Against war (off topic)
Erann Gat
patience for off-topic posts, stop reading now.
I am posting this because c.l.l. has been more than just a newsgroup
for me. It has been a community. I feel like I know and am known by
many people here despite the fact that we have never met. Indeed, in
many cases we have no idea what we look like, or what nationality we
are.
I was born in what was at the time West Germany, and am now a
naturalized citizen of the United States. My country is about to go
to war, and I wanted this community and the world to know where I
stand.
Just about everything Geroge Bush has done since before he came to
office has made me ashamed to call myself an American. No President
has ever shown more contempt for the bedrock principle of Democracy,
which is that what other people think matters. George Bush has
repeatedly demonstrated (and even explicitly stated) that he doesn't
give a damn what anyone else thinks. He is a dictator who dons the
trappings of Democracy but does not embrace its substance. When he
launches his war against Iraq he will be in my mind little different
from Osama bin Laden. The next time terrorists strike the United
States it will no longer be true that we did nothing to deserve it.
The stupidity and tragedy of this situation boggles my mind. Yes,
Saddam Hussein is an evil man. Yes, the world will be better off
without him. But Saddam is hardly unique in this regard, and solving
this problem by starting a war sets a horrible precedent. What is to
stop any country from launching a war against anyone that they judge
to be evil?
Robert Bolt said it best in "A Man for all Seasons":
Roper: So now you'd give the Devil benefit of law!
More: Yes, what would you do? Cut a great road through the law to
get after the Devil?
Roper: I'd cut down every law in England to do that.
More: Oh? And when the last law was down and the Devil turned round
on you - where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? The
country's planted thick with laws from coast to coast - man's law, not
God's - and if you cut them down - and you're the man to do it - d'you
really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow
then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's
sake.
I stand with Thomas More on this occasion.
Thank you for your forbearance on this decidedly off-topic post. When
the bombs start to fly I wanted everyone to know that they do so
without the consent of this American.
OK, I've said my peace. You can come get me now, John Ashcroft. You
know where I live.
Erann Gat
Nils Kassube
Nils Goesche
> Just about everything Geroge Bush has done since before he came to
> office has made me ashamed to call myself an American. No President
> has ever shown more contempt for the bedrock principle of Democracy,
> which is that what other people think matters. George Bush has
> repeatedly demonstrated (and even explicitly stated) that he doesn't
> give a damn what anyone else thinks. He is a dictator who dons the
> trappings of Democracy but does not embrace its substance. When he
> launches his war against Iraq he will be in my mind little different
> from Osama bin Laden. The next time terrorists strike the United
> States it will no longer be true that we did nothing to deserve it.
Oh /come on/! The senate voted 77-23, the House 296-133 to authorize
the president to attack Iraq. This means that even most of the
Democrats voted for it. You can hardly call it dictatorial behavior
if the president does what he has been authorized to do by the
democratic institutions.
> The stupidity and tragedy of this situation boggles my mind. Yes,
> Saddam Hussein is an evil man. Yes, the world will be better off
> without him. But Saddam is hardly unique in this regard, and
> solving this problem by starting a war sets a horrible precedent.
I find this ``Saddam is not the only bad guy´´ argument very strange.
So, would it be ok with you if the US attacked all the other bad guys,
too?
> What is to stop any country from launching a war against anyone that
> they judge to be evil?
As has always been the case for the last few millennia: Nothing but
military force. There are several countries in the world that judge
not only the US but /every/ civilized Western country to be evil. And
that would attack us the very first minute they think they can do it
without being destroyed. No, this isn't nice, but when has the world
ever been a nice place?
Also, I reject this kind of relativism. ``We say they're evil, they
say we're evil, so who is to say?´´. I read a nice analogy somewhere
a while ago: This is as if you were saying that the guy who pushes an
old lady away from an approaching bus is morally equivalent to the guy
who pushes the lady /before/ the bus because both are doing the same
thing: Both of them are pushing old ladies around! ;-)
> Robert Bolt said it best in "A Man for all Seasons":
[snip nice little story]
> Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake.
>
> I stand with Thomas More on this occasion.
So do I, incidentally. The ``Rule of Law´´ is an important principle.
However I don't think that it applies here. We are not living in one
established law system; the UN are /not/ the government of the world,
and I wouldn't want them to be, either, at least for the time being,
where most of the governments in the world don't give a /damn/ about
Western values, freedom and democracy. For many decades doing
anything sensible with UN approval has been pretty much impossible
because of the Soviet ``Nyet!´´. The Korean war was one of the few
exceptions -- the Soviets were boycotting the Security Council at the
time and weren't there to give their veto :-) World isn't ripe for
this kind of world-government yet. Heck, not even the Europeans can
make up their mind whether they are for or against the war.
> Thank you for your forbearance on this decidedly off-topic post.
> When the bombs start to fly I wanted everyone to know that they do
> so without the consent of this American.
>
> OK, I've said my peace. You can come get me now, John Ashcroft.
> You know where I live.
A bit paranoid, aren't we? ;-)
Regards,
--
Nils Gösche
"Don't ask for whom the <CTRL-G> tolls."
PGP key ID 0x0655CFA0
Pascal Costanza
> http://www.poetsforthewar.org/poems/russel01.shtml
Did the Iraqi people ask for Mr. Russell's "concern"?
Pascal
--
Pascal Costanza University of Bonn
mailto:cost...@web.de Institute of Computer Science III
http://www.pascalcostanza.de Römerstr. 164, D-53117 Bonn (Germany)
Nils Goesche
> Nils Kassube wrote:
> > http://www.poetsforthewar.org/poems/russel01.shtml
>
> Did the Iraqi people ask for Mr. Russell's "concern"?
That probably depends on whether you ask those who are still living in
Iraq under the watchful eyes of the dreaded secret police or some of
the refugees living elsewhere.
Pascal Costanza
> Pascal Costanza <cost...@web.de> writes:
>
>
>>Nils Kassube wrote:
>
>
>>>http://www.poetsforthewar.org/poems/russel01.shtml
>>
>>Did the Iraqi people ask for Mr. Russell's "concern"?
>
>
> That probably depends on whether you ask those who are still living in
> Iraq under the watchful eyes of the dreaded secret police or some of
> the refugees living elsewhere.
Have you talked to some of those refugees? I haven't, but according to a
radio report I have heard today, at least some of those refugees are
strictly against the war.
