DISQUS

AMERICAblog: Is it ever okay to assassinate foreign leaders?

  • tbhull · 1 year ago
    I say we kidnap him, bring him back to the US and make him the car czar.
  • sherifffruitfly · 1 year ago
    (facepalm)

    This is so stupid on so many levels.
  • Bob · 1 year ago
    John, your logic sounds oddly like the Bush administration's rationale for torture. It's illegal, but he's a REALLY bad guy so we're going to say it's OK this time.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    So it's ok to let him terrorize his own people? Your logic makes no sense. Inaction is just as bad. I had a lot of relatives die in the holocaust because of the inaction of people like you and the Republicans in Congress. The blood of millions of Jews is on the hands of the Republicans for killing the League of nations and opposing entering into War until Pearl Harbor was attacked.
  • sigh · 1 year ago
    It sounds like you are saying that had there been an effective international legal system during the Nazi years, or had the US felt sufficiently imperiled to have entered the war earlier (and thus killed Hitler?), millions would not have died. That is a far cry from saying that it should have been legal for FDR individually to have signed a foreign national's death warrant, particularly when that foreign national was not subject to US law.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    So are you saying it's better to go to war and kill millions of innocent civilians, as oppose to individually killing brutal dictators whose lives are worthless? Sorry don't buy your argument.

    And the legal argument doesn't work with me. There are some things more important the the niceties of legality like genocide.
  • Bob · 1 year ago
    So you're saying that if the president does it is not illegal?
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Here is a little constitutional lesson for you. The judicial system uses something called the Mathews test. If the Supreme court thinks if the interest of the general public far outweighs the interest of an individual's rights, then they can take away someone's right. If killing a brutal leader is likely to lead to the end of oppression for millions of people then it's legal, as it would pass the Mathews test.

    Now answer my question: You think it's all right for millions of people to live under oppression than to not assassinate a brutal leader because it's not legal?

    You need to get your priorities in order.
  • Bob · 1 year ago
    OK, admit it, your real name is John Yoo, isn't it?
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    you didn't answer my question.
  • Bob · 1 year ago
    Doesn't seem like you've been answering mine either.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    I did I told you why I thought it would be legal. Stop with your excuses. You know I answered your question. You are just trying to weasel your way out of answering mine.
  • Bob · 1 year ago
    So your argument is that killing someone is depriving them of their rights? I thought you must be joking. Or weaseling, at the very least.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    The Mathews test is not just applied to rights. But there is a right to live.

    I just think it's interesting you think it's better to not assassinate one worthless human being than end the oppression of millions of people. Just goes to show what kind of priorities you have.
  • Bob · 1 year ago
    Site a case where Mathews balancing was used to rule it was OK to kill someone. Just one. Otherwise, you're just weaseling.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Just because it has never been used in a certain case doesn't mean it is relevant. Lack of evidence is not proof in itself. The principle is still there.
  • Bob · 1 year ago
    In your mind perhaps.

    Weasel away.

    As I say, is your real name actually John Yoo?
  • Bob · 1 year ago
    Hey Obamalover, somehow I missed it when we declared war against Zimbabwe I guess. Must not be reading the right blogs I guess.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Why do we need to declare war? Just shoot the mother fooker.
  • Naked Bunny with a Whip · 1 year ago
    Okay, just don't complain if someone takes out Obama, too. The US kills a lot of people, too, so it'll ultimately be his responsibility. Fair is fair.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Of course it's alright to assassinate a leader. I think most would say there are good wars (i.e. WWII), but why is a corrupt and genocidal leader's life more precious than the people we kill in wars, or more precious than the innocent people he kills in his own country? If there is a guy like Hitler, Mugabe, or whoever you kill them. Period.
  • vkobaya · 1 year ago
    I don't agree with the argument about whether it is legal or not. Can only be illegal. However, that never stopped the right wing assassinations of Lincoln, JFK, RFK or MLK. Disappointing that our side isn't as pragmatic and eliminated the current insane usurping Oval Office despot. Yeah, opens up the possibility of the right deciding that Obama is an intolerable threat, but just means that we need to be extra vigilant protecting our side ... Obama. This nation has assassinated many foreign leaders that we didn't like and those assassinations were very clearly against the law, but never could prosecute them.
  • Gregory Lyons · 1 year ago
    Oh YES! Killing is always such a fine answer to everything!

    ,***ypical***
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Are you retarded. We have tried every non-military measure with Zimbabwe and North Korea. What else do you want to do? Just let all those people remain terrorized. Easy to say when it's not you.

    Why don't you go over to North Korea and spend a few years of your life there or in one of their many concentration camps and tell me killing a brutal leader is not all right.

    Kill the North Korean brutal leadership, or let millions of people starve. If killing someone saves millions of life then you kill them.
  • vkobaya · 1 year ago
    ,***ypical***

    Unfortunately, it is the way of the world. Regretable, yes, but as Kissinger calls it Real Politics. We have a ways to go before this isn't true if it ever will be. Of course, killing is wrong, but there is far more wrong with this world than just killing and many of those wrongs result indirectly in death anyway. You have to act on what you believe in.
  • sigh · 1 year ago
    There is an interesting tension between national sovereignty and individual accountability to a supranational system of laws. Do we have the right balance? Tough to say. What is easy to say is that allowing nation-states unilaterally to act quite literally as judge, jury, and executioner is absolutely a step backward. Frankly, I'm disappointed that anyone with a law degree would hesitate for a moment over the question.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Well you don't know the law very well then do you. There is something called the Mathews test. The interests of the government and the general public far outweigh the interests of not killing brutal dictator and his right to be alive.

    I'm appalled that there are so many liberals who would allow brutal oppression for the sake of not killing someone whose life is worthless. It is almost as bad as conservatives who want to install brutal dictators like Pinochet.
  • senseandsensibility · 1 year ago
    No ones life is worthless. Dehumanization is a slippery slope. One can make a utilitarian argument without resorting to that (or can they?). I don't think most have considered it in depth enough to get where you're coming from, but I keep getting the impression that you're minimizing the negatives of killing and violence.
  • Gregory Lyons · 1 year ago
    I sat let's bring it all home and kill all those miscreants in the Bush inner circle... Pelosi, Reid, Hoyer, Rumsfeld and all of the usual suspects. They've been invaluable to the genocidal holocaust unleashed on the Muslim nation of Iraq.

    Then, right after Obama's SURGE in Afghanistan, we can get him and all of his.

    //snark//
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Pelosi voted against the war and is one of it's most adamant opponents you ignoramus.
  • paulbe · 1 year ago
    You wouldn't think so the way she continued to enable the Bush juggernaut by refusing to broach the impeachment issue when the Dems won in 06. That would have been "opposing the war".
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Yeah because impeaching Clinton worked out real well for the Republicans.

    There is your world, and then there is real world.
  • doggril · 1 year ago
    Impeaching Clinton might have worked out better for the Republicans if Clinton had actually committed some substantive crime. Even prudes like me can distinguish the difference between a guy who can't keep it in his pants and a war criminal. But then, maybe war crimes aren't real world enough for you, if you're actively defending the notion of killing the leader of a sovereign nation. Once you cross that moral line, the sky's the limit...torture? No problem. Illegal detention? Just an inconvenience...and on and on...
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Problem is perception is not the same thing as reality with the average American. Bush committed awful and reprehensible crimes to the American public and the Iraqi people, but the American people don't see it that way otherwise he wouldn't have been reelected.

