From: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org (fegmaniax-digest) To: fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Subject: fegmaniax-digest V12 #465 Reply-To: fegmaniax@smoe.org Sender: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk fegmaniax-digest Wednesday, December 17 2003 Volume 12 : Number 465 Today's Subjects: ----------------- bile and crap, together at last ["Fortissimo" ] Re: one bile-filled, horrifying piece of crap [Capuchin ] Re: Luxor- a rather fond review: [Eb ] obscure Detroit band gets violent PR ["Natalie Jacobs" ] Re: one bile-filled, horrifying piece of crap ["Jason R. Thornton" Subject: bile and crap, together at last On Wed, 17 Dec 2003 11:24:28 -0800, "Jason R. Thornton" said: > At 10:23 AM 12/17/2003 -0800, Capuchin wrote: > > >Second, I think it's important to note that Hitler > >invaded several foreign nations and spoke openly of dominating all of > >Europe. > > Even ignoring Kuwait, neither I nor Safire were comparing Saddam's > attempts > at empire-building and war-mongering to Adolf's. We were comparing acts > of > mass murder, the acts for which I, and seemingly he, think Saddam should > be > tried. Nuremberg is popularly remembered for the crimes against humanity > indictments, much more so than the charges of waging an aggressive war. > >I can't believe anyone would even try to compare some pissant > >CIA-supported dictator in the Middle East to Adolf Hitler and the rise of > >Naziism in Germany. > > I can't believe anyone would even try to play apologist for a genocidal > maniac, or would dismiss away the murderer of 400,000 individuals as > merely "pissant." Boys, boys - stop *fighting*! There is a difference between state murder and individual murder. Conflating the two, or phrasing things as if Saddam (or Hitler) personally murdered those people, only confuses the issue. (Note: stating there's a difference is not saying one's any less wrong than the other.) But certainly, comparisons to Nazi Germany - which not only embroiled half the world in war, nearly exterminated several population groups in Europe, led indirectly to the Cold War and the threat of nuclear terror, and created destruction on a vastly more enormous scale both in action and ambition than Saddam's Iraq - serve more to stir up emotional (over)reaction than to set forth the considerable evil Saddam is responsible for. The unfortunate other point is this: when we start stacking up thousands and millions of state-sponsored killings, Saddam *is* "pissant" in comparison. To inflate the enormity (in both senses) of his crime to the levels of World War II and the Holocaust is, however, the opposite error from characterizing them as "pissant" without any context (and Jeme did provide context for that remark). What continues to bother me is the extent to which our (by which I mean U.S. citizens') outrage is so manipulable. If it's done by someone on our official enemies' list, we're outraged. If it's done by someone with whom we're "friendly" - or, indeed, by us - we shrug, yawn, and look for the remote. Saddam Hussein is a horrible person and should be punished for his crimes against humanity. What about Henry Kissinger? - ------------------------------- ...Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.blogspot.com/ :: Miracles are like meatballs, because nobody can exactly agree :: what they are made of, where they come from, or how often :: they should appear. :: --Lemony Snicket ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2003 11:49:17 -0800 (PST) From: Capuchin Subject: Re: one bile-filled, horrifying piece of crap On Wed, 17 Dec 2003, Jason R. Thornton wrote: > Even ignoring Kuwait, neither I nor Safire were comparing Saddam's > attempts at empire-building and war-mongering to Adolf's. Well, that's why all the Hitler analogies are pretty worthless. That's the reason Godwin's Law exists. The comparisons don't hold up and it's just an attempt to conflate things that really have nothing to do with one another. > We were comparing acts of mass murder, the acts for which I, and > seemingly he, think Saddam should be tried. It seems like you think he should be punished more than you think he should be tried. > Nuremberg is popularly remembered for the crimes against humanity > indictments, much more so than the charges of waging an aggressive war. It was historically significant for both. That's why (or at least another reason) it's a silly comparison. > I was not comparing Saddam and Adolf's weapons programs. Right... the analogy breaks down with any kind of analysis beyond the superficial comparisons of one aspect of (alleged) crimes. > Although, there have been assertions that Saddam was attempting