I can't imagine that George W. has asked any of those concernced what
they want. It's obvious that he wanted the war from the very beginning,
and that he wasn't interested in peace in that region. His only interest
is to gain control over the oil fields. That's extremely disgusting!
Nils Goesche
> Nils Goesche wrote:
> > Pascal Costanza <cost...@web.de> writes:
> >
> >>Nils Kassube wrote:
> >
> >>>http://www.poetsforthewar.org/poems/russel01.shtml
> >>
> >>Did the Iraqi people ask for Mr. Russell's "concern"?
> > That probably depends on whether you ask those who are still living
> > in
> > Iraq under the watchful eyes of the dreaded secret police or some of
> > the refugees living elsewhere.
>
> Have you talked to some of those refugees? I haven't, but according
> to a radio report I have heard today, at least some of those
> refugees are strictly against the war.
``At least some...´´? Well, as there is a great lot of such refugees,
this is hardly surprising ;-)
> I can't imagine that George W. has asked any of those concernced
> what they want. It's obvious that he wanted the war from the very
> beginning, and that he wasn't interested in peace in that
> region. His only interest is to gain control over the oil
> fields. That's extremely disgusting!
*ROFL* Yeah, right. It's the oil fields.
Look, this ``for oil´´ argument is so extremely ridiculous that it is
not even worth being discussed. Even our leftist government didn't
use it, probably because they feared it would make them look all too
stupid, even through our biased media. Just think about it for a
moment (which you should have done the first time you read it in,
what, the ``taz´´?) and I'm sure you'll understand.
Hint: If they want oil, they'll buy it.
If you still don't get it, I'll make a little prophecy:
I claim the US are not going to annex any part of Iraq and they are
not going to declare any oil well in Iraq to be property of the US
government.
If you think I'm wrong, please say so. I'll happily quote you over
and over again, after the war :-)
Wade Humeniuk
"Nils Goesche" <car...@cartan.de> wrote in message news:lybs075...@cartan.de...> Look, this ``for oil创 argument is so extremely ridiculous that it is
> not even worth being discussed. Even our leftist government didn't
> use it, probably because they feared it would make them look all too
> stupid, even through our biased media. Just think about it for a
> moment (which you should have done the first time you read it in,
>
> Hint: If they want oil, they'll buy it.
I actually heard a plausible reason for it being partially about oil. A
strong right-winger here in Canada said that we should get control
of Iraqi oil because then we can really put the screws to Saudi Arabia.
Get control of the oil so the problem of Saudi Arabia can be dealt with
without throwing the world into a temporary oil crisis. After all the
vast source of terrorists involved in 9/11 were Saudi's, right? And,
I assume the US is thinking down the road.
Wade
Nils Goesche
> "Nils Goesche" <car...@cartan.de> wrote in message news:lybs075...@cartan.de...
> > Hint: If they want oil, they'll buy it.
> I actually heard a plausible reason for it being partially about
> oil. A strong right-winger here in Canada said that we should get
> control of Iraqi oil because then we can really put the screws to
> Saudi Arabia. Get control of the oil so the problem of Saudi Arabia
> can be dealt with without throwing the world into a temporary oil
> crisis. After all the vast source of terrorists involved in 9/11
> were Saudi's, right? And, I assume the US is thinking down the
> road.
IMHO this only shows that the typical ``strong right winger´´ is
actually a similar kind of paranoid lunatic as the strong left
winger :-)
Michael Parker
<g...@flownet.com> wrote:
The whole tone of this and much of the other rhetoric coming from the
left really reminds me of the sort of cr*p the wacko right was spewing
during the Clinton administration. But that sort of paranoid hysteria
was self-defeating for them, and it is not pretty to see it coming from
the left. It is unpursuasive, devoid of logic, and corrosive to public
discourse.
>
> Just about everything Geroge Bush has done since before he came to
> office has made me ashamed to call myself an American.
Sorry to hear that. He doesn't make me ashamed.
> No President
> has ever shown more contempt for the bedrock principle of Democracy,
> which is that what other people think matters.
You're sort-of right here, but a bit off the mark. A couple of points:
(a) the US is not strictly speaking a democracy. What people think
only directly matters at election time, with only an indirect influence
the rest of the time. This was considered a feature by the founding
fathers as a way around the instability and lack of focus that plagued
the classical democracies of ancient Greece.
(b) What non-citizens think *doesn't* matter, except as a courtesy.
(c) What citizens think does indeed matter, subject to the restrictions
I mentioned in (a). But the demonstrations thus far aren't significant
as an expression of public opinion, except to the extent that they sway
the greater public to their side and thereby effect an indirect
influence, which has notably failed to happen. Depth of feeling does
not equal breadth of opinion. And opinion polls are not convertible
with elections. As for the foreign demonstrations, (c) applies to
their governments, (b) applies to ours.
> George Bush has
> repeatedly demonstrated (and even explicitly stated) that he doesn't
> give a damn what anyone else thinks.
I agree with him, at least wrt foreign opinion. I didn't vote for him
so he would listen to foreigners (actually, I didn't vote for him at
all, which I have since come to regret). As for U.S. opinion, the
majority seem to support him.
> He is a dictator who dons the
> trappings of Democracy but does not embrace its substance.
You're really out on a limb here -- what exactly makes him a dictator?
A handful of people claiming so does not make it true.
> When he
> launches his war against Iraq he will be in my mind little different
> from Osama bin Laden.
Don't really know what to say here -- I think we're just on different
planets somehow.
> The next time terrorists strike the United
> States it will no longer be true that we did nothing to deserve it.
Was it even true the last time? Most of the people I've heard making
this claim were claiming last time that we must have done something to
deserve it, the claimed reasons being kyoto, missile ban, etc.
> The stupidity and tragedy of this situation boggles my mind. Yes,
> Saddam Hussein is an evil man. Yes, the world will be better off
> without him.
So what's the problem?
> But Saddam is hardly unique in this regard, and solving
> this problem by starting a war sets a horrible precedent.
What precedent? That liberating people from a horrible evil man is not
only possible, but even desirable? How exactly is this horrible?
> What is to
> stop any country from launching a war against anyone that they judge
> to be evil?
What has *ever* kept any country from launching a war? This is nothing
new -- the U.S. didn't suddenly pull the concept of war out of a hat.