    Well I could give a shit about moral lines. I think morals and religious values are stupid. I believe in ethics not morals. Moreover you are not crossing an ethical line by killing a brutal leader. In fact if you have it in your power to end the oppression of millions by assassinating someone and you don't then you have committed an unethical act by inaction.

    With ethics there is no slippery slope; it is all about weighing interests and doing things within reason for the overall good. There are no bright lines or hard and fast rules like there is with morals.
  • senseandsensibility · 1 year ago
    You're right about perception and too few people get that. I also agree with ethics as being the proper guide, but it seems like you're an ends justify the means utilitarian. Dangers endemic to that thinking must be weighed, too.

    The adage "violence begets violence" applies as does the danger of becoming what we presumably despise (or at least say we're fighting against). As has been said, in most cases, it's the system and wider society/social conditions that are making for the problem (and assassination may not work and may even backfire), but with the "ever" modifier in there it's hard to rule out. Still we should be very reticent on violence for the host of evils it brings on its targets and its purveyors. People are right to take a strong stance against decapitating foreign leaders, but should at least consider reasoning for it.
  • Naked Bunny with a Whip · 1 year ago
    In what sense did it not work out for the Republicans? They've had control of this country for the better part of a decade, and they've sucked every last bit of wealth from it that they could. Sounds like a win for them. Once Obama fixes the economy, they'll start up again with their bullshit wedge issues and retake power, just like they always do after the Democrat fixes things.
  • smiling_dog · 1 year ago
    This is the kind of simplistic thinking that gets us into crazy wars. Who do you think is going to replace him, Mother Theresa?
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Will it work? Maybe not. But it's worth a try. Mugabe's life is worth nothing, so why not give it a shot.
  • smiling_dog · 1 year ago
    Obamalover,
    You talk tough enough, so are you on your way down to your local military recruiting station? We might need help with the possible civil war that results from the assassination and we are otherwise tapped out of troops fighting pointlessly in Iraq. Hey, it might not come to that, but I'd feel more comfortable with you in the ready (just in case).
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    It doesn't work in all situations, but Zimbabwe is a pretty monolithic country. Comparing that country to Iraq is just ignorant.
  • smiling_dog · 1 year ago
    Didn't answer my question. Grow up, little man. You are a pilot in white gloves, like the neocons.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Yeah I did. Iraq is not a monolithic country and Zimbabwe is to a relative extent. That is why it would work here and not there. And with Mugabe and some of his lieutenants taken out it would be very easy to have the AU go in and help the transition.
  • smiling_dog · 1 year ago
    Questions end with a question mark. You, little man, will let others die for your bright little ideas, based on your extensive interstate travel and television watching.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    What the f are you talking about. There wouldn't be all out civil war in Zibabwe if Mugabe was assassinated. You know nothing about the country. The AU would be there just as peace keepers for a limited time.

    You people are ignorant. Not all Nations are the same. Each one is different. I was a against the Iraq War because there country was so divided along ethnic and religious lines. It's not like that in Zibabwe.

    Moreover, you are willing to let millions of people live under oppression for the sake of your misguided principles.
  • smiling_dog · 1 year ago
    Then you have nothing to worry about when you join our proud military, little man.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Exactly.

    Does calling me a "little man" make you feel better that you can't come up with an intelligent response? Ad hominems are the first sign of a losing argument.
  • senseandsensibility · 1 year ago
    I've gotta agree with you on this one. It's annoying.

    You've at least made arguments in this thread; but your derision of other people doesn't serve your arguments anymore than smiling_dog's has his.
  • example · 1 year ago
    Who do you think is supporting Mugabe now? He's not holding on to power out of respect for crooked elections. The military and police are behind him. They would just pick another leader and you'd have the same problem.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    That is speculation that another brutal leader would just take over. Although you may be correct. But there is a good enough chance that what you say won't happen so an assassination attempt would be worth it as Mugabe's life is pretty much worthless.
  • senseandsensibility · 1 year ago
    And what principles motivate you?
  • smallhandff · 1 year ago
    Hmmm, I don't recall this site being so open to discourse when Pat Robinson called for Hugo Chavez' assassination last year-or there abouts.
  • senseandsensibility · 1 year ago
    The United States helped orchestrate a failed coup against the Chavez government in 2002 and the mainstream media went along cheerleading propaganda as is its de facto place to do so. They didn't report report the truth or even have an interest in delving into it. They're not lazy, they're complicit. Of course, the world is not black and white though and Chavez isn't inculpable, but the problems he incurs aren't what the establishment talks or cares about.

    In the cuckoo environment in which many of the leaders of social conservatives and militaristic hawks in power are surrounded, assassination sentiment isn't so radical, one just is not supposed to say it publicly. The placating to religious fundamentalism will be culled for conservatism to survive. Their uncouthness is now fatal to too much of the population. Many of the most strident militarists carrying out (and influencing) policy were behind the scenes in the 50s-60s, and they'll be back in the closet in the future. Which isn't to say there's accountability or change in agenda; it's merely strategy.
  • SCLiberal · 1 year ago
    Is it ever okay to assassinate foreign leaders?
    Only if you want to become like the people you are killing. Frankly, this is the kind of question a Republican would entertain. We are better than that.
  • senseandsensibility · 1 year ago
    Yes, they would, but clearly they're not the only ones. Simplistic condemnation of some position by association with an undesirable group doesn't get us anywhere either, especially when so many may have sympathies to said position. That is, it's not wrong just because it's skewed Republican/conservative and alienating people doesn't invite open discourse, it invites rentrenchment.

    That said, I strongly agree with your statement that we (risk) become(ing) that which we say we're fighting. First principles, principles first.
  • paulbe · 1 year ago
    Israel (your friend) has a stated policy of extra-judicial assassination of its "enemies" in whatever country they may be. They won't go Mugabe though because he buys too much weaponry from them.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    What's your point? How does the evils of Israel make it all right to let someone like Mugabe live?
  • nudist · 1 year ago
    he told you... because he buys alot of weapons.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    yeah and... what does that have to do with assassinating him.
  • f · 1 year ago
    Turn the question around: would it be OK for another country, fed up with this administration's policies, to invade the United States to assassinate Bush?
  • vkobaya · 1 year ago
    Invasion and assassination are two distinct things. I'm very disappointed that Bush wasn't assassinated. If two bullets took out the VP also, a massive amount of evil would have been avoided. Invasion of our nation? No, of course not. I would be among the patriots fighting for this nation, but of course, not to protect Bush. Same in Iraq, many opposed our invasion, but hated Hussain, were not fighting for him but for their nation and themselves. Rightfully so considering 1.3 million killed, 4 million displaced, millions permanently maimed and brain damaged by our attack, children starving, no clean water, electricity or infrastructure remaining. Israel has repeatedly demonstrated that a precision surgical strike is possible. We didn't have to invade to get Hussain. Bush wanted a war for the despotic war powers and the war profits. Plus, Iraq had zero to do with 9/11. For all the legitimacy of the war against Iraq, Bush might as well have declared war on California to get Governor Davis ... or Schwarzennagger. In fact, he’d have a million times more legitimacy going to war with Illinois now to take out Blagojevich. Oops! Accidentally shock and awed Chicago killing Obama, his wife and daughters. Don’t think that he hasn’t thought of this.
  • RobertSanDimas · 1 year ago
    Since my screenname is damn near my address, I have to be careful. But I do make loud demands of my tv set whenever I see him on (SHOOT THAT EFFER!). My rational side has qualms, however. Obamalover has none, I see. He does have some compelling points - started to say "legit" but that's the issue here.
  • bleh · 1 year ago
    Well, if you're at war, then of course it's okay; you just don't call it assassination. But one assumes you're talking about doing so outside of war.