to > acquire or had stockpiled weaponry that would put significant portions > of the world at risk. Lots of people assert a lot of things. I haven't heard any accusations by anyone that didn't have a whole lot to gain personally from proving those allegations. > I can't believe anyone would even try to play apologist for a genocidal > maniac, or would dismiss away the murderer of 400,000 individuals as > merely "pissant." Well, we'll see how responsible the guy is personally if there's a fair trial and examination is made of the evidence by both sides. > You seem pretty fired up, making accusations and assumptions about the > CIA, by the way. Golly, I was pretty sure that was admitted fact at this point. The Iran/Contra hearings brought out much of how that situation was manipulated by the CIA and the military for their own ends. > You also seem to be implying that the Middle East is less important than > Germany or Europe. I hope you're not that racist. Nope. I'm trying to show that one person was bent on dominating the economic and cultural center of the western world while the other was pushing a few hundred thousand people around a fairly isolated area. There's a difference. As I wrote initially, killing is killing and it's always horrible and tragic. But if we're going to say that 400,000 deaths is the same as 8,000,000 in the case of hitler and a couple of million in the case of Pol Pot, then we should probably consider the tens of thousands that the Bushes and Clinton have ordered killed and the hundreds of thousands killed by Johnson. > >It's a whole different kind of atrocity. > > Mass murder is mass murder. All war is mass murder. There's no reason for a double standard. > > Now, if you want to compare Saddam Hussein to, say, early Pol Pot, > >we might have something closer to real analogy. > > All three are comparable. But still we're way out of scale. At least with Pol Pot we're talking about someone who confined the killing to his own nation and immediate surroundings. > > > >...learn how to deal with his pent-up aggression and hatred of > > > >humanity. > > > Heh. > > > >I don't know that there's anything funny about it. > > It's funny, coming from you. Because I'm not screaming for more blood? J. - -- _______________________________________________ Capuchin capuchin@bitmine.net Jeme A Brelin ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2003 12:33:37 -0800 From: "Rex.Broome" Subject: Miranda ROCKS!!! Jason B: >>Subject: Piss Calvin Wasn't this one of the flashpoints of the big NEA controversy back in the late '80's? But seriously, wow, most of my pissing-Calvin questions answered a scant post later. And my spelling of Watterson's name corrected... thanks! Eb: >>Uh, my comment really didn't have much to do with male vs. female >>members. I was talking about the predominance of dilettante keyboard >>players in alt-rock bands, who come off as if playing a two-handed >>chord would be completely beyond their range. Regardless of gender. Sorry about that. I knew that's what you meant, but I was linking it to what I see as another indie-imperative that I find is often related (find a chick, teach her to sort of play... ummm... let's say, keyboards!). Didn't mean to ascribe that viewpoint to you (or relate it to the Minders) at all! Although I guarantee you... it happens. Lots. My neighbor's band is Bedroom Walls (current Nic Harcourt darlings, if that's a deal-breaker or -maker). Not bad at all, although I prefer their current live sound (as heard through the kitchen window when I'm washing the dishes etc.) to the stuff on their record, which is perhaps a bit too precious for my tastes. Live they can get a good loud New Order groove going. Fans of '80's Wuss Rock, please not the self-professed influence of Aztec Camera and Durruti Column! http://www.bedroomwalls.com/bio.html Oddly they rehearse at Adam's house using my PA system and I rehearse in a plumbing shop in Burbank using someone else's. Not sure how that happened. John BJ: >>That's not really the case with The Minders.....Rebecca (keyboardist, used >>to be the drummer) and Martyn (guitar, bass,etc) are married, and have >>been for awhile. Actually, not only did I know that, I also knew (or used to know) Rebecca herself pretty well, if only over the phone. She'd probably remember Rex the Rockin' Film Shipper from Landmark. Never met her in person but we used to swap working-stiff-with-a-band-on-the-side stories daily when she and the band were in Denver. ____ By the way, you all are racist fascist assholes, it just has to be said. But I love you one and all, happy holidays and shit. Thas said, I need to set up a web-based e-mail account for while I'm away (yes, they have