This is one of the 'quoting' works, that means I have
nothing to do except quote a bit and after that place some comments on the
quotes. This time it is from a column by the hand of Pat Buchanan. Pat is
some conservative kind of column writer and therefore he is at the very
hart of that what I like to attack in America, Pat is probably one of
those folks who think that what good is for America is good for the entire
world.
And of course Pat has some sharp vision about who is right and who is
wrong, who is evil and who is the holy President only defending freedom
and nothing else.
Now we quote a bit:
| The case for torture.
Can torture -- the infliction of
intolerable, even excruciating, pain to extract information from
war criminals -- ever be justified?
Civilized society has answered in the
negative. No, never. And torture is everywhere outlawed. Regimes
that resort to it deny it, lest they be judged barbarous. Routine
torture marks the regime that uses it as unworthy of rule or even
respect. And rightly so.
But that does not address the moral question, a question that has
arisen with the capture of Khalid Shaikh Muhammad. Among the
crimes to which this monster has been linked are the plot to blow
up a dozen airliners over the Pacific, the truck-bomb massacre at
the U.S. embassies in Africa, 9/11 and slashing the throat of
Daniel Pearl.
When Muhammad was seized in Pakistan,
found with him was a treasure trove for CIA and FBI investigators:
a computer, disks, tapes and cell phones with data pointing to
planned new atrocities.
Muhammad is not talking. Yet, if he can
be forced to talk, the information could save thousands. It was
said to be two weeks of torture that broke the Al Qaeda
conspirator who betrayed the plot to blow up those airliners. And
if ever there was a case for torture, this excuse for a human
being, Khalid Shaikh Muhammad, is it. |
Wow wow Pat, what a hate is emerging from your keyboard born big mouth.
Isn't it some cornerstone of the civil Western society that a person is
only suspect before being on trial? But you are convinced he is guilty and
you could be right of course, but Pat let me remind you of the following:
Long time ago I, Reinko Venema, asked via this nice website if arrested
al Queda members simply tell the truth when they are arrested (not by
giving all important stuff just away but only to try and talk some sense
into the head of one's opponents). Till so far this has been the case,
previous arrested al Queda members were rather willing to cooperate. But
my dear Pat, a lot of important information did never reach the public
because of that stupid (anti) patriot act you have around there. And may
be if I asked Muhammad he would even cooperate, but right now I wonder why
I should ask such a question. Why give you the benefit of information
while your government cannot live without this patriot act? No no, this
time not my dear Pat.
Lets quote on with your wisdom:
| Thus, the question: Would it
be moral to inflict pain on this beast to force him to reveal what
he knows? Positive law prohibits it. However, the higher law, the
moral law, the Natural Law permits it in extraordinary
circumstances such as these.
Here is the reasoning. The morality of
any act depends not only on its character, but on the
circumstances and motive. Stealing is wrong and illegal, but
stealing food for one's starving family is a moral act. Even
killing is not always wrong. If a U.S. soldier had shot Muhammad
to save 50 hostages, he would be an American hero.
But if it is permissible to take
Muhammad's life to save lives, why is it impermissible to inflict
pain on him to save lives? |
But Pat, isn't it well known that a lot of people arrested under the
new anti terror laws were send back to the country they came from only
because in those countries it would be easier to get what you want from
the arrested. Simply said; It has already happened that some shit was
beaten out of humans, and this probably goes on until this day. So your so
called 'moral dilemma' is rather out of time don't you think?
And why don't you ask your government how much all this 'rough
questioning' has brought them? It must give them some benefit (on the
short term anyway). We quote on:
| Is the deliberate infliction
of pain always immoral? Of course not. Twisting another kid's arm
to make him tell where he hid your stolen bicycle is not wrong.
Parents spank children to punish them and drive home the lessons
of living good lives. Even the caning of that American kid in
Singapore that caused a firestorm was not immoral.
Civil War doctors who amputated limbs
without anesthesia on battlefields inflicted horrible pain. Why?
For a higher good: to save the soldier's life, lest he die of
gangrene.
But if doctors can cut off limbs and open
up hearts to save lives, and cops may shoot criminals to save
lives, and the state may execute criminals, why cannot we commit a
lesser evil -- squeezing the truth out of Muhammad -- for a far
greater good: preventing the murder of innocents.
Before America had its vast prison
system, petty criminals were locked in stocks in the town square
as humiliation. Others were flogged. Barbaric, we now say. But was
flogging immoral?
Today, many believe that public caning of
young criminals, and their return to society for a second chance,
would be far better for them and us. It might be a superior
deterrent to crime than dumping them into the animal cages that
are too many of American prisons, where young offenders face
sexual abuse and are exposed to the daily example of how
incorrigible criminals succeed and fail.
Who would not prefer a thrashing that
might even put one in a hospital for a week to spending years in
such a prison?
In short, while the instant recoiling
that decent people exhibit to the idea of torturing Muhammad may
mark them as progressive, it may also be a sign of fuzzy liberal
thinking.
Many of these same folks are all for war
on Iraq. Why? To rid the Middle East of a tyrant and his weapons
of mass destruction. When John Paul II argues that, with
inspections underway, such a war does not seem necessary, or thus
moral, Ari Fleischer instructed the Holy Father that this war has
to be fought to keep Saddam from giving horrible weapons to
terrorists. |
It is fine that Ari is into some kind of position to instruct the Holy
Father, I did not know that Ari was such a good teacher. And can we not
say that the 11 Sept 2001 atrocities were some kind of torture themselves?
I remember I sometimes did describe it as 'tit torture'.
And indeed, now we are some time further down the timeline we can say that
the general economic system did get some heavy torture that day, just look
at stocks and tax declines and etc etc. The market 'proofs' America might
be on the wrong way, the very wrong way...
Lets proceed quotation:
| But if it is moral to go to
war and kill thousands to prevent potential acts of terror on U.S.
soil, why cannot we inflict pain on one man, if that would stop
imminent acts of terror on U.S. soil? There is no evidence Saddam
has murdered Americans, but there is a computer full that Muhammad
has and has hatched plots to slaughter more.
What will history say about people who
hold Harry Truman to be a moral hero for dropping atom bombs on
Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but recoil in horror from painfully
extracting the truth out of one mass murderer to stop the almost
certain slaughter of their own people? |
What a drama, what a drama. Is it wisdom to recall the atom bombs on
Japan into a writing upon the 'moral fraction' found in torture? You choose your words
very clever and you better not forget we could have some 'dual reasoning'
to that. But right now I am in a hurry to go to the shop before it is
closed.
Bye bye but do not torture to much please, America I warn you...
Greetings,
Reinko Venema. |