    In that case, there are a couple of questions you have to ask:

    -- Where DO you draw the line? How bad is "bad enough"? Is killing 100,000 of his own people enough, but killing 99,999 isn't? Or is it 50,000 and 49,999? And how do you count? And do you count "allowing" them to die, e.g., by malign neglect, the same as active butchery? And where do you draw THAT line? Who pleads the case that, even if millions died from, say, disease or starvation, the leader didn't do "enough" not to be killed by the self-anointed forces of righteousness?

    What about our own leaders? Would Bush or Cheney qualify for the Iraq war? Would Truman qualify, given the historical debate over whether the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings were militarily necessary? Should our standard for dispatching avenging angels be dependent on our own behavior? Or if not, should said avenging angels target our own leaders when they cross the line? And in that case, who dispatches them? The Federal Reserve?

    Finally, and probably most practically, what do we do when other countries retaliate using their own standards? Pretty soon every country on the planet is in the business of knocking off each others' heads of government, and where does THAT get us?

    It's illegal and it should stay illegal, just like torture. That inhibits its use. And if and when there really are situations where the president decides s/he's gonna send in the sharpshooters in the little rubber boats, the legal barrier is a clear "acid test": if s/he can't do the time, s/he shouldn't do the crime.
  • nudist · 1 year ago
    Life is sacred! at least for fetuses.

    Republicans are pro-life from conception to birth. after that it is not so sacred anymore.
  • smiling_dog · 1 year ago
    I just hate it when the remnants of John's right wing side come out.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    I'm a Socialist and I think it's all right. It has nothing to do with being liberal or conservative. It has to do with standing by and letting oppression happen because of misunderstood principles.
  • smiling_dog · 1 year ago
    You wouldn't know a Socialist if he bit you in the ass, little man. You don't know what you are. And you should take some time to figure it out before you start spouting off nickel "knowledge."
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Your lack of education is obvious. In the 1800's Socialists were some of the biggest proponents of violent revolutions. Learning is essential jack ass.
  • example · 1 year ago
    You're a socialist like Mao and Stalin.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    How is that? I am for killing people of those ilk, you are for letting them rule their nations in oppression if sanctions don't work. You are Chamberlain, you are no better than all those people who stood by and watched millions of Jews die. Just because you do nothing doesn't mean blood isn't on your hands.
  • Ron · 1 year ago
    It is wrong to take a life. Same with torture - it's wrong.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    So are you against all wars?
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    I don't believe in god or any religion, so I don't have any moral qualms in killing someone for very significant practical purposes.

    However, I'm against the death penalty because it is very impractical, and just causes more harm than good.
  • SCLiberal · 1 year ago
    Two bullets fired on a Sarajevo street on a sunny June morning in 1914 set in motion a series of events that shaped the world we live in today. World War One, World War Two, the Cold War and its conclusion all trace their origins to the gunshots that interrupted that summer day.

    The victims, Archduke Franz Ferdinand - heir to the throne of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and his wife Sophie, were in the Bosnian city in conjunction with Austrian troop exercises nearby. The couple was returning from an official visit to City Hall. The assassin, 19-year-old Gavrilo Princip burned with the fire of Slavic nationalism. He envisioned the death of the Archduke as the key that would unlock the shackles binding his people to the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
    ------------------------
    Gavrilo Princip was convinced he was doing the right thing via assassination.
    It is always, always wrong. No one can convince me otherwise.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Well the black hand wanted to create war in the Balkans by assassinating Ferdinand. We are trying to end oppression. The purposes are completely different.

    Two questions:

    Assassinating Hitler in 1933: would that be all right?

    Are you against all kinds of wars?
  • SCLiberal · 1 year ago
    No and yes.
    It is hypocritical to rail against the crimes of the Bush administration while you harbor the same violence within yourself.
    If we are ever to evolve into a peaceful society, the kind of world we all want to live in, we must start by purging the hatred inside. As Gandhi said, you must become the change you wish to see in the world.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    I had relatives die in the holocaust you dipshit. Inaction is just as bad as the act of killing someone. Millions of Jews died because good people did nothing. So instead of one worthless waste of a human life being killed; millions did.

    Ghandi was also hated black people, so it's no surpise you would quote him in your racist argument to let millions of blacks live under oppression.

    There will always be misguided brutal people in this world. There is no way of "evolving" out of that. That is just naive and ignorant. You can live in your fantasy world, but I choose to live in the real world.
  • SCLiberal · 1 year ago
    You live in the past. You live steeped in hatred. You live in the world you choose to see.
    I choose differently.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    You choose to follow the words of a racist.
  • Puzzling · 1 year ago
    So, with Hitler dead, the fascist movement falls into disarray. Democratic institutions are reinvigorated and Germany emerges as a beacon of liberal democracy in central Europe. German anti-semitism withers.

    Real world or fantasy??
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    We can't be sure what would exactly happen, but scape goating the Jews to the extent that Hitler did was an idea that came entirely from him and the German nation blindly followed him. Hitler was a dictator in the truest sense of the word. I sincerely doubt the Holocaust would have happened if Hitler would have been assassinated.
  • sigh · 1 year ago
    Not to put too fine a point on it, but "fuck you". There are plenty of people who have had relatives die in the Holocaust. Thankfully, not all of them are sanctimonious twats.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    No most of them are not sanctimonious twats, but most of them would agree with me though.
  • Oh brother · 1 year ago
    Don't feed the trolls.
  • Bill · 1 year ago
    Who is going to decide that a leader deserves to be killed? It's a very slippery slope. Kill one because we believe he is evil, then kill the next one because we don't like his politics, or religion, or color, or sexual orientation, or whatever.
  • AJM · 1 year ago
    This is really appalling, especially the comments of the unfortunately named "ObamaLover." Even if we posit an "easy" case (Mugabe, Hitler), there are unintended consequences which are invariably negative. It is acting like a lynch mob -- even if the victim is a criminal, lynching is, itself, an odious crime. Add to the mix that such actions are virtually never done for purely altruistic reasons, the possibilities for self-delusion as to motives are too great. It is more moral (and I suspect more efficient) to expend energy in the direction of strengthening international institutions and sanctions.
  • SCLiberal · 1 year ago
    "It is acting like a lynch mob..."
    And that always makes me think of the book The Oxbow Incident. Good read.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Has sanctions worked for North Korea? Sanctions do work sometimes but not all the time. Sometimes force must be used. Maybe you should go infiltrate a North Korean concentration camp and tell them your ideas. Better yet speak to a holocaust survivor about the positives of pacifism.

    And I don't see how a well thought out and executed assassination attempt can be equated to a lynch mob. That was just ignorant.