> Thank you for your forbearance on this decidedly off-topic post. When
> the bombs start to fly I wanted everyone to know that they do so
> without the consent of this American.
He does so with the consent of this American. But thank you for your
opinion. Feel free to register it officially next election.
> OK, I've said my peace. You can come get me now, John Ashcroft. You
> know where I live.
Oh please, join the crowd. What have you said here that many americans
from congress, the press, celebrities on down haven't said? How many
of them has Ashcroft gone after?
I know, just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're *not* out to
get you, but you really need to calm down.
I remember listening to a call-in show on the radio back in the mid
90's, and this one "militia" guy called in ranting, cowering in his
basement with his pistol claiming Reno was coming after him. Your
paranoia is no less absurd, and no less amusing, than his.
Joost Kremers
> (b) What non-citizens think *doesn't* matter, except as a courtesy.
it should be more than a courtesy when the policy of the US government
directly influences the lives of non-US citizens.
>> The next time terrorists strike the United
>> States it will no longer be true that we did nothing to deserve it.
>
> Was it even true the last time? Most of the people I've heard making
> this claim were claiming last time that we must have done something to
> deserve it, the claimed reasons being kyoto, missile ban, etc.
then they could have given much better reasons. the main reason for the
frustration that so many (ordinary) people in the middle east feel with the
US is caused by the fact that the US has supported and continues to support
a series of oppressive undemocratic regimes in the region: egypt, jordan,
saudi-arabia and other regimes on the arabian peninsula, israel, to a
lesser extent morocco. and in the past also the shah of persia, nowadays
iran. obviously, the US is not the only factor responsible for the lack of
freedom in the middle east, but it does contribute.
i should perhaps make it clear that although i find this policy of the US
repulsive, i do not believe it justifies terrorist attacks such as those of
9/11. but it isn't difficult to see how the people in the middle-east who
suffer daily from this US policy, may feel differently about that. in the
same way that the citizens of the countries that were occupied by
nazi-germany in WOII didn't object very much to the bombing campaigns of
the allied forces against german cities.
--
Joost Kremers http://baserv.uci.kun.nl/~jkremers
mail me for a bon mot
Thaddeus L Olczyk
<joostk...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> Was it even true the last time? Most of the people I've heard making
>> this claim were claiming last time that we must have done something to
>> deserve it, the claimed reasons being kyoto, missile ban, etc.
>
>then they could have given much better reasons. the main reason for the
>frustration that so many (ordinary) people in the middle east feel with the
I see by your name that you are an expert in what Arabs think.
>US is caused by the fact that the US has supported and continues to support
>a series of oppressive undemocratic regimes in the region: egypt, jordan,
>saudi-arabia and other regimes on the arabian peninsula, israel, to a
>lesser extent morocco. and in the past also the shah of persia, nowadays
>iran. obviously, the US is not the only factor responsible for the lack of
>freedom in the middle east, but it does contribute.
Oh my my. You are so right. The US supports dictators. Such an evil
thing that can never be justified. It such an embarassment. In fact
it's worse, the US has supported some very nasty dictators in the
past. The US should immediately apologize and make reparations
for supporting these dictators. Including one of the worst dictators
in the whole of history. Josef Stalin.
Erann Gat
> g...@flownet.com (Erann Gat) writes:
>
> > Just about everything Geroge Bush has done since before he came to
> > office has made me ashamed to call myself an American. No President
> > has ever shown more contempt for the bedrock principle of Democracy,
> > which is that what other people think matters. George Bush has
> > repeatedly demonstrated (and even explicitly stated) that he doesn't
> > give a damn what anyone else thinks. He is a dictator who dons the
> > trappings of Democracy but does not embrace its substance. When he
> > launches his war against Iraq he will be in my mind little different
> > from Osama bin Laden. The next time terrorists strike the United
> > States it will no longer be true that we did nothing to deserve it.
>
> Oh /come on/! The senate voted 77-23, the House 296-133 to authorize
> the president to attack Iraq. This means that even most of the
> Democrats voted for it. You can hardly call it dictatorial behavior
> if the president does what he has been authorized to do by the
> democratic institutions.
Like I said, he dons the trappings of democracy when they suit him. Then
he discards then when they do not. He invokes the authority of UN
resolution 1441 as justification for war *now* despite the fact that it is
clear that the Security Council does *not* support war *now*.
One can only speculate what Bush might have done had Congress and the UN
not voted his way, but we can abserve his behavior in other cases where
democratic instutions have opposed him. For example, he has used the
power of the Federal government to nullify voter-approved initiatives in
Oregon (doctor-assisted suicide) and California (medical marijuana). He
has fought for the power to detain people indefinitely without trial or
access to counsel if they are "enemy combatants", but he gets to decide
who is and is not an enemy combatant. Clearer cases of contempt for
democracy I cannot imagine. He may not be a dictator in fact (yet), but
it is pretty clear to me that he has dictatorial aspirations.
> > The stupidity and tragedy of this situation boggles my mind. Yes,
> > Saddam Hussein is an evil man. Yes, the world will be better off
> > without him. But Saddam is hardly unique in this regard, and
> > solving this problem by starting a war sets a horrible precedent.
>
> I find this ``Saddam is not the only bad guy创 argument very strange.
> So, would it be ok with you if the US attacked all the other bad guys,
> too?
No. The point is this: if we're going to attaack Saddam because he's a
bad guy then we are hypocrites if we do not also attack all the other bad
guys. Attacking all the other bad guys is clearly a bad idea -- because
we would lose, and because we would get caught up in the tangle of
confusion trying to decide who "all the other bad guys" are.
That is really the point. It is clear to *me* that Saddam is a bad guy
and ought to be gotten rid of. And it is clear to Gearge Bush. But it is
not clear to a lot of other people in the world (including many Iraqis)
and (and this is the salient point) I believe THEIR OPINION MATTERS.
George Bush does not (and has said so explicitly).
I would actually like to see us go to war against Iraq and get rid of
Saddam. But only with the rest of the world behind us, as they were in
1991. Not like this.
> > What is to stop any country from launching a war against anyone that
> > they judge to be evil?
>
> As has always been the case for the last few millennia: Nothing but
> military force.