the internet in West Virginia... at least in the Maryland-ish parts)... can anyone genuinely recommend one that does not, in fact, suck ass through a straw? Oh, and apologies to Natalie, but I did send my 2 and 3/4 yr. old daughter to daycare today wearing a Sleater-Kinney t-shirt. Because my friends were cool enough to make her one for Christmas, and also because she's going to marry Corrin's son. And also she rocks so damn hard. Last night she pulled a single CD off the shelf at random to hand to me. Any guesses? Yup, Underwater Moonlight. (Two days ago it was Crazy Rhythms, which I'd just been discussing with my friend Babs at the haunted house... weird.) I also love the fact that she can hear weird noisy ambient amp noise and stuff on a record and immediately identify it as a guitar. Well, okay, a "di-car", but pronunciation is for sissies, really. - -Rex, almost outta here... ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2003 12:55:48 -0800 From: Eb Subject: Re: Luxor- a rather fond review: > > >Does anyone know who Brian Downing is? We need him on this list. I thought that review had way too many "generic Robyn Hitchcock sentences" which could have fit into almost any RH review. For starters, he compares the album to a "musical tea party" (cringe) of Lennon, Barrett and Dylan, as if these comparisons are a fresh revelation. Bleh. Idle thought: Didn't there used to be a Angels player with that name? Why yes indeed, there was, according to Google. > I rehearse in a plumbing shop Oh man...talk about a setup. ;) Eb ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2003 12:56:55 -0800 From: "Natalie Jacobs" Subject: obscure Detroit band gets violent PR >FWIW I'm sure there's nary a religious icon that hasn't been pissed on by a >Sticker-Calvin at some point. Yeah, it's an invitation for someone to key >your car, but what political-message bumper-sticker type thing isn't? A few days ago I saw a new variant on the pissing Calvin - it was a female Calvin (or rather, a woman with Calvin's head) squatting and pissing, although I can't remember what s/he was pissing on. >And in this case, I was praising the Minders' female keyboardist for >*not* being a faker. I think we got into a whole hoo-ha at some point about the phrase "classically-trained," but Rebecca is a classically-trained pianist (i.e., she genuinely knows how to play, even before she joined the band), hence the lack of faking. >I must say, I miss the Joanna Bolme era. The Minders were a >four-piece then - I saw this one show where they really reminded me of >the cast of Scooby Doo. > >(Fred=Martyn, Shaggy=drummer, Joanna=Daphne, Rebecca=Velma) Heh... yeah, I can see that. I think they probably could use a fourth member. The whole keyboard-bass thing (a la the Doors) never did much for me. >I saw the Von Bondies play Toledo at a local club called Mickey Finn's >(how many bars are called *that*?), and I can testify they put on a damn >fine show. If I remember correctly it was the drummers 21st birthday >party show and everyone kept buying him shots. Did you see them a long time ago? Their current drummer Don went to high school with me, which means he must be my age (31) - but maybe it wasn't his 21st birthday, or maybe it was a different drummer. Don is kind of a weird guy - he hardly ever talks, and in my creative writing class, he used to write this hilarious stuff and get other people to read it to the class, while he sat in the back and smiled quietly to himself. Don used to be in a band with my friend Marc, but left to join the Von Bondies. Marc is all bitter now that the Von Bondies are supposedly huge - I keep telling him that nobody gives a shit about them outside of the Detroit area, but he keeps insisting that they're "huge in Europe." Yeah, is that like being "big in Japan"? Marc is also bitter because he didn't witness the Jack White/Von Bondies guy fracas, because some of the witnesses got mentioned in the local papers and Marc wanted the press. Yeesh... n. _________________________________________________________________ Tired of slow downloads? Compare online deals from your local high-speed providers now. https://broadband.msn.com ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2003 12:59:51 -0800 From: "Jason Brown \(Echo Services Inc\)" Subject: RE: Piss Calvin Rex: > Jason B: > >>Subject: Piss Calvin > > Wasn't this one of the flashpoints of the big NEA controversy back in the > late '80's? But seriously, wow, most of my pissing-Calvin questions > answered a scant post later. And my spelling of Watterson's name > corrected... thanks! Actually I was going for a Todd Rundgren reference, namely "Piss Aaron" off of Something/Anything. Glad I could help! ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2003 13:12:21 -0800 From: Eb Subject: Re: bile and crap, together at last >Saddam Hussein is a horrible person and should be punished for his crimes >against humanity. Joe Mantegna is licking his chops about the movie prospects, however. Eb ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2003 13:27:58 -0800 From: "Jason R. Thornton" Subject: Re: one bile-filled, horrifying piece of crap At 11:49 AM 12/17/2003 -0800, Capuchin wrote: >The comparisons don't hold up and it's >just an attempt to conflate things that really have nothing to do with one >another. Almost no analogy will hold if you start comparing elements of the compared other than those under discussion. >It seems like you think he should be punished more than you think he >should be tried. It seems that you would be better off not attempting to put words in my mouth. Trials are a means to an end - justice. Why would you assert that the trial itself is more important than bringing the man directly responsible for the murders of hundreds of thousands to justice? Why are you even trying to separate the two, when the need for trials would not even exist were humanity not concerned with assigning guilt for and punishing certain acts we find immoral and detastable? I am interested in seeing that the responsible person punished, yes, but it does not follow that I think that the process not be open, honest, fair and transparent. > > Nuremberg is popularly remembered for the crimes against humanity > > indictments, much more so than the charges of waging an aggressive war. > >It was historically significant for both. That's why (or at least another >reason) it's a silly comparison. Your entire argument is silly. You are blowing the importance of a simple comparison far out of proportion, and implying that those making the comparison have devious reasons for making the analogy. > > I was not comparing Saddam and Adolf's weapons programs. > >Right... the analogy breaks down with any kind of analysis beyond the >superficial comparisons of one aspect of (alleged) crimes. Analyzing aspects of analogies irrelevant to what is being compared of course shows the superficiality of almost any such comparison. Safire only mentioned that Saddam's trial would rival the "genocide trials" of Nuremberg, and considering what Saddam is being accused of, that analogy is more than appropriate. You however decided to build strawmen and suggest people were saying something other than that. > > Although, there have been assertions that Saddam was attempting to > > acquire or had stockpiled weaponry that would put significant portions > > of the world at risk. > >Lots of people assert a lot of things. I haven't heard any accusations by >anyone that didn't have a whole lot to gain personally from proving those >allegations. Exactly why evidence needs to be brought forward, and if it is, it will make the trial all the more similar to Nuremberg. As would evidence of participation in terrorist attacks against the United States. I'm not asserting Saddam was likely even involved in either activity, only that assertions, if brought forth in court through evidence, would make the two trials themselves, regardless of whether Saddam is found guilty or innocent, even more comparable, above and beyond the crimes against humanity similarities which were under discussion. >Well, we'll see how responsible the guy is personally if there's a fair >trial and examination is made of the evidence by both sides. Are you asserting ahead of time that it won't be, or will you wait until after the trial actually occurs before passing judgements on the process? What would be the fairer course of action? >Golly, I was pretty sure that was admitted fact at this point. The >Iran/Contra hearings brought out much of how that situation was >manipulated by the CIA and the military for their own ends. Was anyone in the CIA found guilty in a court of law of any wrong-doing, or are we allowed to make such assessments based on facts brought to our attention outside of the court-room? > > You also seem to be implying that the Middle East is less important than > > Germany or Europe. I hope you're not that racist. > >Nope. I'm trying to show that one person was bent on dominating the >economic and cultural center of the western world while the other was >pushing a few hundred thousand people around a fairly isolated area. >There's a difference. The fact that you put such emphasis on the importance of the western world, economically and culturally, over the homeland of a multitude of Middle Easterners, which you choose to describe as "isolated," even though the oil that comes from the area has a