    Inaction is just as bad as the act of killing itself. The results are the same: people die. Only difference is instead of one person dying, millions die.
  • iggy · 1 year ago
    This will not be a popular sentiment, but 1) It should absolutely be illegal; 2) Sometimes you should do it anyway.
  • MikeDub · 1 year ago
    Agree
  • doggril · 1 year ago
    John- What happened to your respect for the "rule of law?" How would killing Mugabe to end the suffering of Africans be different from, say, bin Laden killing Bush to end the suffering of Muslims?
    It's wrong, and I'm embarassed for you that you'd even consider condoning such a thing.
  • Michael Connolly · 1 year ago
    John -
    "We" don't run the US government. The people who do run our government HAVE been assassinating foreign leaders for decades - Lumumba comes to mind and so does Diem; Castro and Chavez have been targets.
    And when our "leaders" think about fags like you and me, especially uppity fags who get in their way, I don't think they refer to us as "We." The Rule of Law protects the weak. Reigning in the thugs, starting with our own, is in everyone's best interest, except perhaps for Rumsfeld and the CFR.
  • Freddie · 1 year ago
    If Bill Clinton had killed Saddam instead of the hundreds of thousands of Iraqis he killed via his sanctions against Iraq, would it have been a morally superior action? Can the same thing be applied with regard to other foreign leaders, both within governmental and non-governmental organizations, who ultimately cause terrible consequences to large masses of people?
  • bumpkis · 1 year ago
    I'd be more inclined to bribery to his security detail for a snatch and grab...ALIVE....and deposit him at the Hague.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Yes that would be ideal.
  • apikoros · 1 year ago
    Interesting that you should pose this question on the day that the WaPo published the obituary of Larry Devlin, our CIA station chief in the Congo in 1960. Like torture, I would argue against assassination on the grounds that IT DOESN'T WORK! We have actual experience with assassaniating foreign leaders and so far it has never improved the situation in the country where it was done. Examples:

    1. The keystone kops vs. Fidel Castro in the early 60s may well have lead to the death of JFK. No, no tin foil hat here and truly we will never know but it is within the realm of possibility. Certainly the attempts cemented Castro's hold on power within the country.

    2. The above mentioned overthrow and assassination of Patrice Lumumba. Certainly his replacement, Joseph Mobutu, was no improvement.

    3. Ngo Dinh Diem in Vietnam. What precisely did we gain by backing Nguyen Van Thieu instead for the next decade (and tens of thousands of dead)?

    4. Salvador Allende. Not only brought to power Augusto Pinochet, one of the most brutal and murderous dictators the Americas have ever seen, it inspired one of the rare car-bombings within the United States.

    No, even if I could countenance murder "in a good cause" in this case, the expectable end don't even justify the means.
  • zorbear · 1 year ago
    Your question reflects the sort of paternalistic attitude that governments run by old white men usually show. Britain's Empire building may have been driven by a need to expand their political sphere (whereas ours is driven by a need to expand our markets), but their attitude towards the people in their colonies was always that of a father looking after his dimwitted children. "There, there, I know what's best for you, you poor ignorant savage." To suggest that WE know better how to take care of another country's internal situation is the height of arrogance. Do you honestly think that in a country of several million people, not ONE of them is adult enough to shoot their own leader, if that's what the country as a whole wants?

    Just as there are some people in the USA that thinks a black man shouldn't be president over good ole white folks, there are some governments out there that think the same way. What would you think if one of them "helped us out" by knocking off OUR President?
  • lynchie · 1 year ago
    Who will be the decider. Certainly not a Bush or Cheney nor I fear is anyone equipped to properly decide who dies. How about simple kidnapping, flight to the Hague and the World court decide his fate. The void will be filled by the next despot since the very nature of governing these countries requires a dictatorship and out of the various military arms always rises someone prepared to kill anyone in his patch. Remember Idi Amin, Noriega, Ghadafi, all certified loon bars put initially supported by the various world governments who were prepared to lick their balls for access to the raw materials. Saddam Hussein is the most glowing example of the rise and fall of populism. When we needed him he was ours, when we wanted to divert the attention of the middle class and poor we started a war with him. Killing anyone is wrong, Use the law, Let him have his day in court, Let a jury sit in judgement but the slippery slope of who decides and what is deemed a killing offense can be twisted and distorted beyond recongition. We are back to all Jews need to die, Anyone with 3 moles will die. No killing is wrong and that is final.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    You are obviously a religious person. "Killing is wrong and that is final." That is why morals are stupid, because they give set rules and don't take into account extenuating circumstances. I believe in ethics. Ethics is based on reasoning. Morals are based on blind following of ignorant hard and fast rules. Most ethicists would contend that ending the oppression of millions of lives by killing a brutal human being would be all right.

    But obviously bringing him before the Hague would be an ideal situation.
  • ComradeRutherford · 1 year ago
    "Most ethicists would contend that ending the oppression of millions of lives by killing a brutal human being would be all right."

    So, obviously, you call for the assassination of Bush and Cheney, Rumsfeld, Feith, and the entire Joint Chiefs. Or do you have a double-standard to your 'reasoning'?
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    there is no double standard.
  • ComradeRutherford · 1 year ago
    So, then, you do call for the assassination of Bush and Cheney, Rumsfeld, Feith, and the entire Joint Chiefs.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    there is no double standard.
  • Jackson Thersites · 1 year ago
    You have misunderstood an aspect of ethical deliberation. Ethics takes into account moral standards. For instance in cultures where there is a strong moral standing against killing there will be deeper ethical revulsion at assasination. Ethics is not math it is art.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Wrong. Morals are for dummies and religious freaks who don't want to think for themselves.

    We as a people should should make policy decisions by weighing the interests of both sides and see what benefits which side the most and to what extent, and conversely to what extent is the opposing side put at a detriment. Using that formula there are situations in which assassination is proper.
  • example · 1 year ago
    Well, there is a huge difference between assassinating an oppressive despot who tortures his own citizens (like Mugabe) and assassinating an elected leader like Mbeki just because he has ill conceived scientific policies.

    Mbeki's government hasn't been out there banning condoms or anything like that, the AIDS policy isn't very effective, but he's not, or hasn't been actively fighting legitimate policies as far as I can tell.

    By your logic it would be fine to assassinate any leader of a country with a poor healthcare system, which would by practically by definition cause excess death, or for global warming denialism.
  • Ted · 1 year ago
    We have to hold our own country to the standards to which we hold others. Regardless of your politics around W, how would you feel if a foreign government assassinated the American president, even one you loathed?

    Nope, not OK, no way, no how.
  • wearing out my F key · 1 year ago
    let's make a nuclear bomb with an american sized hole in the middle. then we can drop it around ourselves. problem solved.

    but seriously, no, that's hella stupid.
  • AdrianLesher · 1 year ago
    It's a bad practice. Killing Mugabe would not be likely to make the situation better (and of course Mugabe is not long for this earth in any event). Those immediately under him would still have an interest in maintaining the status quo, and repressive measures would therefor not be alleviated by his death.

    As for Mbeki, he is the head of state of a functioning democracy. The people of South Africa certainly had means to get rid of him before, but they did not. Assassinating democratically elected leaders seems to be a particularly bad idea, since it damages the structures of democracy in the country in question.

    Additionally, the use of political assassination to serve one ideological end legitimizes assassinations by those of other ideological temperaments. I'm sure Bush would have liked to have bumped off Hugo Chavez or Evo Morales.

