The George W. Bush Poll

I was thinking after "The Information Age" we'd see "The Decision Age"

 

If the self-proclaimed 'world's police force' were willing to step in to right injustices everywhere, and not just where they have 'interests', they'd garner far more respect.

 

Damned if you do, Damned if you don't. The public is fickle. WHy did we pull out of Somalia , soldiers got killed. I support us being a "world police force". The UN is supposed to be, but they didn't do that as they needed.

Just as my job is, you do WHAT you can, WHERE you can, WHEN you can. You can't be everywhere at once. If you would support the US being a World Police FOrce, then say "I don't care about the WMD's", "I am glad that killer Saddam is gone as are his prisons and torture chambers, etc". Now, let's ease out of there so we can liberate (insert any country run by an evil gov't). Evil is defined as any country that does not respect "what the world community" defines as basic human rights (N. Korea, Somalia-oops, no gov't there)

 

Instead, for avoidance purposes, you provide an alternate scenario. Yes, of course there are problems with determination, as in everything. Is it reasonable to say that torture of one individual will sometimes produce information that will save lives? Yes. Is it reasonable to say that torture of one individual will sometimes produce inaccurate/useless information? Yes to that one too. So do you take the chance and exclude? Hmmm....
-----------------------------------------

Well, I don't condone torture under any circumstances. The reason being that I would't be able to trust the information from an individual who had kidnapped my family or whomever anyway. How many times do we hear about kidnap victims being found alive after the ransom was paid? The reality is that we're sinking to the level of the terrorist. We're behaving almost as badly as they are and in doing that we're losing the respect of the world. No one has really explained what the heck we're doing in Iraq to begin with and we just keep making things worse.

 

I can relate to that. Unfortunately, all we can do is discuss it and there's no closure. Even elections don't bring closure... :blink:

 

There is no longer closure after an election becuase of the 24 hour news cycle. A relatively new phenomenon that is contributing to the great political divide.

 

In the situation you describe, anyone would choose torture. But so what? Your scenario could never possibly occur outside a Hollywood thriller:

1. You know that your spouse is going to be murdered (and presumably time is of the essence, because otherwise you could use less lethal methods of extracting information);
2. You know your captive possesses the information that could save your spouse;
3. You know your torture will cause death;
4. Your captive is unaware that your torture will cause death (because if he knew he were going to die anyway, there's no incentive for him to tell you anything); AND, most important,
5. You know your captive is going to tell the truth. If he lies and dies, then the next place you're going to see your spouse is on the news.

A more probable scenario is that your spouse has been kidnapped for you-know-not-what purpose, the person in your basement may or may not have relevant information, and any information he gives you may or may not be true. Most people would be a lot less willing to torture someone to death in that case.

Years ago, a retired Army intelligence officer told me why the U.S. didn't use torture. His argument wasn't moral, but economic. [Paraphrasing:] "Torture is a viable method for extracting information in a country like the Soviet Union, in which 8 percent of the people were paid to keep an eye on the other 92 percent. The problem is that people who are being tortured will tell you anything just to get you to stop. If you have the resources to check out 50 false pieces of information in order to get one piece of good intelligence, then torture may be worth the cost. But surveillance societies are tremendously inefficient - this was a major reason the Soviet Union collapsed. A free society simply can't afford torture."

 

It goes back to the age old question... if we're the police, then who polices the police?

It's pretty arrogant to think we're always in the right all the time.
And it's pretty arrogant to think we've got the end-all definition of good and evil...

You see, the problem is more subtle than just a black and white issue of good and evil...

You are very much in the modernist way of thinking. You believe that there is a clear path to progress out there in the world somewhere... call it whatever... call it "civilization"... call it "liberation" call it "spreading democracy"

The fact is that we made a decision to invade the sovereign country of Iraq because we believed in progress. Because we believed that our system of government, economy, and politics was so vastly superior to theirs that we were compelled to wage war for it.

