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Mav, i think that number (65%) exist, becuase americans, with all our fault, have a system of justice. Most Americans believe OJ "got away with murder"-- but he had is day in court, and he will not be "assasinated". he might be a social outcast, but he will live.
We have very little trust in justice in other countries, england pehaps being the exception, the rest of europe iffy.
maybe we are wrong. but we don't have any faith, that any "government" in any mid eastern country, even if presented with the cancelled checked for the payment of the flight school, or the paying the bills for the the terrorist who boared the flight, would find any of their nationalist guilty-- actually, we think, the accused, would be "hiding out" in plain site, going about unencombered by the law.
it is from this perspective, (right or wrongly held) that the appalling number arises.
One of the truths is, as Cap't Kiwi can tell you, america is a big, and beautiful country. and unfortunately, unlike Kiwi's or Ozzies, we don't have a sense that we need to go out and see the world. the percentage of americans who have travel abroad is very low (look at bush--his idea of world travel was canada and mexico.)
i don't know which comes first, our personal narrow parochial views, or our political isolation. but they do go hand in hand. the rest of the world is a little scary to america, -- and they close their eyes to it-- but are very happy to enjoy the riches corporate america hauls off from where ever. We are a youthful nation, we grew a bit with the WW's, but now, we must come to acting as adults in the world.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Mav, i think that number (65%) exist, becaase americans, with all our fault, have a system of justice. ... but we don't have any faith, that any "government" in any mid eastern country would find any of their nationalist guilty -- actually, we think, the accused, would be "hiding out" in plain site, going about unencumbered by the law.
This is, I think, a good part of the concern. It would be laudable for the accused to have a full criminal trial here -- but no one expects, for example, that Afghanistan would consent to extradite bin Ladin et al. to stand trial in the U.S. Given that, mav, how would you propose to go about separating the "judge, jury and executioner"?
Interestingly: where extradition is not feasible, international law allows a trial if the accused is instead kidnapped to bring him into the jurisdiction of the country in which he is to be tried. The most familiar example is Adolph Eichman, kidnapped from Argentina by Israeli agents, and brought to Israel for trial.
The court rejected, based on prior precedent, Eichman's attorneys' argument that the court had no proper jurisdiction over his person (having obtained his person only by kidnapping). Those precedents included:
(a) (I think) the Nurenberg trials, and
(b) (I am certain) U.S Supreme Court rulings in the 1890's, where various US labor leaders, when criminally tried for labor-movement violence, had been brought by kidnap into the jurisdiction where the violence occurred.
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but now, we must come to acting as adults in the worldHelen, I really hope this may come about as some sort of positive counterweight to so many individual pains and tragedies. I can certainly recognise what you are saying about justice and perceptions of its absence in many parts of the world. But I know that whatever else we get right or wrong, we CANNOT take the path of state-supported murder. It is tantamount to cutting the branch on which we sit. I have been struck, through wide exposure to European radio and TV and newspapers over the last 48 hours *, that (actually as Jo suggested) my views expressed recently may be closer to the educated mainstream than I had assumed likely. I think there is, in addition to the obvious and open-hearted sympathy for everyone caught up in the tragedy, a desperate hope that Americans will find a cool sane space of contemplation – and realise that much of the rhetoric they have been spoon-fed by their political system for generations contains much self-imagery that is completely delusional. “Of all history's great powers, from Athens and Rome to Byzantium and imperial Britain, perhaps none has ever so dominated the globe as America does now.
Nor has any of these powers aroused such a complex of feelings, positive and negative, that could go some way toward explaining how extremists from a distant world could mount an attack of the unfathomable hatred seen this week in New York and Washington, followed by the unrestrained outpouring of sadness and support from some of the very peoples that America's terrorist enemies claim to represent.
America, with its daunting economic, political and military power, its pervasive popular culture, and its instinct to spread the freewheeling, secularist ways of American life — even to those who may prefer to shun them — has an impact on people's lives to the farthest corners of the earth. Just how great this impact is, and how, in many places, it is resented, may be more than many Americans can grasp.