    It's notable how unhelpful the show trial and execution of the undoubtedly odious Saddam Hussein (in essence an assassination) did little to help the people of Iraq.
  • ComradeRutherford · 1 year ago
    To those that answer yes, then you must also agree that it's perfectly fine for some foreign agent to do the same to our leaders. Turnabout is fair play.

    I am a firm believer in the Golden Rule. For example, we used to not torture other soldiers because the USA was better than that. Now we torture civilians for fun, so we have NO legitimate position to complain when our countrymen, civilian or soldier, is tortured by others.

    Since Bush/Cheney have started two illegal wars solely for the profiteering of their GOP pals, causing the murders of tens of thousands of civilians and the forced displacement of millions of other civilians, then, by your logic, a foreign entity has every right to assassinate our nation's Executive Branch? (Attn: Secret Service- I am not advocating or condoning such an act. I am engaging the commenters here in a hypothetical discussion.)

    I do not see that as an answer, so I say, no, the US never has any legal or moral right to assassinate the leaders of other nations, ever.

    I do advocate for two leaders to challenge each other to single combat, rather than hide behind armies of millions to do the bullet-catching for them. Something like the climax to The Postman, but better...
  • Naked Bunny with a Whip · 1 year ago
    Shit, this is going too far. The stink of neoconservative American imperialism is getting thick now. Fuck it, I'm heading back to saner waters.
  • CitizenX · 1 year ago
    mmmm... naked bunnies with whips....

    As far as assassinating foreign leaders..

    No it is not ok.
  • TXfemmom · 1 year ago
    Murder is murder. However, the Bible says murder is killing someone who is innocent. Mugabe is far from innocent. There are few sane people who would wish Mugabe on the people of Zimbabwe. If we wish to save the lives of many thousands of innocents, Mugabe and his henchmen would have to die, because they are a threat as long as they exist.

    It is a shame that he has been permitted to continue this murderous administration to the point that the people of Zimbabwe who are innocents have died, endured, and undergone this. Mugabe is another Stalin, another Hitler, another Pol Pot. Righteousness is caring for the innocent and the weak, and the people of Zimbabwe are certainly the innocent and the weak.

    I don't want to colonize Zimbabwe, just give them a reasonable chance to survive.
  • Oh brother · 1 year ago
    Nothing like good ol' Western paternalism and relying on the Bible. That last sentence is classic, as is the stupid concept that all Zimbabweans are innocent and weak. You don't know much about "the people of Zimbabwe" or its history, I am guessing. I love all of this "we have to kill" so-and-so, blah blah blah, as if killing a single leader will result in some magical transformation. You pulling the trigger? Keep your Bible-addled brain out of international affairs. I can't even believe the question of state-sponsored assassination is even on the table.
  • TXfemmom · 1 year ago
    I know the people of Zumbabwe were strong and it was a wonderful country for
    a long time and it has an illustrious history. As for the Bible stuff, I
    taught Bible School for a while, and while teaching it I did a lot of research
    on the origins, the original meanings, teachings and meanings which have been
    distorted. I do know there are innocents, as in children, in that country
    and they deserve a chance to have a decent life. One has to realize that
    replacement of a tyrant in Africa, and any country sometimes just leads to
    another one who becomes a monster over time, as well.

    I left organized religion after I taught Sunday School and have come to
    believe that organized religion is a danger to the spiritual growth as well as
    society as a whole. I do, however, think that if Jesus isn't the son of God,
    he had some FABULOUS IDEAS, and he spelled out what was a righteous war, and
    not a righteous war. Afghanistan was a righteous war, but Iraq was not. I
    never believed that going into Iraq should have been done and took terrible
    abuse from many people prior to the war.


    In a message dated 12/14/2008 12:56:12 P.M. Central Standard Time,
    writes:

    Oh brother (unregistered) wrote, in response to TXfemmom:

    Nothing like good ol' Western paternalism and relying on the Bible. That
    last sentence is classic, as is the stupid concept that all Zimbabweans are
    innocent and weak. You don't know much about "the people of Zimbabwe" or its
    history, I am guessing. I love all of this "we have to kill" so-and-so, blah
    blah blah, as if killing a single leader will result in some magical
    transformation. You pulling the trigger? Keep your Bible-addled brain out of
    international affairs. I can't even believe the question of state-sponsored
    assassination is even on the table.

    Link:
    http://www.americablog.com/2008/12/is-it-ever-o...

    --
    You may reply to this email to post your response. To turn off
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  • Jim Olson · 1 year ago
    Never. Assasination is government sanctioned murder. War is never just. It is just organised murder...and no matter how we try, innocent people are killed. The death penalty is never justified. And, FWIW, I do believe that there are too many abortions.

    Unfortunately, the loudest voices calling for political assasinations and for war are the loudest calling for repeal of Roe v Wade. No consistency at all.
  • Butch1 · 1 year ago
    I would settle for impeachment hearings from Pelosi. (snark)
  • ej_52 · 1 year ago
    The problem is that the same people who chose to back the Shah of Iran, Batista, and (at one time) Saddam Hussein, are the ones who will decide whom to kill.
  • Older_Wiser · 1 year ago
    No, not acceptable. But not acceptable to stand by and do nothing, either, and let all those people die, as the rest of the world is doing. There are other solutions--where are the smart people who can get them done?
  • tlsintx · 1 year ago
    we really need to figure out ways to get along short of killing each other...
  • DougStamate · 1 year ago
    Planning and carrying out the assassination of a foreign leader is acceptable as a war-measure. However, since Zimbabwe is currently not at war with anyone (other than its own citizens), the answer to the question posed by John is no; there are other methods, however, that may be employed..
    A diplomatic boycott followed by a complete economic boycott (to deny Mugabe the ability to continue bribing his supporters) should have been implemented months, if not years ago. Remove Mubage's ability to pay off his hired guns and he would be out in weeks.
  • Indigo · 1 year ago
    No. And it's also not okay to assassinate our own leaders. Speaking of assassinated leaders, I just got home from seeing 'Milk.' It's amazingly well done and narrates the events pretty much the way I remember them unfolding during the 70s when I was in my 30s. No Oliver Stone silliness whatsoever, just clean narrative a la Van Sant. Now I have a clearer understanding of exactly how Prop 8 passed in Calif and Prop 2 in Flawd. Our "leaders" sold out in favor of caution.
  • tlsintx · 1 year ago
    I saw it today too! Really well done...great acting...i enjoyed it.
  • Older_Wiser · 1 year ago
    "Milk" is only playing at one theater in Charlotte (which always gets the "art" and "controversial" films), not convenient for me, and I want to see it badly. None of the cineplexes are showing it at all, the craven bastards. And I hear Penn's portrayal is Oscar-worthy. Guess I'll have to wait for the video, damn it.
  • HarpoSnarx · 1 year ago
    I must have missed a few homilies; exactly how many Commandments do Christianists now follow?

