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Captain Beans posted:No one cares about the drone's accuracy, and no one disputes that we can't hit smaller targets. The issue is how we are deciding to mark the potential corpses for burning. And I'm saying your demands are unreasonable given the nature of the conflict. Also still waiting to hear an alternative.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:33 |
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| # ? May 23, 2013 20:08 |
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Locobono posted:Whoah, big shocker, war sucks and people die gruesomely. Can't we all just get along? Peace across the globe, etc. Lmao yes that is exactly what we are doing across the Middle-East, that's exactly it, we're over there Protecting Freedom. I guess if you actually believe that then the tortured logic that you have to employ to come to the conclusion that the only possible solutions to terrorism are encompassed by Murdering All Targets In One Manner Or Another makes sense. The alternative is literally "don't rain fire and death down on the heads of [given populace], radicalizing generations of young people in the process". Now if you mean situations that are viable in the actual, current political climate, there simply aren't any that aren't grossly reprehensible. Which should tell you something. (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:36 |
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Ambrose Burnside posted:Lmao yes that is exactly what we are doing across the Middle-East, that's exactly it, we're over there Protecting Freedom. I guess if you actually believe that then the tortured logic that you have to employ to come to the conclusion that the only possible solutions to terrorism are encompassed by Murdering All Targets In One Manner Or Another makes sense. Every time I see "lol if you believe that you must be as dumb as a box of rocks" posted without any refuting evidence, I appreciate how you could read the same words in the post of a holocaust denier or birther.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:40 |
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Locobono posted:Straw man. You can't wish away the enormous dividing line between an American going about their daily business and an American in Afghanistan fraternizing with the enemy. Who is this "Enemy"? Why is a 16 year old afghan shepherd who hasn't seen an american in his life, hasn't travelled 30 miles from the place he was born and can barely read a threat to you, a stunningly athletic, handsome, intelligent well endowed american living in a solid gold house on the other side of the planet. Why do you have to nuke him from the sky with your hi tech death kites, at least give him a stick or tell him in advance to not be born in an area you've scheduled for bombing ugh im out
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:40 |
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Mugsbaloney posted:I would love to know what kind of education system you are a product of if you think that all the people that have been killed by drone strikes are "combatants".
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:42 |
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Black Baby Goku posted:gently caress Obama Pretty much this. He is as much of a fascist thug as Bush was, he has even kept Guantanimo open and it's occupants in a Kafkaesque black hole. Three-Phase posted:This is really not something I expected from the Obama administration. That's because you're not paying attention.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:42 |
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Locobono posted:Meanwhile in the real world the U.S. Government, tasked with the thankless job of protecting you from another domestic attack, applies all of it's resources to satisfying everyone. Locobono posted:Tell me how we can stop them from blowing up buildings and subways in a neat, clean fashion. Wikipedia posted:Blowback is unintended consequences of a covert operation that are suffered by the civil population of the aggressor government. To the civilians suffering the blowback of covert operations, the effect typically manifests itself as “random” acts of political violence without a discernible, direct cause; because the public—in whose name the intelligence agency acted—are ignorant of the effected secret attacks that provoked revenge (counter-attack) against them.[1]
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:45 |
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Locobono posted:Straw man. You can't wish away the enormous dividing line between an American going about their daily business and an American in Afghanistan fraternizing with the enemy. The thing is, the effect of the executive branche's legal reasoning on this matter is that a sufficiently high-ranking member of the military can wish away that dividing line. This is the kind of Orwellian twisting language present in the whitepaper you're defending: quote:The condition that an operational leader present an ‘imminent’ threat of violent attack against the United States does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on U.S. persons and interests will take place in the immediate future.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:47 |
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You people just don't like war. That's cool, war isn't for everyone. Some people are more in to fashion, stamp collecting, or Lego. We all have our things and that's what makes us unique and beautiful. Man, if we would have had to drag Osama back here for a long rear end trial just because it had turned out he was born in Hawaii I'd be gruff!