If they consider their country's place at all, many Americans may see it in uncomplicated terms, as the "beacon of freedom" President Bush spoke of with moistened eyes this week. But the feelings of many of the peoples who live in America's shadow are frequently less sanguine, or at least deeply contradictory. Grievances run side by side, and often in the same person, with a consuming passion for things American.”http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/16/international/16AMER.html?todaysheadlinesAmerica is not viewed worldwide as a beacon of all that is best in mankind, not by a long chalk: close friends admire and indeed share much of America’s values, but the complete mix of feelings is far more complicated. It is the twin realisation that (like it or not) the USA is a part of the wider world, and also that the wider world has some serious issues that the USA needs to come to terms with, which gives a hope that some good may arise from the ashes, not just more death and inhumanity. “That fat, daydreaming America is gone now, way gone — as spent as the tax-rebate checks, as forgotten as the 2000 campaign's debate over prescription-drug plans, as bankrupt as our dot-com fantasies of instant millions, as vaporized as the faith that high-tech surveillance and weaponry would keep us safe……
We have no choice now but, as a horror- struck Hamlet said after being visited by the ghost, to ‘wipe away all trivial fond records’ from the table of memory, and hope that our learning curve will be steep.”http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/15/opinion/15RICH.html* as an example only of these emerging view trends here, let me quote from the Letters page of The Times on Saturday, not generally a notably libertarian medium! (There were 8 published letters in all, three about more tangential matters such as potential terrorist access to plutonium)
1 “Firm and legitimate action must be taken to hit back effectively…/… But account must also be taken of the wider issues of foreign policy that provide an underlying cause of the deep animosity against the US which is fuelling these atrocities. In large part this hostility arises out of a perception across the Arab and Islamic world that United States policy is irrevocably committed to support for Israel’s continued occupation of Palestinian lands. The obduracy of the present Israeli leadership, initiated with Ariel Sharon’s ill-judged act of provocation by parading near the Muslim sanctuary of the Haram al-Sharif in Jerusalem during last year’s election campaign, has intensified the frustration among extremists within the Islamic world. If the issues that are generating such ferocious acts of terrorism are to be effectively countered, a deliberate American lead in renewed progress over the Arab-Israeli peace process, as was given by George Bush Snr at the end of the Gulf War in 1991, has to form part of the answer.” – Alan Munro, British Ambassador to Saudi Arabia ’89-‘93
2 “…However well intentioned, US governments have aroused a sense of injustice throughout the Arab and Islamic world and provoked feelings ranged from muted disapproval to fanatical hated. Western leaders should aim to cut at the roots of terrorism, not just its vile tentacles.” – Micheal Purcell.
3 “….While terrorism can never be right, the fact that those who carry out terrorist acts have often been driven to it by the failure of others to listen to their grievances needs to be recognised. It does no good to the credibility of the US or NATO to assume that right is entirely and irrefutably on their side.” – John Evers.
4 “I fully agree with Simon Jenkins (Comment, Sept 14) that the crisis calls for a distinction between determination and vengeance, acts of will and acts of idiocy. It is a time when head must rule heart. Assuming that the attack on the WTC and Pentagon is the work of associates of Osama bin Laden, the core complaints of the world of Islam – dispossession of Palestinians by Israel – must be seriously attended to; otherwise we will simply be helping bin Laden’s cause and validating fanaticism.” – Ghayasuddin Siddiqui, Leader Muslim Parliament of GB.
5 “Having grown up with 30 years of terrorism in Northern Ireland, it is disappointing to hear President Bush and his Secretary of State, Colin Powell, talk of revenge. Revenge has done nothing to solve the tit-for-tat loss of life in Ulster. It is only serving to heighten tension between Palestinians and Israelis. NATO countries must not be drawn into a military confrontation as a result of the attacks in the US.” – William Sellar.There is a range of views represented through the BBC services, including this: http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/americas/newsid_1547000/1547292.stmBob, I too have made a detailed study of the history of the Middle East, and could happily trade skirmishes about the Balfour Declaration and the detail of the Palestine Mandate until everyone else in the room was screaming for relief! But let us just look for a moment at the big picture: there are two groups of peoples in that area of the world, with an immensely complicated history of mutual stupidity and sometimes simply evil. The most recent attempt at a peace process was being undermined by the most accelerated grab of Palestinian lands for new Jewish-only settlements and roads ever seen in the region. Does current US foreign policy make the eventual peaceful co-existence of these two tribes more or less likely?The thing that makes this most odd for me is that through all personal friendships and other contacts I have had with nationals from that whole region, and from deep-seated cultural predispositions I am a natural friend of the state of Israel, and continue to wish her citizens nothing but happiness. It is only cold logical analysis of the actual reality being played out daily that makes me so concerned that we do now what we have to do eventually: facilitate a peace process based on mutual respect and even-handed justice (even if we doubt some aspects of one or other or indeed both parties’ good faith). And Bel, no, your dad was right despite the shameful displays we witness from time to time, so keep that flame burning. The world is continuously recreated in the image of our actions and our beliefs. If we act well and with justice, we leave our children’s world a small increment of truth and beauty; if we act otherwise, we rob ourselves of an increment of peace and happiness and leave a bill for future generations to pay in blood and misery. Keep faith with the good in all of us – as Insel has so vividly commented, a thousand incidences of this have been on view through this terrible week.