    Sorry for asking.
  • tlsintx · 1 year ago
    it's a very good question.
  • mikecoatl · 1 year ago
    We obviously can't go around killing anyone that crosses us. But there are rare circumstances (and Mugabe may be one) where I think assassination should be cautiously considered. Is there anyone who wouldn't take out Bin Laden given the chance? What if they had managed to kill Hitler (there were a dozen or more serious attempts)? On the other hand, replacing Mugabe or whoever with our own stooge would likely not work (see Iran, Iraq, Vietnam and basically every country between the Rio Grande and the strait of Magellan). I don't have any moral qualms with wasting some sociopath like Mugabe, but it's a touchy situation and I don't know if it would work in the long run.
  • Ruttle · 1 year ago
    No. The answer is no.
  • Mike Greb · 1 year ago
    Why is dropping a bomb from an aircraft or missle in an attempt to kill the leader of a country any less of an assasination attempt than sending a sniper to kill the leader? As far as I am concerned the US made at least three assasination attempts on Saddam Hussen in the Iraq war.
  • Steerpike · 1 year ago
    NO! No! No! No! No! No!

    If it's OK for us to take out a Mugabe, or a Saddam, or Kim, then it's OK for someone to take out OUR President. Now, before you say, "great, I wish someone HAD taken out Bush", ask yourself: Are there Israelis who would like to take out Obama? Are there Serbs who would have felt justified in taking out Clinton?
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Well the Israelis and Serbs wouldn't be ethically justified in their actions. You neglect that important aspect "ethical justification."

    These slippery slope arguments are rather weak. Slippery slope arguments are what stupid people use when they can't come up with anything intelligent to say. It's like when conservative dim wits say "Well if you let the gays get married [not sure why they put an article in front of gays] then you have to allow bestiality. It's a slippery slope." No it's not you're just an idiot.
  • Steerpike · 1 year ago
    I'm an "idiot"? thanks for showing your true colors. So--who decides--you? If our leader decides that another counry's leader is in need of being killed, what is to stop another country's leader from deciding our country's leader is in need of the same thing.? This isn't some abstract "slippery slope" argument; it's a very real point, and exactly the reason clandestine assassination is considered to be a bad idea. Where does it stop?
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    The president decides. That is what we elect him to do: make judgment calls based on ethics. In ethics there are no slippery slopes, unlike morals. See this is why ignorant religious people on this blog have trouble understanding how ethics work. They believe if you don't have a hard and fast rule then all hell breaks loose. Where people who make decisions based on intellectual ethical analysis weigh pros and cons of each side and decide what is the best thing for the greatest number of people while caring for and limiting detriment to the other side of the equation. Whereas, religious people and the like believe in morals and don't have that intellectual analysis of situations. Those troglodytes just think, "Murder equals Bad" without taking into account the circumstances and consequences.

    Furthermore, I think if another country wanted to kill our leader they wouldn't stop and think, "Well W.W.A.D. (what would America do)." No they would just do it, (i.e. Sadaam and Bush 41). That argument is just stupid.
  • Steerpike · 1 year ago
    OK, "Obama Lover" Ask yorself: WWOD? What Would Obama Do? I have been an Obama supporter since at least last February, whe it became clear that the Democratic primary was going to come down to a race between him and Hilary ( I started as a strong Edwards supporter--more fool me). Do you really think our illustrious president-elect would agree with your position? Tell me now, with a straight face, that Barack Obama would agree with your wild-ass claim that he has the moral authority to decie which foreign, soverieign leaders should live, and which should die.
  • Jackson Thersites · 1 year ago
    There is only one time when assassination of a foreign leader becomes at all morally debatable: when engaged in active combat warfare with the country the leader rules. Other than that it is a lawless and morally bankrupt act. I mean seriously, you ask this?!
  • cherylincanada · 1 year ago
    No! No! No! Who would be responsible for deciding if this guy or that guy should be assassinated? That's a scary road to start treading down, John.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Um the president would decide. There is something called judgment. We elect the person we think has the best judgment to make those decisions. Duh.
  • senseandsensibility · 1 year ago
    With that kind of civil openness to someone with who you disagree, you show great interest at getting at the truth and respect for the other party.
  • MikeDub · 1 year ago
    Yeah, and the evidence the President bases his/her judgment on comes from ... the CIA ... which as the current President has just recently pointed out, can be spectacularly wrong. Are you happy to have your own life/death being decided by these guys?
  • sherifffruitfly · 1 year ago
    Teh stupid! It BURNS!
  • Feklar! · 1 year ago
    Jon, it is not ever acceptable to kill anyone. Ever.
    Peace to you.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    So you were against WWII, the Revolutionary War, and the Civil War? Is that correct?
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    "would be" not "were"
  • tlsintx · 1 year ago
    someday war will be so obsolete...maybe even quaint. hope i live to see the day.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    yep that would be nice. But you did not answer my question.
  • tlsintx · 1 year ago
    i might change my mind...all because of you...maybe assassination is a terrific idea.
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    Great, I just would like to know the answer to this question: do you think we should not have gone to war in WWII and the Civil War?
  • tlsintx · 1 year ago
    why are you so intent on the answer to that question? what does it have to do with assassinating people?

    my position on war is that war is inhumane and as a species, if we don't become more humane, we will annihilate ourselves. therefore, war is not an intelligent option.
  • senseandsensibility · 1 year ago
    I get the impression from the thought terminating cliche this commenter keeps lurching for and tendentious, loaded replies invoked, that (s)he isn't interested in actual dialogue, rather making a one-sided point.
  • Fifi · 1 year ago
    Unless as an act of war, assassination is wrong and, yes, it should be illegal.

    There are too many reasons to list them all but as a try.

    - Murder is murder is murder. Where do you stop? What about reciprocation?
    - It doesn't work. Those leaders don't exist in a vacuum, all on their own. Killing one would just mean a chaotic transition to one of his followers and then, that guy would have a martyr to whip up support and play the victim.
    - Like it or not, we live in an international order where each country is sovereign and accountable to no one for what they do at home. The opposite, "superior" countries imposing their will and values upon other nations, has already been tried: imperialism, colonialism "for the good" of the colonized, etc. We've already been down that path. It doesn't work.
    - Even as an act of war, there is a very good reason to specifically spare the leaders while the far more innocent grunts and civilians are slaughtered wholesale : you need someone to talk to, bring the war to an end and enforce surrender on the vanquished population. If you really need to, you only kill them once they are done talking and surrendering.

    Mind you, I'm not of the "US and Western countries are always wrong" hair-shirt school of international relations. I have no doubts that for all their faillings, liberal secular democratic societies and values are vastly superior to all other existing systems. I have no doubts that liberal democracies should be far more harsh and brutal toward illiberal regimes and cultures then we are and that we should be extremely consistent about it.

    But :
    1 - We are far from perfect in living to our own lofty ideals at home so that should instill a good bit of humility on what we do to other countries abroad.
    2 - Our presumed superiority doesn't mean we can go around the world and further our ways through manipulation and murder. Not only it is probably unjust; it also doesn't work.

    You should never forget that stable liberal democracies only come in existence in two ways:
    - In the very rare case where an illiberal country justifiably suffers a total, abject military defeat at the hand of a liberal democracy. After the defeat, all the social and cultural structures that propped the previous illiberal political order are totally discredited and it's easy for the victor to rebuild and mold the vanquished to its own standards. The only valid examples are Japan and Germany after WWII and even those examples come with a lot of qualifications and cautionary notes.
    - By endogenous political evolution, through revolutions, reform movements, etc. The way it happened over the past two centuries in many countries including ours. It's slow, messy but it's the best way but it takes democrats to have a democracy and it takes time to forge democrats. Each country has to figure out its own ways, to go through its own trials and tribulations without undue interferences from outside. It has to become embedded in the socio-cultural structures.