Yes, that is alas what we are reverting to. The whole point of the U.N.
was to get away from that "might makes right" philosophy that lead to all
the bloody wars of the 20th century. That is why I oppose this war. It
is not for lack of compassion for the Iraqi people. It is not for lack of
desire to see Saddam go. It is for the belief that we must adhere to
*principle*, because if we do not then we are indeed back to "might makes
right." Today we are the mighty ones. But great powers rise and great
powers fall. What will protect us when we are no longer the mighty ones?
> There are several countries in the world that judge
> not only the US but /every/ civilized Western country to be evil. And
> that would attack us the very first minute they think they can do it
> without being destroyed.
Yes, and why shouldn't they, when they see us doing exactly the same
thing? Why should they not follow our example?
> No, this isn't nice, but when has the world
> ever been a nice place?
Never. That is no excuse not to try to make is a nicer place.
> Also, I reject this kind of relativism. ``We say they're evil, they
> say we're evil, so who is to say?创.
That is not my brand of relativism. My brand of relativism is: we're all
a mix of good and evil. Saddam is pretty clearly towards one extreme, but
even he has done some good things for Iraq. Bush is pretty clearly
towards the other extreme, and I think in his heart of hearts his
intentions are good. But intentions don't matter -- results do. And I
believe that there is a significant danger that the results of our actions
will bring more evil than good in the long term.
> I read a nice analogy somewhere
> a while ago: This is as if you were saying that the guy who pushes an
> old lady away from an approaching bus is morally equivalent to the guy
> who pushes the lady /before/ the bus because both are doing the same
> thing: Both of them are pushing old ladies around! ;-)
No, because the resuls are what matter. A better example is giving
someone poison. Under certain circumstances that can be a compassionate
thing to do. For example, if they have cancer and the poison you give
them is a chemotherapy drug. Good and evil are not absolutes. There are
many shades of grey, and they are all colored by circumstance.
> > Robert Bolt said it best in "A Man for all Seasons":
>
> [snip nice little story]
>
> > Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake.
> >
> > I stand with Thomas More on this occasion.
>
> So do I, incidentally. The ``Rule of Law创 is an important principle.
> However I don't think that it applies here. We are not living in one
> established law system; the UN are /not/ the government of the world,
I agree. The "law" that is at work here is contract law, and the law of
honor. If we expect others to play by the rules then we must play by the
rules, even if the outcome of playing by the rules is not what we would
like it to be. It is hypocracy to hold up U.N. resolution 1441 as
justification for going to war, while at the same time ignoring the clear
message from the U.N. that the time for war has not yet come.
Hypocracy is the greatest evil, because once you yield to it you can
justify anything.
> > OK, I've said my peace. You can come get me now, John Ashcroft.
> > You know where I live.
>
> A bit paranoid, aren't we? ;-)
Perhaps. My grandparents lost most of their childhood friends in Nazi
concentration camps. The lesson of that experience is that it is
important to stand up to tyranny before it becomes apparent that it is
tyranny. Otherwise it may be too late.
E.
Joost Kremers
> On Wed, 19 Mar 2003 20:43:34 +0000 (UTC), Joost Kremers
> <joostk...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>>> Was it even true the last time? Most of the people I've heard making
>>> this claim were claiming last time that we must have done something to
>>> deserve it, the claimed reasons being kyoto, missile ban, etc.
>>
>>then they could have given much better reasons. the main reason for the
>>frustration that so many (ordinary) people in the middle east feel with the
> I see by your name that you are an expert in what Arabs think.
given the fact that i have studied arabic for ten years now (am about to
receive my PhD), that i have been to egypt several times (in total for
about a year), talked to the people there and regularly keep up with the
arab media through the internet, yes, i do believe that although i wouldn't
call myself an expert, i do have a somewhat better insight into what arabs
think than the average citizen of europe and the US.
BTW, it doesn't take a genius to understand this part of their thinking.
>>US is caused by the fact that the US has supported and continues to support
>>a series of oppressive undemocratic regimes in the region: egypt, jordan,
>>saudi-arabia and other regimes on the arabian peninsula, israel, to a
>>lesser extent morocco. and in the past also the shah of persia, nowadays
>>iran. obviously, the US is not the only factor responsible for the lack of
>>freedom in the middle east, but it does contribute.
> Oh my my. You are so right. The US supports dictators. Such an evil
> thing that can never be justified. It such an embarassment. In fact
> it's worse, the US has supported some very nasty dictators in the
> past. The US should immediately apologize and make reparations
> for supporting these dictators. Including one of the worst dictators
> in the whole of history. Josef Stalin.
what is your point?
Erann Gat
Parker <michae...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> > No President
> > has ever shown more contempt for the bedrock principle of Democracy,
> > which is that what other people think matters.
>
> You're sort-of right here, but a bit off the mark. A couple of points:
>
> (a) the US is not strictly speaking a democracy.
True. I'm referring to "democracy" in the sense that is meant when we
refer to ridding the world of dictators and tyrants.
> > George Bush has
> > repeatedly demonstrated (and even explicitly stated) that he doesn't
> > give a damn what anyone else thinks.
>
> I agree with him, at least wrt foreign opinion. I didn't vote for him
> so he would listen to foreigners (actually, I didn't vote for him at
> all, which I have since come to regret). As for U.S. opinion, the
> majority seem to support him.
Yes, but this is merely a convenient coincidence. It is clear that he
would not be the least bit deterred if this were not so. He has said so
explicitly.
> > He is a dictator who dons the
> > trappings of Democracy but does not embrace its substance.
>
> You're really out on a limb here -- what exactly makes him a dictator?
> A handful of people claiming so does not make it true.
You're right, I was being overly dramatic here. He is not a dictator
(yet) but he does seem to have dictatorial ambitions. I cite once again
his invokation of Federal power to quash voter initiatives, and his
unilateral assertion of the power to detain anyone he deems to be an
"enemy combatant" indefinitely.
> > When he
> > launches his war against Iraq he will be in my mind little different
> > from Osama bin Laden.
>
> Don't really know what to say here -- I think we're just on different
> planets somehow.
Perhaps I was being overly dramatic here too. But really, what is the
difference? Both men think that they are right, that they have God on
their side, and to hell with what anyone else thinks. The only
difference, it seems to me, is that bin Laden targets civilians
intentionally, whereas Bush doesn't, but again I say that it is the
results that matter, not intentions. How many civilians have we already
killed? How many more will die? I don't know -- those numbers aren't
regularly recited in the American press. But I'll be surprised if the
final tally is less than 2795.
> > The next time terrorists strike the United
> > States it will no longer be true that we did nothing to deserve it.
