re: #231 Obdicut

Who is the ‘we’ that knows so certainly that allows us to authorize assassination? It’s not the justice system, so who is it?

Well in the case of some of these terrorists, it’s the whole world, since they release videos of themselves bragging about their deeds and sometimes even committing the deeds.

We do not live in a perfect world. At some point, you do have to say that the accumulated intelligence about a bad guy is likely correct - and the need to save innoent lives from the bad guy’s next act outweighs perfect world niceties.

However, on the other hand, once you have the guy in custody, the clear and present danger condition goes away.

All I am saying is that if you have a known bad guy (and I agree that there can be mistakes made and that there are grey zones) if you determine that you do not want to risk the lives of your own people to capture the bastard, and rather just kill him, that is justified. He had it coming and you are saving lives ultimately.

However, the part the my right wing interlocutors miss about this, is that in order to trust that we did the right thing in such cases, we need a track record of acting honorably in all other cases.

Again, my argument is not about the known bad guys. I argue that we should not debase ourselves and torture them and that we should not inflame enemies by torturing them. I argue that we should give the enemy who is not the known bad guy reason to surrender - because he knows he will be treated justly and with compassion - rather than reason to fight to the death (risking more of our people and insuring his death) for fear of torture.

But I am not arguing torture here either. I am simply arguing about what courses of action save the most lives and preserve the most honor.

I am also arguing that in the case of the random guy we picked up, but do not have an orgy of evidence about, we have the duty to err on the side of being compassionate.

But as to the ones who are proudly, openly and evilly guilty as sin. Just kill them in the field - or if you must take them in for intelligence purposes, don’t torture them and act to our highest standards, so that the world knows that if even they get the justice of a trial, so will will the little fish who might not even be guilty.