OK, the Gitmo sketch on Daily Show was just the perfect balance of insightful and surreal and wtf?
Natter 63: Life after PuppyCam
Off-topic discussion. Wanna talk about corsets, duct tape, or physics? This is the place. Detailed discussion of any current-season TV must be whitefonted.
One of my kids today commented on how Obama wants to "let all the people in Gitmo go." People really seem to think that it's Guantanamo or NOTHING, somehow, as though there's no other way to incarcerate or try people.
Not to mention, apparently so long as the people we're dealing with aren't American, American standards shouldn't have to apply (like, I don't know, due process and innocent until proven guilty). Now, I'll admit I don't know the legal details, but... that doesn't seem right to me exactly.
Our government tortured them, making it impossible to get convictions by any standard of innocent until proven guilty (presumption of innocence is an American tradition in both civilian and military courts.).
Yep. Even if they could've been convicted on evidence completely independent of the way they were treated, any trial is now impossibly tainted. Benjamin Franklin said something along the lines of "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety". The Bush administration managed to give up both.
I also like to think of the words of Thomas Jefferson, who said something to the effect that it is better that a thousand guilty people go free than a single innocent person get wrongly convicted.
I also like to think of the words of Thomas Jefferson, who said something to the effect that it is better that a thousand guilty people go free than a single innocent person get wrongly convicted.
I used that on someone once, and he said, "No, it isn't." I asked, "What if that innocent person was someone you loved?" He laughed: "That wouldn't happen." Because of coure, "decent" people wouldn't get in that kind of situation.
I'm watching You Kill Me and oh, man, Ben Kingsley? Still sexy.
What if that innocent person was you?
What if that innocent person was you?
Why, a fine upstanding citizen like himself would never find himself in such sordid circumstances as to be charged for a serious crime that he wouldn't be immediately be acquited of. And, really, such a person who couldn't prove his innocence would probably be guily of something, and probably wouldn't be a loss.
What if that innocent person was you?
Yeah, I'm white.
Yeah, I hate everybody (except you guys).