    Killing the occasional leader (or anyone else) we don't like is not helpful. It's just a "quick fix" that yields no durable positive results. It creates martyrs when the best way to stop and discredit illeberal leaders and ideas is to let them fail on their own.

    Mugabe will probably be a far better and long-lasting lesson for many populations and politicans in Southern Africa than he would ever had been if we had snuffed him. You should note that South Africa got rid of M'Beki the right way and that he and his ideas are now powerless and utterly discredited.
  • joeyess · 1 year ago
    It's probably already been said, but, no it is not ok to assassinate foreign leaders. I don't care how bad.

    What happens when a foreign regime decides that our leaders are "orchestrating a genocide"?

    What exactly was Vietnam? I can't find a more stark comparison. We killed a whole bunch of folks over there. Maybe more than........
  • Anony Mouse · 1 year ago
    I don't like the idea of governments killing people - I'm even against the Death Penalty - but I don't necessarily have a problem with the concept that sometimes, certain people have to die. Not any more. There are too many people in this world profiting off the death and misery of others. If they're not going to stop, they should be stopped.

    If you think the filth of this world is going to wake up one day and have a change of heart, you're fooling yourself. It's a nice idea - but that's all it is, an idea.

    To bridge that gap between what a government should do and what people sometimes have to do, ideally, in my mind, you'd be able to create situations where you can put a man in a room with his victims and a loaded gun on the table, and then walk out of the room and lock the door. Let them decide whether to use it. Then, most importantly, let them decide how to replace him. Make it clear that if they turn around to treat others the same way, they'll find themselves in a very similar room. This idea of nation-building and bombing people into democracy is absurd on the face of it, and doesn't really seem to be working. Let them create something that makes sense for them, as long as it doesn't create a new group of victims.
  • ABProsper · 1 year ago
    Aside from international law concerns its not a good idea to start such a thing. Assassination is a game anyone can play and third world countries are at no disadvantage.

    So far the "we don't do it, they do do it" truce is holding -- let us hope it stays
  • devon · 1 year ago
    John Aravosis would shoot a 15 year old Greek rioter no problem, but wrings his hands over murdering Mugabe? lol why do I even read his blog?
  • tlsintx · 1 year ago
    lol the question is why would you bother to comment?
  • cosanostradamus · 1 year ago
    .
    The problem is, there's likely to be a Goering or a Goebbels right behind your Mugabe. And by the time you realize he's got to be taken out, hundreds, thousands, millions are already dead. The problem is never the individual. It's always the system. You have to look at how the system works, or fails to work. Why do Hitler's and Mugabe's rise to power, and then wildly abuse it? Because their own people allow it, even support it. And because our people and our leaders allow it, and even support it, actively or passively. It might be more effective to kill our own leaders. After all, they are supporting more than one Mugabe at any given time, in the name of "democracy and free enterprise," aka "anti-terrorism" and "anti-communism," or just because there's oil or uranium or bananas or whatever it is that the system requires, in the monster's country. So we're all monsters. Maybe we should all kill ourselves. Maybe we are killing ourselves, slowly. Maybe the whole system is insane. But killing is never the answer.

    The idea that a modern, educated, free and independent people, or group of nations, still need a warlord to lead them, a man on a white horse to save them, a messiah or just some guy with big ju-ju to dominate them, is the notion at the root of the problem. It is Simian Behavior 101. We have the means, the motive and the opportunity to NOT keep on creating and supporting systems based upon violence and inhumanity, to take conscious, rational, moral and ethical control over our own lives, individually and collectively. The fact that, instead, even the "advanced" "developed" "civilized" countries and peoples of the world still choose to allow their lives to be run by the biggest, greediest, most violent, cunning and sociopathic apes is the problem.

    Here in America, our own super-Mugabe, George W. Bush, is about to walk away from crimes that dwarf those of Mugabe. The fact that he committed them all after thorough vetting by lawyers, diplomats, generals and legislators, with the blessings of our churches, our media, our political parties and ourselves in two elections we allowed to stand, only makes it worse, for all of us. Not only did we let it happen, now we're letting him and his gang walk away scot-free, and richer for their crimes. Our "solution" is to invest all of our individual and collective powers in one new individual and his gang, instead of taking direct control ourselves: Change the person, not the system? We need a new car, so we get a new driver? Not!

    We're actually using the potential means of control, the Internet and electronic funds transfer, our democratic institutions and freedoms, to give it all up to one guy again, and just HOPE that he doesn't f*ck up. But he will. He can't help but f*ck up, because we won't be there to help and support him, to watch over him and keep him honest. We can't. The system doesn't allow it. It's winner-take-all, until next time, next winner, next mess. No human being should ever be burdened with that sort of power, no matter how smart or reasonable or decent he or she may seem to be. By overloading one person with all of our collective and individual powers and responsibilities, and then walking away for four years, we are guaranteeing failure of the system, and the individual we dump it on.

    We are Mugabe, every one of us. We must take responsibility for our own lives, our own actions, individual and collective. Instead of looking for someone to blame, someone to follow, a great big Mommy or Daddy to take care of us and make the boogy-man go away, we should use our technology, our resources, our rational minds, our consciences and our democracy to move the world away from this childish, sociopathic, even psychotic game of ape-like dominance and forced submission, and into a new era of humane intelligent adult responsibility, cooperation and dedication to the principles we claim to espouse. Otherwise, our history will go on being full of names like Caligula, Attila, Pizarro, Cromwell, Napoleon, Stalin, Hitler, Tojo, Mao, Pol Pot, Idi Amin, Pinochet, Rios Montt, Nixon, Reagan, Bush and Mugabe; all governing and murdering in our name, with our active or passive support, as long as we allow it. The individuals whom we allow to govern us are only a symptom of the sickness of the system, and the weakness of the individuals within it. Us. WE need to fix OUR system NOW. Or history will judge us harshly, too.

    Violence is never the solution, it is always the problem. We don't allow it in our personal lives, our communities, our families. We cannot allow physical or economic violence to be used in our names by our governments and businesses. We have to stop the simianism, which is "evolving" into corporate fascism. If we don't, the brief experiment with democracy will be over before it ever really got started. Get active, stay active, take over your local political Parties or start new ones. Use your power as voters, taxpayers, workers, consumers and "netizens" every day. Send a clear and unwavering message, and make sure it gets delivered, every day. If there is any hope for "Change," it lies within us, not our superstars, dear brutes. Grow up.
    .
  • Obamalover · 1 year ago
    You say violence is never the solution, so did you think we should not have gone to war in WWII and the Civil War?
  • TomJoad · 1 year ago
    WWII was a direct result of WWI. The best solution was not to have built up WWI to a world war status. Cosanostradamus has written the truth as I see it too.
    When I was a kid and read the Dune trilogy (which after reading, at 15 I became a LOT more politically astute, learning through it that things are never what they seem, that the games within games, that just like religion, politics is "dog and pony show" for the masses who do their part by buying into the jingoism...while the leaders play a totally different game...religions at the higher levels are VERY close to one another, but the religion for the masses is dumbed down, and made to seem different) learned that a "hero" can be one of the worst things to have in a time of change and difficulty. I like Obama (wanted Kucinich in there even more, but am very glad for Obama, and the historic part of I think is wonderful) but you don't EVER trust in a leader that weilds power over you.

