Mister Bush, do feel free to use this

[gerbie]

It took a while before we learned what we did wrong. It took a big attack, in which thousands of innocent lives have been lost, before we realised that the way we are dealing with the rest of the world was wrong. I am very sorry that this has had to happen. From here there are two possible options. A third world war or a continuation of what we have been doing over the last decade, a cold war against everything we Americans considered wrong. It would make the cold war look like a fight in kindergarten. We shall take none of these options. As a true Christian, we will turn the other cheek. The only way this cycle can be stopped as by not reacting. No retaliation, no attacks on possible suspects. I shall repeat this, read my lips, NO RETALIATION.

It is time for us to admit that we had this one coming. Fifty years of interfering everywhere in the world whenever it suited us has come to a bloody final. Now we see what we have done in Korea and Vietnam. In Cuba and the Dominican Republic. In Haiti and Guatemala. In Nicaragua and Chile. In Panama and Somalia. And in dozens of other countries. Thousands of innocent Americans have become the victim of an idiot who wanted us to know what we did wrong. Until now we knew, but thought we could get away with it. We couldn't.

From now on we shall do whatever is necessary to help all those families in this tragedy. But not only the thousands who have died in the last 24 hours, but also those thousands who died in the last 50 years, because we considered our position in the world more important than the lives of individuals. The whole budget from defence will go to welfare, social benefits or third world development. We will finally pay off our billions of debt to the UN. We well recognise the UN as the true world power, the voice of the people of the world. We will do as the majority wants us to. We shall propose the abolishment of veto's for countries who happen to have too much power.

Finally I shall resign from my position as President of the United States of America. We will soon have new elections in which every vote is counted, in which democracy will really work. Until then I shall hand over the power to the senate.

Let our thoughts be with the ones who have lost their lives. Thank you for your attention, God bless America and peace on earth!

Comments

[mattrix.livejournal.com]

I appreciate your comment as you quite lucidly expressed your viewpoint.

For the USA to make good on what it seems to be saying, that they'll hunt down the baddies and not put up with nations that harbor them, we would be guilty of what bin Laden and others have claimed as grievance against the USA. Using our might to push the world around. I'm concerned about that. I am not enough of a student of recent history to see how the world sees the USA. No matter, it could be a self-fulfilling prophesy.

My problem with this is the notion of civilized and moral... on whose morality do you judge someone? On yours or on theirs? If a person is willing and able to murder, their morality must say that murder is somehow acceptable. Or, some other extenuating circumstance. If you, as society-at-large don't think so, that's fine. But it's hard to deal with if your society has a lot of people who think differently.

But, it still doesn't seem just or fair. Do human rights belong to everyone no matter how they act towards their fellow human? No matter whether they act in a way that respects other's human rights?

I am guessing that your answer is that incarceration is for those who violate this contract. But even prison seems too cushy for some of these, for lack of a better word, people.

To ask a blunt question, if any of the perpetrators of genocide were tried today in Sweden or the Netherlands or any other of the nations who deemed death-penalty "beneath them", they would be locked up for life as a sentence for the death of thousands and millions?

And as far as the US requesting other nations to try and convict those responsible for various crimes committed in the US, what's to say that that nation won't be more inhumane than the US?

Even though the US does generally consider the death-penalty cruel-and-unusual, in general it seems the justice systems here do all they can to make sure that nobody who is deemed undeserving gets it. Since there have been recent revelations of fraud in the system as evidenced by DNA techniques, then perhaps the system is fundamentally flawed.

But to say that a butcher deserves to live at the courtesy of the state, that seems a bit hard to take.

Of course, there's always the question why there's so many people who are locked up here and who do get tried for crimes that could lead to the death-penalty. That, I have no answer for.

It's not a deterrent from the looks of it... if anything, laws like California's three-strikes seem to be worse in some senses. You get people who are facing their third-strike and resist arrest like crazy since they don't want to go down for life.

[gerbie.livejournal.com]

"But, it still doesn't seem just or fair. Do human rights belong to everyone no matter how they act towards their fellow human? No matter whether they act in a way that respects other's human rights?"
Yes. Even murderers have human rights. I can only judge people based on my own morale. I think it is wrong to kill, therefore I could never live with the Death penalty, however deserving it may seem sometimes for people who behave like animals. I wouldn't want to be in the jury and send someone to death row, if there was only a hint of a chance that I might be wrong, which there always is. I wouldn't want to be the one to push the button of the chair, place the final injection. I could never sleep again if I knew someone had died because of me. However guilty he might have been. I would feel as if I'm on the same level.

"And as far as the US requesting other nations to try and convict those responsible for various crimes committed in the US, what's to say that that nation won't be more inhumane than the US?"
Also very true. It is easy to bash the US. Everybody has an opinion, there is plenty wrong, loads of people will agree. But I'd still rather be in a US court than in a court in Nigeria. Or China. Or another couple of dozen countries. But that doesn't meant the US courts are doing well. They are not. Plenty of countries have got a better legal system, that's why I started critisizing the US in the first place. (entry june 15).

[mattrix.livejournal.com]

The American legal system has a sick combination of people who have to run for office and thus have to show that they're "tough on crime" as well as judges who are tenured.

The prosecutors have to enforce laws that they don't agree with. There's a show "Law and Order" where there are two assistant DAs, one of whom is pro-death-penalty and one is against it. Makes for interesting television/drama.

The courts are inefficient and overrun with cases. There's a constant battle for middle ground where the DAs and cops try to pin a whole bunch of stuff on a perpetrator, expecting him or her to plea-bargain and get the case over with.

There's definitely the sense that having money gives you a distinct advantage over those who don't when it comes to legal representation.

There are juries in civil cases, many of which are better decided by a judge.

There are steps that are taken to keep the system honest but it slows things down.

There are those who argue that victimless crimes do not be on the books in a free society. I don't know how well this would work but it would surely help clean up the courts.

As far as human rights go, sometimes I think that certain people don't deserve them... that they should lose them. Some murder takes place under "crime of passion" or in the moment type situations. Others are well planned.

Sometimes I think that America, if the death-penalty is to be kept, should have public executions, where the condemning jury participates in the execution. The public executions would cause the public to see it as barbaric perhaps. Either we'd get rid of death penalties or at the minimum, demand that more care is taken to keep the innocent out. And, maybe it'd be a deterrent. Making the death penalty a black-box isn't good, though doing otherwise is considered cruel and unusual. Go figure.

I remember hearding people wanting Tim McVeigh to be executed so they could have closure in their lives. These were family of the victims saying this. Maybe this sort of thinking is too ingrained in most humans, at least many Americans. I'd be interested to know what percentage is in favor of dp.

Re:

[gerbie.livejournal.com]

You are right about an important problem: how can you have to vote for a jury, one can not remain impossible if you are being judged by the people. Independent judges, not political ones are the only solution.

The idea that you can actually get consolation out of the fact that the murderer of someone you loved is killed as well, goes beyond me. The concept is too weird for my mind. But I have never lost someone trough violence, through someone else's hands, so how can I judge?

I'm not even interested in the percentage in favor in the us. Call me cynical, but in the Soviet Union the communist party always scored 99.something percent as well. Did they all agree? Doubt it. Conditioning goes on from a very early age. It should be a decision by a good politician, however scarce they may be.