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:47 |
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Locobono posted:Every time I see "lol if you believe that you must be as dumb as a box of rocks" posted without any refuting evidence, I appreciate how you could read the same words in the post of a holocaust denier or birther. This is like saying "how could America be imperialist, it isn't even an EMPIRE, it's a REPUBLIC, lemme see your citations". How do I cite "America has an incredibly long history of doing illegal and reprehensible things, both domestically and abroad, in its own base self-interest, which has no actual bearing on national ideology" to you, exactly? Throw a dozen book suggestions at you that you won't actually read? Any effective addressing of this point would be a massive undertaking, which you, Random Internet Person, are asking of me, a person you do not know and do not care about. Are you not surprised that nobody has given you a hand-holding American Imperialism 101 personal lecture?
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:47 |
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Locobono posted:Straw man. You can't wish away the enormous dividing line between an American going about their daily business and an American in Afghanistan fraternizing with the enemy. You naively assume this only happens to active, proven terrorists, and that the US government in its infinite wisdom could never ever do anything bad with this basically limitless power you seem to be ok with them wielding. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/08/o...-nightmare.html Read that. This guy wasn't some AK-47 waving lunatic palling around with his Taliban buddies on the mean streets of Kandahar, this was just some poor bastard working for a humanitarian organization in Bosnia. He got to rot in gitmo for 7 years because the powers that be decided he was possibly maybe perhaps in some way linked to a terrorist possibly. No evidence, no trial, seven years. Today, he probably just would've been offed instead of imprisoned. I mean, there was a baseless suspicion after all, and that's really all you need according to you (and the Obama administration apparently). There's no strawman here, just facts. If you're ok with murdering on the basis of mere suspicion, then you have to justify why wiretapping, surveillance, search + seizure, imprisonment, and torture on the basis of mere suspicion aren't ok too.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:48 |
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Cardiovorax posted:Eastern Germany. I'll be the first to admit that our educational system wasn't very nuanced, but on the other hand it taught me the value of a government actually sticking to it's obs... goddamn, I keep forgetting that word... it's supposed values, anyway. I've personally met people who were "disappeared" by the Stasi. Some returned. Some never did. If you think that this sort of right is something that your government ought to have, you really need to get your head examined. It really isn't. It's horrible beyond words. It will be abused. Everybody who's making light of this is out of their mind and frankly delusional. That's what I'm saying, as someone who experiences the consequences of that kind of policy first-hand. Im not making light of this. This is bad news. However what is also bad news is that the US can already do this to random sheperds. It is bad news that a massive controversy ONLY COMES INTO EXISTENCE when the US chooses to extend its right to murder at will to cover its own people as well as everybody else. Boohoo now I can be murdered as well! Before it was just bads in other countries that had it coming but now it could be me!
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:49 |
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ZLogic posted:Colossal, unfounded assumption bolded. Nice idea, and I'm behind it 100%, but how does the current administration revert fifty years of political infighting and injustice? Obama's responsibility first and foremost is keeping Americans alive. The drone program is the sour pill that, in mine and many analysts' opinion, does this with the least amount of collateral damage possible. Obama gets slammed for this. On the other front, he get's slammed for his "worldwide apology tour" for trying to make inroads in regions where we've been unpopular. He also gets slammed for even imagined lessening of our overt support of Israel, the key policy that sticks in most of the Arab world's craw. The guy can't win, but I give him credit for at least admitting it's a poo poo sandwich.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:52 |
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Mugsbaloney posted:Im not making light of this. This is bad news. However what is also bad news is that the US can already do this to random sheperds. It is bad news that a massive controversy ONLY COMES INTO EXISTENCE when the US chooses to extend its right to murder at will to cover its own people as well as everybody else. Yeah, the US Citizen thing only matters to liberals who sideline morality for legalism, although it -is- a helpful and prominent reminder of just how little interest the American government has in public adherence to its own laws.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:53 |
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sentientcarbon posted:You naively assume this only happens to active, proven terrorists, and that the US government in its infinite wisdom could never ever do anything bad with this basically limitless power you seem to be ok with them wielding. Equating my support for drone warfare with support for any other government action, especially internment, is again another straw man.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:53 |
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Locobono posted:Straw man. You can't wish away the enormous dividing line between an American going about their daily business and an American in Afghanistan fraternizing with the enemy. ^^ this. I'm also curious as to how many of you arguing against this have actually read the document. It's hardly the give Obama the keys to murdering everyone in their sleep that you're busy painting it as.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:54 |