major impact on the world's economy, simply shows your cultural bias. >But if we're going to say that 400,000 deaths is the same as >8,000,000 in the case of hitler and a couple of million in the case of Pol >Pot... Who, but you, used the word "same"? All three numbers are rather large. > > >It's a whole different kind of atrocity. > > > > Mass murder is mass murder. > >All war is mass murder. There's no reason for a double standard. The only double standard here is with you, specifically the way you make all sorts of unproven assertions and judgements about the American government and its leaders, but attack with phrases like that quoted in the subject, anyone who does the same about someone like Saddam. War is mass killing, and in a necessary war, the killing is justified. Intentionally killing civilians is murder, and extremely large numbers of them, is mass murder. Much of what Saddam will presumably be accused of did not even occur during wartime. >But still we're way out of scale. At least with Pol Pot we're talking >about someone who confined the killing to his own nation and immediate >surroundings. Immediate surroundings being other nations, of course. Sure, there's a difference in number of people killed and number of nations attacked when comparing the three. No one is saying that the numbers are exactly the same, only that the three are comparable in the fact they were responsible for the torture and deaths of extremely large numbers of innocent civilians, and, especially in terms of Saddam and Hitler, since this point has now been brought up, in aggressiveness toward other countries. If you want to read more into what people are saying when making analogies, that's your problem. > > > > >...learn how to deal with his pent-up aggression and hatred of > > > > >humanity. > > > > Heh. > > > > > >I don't know that there's anything funny about it. > > > > It's funny, coming from you. > >Because I'm not screaming for more blood? Because the phrase fits you to a tee. - --Jason "Only the few know the sweetness of the twisted apples." - Sherwood Anderson ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2003 13:37:58 -0800 From: "Brian" Subject: Re: obscure Detroit band gets violent PR On Wed, 17 Dec 2003 12:56:55 -0800, "Natalie Jacobs" > >I saw the Von Bondies play Toledo at a local club called Mickey Finn's > >(how many bars are called *that*?), and I can testify they put on a damn > >fine show. If I remember correctly it was the drummers 21st birthday > >party show and everyone kept buying him shots. > > Did you see them a long time ago? Their current drummer Don went to high > school with me, which means he must be my age (31) - but maybe it wasn't > his > 21st birthday, or maybe it was a different drummer. Don is kind of a > weird > guy - he hardly ever talks, and in my creative writing class, he used to > write this hilarious stuff and get other people to read it to the class, > while he sat in the back and smiled quietly to himself. Don Blum, right? Huh. I just looked here:http://www.vonbondies.com/# and saw his picture. Same asian-kinda-lookin-guy who played when I saw them. I could've swore they said it was his 21st birthday, but maybe they were joking and it was his 30th.?? It was maybe a year and a half ago. That bar use to have all sorts of great shows, now it's just sappy tradional irish music or blues. I think there is a Mickey Finn's in every city... - -Nuppy - -- Brian nightshadecat@mailbolt.com ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2003 14:06:25 -0800 From: "Jason R. Thornton" Subject: Re: bile and crap, together at last At 01:47 PM 12/17/2003 -0600, Fortissimo wrote: >To inflate the enormity (in both senses) of his crime to the >levels of World War II and the Holocaust is, however, the opposite error >from characterizing them as "pissant" without any context (and Jeme did >provide context for that remark). No one is attempting to inflate the enormity of his "crime." Look, think of all the crimes that are committed by people throughout the world. Only a very tiny handful come even close, in both senses of the word "enormity." And Hitler's was one of them. It'd be inane to compare some gangbanger who capped a couple of rival gang members to Hitler, but another dictator who was responsible for the deaths of extremely large numbers of people, enormous amounts, is not that far of a stretch at all. >What continues to bother me is the extent to which our (by which I mean >U.S. citizens') outrage is so manipulable. If it's done by someone on our >official enemies' list, we're outraged. If it's done by someone with whom >we're "friendly" - or, indeed, by us - we shrug, yawn, and look for the >remote. To be