Open Comment Thread (2014-12)
There are some weaknesses to my Open Line Post feature which I started recently to accommodate anything "off-topic". The comments aren't individually linkable and there can't be any label tags, and these cripple the usefulness of such a comment thread.
So here's my solution. I'm going to put up a new post for Open Comments on the first of every month. All the other Open Comment Threads will remain accessible, but the current one will be linked to the picture in the right side-bar. This is the first one—have at it!
Next year, who is going to see the Holy Father in Philadelphia ? Jonathan Carpenter
ReplyDeleteI am just waiting the guy out. Not worth the bus fare.
DeleteCongrats to Russ Saltzman, who has joined the Catholic Church!
ReplyDeleteSomehow he resisted the temptation to join ROCOR with Rod...LOL.
But in spite of all temptations
To do Orthodox prostrations,
He remains a Cath-o-lic.
He remai-ai-ai-ai-ai-ai-ains a Cah-o-lic.
Oops, I put the hyphens in the wrong place. It should be:
ReplyDeleteHe remains a Cath-cath-cath-cath-cath-cath-cath-cath-cath-o-lic.
Good news. I don't know much about Saltzman's work except that he writes for First Things.
ReplyDeleteWords have meanings. Or at least they ought to:
ReplyDeleteTorture is a concept way out on the edges of cruelty and evil. It is not merely making a person uncomfortable. Torture causes screaming, mind-destroying agony. It is not merely scaring or even terrifying a person. It is not humiliation, nor is it mere confinement. Nor is it the same as irritation, or annoyance, or frustration. It’s not merely causing distress or anxiety. Torture leaves physical scars – twisted limbs, missing fingernails, missing fingers, toes, eyes, tongues. It drives people permanently mad. To torture is to cause maximum pain while still keeping the victim alive, and has been used throughout human history to extract information, to effect revenge, to punish in such a way as to scare others out of committing the same crime – Braveheart comes to mind.
To think that pouring water on a prisoner reaches that level is to demonstrate a complete lack of knowledge about what man is capable of doing to his fellow man. It is ignorance of history. When the CIA water boarded Khalid Sheikh Mohammed they followed strict guidelines allowing breaks every few seconds; they had doctors and minders and interpreters in the room with him. There were strict limits. With torture there are no limits.
RTWT, as they say.
Rank sophistry in the service of grave evil.
DeleteFrom the prior post where we went back and forth on this, the problem I had was that the term "torture" was being thrown around loosely. And because it is a word like "racism" (or, if I were a wise guy, "in the service of grave evil"), it permits no further discussion.
DeleteWhich, for the TAC/Dreher crowd, is exactly the purpose. Their problem was with the war on terror to begin with -- in the service of which not even the playing of loud music would be justified because the cause was unjustified. But this argument-by-proxy allows them to put the defenders of the war on terror in the role of defending "torture!" -- when the argument is instead about how to address Islamic terrorism.
Calling waterboarding "pouring water on a prisoner" is a moral or intellectual failure. It is an offense against the truth, and anyone who commits it is a liar or an idiot.
DeleteWaterboarding was easily recognized as torture when it was committed by those savage Spaniards, and by those savage Filipinos, and by those savage Japanese, and by those savage Germans, and by those savage French, and by those savage Vietnamese, and by those savage Cambodians, and by those savage South Africans. It was even easily recognized as torture when it was committed by savage Americans acting contrary to orders.
Somehow, it's only people who feel they personally benefit from it, and who don't think of themselves as favoring torture, who can't see that waterboarding is torture.
Calling waterboarding "pouring water on a prisoner" is a moral or intellectual failure. It is an offense against the truth, and anyone who commits it is a liar or an idiot.
DeleteI'm not insensitive to the offenses against your sensibilities, Tom, but there are several problems you've chosen to straddle here that by doing so you're going to have to resolve.
First is that most of the EITs being discussed, especially waterboarding, were deemed legal and not torture by not only the Bush administration but also by the Obama administration which has publicly declined to pursue any of the personnel involved.
But, fine, you're interested in the moral ramifications - but of what, exactly? The word torture? What Rod Dreher meant when he claimed to have been tortured? Because by indiscriminately lumping together across all the examples you gave techniques specific to each you are almost certainly unfamiliar with the best you're left with is the common terminology.
But, fine, still; you've assumed moral jurisdiction over U. S. waterboarding, whether or not that is the same "torture" practiced by the Japanese, etc.
Is that morality absolute, or does it cover a spectrum of relative moralnesses, such that waterboarding KSM is very immoral while slapping him impudently with an evening glove is only a little immoral? Once you lay moral claim to real estate such as EITs, Tom, you own all of it and, if you are to be credible, you have to render consistent decisions from your moral/torture touchstone across the whole of it. You can't just capriciously pick one thing, declare that it's immoral torture, and then walk away, no longer interested, and order a burger.
By contrast, the legal definitions of torture, again, which were found by both Bush and Obama not to have been breached, do have going for them a fairly finely grained statement of principles by which the spectrum of proposed EITs was parsed before the fact of being used.
If you want to supersede those guidelines, it seems to me that you're going to have to do at least the same degree of IRL parsing - saying which of each possible specific behaviors by man against his fellow man is immoral torture, and why, and which is not, and why. Otherwise, it seems to me, your left in a condition of only being, to twist a slang term, wordhurt.
Keith, that's finely spun horseshit, Keith. Though if you believe it, Keith, then you either think adultery is moral, or you own all of the spectrum of physical acts between a married person and someone they're not married to, from looking at them through hugging and on up to running away with them. Or you apply your "own it all" rule capriciously.
DeleteInstead of a silly invocation of sorites, why not offer an actual defense of the morality of waterboarding? Or are you seriously suggesting that whatever the executive branch declares to be legal is therefore moral?
Here is some serious inside baseball to close the year out. I spent a lot of time on my review of The Little Way of Ruthie Leming, and I've been satisfied with how many people have deemed it helpful. Recently some liberals over here mentioned my review positively, and seemingly some of them went over and up-voted it. Diane, I think, pointed out this link at the time, and around November 30 I went to the Amazon book page and noticed that my review had claimed the tippy top spot under Most Helpful Customer Reviews.
ReplyDeleteThat put me in a jovial mood, so I pulled out the calculator. Looking at my rating sentence "65 of 73 people found the following review helpful", I noted that 65/73 was around 89% as opposed to the top positive customer review 55/62 = 88.7%. So I was just barely ahead of Mr. Fabry's "Honest, Unfettered, Beautiful" review which thanks the author for opening his soul and delivering unto us the "ugly, beautiful truth".
A day later I noticed that my review had received two unhelpful votes which put me back into second place. Now I was at 65/75 = 86.7%. Was this merely a coincidence? I think the odds are against it. Reviews don't get too much attention comparatively after a rather mediocre-selling book has been out awhile. If I'd gotten one down-ding I think the odds might allow for coincidence. But two?
So if you want to have some end of year fun, do me a favor and go over to the honest-unfettered-beautiful review and hit it with a down-vote. Two down-votes will put my review back in the lead!
I'd asked everyone to up-vote my review as well, but I think everyone over here probably did that already.
Well, Happy New Year to all y'all and remember to party responsibly!