>
> Was it even true the last time?
Last time it was arguable. Next time it may not be.
> > The stupidity and tragedy of this situation boggles my mind. Yes,
> > Saddam Hussein is an evil man. Yes, the world will be better off
> > without him.
>
> So what's the problem?
The problem is that my opinion is not the only one that matters.
> > But Saddam is hardly unique in this regard, and solving
> > this problem by starting a war sets a horrible precedent.
>
> What precedent? That liberating people from a horrible evil man is not
> only possible, but even desirable? How exactly is this horrible?
The precedent I fear is that it is OK for one country to launch a war
against another country simply because the one country judges that there
is sufficient reason to do so.
> > What is to
> > stop any country from launching a war against anyone that they judge
> > to be evil?
>
> What has *ever* kept any country from launching a war? This is nothing
> new -- the U.S. didn't suddenly pull the concept of war out of a hat.
Principle. Self-preservation. A desire to do the Right Thing. And yes,
as a matter of fact, the United States did pull the concept of this war
out of a hat. Before 9/11 there was nothing in George Bush's rhetoric
about Iraq. After 9/11 it's suddenly Job 1, despite the fact that Iraq's
connection with 9/11 is tenuous at best. That's part of the problem. I
don't understand why we're going to war *now*. It really does seem
completely irrational to me, particularly since North Korea seems to be a
much more credible and emininent threat to U.S. and world security.
> I remember listening to a call-in show on the radio back in the mid
> 90's, and this one "militia" guy called in ranting, cowering in his
> basement with his pistol claiming Reno was coming after him. Your
> paranoia is no less absurd, and no less amusing, than his.
<shrug> I don't suppose this person was calling from Waco Texas?
You know, I would like nothing better than to be proven wrong about all
this. If we attack Iraq and everything turns out all hunky dory, I will
happily eat the biggest serving of crow you can dish up. I will say, "Mr.
President, you were right, and I was wrong, and I'm damn glad you were
leading the country and not me." I honestly hope that I will some day be
able to say that.
But right now I'm saying that IMO this is not the time for war.
E.
Michael Parker
Kremers <joostk...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> Michael Parker wrote:
> > (b) What non-citizens think *doesn't* matter, except as a courtesy.
>
> it should be more than a courtesy when the policy of the US government
> directly influences the lives of non-US citizens.
Morally, yes, I agree with you. But Erann was complaining that Bush's
failure to listen to protesters (including those in other countries)
proved his disdain for democracy -- he actually called Bush a dictator.
My point was in the limited sense that wrt democracy, Bush is
fully justified in ignoring the small though strident internal protests,
and is under no obligation to attend to the foreign protests either. I
would further claim that it is undemocratic for him to allow
non-citizens to unduly influence his actions, precisely because they
are not his demos.
>
> >> The next time terrorists strike the United
> >> States it will no longer be true that we did nothing to deserve it.
> >
> > Was it even true the last time? Most of the people I've heard making
> > this claim were claiming last time that we must have done something to
> > deserve it, the claimed reasons being kyoto, missile ban, etc.
>
> then they could have given much better reasons. the main reason for the
> frustration that so many (ordinary) people in the middle east feel with the
> US is caused by the fact that the US has supported and continues to support
> a series of oppressive undemocratic regimes in the region: egypt, jordan,
> saudi-arabia and other regimes on the arabian peninsula, israel, to a
> lesser extent morocco. and in the past also the shah of persia, nowadays
> iran. obviously, the US is not the only factor responsible for the lack of
> freedom in the middle east, but it does contribute.
You're right, that was another whole set of reasons posited by both the
left and the right, and one that I would have taken a lot more
seriously if the terrorists weren't proposing to replace them with more
of the same -- my belief is that Bin Laden's real complaint is not so
much that the U.S. was supporting despots as it was that *he* was not
the despot.
I may be wrong about that, but I couldn't really see that the Taliban's
regime in Afghanistan, or the regime in Iran is terribly better than
that imposed by the U.S.-supported despots.
I also think that to the extent U.S. policy was wrong, this only
increases our responsibility to improve the situation in the middle
east. The key clause here is "to the extent" -- I do not believe that
a few million dollars a year to Egypt for example makes us 100%
culpable for Mubarak's regime. Does anyone truly believe that this
support was the critical factor preventing a true democracy from
flourishing in Egypt? That deal, after all, was put in place as
reward for the Egypt-Israeli peace accord. Similarly, the U.S. gave
food and oil to North Korea in exchange for promising to stop nuclear
development. Does this mean that the U.S. will now be held responsible
for North Korea's cruelty, and simultaneously restrained from doing
something about it in the future?
I do not know if we have the ability to effect such a democratic change
in the middle east. The responsibility for such a change lies firstly
with the European powers that left the Middle East in such a mess after
WWI, and only secondarily with the U.S. and Russia who used these
people and despots as pawns and proxies during the long struggle of the
cold war.
I do not believe Bush's drive to remove Saddam is motivated from
humanitarian concerns, but I think it is consonant with humanitarian
concerns. Bush's motives may or may not be the purest, but I think
this is orthogonal to the issue of the rightness or wrongness of the
policy.
> i should perhaps make it clear that although i find this policy of the US
> repulsive, i do not believe it justifies terrorist attacks such as those of
> 9/11. but it isn't difficult to see how the people in the middle-east who
> suffer daily from this US policy, may feel differently about that. in the
> same way that the citizens of the countries that were occupied by
> nazi-germany in WOII didn't object very much to the bombing campaigns of
> the allied forces against german cities.
I don't expect the rest of the world to view the U.S. as a saint -- we
have done some very bad things, sometimes because we believed it was
the best of a choice of evils, sometimes out of sheer self-interest.
But I do object to the view that is underlying the "ask yourself why
they hate you" argument so frequently propounded by both the far left
and far right -- that the U.S. must be perfect, that any U.S. action
that anybody disagrees with will serve whatever ills befall us.
This is an impossible standard for any country to live up to, and puts
the U.S. in a "damned if you do and damned if you don't" situation. We
were condemned for being slow to intervene in Kosovo, we are condemned
for failing to stop the Taliban from destroying the Buddist statues, we
are condemned for overthrowing the Taliban. we are condemned for
failing to overthrow the various middle eastern tyrants over the long
years that we were attempting to overthrow a eurasian tyranny, we are
condemned for attempting to overthrow a middle eastern tyrant. In the
face of this, why should the US care for the opinion of others -- they
will condemn us no matter what we do.
