“One last note on whether tragedies like this get politicized or not. How many times have you heard conservatives say that we had to torture people because there might be a situation in which there is a ticking time bomb? In this case, James Holmes literally set a ticking time bomb in his booby-trapped apartment. Yet, there was no talk of torturing him, or taking away his rights, not giving him Miranda warnings, indefinitely detaining him or calling him a terrorist. Are you sure the same thing would have happened if his name was Mohamed al-Abdullah instead of James Holmes? If the shooter was Muslim, do you think you would have heard any Republicans saying “let’s not politicize this tragedy.” They would have been screaming about terrorism the minute the story hit the airwaves. In fact, they would have been so knee-deep in politicizing it that we might have invaded another Middle Eastern country by now.” – Cenk Uygur
Okay, Cenk, lemme ‘splain it to ya. When some psycho prick wipes out a movie theater because he thinks he’s Jack Nicholson in bad clown makeup, it’s not political. When some psycho prick wipes out an Army base for Allah or a group of psycho pricks fly airplanes into buildings for Allah, those are acts of terrorism. Got it, Islamofascist apologist sh!thead?
No need to thank me.
It doesn’t really matter if it would have been politicized or not. If the guy would have been muslim, the way this country is going towards always being politically correct, they would have just slapped his hand and said they want to respect his religious beliefs. Hence wanting to satisfy the muslim brotherhood.
I dont agree with this guy, because if there was any “different” method of handling middle eastern’….it would be because they themselves have worked long and hard to warrant the deserved reputation.
Its like saying “we shouldn’t jump to conclusions that Nazis are have something against the jews…”
Now, do I think that Muslims should be placed into the same category as Nazis…no not at all. But reputation is something earned….
And, Like it or not…TORTURE is what got us the location of Osma Bin Laden.
Bin Laden’s death set a dangerous precedent. It was a extra judicial execution, the US Justice Department acknowledged twice that Bin Laden had a right to trial when they indicted him for the WTC bombing, and again for 9-11. Not only that, but they also set the precedent that they can now extra-judicially execute family members of the accused who had no involvement in the suspected crimes.
It’s a precedent I can live with, and have a quiet lunch after.
Like it or not, collateral damage stops wars. People more or less shrug off the deaths of leaders, soldiers, and guerillas, because that’s what they exist for, but when the civilian populace starts getting killed, the people start demanding a change of pace.
Why am I not surprised that a LEO doesn’t have a problem with extra-judicial executions, and extra judicially executing the innocent family members of the accused.
It was an act of war, targeting an acknowledged member of the enemy’s command structure.
That OBL wasn’t a head of state and not a part of a governmental chain of command is basically irrelevant. He declared himself to be our enemy, took up arms against us, and got what he deserved.
If he wanted a trial he should have surrendered.
Matt:
Osama bin Laden and company are non state actors engaged in warfare. Prior to political correctness such people were labeled Pirates if they were on the high seas or unlawful combatants if they are on land. Do you know what the punishment for being a pirate or unlawful combatant is? It’s summary execution. A trial may be given but isn’t required. Historicially this kind of “extra judicial execution” has been the norm when dealing with such people. They have placed themselves outside the bounds of society. This where the term outlaw come from. It is different from being criminal. Criminals do not place themselves outside the bounds of civil society.
What Ralph said…times 10.
Cenk has an interesting point, as usual. What you guys hate to look at is young Mr. Holmes was one of you just two days ago. Then suddenly he became someone you disown and claim to have nothing to do with. Yet, none of you wanted to water-board him, didja?
If Holmes, a gun owner, was one of us before he went on a killing spree, does that mean any non-gun owner who goes on a killing spree is then one of you? The 9/11 hijackers? Suicide bombers? Arsonists?
Hey, give those guys credit though, at least they’re honest with their deep-rooted insanity, desire for violence, and sociopathic intent to harm others. If only gun-grabbers would be so honest.
On a side note, welcome back mikey. I missed our resident laughingstock. It was getting to be too much work responding to actual challenging dilemmas and opposition, it’s nice to relax with some fish-in-a-barrel mikey responses now and then.
Thanks mike I didn’t know that I am a 24 year old white male, with a mental disorder. Since you have informed me of that I will seek help immediately. That one was close, disaster averted.
So he has a point about prejudicially lumping people into categories, and then you turn around and lump Holmes into a group that you don’t like.
Mike, you kill me. Always good for a laugh.
Cool. Next time someone types in Holmes and water board in their search engine they’ll come to this site. More new site visitors 🙂
Mikeb, it’s been a while. I still remember fondly your last message to me.