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Locobono posted:Obama's responsibility first and foremost is keeping Americans alive. Dude, I was really looking for a telepath. Thank's for coming here and reading Obama's mind for us! We all know how our leaders have been living up to their responbility. Strong historical precedent, too.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:54 |
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Flarestar posted:^^ this. The loving memo posted:The condition that an operational leader present an ‘imminent’ threat of violent attack against the United States does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on U.S. persons and interests will take place in the immediate future. Guys
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:56 |
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Locobono posted:Nice idea, and I'm behind it 100%, but how does the current administration revert fifty years of political infighting and injustice? Obama's responsibility first and foremost is keeping Americans alive. The current administration has no interest in reverting anything, a simple reading of policy changes should make it clear that Obama is only accelerating conservative trends implemented by Bush, regardless of the lil D that used to hang out next to his name. And that's clearly not his responsibility, not in any actual universe anybody lives in. If it were, single-payer would have become a reality and economic policies literally directly killing poor people (say, him nixing the subsidy for heating fuel for poor people above the snowline) wouldn't be pursued. Obama's agenda is the same as every other president's, rewarding the people who put him in power via policy.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 20:59 |
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Flarestar posted:^^ this. Because in the absence of anything to actually be afraid of (since, unless I'm woefully mistaken, most of us here aren't going to do anything that makes us look like a senior member of a terrorist organization), it's required to invent it.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:01 |
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Locobono posted:Equating my support for drone warfare with support for any other government action, especially internment, is again another straw man. Oh for gently caress's sake. I don't have a problem with drones. Not one drat person in this whole drat thread has a problem with drones in and of themselves. The problem we have is that executive powers have been expanded to the point that high-ranking officials can legally use drones as their personal robotic hitmen to murder whoever they want, whenever they want, with no scrutiny or oversight whatsoever. That's the loving problem.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:06 |
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This is obviously reverse psychology against republicans and ensures that all torture will soon be stopped along with banning all firearms.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:06 |
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This is really terrible. So Bush had detention/torture without due process, but Obama takes it to the next level of execution without any kind of due process. I really have trouble understanding how anyone could support this deliberate violation of the fifth amendment.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:07 |
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Ambrose Burnside posted:The current administration has no interest in reverting anything, a simple reading of policy changes should make it clear that Obama is only accelerating conservative trends implemented by Bush, regardless of the lil D that used to hang out next to his name. So his failure to ramrod controversial legislation through congress is clear evidence of his disregard for American lives, and human life in general? This sounds like the kind of bullshit we had to endure during the political debates. Tell me about the "actual universe" without silly appeals to fabricated circumstance.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:07 |
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The ability to arrest and execute citizens without a trial is some really corrupt poo poo and as a result I will have to join the tea party and ironically call obama a kenyan muslim nazi communist in public to prove my loyalty to this country in order to avoid suspicion. Thanks obama.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:08 |
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Space Hamlet posted:Guys The loving memo also posted posted:Here the Department of Justice concludes only that where the following three conditions are met, a U.S. operation using lethal force in a foreign country against a U.S. citizen who is a senior operational leader of al-Qa'ida or an associated force would be lawful: (1) an informed, high-level official of the U.S. government has determined that the target individually poses an imminent threat of violent attack against the United States; (2) capture is infeasible, and the United States continues to monitor whether the capture becomes feasible; and (3) the operation would be conducted in a manner consistent with applicable law of war principles. You also might consider reading the sections of the document immediately following what you quoted, as it explains a bit more clearly what your quote means - basically that the US Government doesn't have to wait for the bullet to actually be en route to shoot the guy aiming the rifle. That document is far from unreasonable, when you actually read it and take the time to understand what it's saying, instead of just frothing at the mouth and screaming about dictatorial states.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:09 |
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sentientcarbon posted:Oh for gently caress's sake. I guess if you frame it in the most negative tones possible. The flip side is that it's an incredible focusing of the president's war powers. He only has as much leash as congress gives him, given that they approve his budget for every action he takes. And why would he stop? The majority of Americans support the drone war.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:13 |