Saddam has been killing thousands each year for 20+ years. The U.S.
decides belatedly to stop him. And yet those on the far left and right
would claim that we are the evil party because we supported him years
ago, and we are doubly evil because we wish to stop him now. We are
triply evil because we do not concurrently stop all the other dictators
in the world, yet we would be quadruply evil if we were to actually
attempt such an endeavor. We are condemned for being overbearing
imperialists, yet also condemned from those same mouths for not being
an omnipotent leviathan.
Nils Goesche
> In article <lyk7ev5...@cartan.de>, Nils Goesche <car...@cartan.de> wrote:
>
> > g...@flownet.com (Erann Gat) writes:
> > > George Bush has repeatedly demonstrated (and even
> > > explicitly stated) that he doesn't give a damn what anyone
> > > else thinks. He is a dictator who dons the trappings of
> > > Democracy but does not embrace its substance.
> > Oh /come on/! The senate voted 77-23, the House 296-133 to
> > authorize the president to attack Iraq.
> For example, he has used the power of the Federal government to
> nullify voter-approved initiatives in Oregon (doctor-assisted
> suicide) and California (medical marijuana). He has fought for
> the power to detain people indefinitely without trial or access
> to counsel if they are "enemy combatants", but he gets to
> decide who is and is not an enemy combatant. Clearer cases of
> contempt for democracy I cannot imagine. He may not be a
> dictator in fact (yet), but it is pretty clear to me that he
> has dictatorial aspirations.
Needless to say, I can't see any such aspirations, but I think
you haven't really understood how our democracies work. If the
president did anything against the rules, it is a safe bet that
the Democrats would already be calling the Supreme Court and it
will set things straight, as it did many times before in its
history. If this doesn't happen, that means that he played by
the rules and then you can't call him a dictator just because you
disagree with his measures. It would be a very, very long list
if I began to talk about all the actions of the German government
which I think are absolutely wrong, dangerous and making things
worse. But that doesn't give me any right to call our chancellor
a dictator, no matter how much I hate his guts.
> > > Yes, Saddam Hussein is an evil man. Yes, the world will be
> > > better off without him. But Saddam is hardly unique in
> > > this regard, and solving this problem by starting a war
> > > sets a horrible precedent.
> >
> > I find this ``Saddam is not the only bad guy´´ argument very
> > strange. So, would it be ok with you if the US attacked all
> > the other bad guys, too?
>
> No. The point is this: if we're going to attaack Saddam
> because he's a bad guy then we are hypocrites if we do not also
> attack all the other bad guys.
That doesn't follow at all. Neither the US nor anyone else have
any /obligation/ to free /any/ country by military force. And
when they do it anyway in one or more cases, this is still better
than nothing at all.
> That is really the point. It is clear to *me* that Saddam is a
> bad guy and ought to be gotten rid of. And it is clear to
> Gearge Bush. But it is not clear to a lot of other people in
> the world (including many Iraqis) and (and this is the salient
> point) I believe THEIR OPINION MATTERS. George Bush does not
> (and has said so explicitly).
No, it doesn't. At least not so much that their disagreement is
reason enough not to fight the war. The German government, for
instance, played a strong part organizing the opposition in the
UN. Most of the politicians in our government are former sixties
radicals. During their whole life they have /hated/ the US and
been against /every single thing/ the US ever did! (Ironically,
all of their arguments, all of their protest forms /and/ their
Anti-Americanism were literally imported from the New Left in the
US ;-) Now I see them in political talk shows arguing Iraq isn't
dangerous at all. But I still lifely remember their faces when
these very same people gave interviews ten years ago, just when
Saddam had invaded Kuwait and was shooting rockets filled with
poison gas at Israel, and they /still/ opposed the war! One of
them, a well-known one, even claimed that Israel /deserved/ that
treatment. I don't have to tell you how disgusting and tasteless
such a statement is, especially when it comes from a German.
No. The ``opinion´´ of these people doesn't matter one bit
because it contains exactly zero information: No matter the
circumstances, they'd oppose the war in any case.
> I would actually like to see us go to war against Iraq and get
> rid of Saddam. But only with the rest of the world behind us,
> as they were in 1991. Not like this.
Yes, it would be nice if it could be done with the world behing
the US. But so far the few occasions when it was were
exceptional. You can't always wait for that to happen and do
nothing the rest of the time.
> > > What is to stop any country from launching a war against
> > > anyone that they judge to be evil?
> >
> > As has always been the case for the last few millennia:
> > Nothing but military force.
>
> Yes, that is alas what we are reverting to. The whole point of
> the U.N. was to get away from that "might makes right"
> philosophy that lead to all the bloody wars of the 20th
> century.
Exactly. Now try to remember how effective it has been in that
regard so far.
> Today we are the mighty ones. But great powers rise and great
> powers fall. What will protect us when we are no longer the
> mighty ones?
Nobody. Absolutely nobody; least of all the UN. This is
important to keep in mind.
At least not until more of the world is governed by sane,
Western-style democracies. The ``Rule of Law´´ is a Western
invention. Be careful not to expect everybody else to play by
our rules yet.
> > No, this isn't nice, but when has the world ever been a nice
> > place?
>
> Never. That is no excuse not to try to make is a nicer place.
Sometimes you can make the world a nicer place precisely by
bombing somebody. Remember when Ronald Reagan bombed Libya?
Nobody had /any/ trouble with Libya after that. I don't remember
if president Reagan asked the UN for permission but I'm pretty
sure he didn't. Still, it was the right thing to do.
> And I believe that there is a significant danger that the
> results of our actions will bring more evil than good in the
> long term.
Yes, this is precisely the question: What's more dangerous?
Removing Saddam or not removing him?
You know what? I don't know! And nobody /really/ knows. I
can't make a strong case either for or against this war because I
have absolutely no idea what's better in this case. The US
government has come to the conclusion that it is safer to remove
Saddam now. Maybe they're right, maybe they're not. All I can
say is that if they are convinced that it is the right thing to
do they should indeed go ahead and do it, with or without the UN.
And I wish them all the luck in the world.
Regards,
--
Nils Gösche
Ask not for whom the <CONTROL-G> tolls.
