June 27, 2008
All over the world down through history, political leaders who have engaged in torture and other grotesque crimes of state have justified their actions as necessary to protect their governments or their people or themselves.
It was true when England’s King Edward I had William Wallace – “Braveheart” – drawn and quartered in 1305 for resisting the crown’s rule in Scotland, and a gruesome death was what King George III foresaw for America’s Founding Fathers in 1776 when they stood up to his abuses in the Colonies.
Read on.
4 comments:
Consortium defends Obama with almost every breath and stroke of the pen (keyboard). Why no comments about his support of the new "compromise" FISA bill, his support of the death penalty, his campaigning for Joe Lieberman, his sucking up to AIPAC, his sucking up to the Cuban Americans with his flip-flopping on the Cuban embargo, and his sucking up to the White voters with his lecture to the Blacks family about their lack of strong family values, and can we ask about the lies he's telling in his latest TV ad? Why did he say he would no more disown Rev. Wright and his church anymore than he would disown his own White grandmother. Well two down, and one more to go. Personally, I would prefer NOT to have a President who has a long-term associate and friend who liked to be photographed standing on the American flag.
GEORGE BUSH IS A SAVAGE IN A SUIT. HE IS A DANGER TO HIMSELF AND OTHERS, A SHEEP IN WOLVES CLOTHING AS IT WERE. A BORDERLINE INTELLECT INFLICTING LETHAL IGNORANCE AND FALSE BRAVADO ON THE WORLD. THE GREEDY WARMONGERING SON OF A RICH AND DETACHED LINEAGE. HE DOESN'T KNOW ANY BETTER.....YEAH RIGHT. THANK GOD HE IS NOT MY SON.
You mention that the Founders sought "to establish a government of laws, not men" that included "protection against arbitrary detention and prohibition of 'cruel and unusual punishment" in reaction to these very practices by the British government. Your characterization makes it seem that in the US, our founders invented this concept. Actually, the founders drew from the English Bill of Rights signed by William and Mary in 1689 which prohibited "cruel and unusual punishment" and other encroachments by the government authority on the rights of citizens.
While this doesn't alter the importance of your commentary, it has implications for how we see the struggle for human rights. Just as the English were capable of undermining their own hard-won principles, so too are Americans. Simply having these principles in writing doesn't guarantee that they'll be upheld. The business of safeguarding our rights must always seen as an ongoing process.
L Holland
Denver
An unbelievable idiocy is allowed to grow through the congress and in front of the americans and the world over. Every country knows perfectly well what is going on and wishing it would go on until it implode. What you saw is what you rip. many countries would like to see McCain succeed to continue the disastrous path of the present administration. The two parties system which is under control of AIPAC is the ultimate shame, one has to admire how the octopus got a firm grip on the entire nation
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