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Mugsbaloney posted:Im not making light of this. This is bad news. However what is also bad news is that the US can already do this to random sheperds. It is bad news that a massive controversy ONLY COMES INTO EXISTENCE when the US chooses to extend its right to murder at will to cover its own people as well as everybody else. Plenty of us are just as horrified that this has been occurring in other countries. Most people are focusing on the 'killing US citizens' because it is the most recent development of our assassination program. Of course there are enough people who don't care as long as it's just the 'other' people far away that we bomb.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:15 |
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Flarestar posted:You also might consider reading the sections of the document immediately following what you quoted, as it explains a bit more clearly what your quote means - basically that the US Government doesn't have to wait for the bullet to actually be en route to shoot the guy aiming the rifle. What you've quoted there opens the document, and it does sound reassuring at first, but the body of it goes on to make those criteria all but meaningless, such as with the quote I provided. It allows all those criteria to be dangerously vague and open-ended. Edit: You really don't think anything's fishy when the document explicitly takes a moment to define "immediate" as "not necessarily immediate or even specific?" Space Hamlet fucked around with this message at Feb 6, 2013 around 21:21 |
| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:18 |
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ZLogic posted:One primary way is to reduce the blowback our globe-wide interventionism causes. Namely by reducing unnecessary globalist interventionism. Mind our own business instead of being the pelvis-thrusting policemen of the world. Lead by example (we have a LOT to improve on first), rather than by sacrificing all freedom for illusory security and spying on/bombing ourselves & others.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:26 |
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Omi-Polari posted:The irony is that the drone strikes are precisely how the U.S. is reducing "unnecessary globalist interventionism." It's come about as the alternative to fighting more land wars. Ambrose Burnside posted:A reduction from 50 units of barbarism to 45 isn't exactly a glowing accolade. Omi-Polari posted:Also... what's "globalist"? Wikipedia posted:Globalism can have at least two different and opposing meanings. One meaning is the attitude or policy of placing the interests of the entire world above those of individual nations.[1] Another is viewing the entire world as a proper sphere for one nation to project political influence.[2]
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:30 |
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Don't worry, Obama. Rest assured, 90% of this forum would write in your name for a third term because gay marriage - no matter how long you postpone the right of habeus corpus or continue executive abuses of power  .
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:30 |
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Captain Beans posted:Plenty of us are just as horrified that this has been occurring in other countries. Most people are focusing on the 'killing US citizens' because it is the most recent development of our assassination program. I think the reason why people don't care is because most people would consider being a drone-attack-qualifying person to be pretty damned Othering, even if that person was a US citizen.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:34 |
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D. Eisenhower posted:Don't worry, Obama. Rest assured, 90% of this forum would write in your name for a third term because gay marriage - no matter how long you postpone the right of habeus corpus or continue executive abuses of power A better alternative candidate would have been
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:37 |
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Sperg Some More posted:A better alternative candidate would have been 
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:40 |
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The Bible posted:Or hell, let's just get out of that region already. They clearly don't want us there, and we have no business being there. That way we'll save soldiers' lives and the lives of our "enemies". It's not like we just have to be invading a country at any given time. Pretty sure in most cases, the guys running a country that attack another country usually don't want to be invaded by the guys they attacked in the first place. You forgot.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:42 |
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chemosh6969 posted:forgot. "Our bombings are justified because guys in charge usually don't want to be invaded by people they attack!!" 
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:50 |
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Ron Paul would kill just as many people abroad, he'd just use mercenaries instead of US military and writs of assistance.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:56 |
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Dusseldorf posted:Ron Paul would kill just as many people abroad, he'd just use mercenaries instead of US military. You have no idea what Ron Paul would do, but at least that explains your willingness to tell everyone about what Ron Paul would do.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2013 21:58 |
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| # ? May 23, 2013 20:08 |
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I was reading the first page and I thought, if only we didn't have the dumb drug war, then I would be cool with the police having drones. It could really help them protect people from legitimate violent crime and vandalism, help find lost individuals, help find escaped or running dangerous individuals. It's just a shame that we can't trust our own law enforcement. That's sorta off topic though. Also, talk about your slippy slope. 1.) NORML bombs DEA. (cough, it wasn't really them and/or it was fanatics that do not truly represent them) 2.) Government labels NORML terrorists. 3.) Government can now do whatever it wants including "just kill everybody". I'm no fan of conspiracy, but can't help but feel this standard gives the government power to basically dispose of anybody who disagrees with them. Divine Disclaimer fucked around with this message at Feb 6, 2013 around 22:22 |
| # ? Feb 6, 2013 22:13 |
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