We believe in progress... Democracy > Dictatorship... etc..

But the belief in progress is a dangerous one, that in the course of human history has caused much pain and suffering... if you have time, i urge you to look up King Leopold II of Belgium, and read about his development in the Congo...

At some point in your life, you may come to the realization that there are other ways of thought out there in the world that are very much different from your own... many times we will be collectively in a conflict with others... and that who's to say that our point of view, our value judgments are superior to others? It's not sufficient to dismiss those who would oppose you as barbarians, or insane people.

I'm no longer talking about one issue... i'm not talking about the US vs. terrorism, but on a broader scale...

I don't expect you to make this realization now, though... it's a very subtle idea, and I understand if you don't

 

While you are "talking" about this, people are being murdered and raped in Dafur. Everything isn't grey. I will GIVE you the issue that sometimes it is not black and white. But there ARE some absolutes in the world. People have the right to LIFE!!!!!!

Good people should do everything within their power to STOP the deliberate infliction of DEATH to the INNOCENTS!

And there IS good and Evil.

(sarcasm on)

Oh, thank you SO much for understanding I am just an ignorant person who has not been enlightened enough yet to see the truth. Please continue posting so that I may someday have eyes to see and ears to hear.

(Sarcasm off)

Oh, WE are the police. If GWB was truly an evil man and the US involvemet was truly evil, the PEOPLE of this country would not have re-elected him. If I didn't believe that, I would have to accept that the majority of Americans are EVIL people. EVIL people create and spread evil, IGNORANT people do not recognize evil and simply deny it exists thereby emboldening EVIL and giving it "tacit" approval(the worse they can do is call them BAD people), GOOD people fight evil incessantly.

Notice GOOD, IGNORANT, and EVIL are gender neutral, race neutral, religion neutral, etc. These 3 characteristics exist in every socio-economic grouping that you care to create.

So, if you are talking simply about GOOD and EVIL, then if you are not for me, you are against me! If you are talking about anyone or anything else.....well....it's just a matter of opinion.

 

From the Los Angeles Times:

 

Alexander Solzhenitsyn - a man who cannot be accused of being fuzzy on the conflict between good and evil - wrote in "The Gulag Archipelago":

"If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being."

 

Oh, so since I have evil within me, I have to give all evil a pass????? The difference is this...I do not ACT upon the evil within me, and I can recognize evil better than most because I ADMIT I have evil within me. And, since I can recognize it...I will work diligently to eradicate it.

You sound like an apologist. Killing and raping of innocents is EVIL. People in power and having the power to stop or influence are EVIL if they let it continue. People who defend it or apologize or ignore it are not EVIL, they are simply ignorant.

 

And you sound like someone who draws conclusions based on way too little evidence. No, I am not an apologist, and in fact I agree with most of what you've said. I simply want to point out that, in a battle between good and evil, there is a very real possibility for good to become corrupted. Lord Acton's words are a truth for the ages.

You write that killing of innocents is evil, and I agree. But we have killed thousands of innocents in Iraq as collateral damage. Does that make us evil? If not, is evil partly a matter of intent - that is, can two people commit the same deed but one is evil and one is not? If so, is it still possible that an evil act may be acceptable in service of a greater good - that there are degrees of evil? I share the truth of your values; but I think it's naive to believe that the line between good and evil can always be so sharply drawn in reality.

 

Hey, Squid, on the off-chance that I'm the one who's supposed to fall into the "tripp," do you know who Solzhenitsyn is? The heroic opponent of the Soviet system? One of the first Russian writers to speak out on what a monstrously evil system it was?

 

I never indicated that it can always be drawn sharply, but sometimes it can. Collateral damage, if you will, has ALWAYS been the tragedy of the fight against evil. I also think we cause MORE damage by trying so hard to cause less.

 

Good exchange. Gettin' down to it.

 

Are you suggesting that we could fight evil more effectively if we were willing to inflict more collateral damage - that is, kill more innocent civilians?