Chris Wallace Shows Us All that Slippery Slope

[paft.livejournal.com]

Chris Wallace on Fox News:

I’m not asking why it was okay to shoot Osama bin Laden…What I am second-guess is, if that’s okay, why can’t you do waterboarding, why can’t you do enhanced interrogation…

So now the argument is that if we’re going to shoot people, we might as well torture them. Apparently Wallace can’t see the difference between shooting someone in a firefight and systematically torturing a naked, bound prisoner. This moral difference is one that has been recognized for decades in the civilized world – people who waterboarded captured combatants in the past have been tried and convicted for it -- but apparently it’s lost on him.

This is why some of us have reservations about targeted assassinations without trials, even targeted assassinations against someone like bin Laden. It’s not because we feel sorry for bin Laden. It’s because of people like Wallace. Give them in inch in that direction, and they'll clamor for a mile the next day. Remove one human rights barrier, and it doesn’t matter how many assurances you get about it only being this once, about it only being done in very specific circumstances, about it never, EVER being abused… A day later the Chris Wallaces of the world will point to where the barrier once stood, assert out there's no barrier anymore, and ask why we all don't go just a little further.

Honest. Just this once! Just a few inches! Cross their hearts and hope to die...

Crossposted from Thoughtcrimes

Comments

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

lol

We've seen how interested US courts are in dealing with the illegalities of their government and they refuse to recognise the jurisdiction of any international courts. The thought that the US government is beholden by the rule of law is pretty laughable.

[whoasksfinds.livejournal.com]

they refuse to recognise the jurisdiction of any international courts

thank God.

[paft.livejournal.com]

Why are you thankful for this?

[whoasksfinds.livejournal.com]

i like being sovereign.

[paft.livejournal.com]

But you don't think other countries should be. Right.

[whoasksfinds.livejournal.com]

i think all democracies should be.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

Pakistan isn't a democracy?

[whoasksfinds.livejournal.com]

part of sovereignty is having the right to self defense. it would be nice if the pakistani intelligence services were trustworthy enough to capture bin laden themselves, but that just wasn't the case. (http://abcnews.go.com/International/osama-bin-laden-aided-rogue-elements-pakistani-intelligence/story?id=13555983)

[geezer-also.livejournal.com]

The fact that they have a vote makes them a democracy?

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Technically speaking it's never been a democracy, the whole secession of Bangladesh with a genocide tolerated, no more accurately phrase encouraged by the USA illustrated that point blatantly. Pakistan's seen a succession of military and hereditary dictatorships and has already collapsed once. Its refusal to admit it hid Bin Laden is plausible deniability.

[paft.livejournal.com]

But if they don't fit your definition of "democracy," we should be able to do whatever we want with them. Right.

[whoasksfinds.livejournal.com]

dictatorships have forfeited their sovereignty, yes.

[paft.livejournal.com]

So you figure we should only respect the sovereignty of countries we like?

[whoasksfinds.livejournal.com]

only those countries that are actually sovereign. dictatorships are not entitled to sovereignty over there own people.

[paft.livejournal.com]

How would you define a "dictatorship?"

[udoswald.livejournal.com]

Unless they can prove he tried to surrender, there's no reason for the international courts to get involved. Do you have proof he tried to surrender because his own words suggest he didn't.