Regarding Holmes and Uygur, this incident wasn’t politically motivated, so far as the news reports say. That’s the difference. Terrorism is the use of violence, often random, for political ends. Holmes appears to be a seriously disturbed person looking for notoriety. But since conflation is a necessary skill for control freaks, I don’t expect either of you to see the difference.
You have advocated repeatedly for mental health checks for all gun owners. What you haven’t done is explained how all 100,000,000 of us will get our appointments on the shrink’s couch. Nor have you recognized that people like Holmes are exceedingly rare. That’s evidence that a free society works. Freedom works. The numbers and the principle show that. Freedom requires courage, and it isn’t safe, but neither is the illusion of security.
oh mikey, you so funny. can i come over to your place and play? honest, i’ll behave.
Classic taqiyya on this Turk’s part. We’re all victims because that alcoholic Glenn Beck wants to waterboard us. Kind of like the old line about concentration camps every time Israel blows up some brown(er) people.
Truth is little Cenk: A lone gunman is….alone! His apartment complex was evacuated. No innocent lives were on the line. Compare to a classic “24” scenario with multiple threats and multiple actors (excuse that pun).
As to the morality of torture, I once viewed five minutes of “the young turks” and was audially molested by pretentious, smarmy, wannabees. Like a browner Bill Maher.
Aww but Maher doesn’t have a sidekick that looks like Ana.
Valiant effort, Ralph, but like always when dealing with gun-grabbers and apologists whose stance lies in emotional and mental immaturity rather than fact, logic won’t work. He’s either being contentious because that’s all he knows how to do, or he’s projecting his own deep racism and hatred.
I don’t understand why this Cenk Uygur became a US citizen. All of his “reporting” points to his hatred of the US so why not return to his birthplace, Turkey; obviously a much better country than the US from his point-of-view.
Perhaps because he can’t make the same money there, or enjoy the same lifestyle there, or maybe because his loose-cannon mouth would get him imprisoned or executed in Turkey.
Key difference is attacks by Islamic extremists aren’t an isolated and rare occurrences. The only similarities between Muslim terrorists(a world wide network) and Holmes(a single twisted individual), as far as I can see, are the blatant disregard for human life. Other than that it’s apples and oranges. Uygur is just one the of many callous opportunist buffoons trying to score political points.
While I agree that he is a terrorist, he is not on the same level as an al Qaeda nut bag. There doesn’t seem to be a reason to torture him for info. He willing gave up the bomb in his apartment. The bomb techs had the time and the know how to disarm what they found.
If you doubt he is a terrorist, look at the effect he had through out the world. In addition to the absolute terror he created in the theater, apartment buildings had to be evacuated until the bomb could be disarmed. Theaters around the country and the world were guarded by police. Bags were searched. Costumes were prohibited. Premiers were cancelled. Movie studios changed routine procedures. Political campaigns were suspended for the weekend.
We changed the way we go about life because the actions of one bat shit crazy but highly intelligent and competent individual.
After 911, some 0f those congressional members that were in the lead for water boarding were some very liberal Democrats men and women, and Republican Conservative too. I have no time for these wing-heads of any left or right or party blaming others and not admitting their own unlawful immoral actions. BTW, the bottom link might need correction.
What is the point of giving whackjobs like this any attention? Can you just STFU now?
Or at least: (for those conversant in vi or sed)
s//bunghole/g
Please?
Speaking of tying this to racism, while watching a bit of MSNBC yesterday (yeah, I know, but it was the only channel I could find that covered the chief’s live status update), I heard Ann Curry say to her cohort, “Once they get his computer, we’ll be able to see if this was racially motivated.” Seems like ever since the Martin/Zimmerman gig, NBC has to tie everything that happens in the world to some racial motivation. They fired her ass from the Today show, but she must have something on the bosses for them to keep her at NBC.
But it’s not a time bomb…
Well was it an act of terror, yes. Is there some political or ideological belief that drove him to d this, no idea. Was it racially motivated, I doubt it. It was a tragedy plain and simply. No type of gun law would have prevented this, even if he didn’t have a gun he would have used explosives or something else to cause mass destruction. He was certainly smart enough to build bombs.
Had the murdering bastard done what he was obviously capable of doing, he would have killed most eveyone in the theater with a fertilizer based bomb. Of course bags of sh*t aren’t as fun for the bed-wetters to talk about, so he did them a favor.
Well, like the old saying goes, “You are judged by the people you associate with.”