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As things unfold we'll have to look at the numbers, at how big the "handful" is. Yep, that sounds reasonable. 65 percent of those questioned say American agents should be allowed to seek out and assassinate people in foreign countries who commit terrorist acts against Americans. the idea that 65% of Americans now evidently support state-conducted murder is appalling. When is it appropriate to use the word 'murder' for state-sponsored assassination?
Mav, you've used linguistic prestidigitation to change the subject. Before, we were talking about the few on lunatic fringe who, like Mr. Beckwith, would "level their country". But the 65% you now cite supports something very different: a specific targeting of the specific individuals directly involved.
Mav, have you set up your requirements in such a way that absolutely no response will be acceptable to you? If the response surgically targets the specific individuals who are directly responsible (and stringently minimizes harm to others), will you castigate it as "assassination"? Conversely, if the response is broader, will you excoriate it as "creating innocent victims"?
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I hope not, Ken. For example, whilst yes, I am completely resolute that murder = murder whether by the individual, the terrorist, or the state, I fully expect and endorse America to go after the perpetrators of this outrage. But I am just trying to suggest we all need to act together within the confines of the law and the justice we seek to protest. It's not an easy path.
You are, of course, absolutely right to discriminate between the two types of response - but I was nevertheless interested in this as a statistical pop-quiz of what Americans are thinking and feeling.
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It's not an easy path.
Amen, brother mine, amen.
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and also please believe that I am not preaching from some lofty position of advantage. In the course of my formative years and adult life, there have been times particularly in relation to the IRA when I have passionately wanted to have my finger on that button. I have personal reasons for that. But I have come by painful degrees, through outrage after outrage, murder after murder, blame after blame after blame, to a current belief that there is simply no alternative. That, however much in pain that we may look for the quick fix, in the longer run there is nothing shown to work but dialog(ue), understanding, patience, compromise: all those grey and amorphous things that cost us dear. It's not what, in some respects, I want to believe - but I just know that if this response is heavy-handed and not accompanied by serious soul searching in the West, we will be back here very soon, but worse.
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Assuming that Bin Laden is behind the attacks, or even that it is simply probable that he is, would America settle for a trial on neutral territory as was recently done with the Libyans accused of being behind the Lockerbie bombing? Of course this would probably mean recognising the Taliban government and persuading them that he would be treated fairly and that handing him over was not a breach of their previous oaths to him.
Bingley
Bingley
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Inselpeter responded: The only reason I can think of that the Israelis would attack the United States would be to engage this country in all-out war in the Middle East thereby destroying their adversaries.
Come on, IP, I can think of several reasons why they may wish to more firmly bind the US to them which would fall short of wanting to engineer all-out war in the region. Amd the Mossad have a lot more influence in Israel than the CIA does in the US, or at least that's my understanding.
While not beyond the scope of possibility, I find it hard to contemplate and also that the suggestion insinuates an incredible evil to that government. *Perhaps, if the country's very existence were threatened..but it is not.
I offer you two items to consider: 1. Ariel Sharon is the ultimate hawk and none of his Arab neighbours will trust him as far as they can kick him. Witness the breakdown in real dialogue between the Israelis and the Palestinians (although, yes, it's relative, but symbols are important). And 2., of course Israel's existence is threatened. That has never changed. The fluid nature of politics in the area has that as a constant.
As to the Saudis, I cannot imagine what possible motive a regime that is at pains to keep power in the face of fundamentalist movements could have to so destabilize the politics of the region.
No, no, IP, the exact opposite. The Saudis are under threat from within and without by fundamentalists. What better response, then, than to have the Americans come in, as they have done before, and do their dirty work for them?
But please note, I merely put these up as straw men. I don't necessarily think that the argument holds any water. I just wanted people to think a little further outside the square.
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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Pooh-Bah
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<<strawdogs>>
Dear Cap,
I appreciate the importance of the thinking outside the square to which you admonish us, and I think I understand you better now that you've written <<..strawdogs..>>. How deliberative we will be, I haven't the heart or stomach to speculate, right now.
Also, I mean you no offense when I say I haven't the heart or stomach to continue this debate right now. I am content to say we disagree on the specifics and to agree the care you recommend is paramount.
Yours,
IP
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