PGP key ID #xD26EF2A0
Greg Menke
> http://www.poetsforthewar.org/poems/russel01.shtml
So we invade & depose (and likely assassinate) a soverign ruler,
dissolve his government, and then occupy the country for the next
decade because to keep some semblance of order we have to supress the
tribal/ethnic divisions that will certainly arise? Plus we want their
oil in reparation for the cost of going in- so we're not getting out
of there anytime soon anyway.
The average Iraqi will probably benefit from our political and
economic subsidy (and the investment of whatever blood we shed in the
process)- which is certainly better than what they have now & I'm all
in favor to helping them. I just wonder how we're going to pay for
it, both monetarily and strategically. Dubya doesn't seem to have
much of an idea much less a plan for those issues. What if some of
the Iraqi citizenry resent us for occupying their country & we start
having to kill people to keep afloat the government we sponsor? Or
more likely, the local security forces that we form & authorize will
do the killing and terrorizing.
Regardless, our invasion has never been about rectifying anything.
This time its a politically inspired war with only the vaguest
relationship to national security.
Gregm
Nicholas Geovanis
> Hint: If they want oil, they'll buy it.
Buying oil is not the issue. The issue is SELLING the oil. They would
like to sell it in order to acquire the profits. Oil is no good to you if
it stays underground.
> If you still don't get it, I'll make a little prophecy:
>
> I claim the US are not going to annex any part of Iraq and they are
> not going to declare any oil well in Iraq to be property of the US
> government.
Of course not, that isn't how America's upper-class does things. They will
install a government which gives American and British firms preferential
treatment and, more importantly, does NOT give French, German and Russian
firms the same treatment. They will also negotiate pricing agreements that
are favorable to US and British firms. This is precisely what was done in
Iran in 1953 when the Mossadegh government was overthrown and the Pahlevi
family installed as the new ruling dynasty.
> Nils Gösche
* Nick Geovanis
| IT Computing Svcs
| Northwestern Univ
| n-geo...@nwu.edu
+------------------->
Mario S. Mommer
> Pascal Costanza <cost...@web.de> writes:
> > I can't imagine that George W. has asked any of those concernced
> > what they want. It's obvious that he wanted the war from the very
> > beginning, and that he wasn't interested in peace in that
> > region. His only interest is to gain control over the oil
> > fields. That's extremely disgusting!
>
> *ROFL* Yeah, right. It's the oil fields.
>
> not even worth being discussed. Even our leftist government didn't
> use it, probably because they feared it would make them look all too
> stupid, even through our biased media. Just think about it for a
> moment (which you should have done the first time you read it in,
>
> Hint: If they want oil, they'll buy it.
Yes and no. I don't think this argument is all that ridiculous. Does
OPEC ring a bell?
If the Americans help to establish a government in Iraq that does not
respect OPEC quotas then oil price will be down by a significant
factor, probably for a long time. I think that is one of the
objectives.
It is possible for the american government to impose an ideological
framework that would have as a consequence a "free trade" approach to
this resource.
It is not necessary to claim oil fields as "american property" (how
primitive) to actually control them in a weak sense, as a
mathematician might say.
I hope the best for the Iraqui people. Overthrowing Saddam is
something that should have been done in '91.
Mario.
Nicholas Geovanis
> Michael Parker wrote:
> >
> > Was it even true the last time? Most of the people I've heard making
> > this claim were claiming last time that we must have done something to
> > deserve it, the claimed reasons being kyoto, missile ban, etc.
>
> then they could have given much better reasons. the main reason for the
> frustration that so many (ordinary) people in the middle east feel with the
> US is caused by the fact that the US has supported and continues to support
> a series of oppressive undemocratic regimes in the region: egypt, jordan,
> saudi-arabia and other regimes on the arabian peninsula, israel, to a
> lesser extent morocco. and in the past also the shah of persia, nowadays
> iran.
You forgot a very important opressive, non-democratic regime which the US
supported for many years: Iraq under Saddam Hussein. The US supported him
with weaponry and hundreds-of-millions of dollars of subsidies while he
was at war with Iran and afterwards.
The National Security Archive at GWU has video footage of "special envoy"
Donald Rumsfeld, now Sec. of Defense, visiting with Saddam Hussein at the
end of 1983 (Windows Media format, .wmv. Scroll down below the picture
of Hussein and Rumsfeld shaking hands for the links to video). The meeting
being taped took place the day after American newspapers first reported
Iraqi use of chemical weapons against Iran and against its own Kurdish
population. At the same website you'll find dozens of declassified
documents showing how the Reagan and Bush-1 administrations got weapons
and money to Iraq, how they covered-up their activities, and how they
forced other US government agencies to cooperate. The documents were
obtained by Freedom Of Information Act request from the US government.
URL is...
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/index.htm
> Joost Kremers http://baserv.uci.kun.nl/~jkremers
Nils Goesche
> On 19 Mar 2003, Nils Goesche wrote:
>
> > Hint: If they want oil, they'll buy it.
>
> Buying oil is not the issue. The issue is SELLING the oil. They
> would like to sell it in order to acquire the profits. Oil is
> no good to you if it stays underground.
Oh yeah. How could I forget.
> > If you still don't get it, I'll make a little prophecy:
> >
> > I claim the US are not going to annex any part of Iraq and
> > they are not going to declare any oil well in Iraq to be
> > property of the US government.
>
> Of course not, that isn't how America's upper-class does
> things.
Only that the party that is usually favored by the upper-class in
America doesn't rule the White House right now.
> They will install a government which gives American and British
> firms preferential treatment and, more importantly, does NOT
> give French, German and Russian firms the same treatment. They
> will also negotiate pricing agreements that are favorable to US
> and British firms.
Ok. Let's just assume for a moment that no such thing is going
to happen. Will you change any of your opinions then? Don't
answer -- Maybe I'll ask you again after the war ;-)
Regards,
--
Nils Gösche
Nicholas Geovanis
> Thank you for your forbearance on this decidedly off-topic post. When
> the bombs start to fly I wanted everyone to know that they do so
> without the consent of this American.
Agree 100%. See my post later in this thread directing you to declassified
US documents online showing the US government's longtime support of the
"evil dictator" Saddam Hussein, as well as video of Rumsfeld meeting with
Saddam in 1983. Hope you're in touch with your local anti-war groups. If
not, write me and I'll get you info. My hope is that this is a short war
with few casualties, but in the worst case it could be quite bad for all
concerned, so don't feel that starting now is too late. There will be many
more wars to come.