honest, this is much of what's bothering me here. Some people who are outraged about us going to war seem unwilling to really speak out against or even be bothered by something which in my mind is even worse - possibly because they are so afraid of being seen as agreeing with the current administration on anything. Even though I could give you a long list of reasons why I opposed the US going to war with Iraq at the time, and still have numerous complaints about the current occupation, I find it odd that anyone could not be outraged by Saddam's brutal dictatorship. Just because a politician I despise, like Bush, brings it up should not mean I am any less horrified by Saddam's actions, nor any less thrilled that he will potentially be held accountable for the crimes for which he is being accused. I refuse to be manipulated by even my own cynicism about Bush's motivation about taking us into war in this particular case. Despite the enormous costs, literally and metaphorically, of this war, the world and the people of Iraq are still better off without him in power - and holding him accountable for everything he did against humanity, and anyone else who commits similar, BUT NOT EXACTLY THE SAME IN TERMS OF SCALE, surely would make the world a better place. - --Jason "Only the few know the sweetness of the twisted apples." - Sherwood Anderson ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2003 15:55:19 -0800 (PST) From: Capuchin Subject: Re: one bile-filled, horrifying piece of crap On Wed, 17 Dec 2003, Jason R. Thornton wrote: > At 11:49 AM 12/17/2003 -0800, Capuchin wrote: > >It seems like you think he should be punished more than you think he > >should be tried. > > It seems that you would be better off not attempting to put words in my > mouth. We'll let your own words do the talking, then... see as follows: > I am interested in seeing that the responsible person punished, yes So, there it is. You're hoping for more pain in the world. [now, going back to the beginning of the paragraph] > Trials are a means to an end - justice. Justice is something that happens instead of crimes being committed, not after. A trial is the means to an end, yes, but that end is a finding of fact and law that will (hopefully) provide an accurate picture of that which occured. A trial is a seeking of truth. The finding of that truth (or at least permanently setting the record crooked) is the most important thing a trial can do. > Why would you assert that the trial itself is more important than > bringing the man directly responsible for the murders of hundreds of > thousands to justice? What do you think that means "bringing... to justice"? To you, it means punishment... it means dealing out more pain. > Why are you even trying to separate the two, when the need for trials > would not even exist were humanity not concerned with assigning guilt > for and punishing certain acts we find immoral and detastable? You're talking about two separate things "assigning guilt AND punishing certain acts" [emphasis mine], but then you ask me why I see them as two separate things. They are separate and do not necessarily belong together. Instead of calling it "assigning guilt", I call it "finding truth". You figure out what happened. When the trial is finished, we should be looking at what really happened and asking "what can we do to make this situation better?" rather than "what can we do to make life worse for the guilty?" > You are blowing the importance of a simple comparison far out of > proportion, and implying that those making the comparison have devious > reasons for making the analogy. Jeffrey's summed this up better than I would have, I think. The Hitler analogy is a button-pusher and not appropriate here. > >Well, we'll see how responsible the guy is personally if there's a fair > >trial and examination is made of the evidence by both sides. > > Are you asserting ahead of time that it won't be, or will you wait until > after the trial actually occurs before passing judgements on the > process? I'm showing vital, healthy skepticism. Liberty can only be maintained with eternal vigilance against tyranny. > Was anyone in the CIA found guilty in a court of law of any wrong-doing, > or are we allowed to make such assessments based on facts brought to our > attention outside of the court-room? You don't find people guilty of wrong-doing in a court of law. Courts determine whether or not law was broken. Wrong-doing and law-breaking are very different things and only sometimes coincide in one action. However, the things the CIA did to bring Saddam to power and knowingly supply his nation with the means to carry out his regime's plans were brought to light through investigative