt that these are political words.

Democracy proper applies to a certain political arrangement – it is a descriptive term. But it is used as a political word – as in "The Democratic Republic of Korea". Freedom (in the political sense) is a thick ethical concept – it's just that there is disagreement over its content.

	01-07-2004 01:52									#88
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quote: Originally posted by Kucinich quote: Were did the issue of OKness enter the discussion? An act of terrorism doesn't magically cease to be terrorism if it's the least bad option in the situation. It does, though, if your intent is to minimize civilian deaths, rather than maximize.

Terrorism is about means, not ends.

quote: It's not terrorism if, for instance, we drop a bomb and accidentally kill some civilians, or if we target someone knowing that some civilians will probably die too but try to minimize the civilian casualties.

Now, the Hiroshima and Nagasaki strikes pretty intentionally killed civilians by the dozens of thousands, so this seems somewhat tangential.

Again, terrorism is about using violence to induce fear, fear that is supposed to further your ends. That doesn't necessarily imply trying to maximize civilian casualties. There's been terrorist groups who have fairly strictly targeted representatives of the state.

	01-07-2004 01:55									#89
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MtG

quote: Really? Tell that to their leadership, or to the Army, Navy and Marines on Okinawa. It doesn't matter if an enemy is beaten or not (arguably, the Japanese were plainly screwed after Midway), if he either doesn't know it, or refuses to acknowledge it.

Arguably, the Japanese were done for in dec '41.

Doesn't mean they didn't need getting the point driven home with some force, of course.

	01-07-2004 01:55									#90
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quote: The whining about terrorism usually stems from a sense that one act is ok (at least in relative terms), while another is not. Unless you want to broaden the definition of "terrorism" to include any destructive act that scares anyone, for anything vaguely related to a social or political reason. There is nothing significantly different from the bombing of Hiroshima than typical strategic bombing at the time - you attacked targets with military value. Dresden and the Tokyo firebombing were exceptions, because there was no significant military value, but most strategic bombing didn't fall into that category.

I would define terrorism as political violence conducted either indescriminately or intentionally against civilians. As such Hiroshima would fall under the category. As would suicide-bombing a police station in the middle of Baghdad.

It's not whining, it's a simple application of a definition. I'm just tired of people defining terrorism as "things I don't like."