> Erann Gat
John M. Adams
> Just about everything Geroge Bush has done since before he came to
> office has made me ashamed to call myself an American. No President
> has ever shown more contempt for the bedrock principle of Democracy,
> which is that what other people think matters. George Bush has
> repeatedly demonstrated (and even explicitly stated) that he doesn't
> give a damn what anyone else thinks. He is a dictator who dons the
> trappings of Democracy but does not embrace its substance. When he
> launches his war against Iraq he will be in my mind little different
> from Osama bin Laden. The next time terrorists strike the United
> States it will no longer be true that we did nothing to deserve it.
As an American, I agree that the war is a bad idea. But I am not
really clear on the basis for your statements about dictatorship and
the `bedrock of democracy'.
Given the world climate, especially our deeply regrettable relations
with the Arab world, I think this is one of those times where we
should step aside and let the bad thing (Iraq sponsored terrorism)
happen if it is going to happen. I don't care too much what France
and Germany think on this particular subject. But if the Arab leaders
don't want it, or if they are unwilling to say publicly that they want
it, then I think we should refrain.
Nevertheless, we elect people to exercise their judgment, not to be
poll takers of public/world opinion. I don't have any reason to
believe that Bush is doing other than what he thinks is right. It
seems to me that he has *much* more to lose than to gain by doing
this. I would guess that he knows this himself. The last thing any
nation needs is a leader that doesn't act unless a comfortable global
majority will go along.
I don't think people are sufficiently sensible that we are lucky that
*anyone* is willing to be President or Secretary of State (or Prime
Minister, Chancellor, ...) It is a huge, burdensome, impossibly
complex endeavor in which almost anything you do is sure to anger some
faction at home or abroad. The complexity one faces guarantees plenty
of mistakes. Most of us would prove decidedly inadequate in these
roles. I wish more people would think about this before bringing
forth harsh criticism against leaders (American or otherwise).
Surely, Americans have done many shameful, stupid and mean things.
Unfortunately, its a safe bet that many shameful, stupid and mean
things are going on all the time all over the globe and in every
country. This is the condition of humanity, not a peculiar property
of American government. The only way I know of to improve things is
to polish my own plate of tarnished silver.
--
John Michael Adams
Mario S. Mommer
> > He is a dictator who dons the
> > trappings of Democracy but does not embrace its substance.
>
> You're really out on a limb here -- what exactly makes him a dictator?
> A handful of people claiming so does not make it true.
That reminds me of my holidays in Venezuela: "Chavez is a dictator, a
fascist, repressive S.O.B", they used to say, using their freedom of
expression. What an oximoron.
If Bush was a Dictator, nobody would dare to say it.
Saddam Hussein is a REAL dictator.
> > The next time terrorists strike the United
> > States it will no longer be true that we did nothing to deserve it.
>
> Was it even true the last time? Most of the people I've heard making
> this claim were claiming last time that we must have done something to
> deserve it, the claimed reasons being kyoto, missile ban, etc.
11th of September 1973, Pinochet overthrows an elected government,
that of Salvador Allende, and installs an ugly facist dictatorship
that claims many more victims than the attack on the twin towers. With
substantial help of the CIA, one might add. And it is only one
example.
I want to add that I think the attack on the twin towers was a monstrous
crime. Nothing could possibly justify it.
> What has *ever* kept any country from launching a war? This is nothing
> new -- the U.S. didn't suddenly pull the concept of war out of a hat.
Well, wars are expensive, and might go wrong. Or might be hopeless,
anyway. Smart bombs, nor anything else, would help in Colombia, for
instance.
Mario.
Michael Parker
<Pine.SOL.4.10.103031...@merle.it.northwestern.edu>,
Nicholas Geovanis <nic...@merle.it.northwestern.edu> wrote:
> You forgot a very important opressive, non-democratic regime which the US
> supported for many years: Iraq under Saddam Hussein. The US supported him
> with weaponry and hundreds-of-millions of dollars of subsidies while he
> was at war with Iran and afterwards.
But does this not increase our responsibility to remove him?
Marco Antoniotti
Michael Parker wrote:
So your point is that you want your cake and eat it too?
Cheers
--
Marco Antoniotti
Marc Spitzer
> In article <lyk7ev5...@cartan.de>, Nils Goesche <car...@cartan.de> wrote:
>
> > g...@flownet.com (Erann Gat) writes:
> >
> > > Just about everything Geroge Bush has done since before he came to
> > > office has made me ashamed to call myself an American. No President
> > > has ever shown more contempt for the bedrock principle of Democracy,
> > > which is that what other people think matters. George Bush has
> > > repeatedly demonstrated (and even explicitly stated) that he doesn't
> > > give a damn what anyone else thinks. He is a dictator who dons the
> > > trappings of Democracy but does not embrace its substance. When he
> > > launches his war against Iraq he will be in my mind little different
> > > from Osama bin Laden. The next time terrorists strike the United
> > > States it will no longer be true that we did nothing to deserve it.
> >
> > Oh /come on/! The senate voted 77-23, the House 296-133 to authorize
> > the president to attack Iraq. This means that even most of the
> > Democrats voted for it. You can hardly call it dictatorial behavior
> > if the president does what he has been authorized to do by the
> > democratic institutions.
>
> Like I said, he dons the trappings of democracy when they suit him. Then
> he discards then when they do not. He invokes the authority of UN
> resolution 1441 as justification for war *now* despite the fact that it is
> clear that the Security Council does *not* support war *now*.
As far as I know the UN has no sovereignty over the US so its resolutions
are not binding. This is not democracy, it is a debating club.
>
> One can only speculate what Bush might have done had Congress and the UN
> not voted his way, but we can abserve his behavior in other cases where
> democratic instutions have opposed him. For example, he has used the
Well you seem to need some remedial civics courses if you are saying that
the UN has the same binding powers as the Congress of the United States.
> power of the Federal government to nullify voter-approved initiatives in
> Oregon (doctor-assisted suicide) and California (medical marijuana). He
I seem to remember another President who used the Army to enforce the
integration of schools in the south, Eisenhower if I remember correctly.
Was he also a dictator in sheep's cloths?
> has fought for the power to detain people indefinitely without trial or
> access to counsel if they are "enemy combatants", but he gets to decide
> who is and is not an