hearings in Congress. They are not courts of law and make no findings of law, but they do find facts. > > > You also seem to be implying that the Middle East is less important > > > than Germany or Europe. I hope you're not that racist. > > > >Nope. I'm trying to show that one person was bent on dominating the > >economic and cultural center of the western world while the other was > >pushing a few hundred thousand people around a fairly isolated area. > >There's a difference. > > The fact that you put such emphasis on the importance of the western > world, economically and culturally, over the homeland of a multitude of > Middle Easterners, which you choose to describe as "isolated," even > though the oil that comes from the area has a major impact on the > world's economy, simply shows your cultural bias. I think you're reading that bias into it and ignoring the substance of the disagreement. If Saddam Hussein's armies had marched on Mecca and Jerusalem, for example, we would have had a more analogous situation. I didn't make any value judgment about which is more important, only that one group attempted to sway the whole of a continent's dominant culture through force whereas the other cannot be accused of attempting to sway more than his own nation and a few surrounding provinces... which are not the most significant in that region of the world. > >But if we're going to say that 400,000 deaths is the same as 8,000,000 > >in the case of hitler and a couple of million in the case of Pol Pot... > > Who, but you, used the word "same"? All three numbers are rather large. There's a difference of an order of magnitude. > > > >It's a whole different kind of atrocity. > > > > > > Mass murder is mass murder. > > > >All war is mass murder. There's no reason for a double standard. > > The only double standard here is with you... Hold that thought. > specifically the way you make all sorts of unproven assertions and > judgements about the American government and its leaders, but attack > with phrases like that quoted in the subject, anyone who does the same > about someone like Saddam. Which unproven assertions have I made about American leaders? And as for the phrase quoted in the subject line here, I was reacting to the EXTREMELY poor taste shown in convicting in the press a person who is still pending trial. > War is mass killing, and in a necessary war, the killing is justified. > Intentionally killing civilians is murder, and extremely large numbers > of them, is mass murder. There's your freakin' double-standard right there. "necessary war". "killing is justified". Surely that has been the reasoning behind every mass murderer in history. The only way to prevent that kind of atrocity is to reject all killing and all intentional pain and suffering as immoral. Your double-standard is the classic US/them dichotomy. If we think it's right, it's justified. If we don't think it's right, it's not... regardless of what the person who did it thinks. > Much of what Saddam will presumably be accused of did not even occur > during wartime. The U.S. hasn't done anything during wartime in over fifty years. What's the difference? > >But still we're way out of scale. At least with Pol Pot we're talking > >about someone who confined the killing to his own nation and immediate > >surroundings. > > Immediate surroundings being other nations, of course. The closest provinces in the other nations... regions that are bounded politically, but not culturally, economically, or in any realistic way other than abstract political lines in the sand (in some cases, literally). > Sure, there's a difference in number of people killed and number of > nations attacked when comparing the three. No one is saying that the > numbers are exactly the same, only that the three are comparable in the > fact they were responsible for the torture and deaths of extremely large > numbers of innocent civilians, and, especially in terms of Saddam and > Hitler, since this point has now been brought up, in aggressiveness > toward other countries. This whole paragraph assumes guilt. > > > > > >...learn how to deal with his pent-up aggression and hatred of > > > > > >humanity. > > > > > Heh. > > > > > > > >I don't know that there's anything funny about it. > > > > > > It's funny, coming from you. > > > >Because I'm not screaming for more blood? > > Because the phrase fits you to a tee. I'd really like to hear how a defense of liberty, brotherhood, and equality can come from someone who hates humanity. J. - -- _______________________________________________ Capuchin capuchin@bitmine.net Jeme A Brelin ------------------------------ End of fegmaniax-digest V12 #465 ********************************