    Even the good ones...leaders of countries are NOTHING like you and I. That is one reason it prematurely ages every president. They are in a kind of high, they are weighing things in terms of "I do this and X number may die, I do this and maybe Y number, but I have to think of my philosophy too". They learn to justifty acts that would make us throw up.

    None of us are "the good guys". The list that the OP covered is just the tip of it all.
    another point, Iraq, Zimbabwe, Afghanistan are not comparable to WWII and the civil war.

    All the wrong people die in wars. Look at history. Innocents, kids that buy into the jingoism and think this is a "way to help" or "serve my country" when we have some madman as a president starting immoral and unjust wars.

    Violence will always be with us, but it is up to US to choose whether we will be violent. There are other ways, one of which is to try to help but let countries find out for themselves what they will do with bad leaders. NONE of the current leaders though would like to truly see "the people" have that power. They all are afraid of true democracy.
  • cosanostradamus · 1 year ago
    .
    Agreed. There has never been a war that couldn't have been avoided. If we the people, all over the world, simply refused to fight, took violence off the table as a means of "statecraft" or civil control, there could not be any more wars. They'd figure out some other way to achieve their goals, just as each and every one of us does every time we're in a tight spot that we wish we could laser-gun our way out of. Reason prevails in our own little lives, it must prevail in the lives of our countries. If it is unacceptable to kill one person, how can it be acceptable to kill a million? No more wars, no more assassinations, period.

    The disturbing thing is that our brilliant leaders have had over seventy years now to think about how and why Hitlers rise to power and then get away with spectacularly abusing it. Seventy years to come up with a PREVENTATIVE solution. With all the tremendous resources at their disposal, and that of their corporate masters, they got nuthin'. So much for "leadership," and the "Great Man" theories of history.

    It's time that average Joe's & Josie's, unannointed though we may be by rigged elections, corporate sponsorship, and high academic honors like Dubya, enforce the rules of common sense that we all follow before any mere law, on a daily basis. The same stuff we teach our kids, we must teach our governments and corporations: No violence. Learn to live with your neighbors. Cooperate with others to achieve your goals. Try and be a good person. Don't make trouble unless it's absolutely necessary, and even then, NO VIOLENCE!!!

    Who doesn't live by these rules? Psychos, criminals and statesmen. We need to fix that.
    .
  • SCLiberal · 1 year ago
    Well thought out response. Thanks and I totally agree.
  • cosanostradamus · 1 year ago
    .
    OK, now let's do it.
    .
  • hawkseye · 1 year ago
    Thanks for saying this. As Pogo would say, "We has met the enemy and he is us."
  • cosanostradamus · 1 year ago
    .
    Yup. Thank you.
    .
  • cosanostradamus · 1 year ago
    NOTA BENE:

    TROLL
    An Internet troll, or simply troll in Internet slang, is someone who posts controversial, inflammatory, irrelevant or off-topic messages in an online community, such as an online discussion forum or chat room, with the intention of provoking other users into an emotional response[1] or to generally disrupt normal on-topic discussion.[2]
    [wikipedia]

    trolling
    Being a prick on the internet because you can. Typically unleashing one or more cynical or sarcastic remarks on an innocent by-stander, because it's the internet and, hey, you can.
    [urban dictionary]

    Trolls' characteristicae
    1) They have a lot of free time, they are mostly lonely people.
    2) They often ingratiate themselves to a person or two on the group and use them to stay in the group. They may protest with these "friends" that their right to free speech is being curtailed.
    3) They sometimes use "socketpuppets", i.e. fake identities that may be used to sustain, or to inflame the troll's position or theory or attack. At times the socket puppets' names are anagrams or similar to the troll name. Thus a troll may engage in artificial conversations with himself. However impersonating multiple people is frowned upon by the more able trolls and is considered the lowest of the possible troll tactics.
    rebuking trolls
    This said, the above methods (and other more nasty ones) are better left to professional webwizards and "older ones" (that may often be willing to help you for a worthy cause). Usually the best method when dealing with trolls is always the same: NEVER ANSWER TO THEIR POSTINGS! ("Please do not feed the troll")
    The whole point of trolling is to have you react. So do not react! It's as simple as that, duh. That is something that enrages trolls (disqualify them: other lurking trolls will take note of their failure and they know - and fear - it).
    By not reacting, you have completely defeated their purpose in life. In other words, the troll sees his self-worth in how much of a reaction he can inspire - ignore him: it's your best weapon.
    Should you, my advices notwithstanding, answer a troll, then calm down! Do not read any of the troll's responses to you. He is just trying to draw you further into its lair. Once more: NEVER ANSWER TO THEIR POSTINGS!
    [searchlores.org]
  • Frank Maston · 1 year ago
    This is a liberal blog and you actually consider an assassination? You've got to be kidding!

    Maybe a capture and a trial...but a killing? Forget it. The negatives are just overwhelming.
  • MikeDub · 1 year ago
    Assuming your complete question is "Is it right FOR THE AMERICAN STATE to assassinate a foreign leader?", then as I assume has already been said, "NO", but I want to register my vote. That fact that a liberal blog raises the question is shocking to me, I thought this nasty aspect of US foreign policy was purely the work of the conservative element.

    The International Criminal Court could order the execution of a leader following a trial, but if one state considers it right to assassinate another leader, so can any other state. Im sure Mr Mugabe and others would like to apply this policy themselves and are only prevented from doing so because they dont have the resources. We cannot assume that those that have the resources would always use the consequent power in a benign or fair fashion. Rather they would use in self-interest. I wouldn't want any state having such a policy, USA China, or Russia, Ireland etc etc.
  • TomJoad · 1 year ago
    It does my heart good to see so many reasoned responses. I started writing a long thing, and then realized the people before me covered it. NO, it isn't okay (even in wartime, someone down at the bottom mistakenly thought assasination of a leader was allowed, I believe that is not so. You have to remember, even crazy leaders, they are ALL in a club together and have more in common with each other than us commoners. Leaders behave civil to each other, while they send us pawns out to do the dirty work. When one goes totally rogue, like Mugabe, they STILL wouldn't touch him.

    But even if that weren't so, it would be wrong, because as pointed out, unintended consequences, slippery slopes, the automatic assumption that we are the "good guys" and would never misuse such power....there is NOTHING in history to support that thesis.

    When you get right down to it....even trying to "help" often ends up in hindsight making things worse.
  • Derekl · 1 year ago
    John, you assume that simply killing someone is the solution, that the problem will go away when the targeted person is dead.

    What happens when the problem is still there after the person is dead? Then the killer is both a murderer and a fool.

    Murder is never a simple solution. Use your brain a little more, please.
  • hawkseye · 1 year ago
    Assassination of foreign leaders encourages more of the same including the targeting of our president.
  • Apphouse50 · 1 year ago
    It's okay to fantasize about a world without them. It's probably not even all that bad to occasionally wish, secretly, when indulging your dark side, that someone would come up and off them (I do it myself): A jealous husband. An angry wife. Someone whose family was wounded by them.

    It's just not okay to kill them. Period. Damnit.
  • Ben · 1 year ago
    Killing Mugabe would prove that every ridiculous claim he makes about western imperialism is true. That's a very bad idea.