Great question, John, go to the head of the class! ;->
I bet if YOU were in GWB's shoes on 9/12, you'd have followed them wherever
they were led - I know he did.
Thank you, Mr Byrne, for your thoughtful and eloquent discourse; you make
some very good points, but as you see you can count on most people to be too
damned ignorant (well, maybe just too bullet-headed?) to listen.
The Other Tracy "I approved this message".
> -----Original Message-----
> From: John Lee [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> Sent: Friday, October 29, 2004 9:55 AM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: OT: Non-conservative comments
>
>
> So James, what would you have done on 9/12, the day after 9/11? After
> watching your brothers and sisters jumping from 100 story buildings
> engulfed in flames, as these leaders of rogue nations watched
> and laughed
> and applauded. Put yourself in GWB's shoes and tell us
> all...what would
> you have done?
>
> John Lee
>
> At 12:37 PM 10/29/04 -0400, James B. Byrne wrote:
> >On Thu, 28 Oct 2004 20:50:47 -0500 Denys Beauchemin
> ><[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> >
> >> Pure sophistry=2E
> >
> >> Whilst you fiddle around with the meaning of =93war=94=2C
> the enemy has
> >> a= lready declared war on the US=2C Canada and the rest of
> the Western
> >> World= and has attacked multiple times=2E In fact the
> declaration of
> >> war from = the Islamo-Fascists is constantly expanding=2C
> to the point
> >> where anyone = who does not immediately subordinate
> themselves to their
> >> will is condemne= d to die=2C by the most disgusting means
> possible=2E
> >
> >THE enemy? And who is THE enemy? How will you know when THE enemy is
> >met? How will you defeat THE enemy? Where will you find THE enemy?
> >How many more "enemies" has this pointless, aimless, futile exercise
> >in primitive violence begat? How many more people must die before
> >the sheer impossibility of the task sinks in? THE enemy, as if there
> >is ever one true source of anything.
> >
> >The United States is NOT the western world. Canada does not feel
> >itself under attack. Your hyperbole reveals a naive and childlike
> >view of existence where all imagined groups are homogeneous, readily
> >identified, and easily categorized. The world is neither so neat nor
> >so superficial. It may surprise you to learn that the United States
> >itself is not as homogeneous as you seem to assume. Many within
> >consider that present attempts to force it to become more so pose a
> >far greater threat to the well-being of each of its citizens than any
> >imagined external enemy. THE enemy is met, and it is ourselves.
> >
> >You mock the law because you lack both the imagination to see how it
> >can work and the desire to try. Yes, the law is a oft-times
> >lethargic, always blunt, and frequently unsatisfactory instrument,
> >particularly when the fundamental desire is to promote a narrow self-
> >interest. Funnily enough, that is its strength. Instead of yielding
> >to red-hot emotion or private gain it forces cool public
> >contemplation of all the issues that can be discerned and
> >consideration of all of the consequences that can be estimated. Then
> >it applies rules, standards, and precedence to establish a "just"
> >response.
> >
> >A "just" response is often unsatisfactory for those that have been
> >injured. That is because the law does not exist to protect the
> >individual but rather the society to the which every individual,
> >victim and criminal alike, belongs. Justice, to have effect, must be
> >acceptable to all, or at least a preponderant majority, or it is
> >retribution only. Justice may have an element of retribution in it,
> >indeed it often must or else it is no justice at all, but justice is
> >primarily a process of establishing the rightness of public action in
> >the face of an offence to the common order.
> >
> >To be just, all of the acts leading to judgement must themselves be
> >free of the taint of personal revenge and private interest. Claims
> >about how present circumstances are somehow different than the past
> >and thus justify departure from hard won advances in civil behaviour
> >are the cry of the barbarian. An appeal to base fear. An atavistic
> >response to horribly complex issues that are simply not susceptible
> >to simple answers and are only confused and worsened by recourse to
> >mindless violence.
> >
> >Islamo-Fascists indeed! Your paranoia would be humorous in other
> >circumstances but I find it hard to smile when I consider the tens of
> >thousands of women and children dead because similar thoughts have
> >blinded people who ought, and have a duty, to think things through to
> >their likely outcomes before precipitating irretrievable acts of
> >violence.
> >
> >I will put it very clearly. The present course of action pursued by
> >the United States cannot succeed in reducing terrorism as a political
> >tool because it creates more foes than it kills. The process is
> >geometric and it can only be halted if one of the instigators
> >restrains itself. Since the role of barbarian has been cast for the
> >other side then this necessitates that those who see themselves as
> >civilized must act with restraint. The process by which public
> >violence is both restrained and legitimized is called law.
> >
> >Law is a process that develops to suit evolving social needs. The
> >requirement to reduce international political violence is a pressing
> >social need. Two world wars made that case very clear. Responses
> >that employ raw violence without social consent fail in their social
> >object and often create internal social stresses of separate and
> >novel natures in themselves. This in turn promotes internal
> >instability and may cause cherished social institutions to weaken or
> >fail under the trial. The longer violence whose legitimacy is
> >contested is continued the greater the possibility of some
> >catastrophic internal failure.
> >
> >The situation in Iraq is not tractable to a military solution. The
> >deep unhappiness of many non-western people who see important
> >cultural values being swept away by a tide of capitalist inspired
> >consumerism cannot be satisfied by superficial calls for greater
> >education and more equitable wealth distribution. These are
> >important issues but they are not central to this situation. This
> >problem most certainly cannot be answered by killing people
> >indiscriminately. A space must be made for these people or they will
> >continue to strike out at those whom they perceive promote this
> >social upheaval for private profit and against the institutions that
> >they believe support the process.
> >
> >They will fail, because blunt violence only creates problems, it
> >cannot solve any. The mistake is to copy them and respond in kind.
> >By doing so you play into their hands and accept the rules of the
> >game as they have written them. For killing spreads unhappiness to
> >the relatives and friends of those killed, it does not cower them.
> >If you try this then you end up having everyone for an enemy and you
> >cannot watch everyone all of the time. Eventually, either you must
> >enlist the world's co-operation to eliminate this source of violence
> >or you are condemned to retreating within a prison.
> >
> >The law that you mock, the legitimacy that you deny, is in the end
> >the only thing that stands between the individual and brute force.
> >If you do not grant its protection to others then you will not
> >preserve its shield for yourself.
> >
> >There is nothing utopian or idealistic about this, it is simple
> >politics. Piss enough people off long enough and eventually they will
> >combine to kill you. The only realistic alternative is to convince
> >most people that the law needs to be changed to eliminate that which
> >you find intolerable and to see that it is equitably enforced for
> >all, including yourself. And that often necessitates giving up a few
> >valuable considerations in exchange. Sometimes it takes the powerful
> >and wealthy a long time to see where their interests truly lie.
> >Sometimes they never see it. Sometimes their hands are forced and
> >they loose the ability to choose.
> >
> >As for your opinion on the credibility of the United Nations, you are
> >in a minority position even within the United States. Many who
> >express similar sentiments wish it were otherwise but one opinion
> >poll after another show that a constant 60%+ of U.S. citizens approve
> >of the UN and the same number indicate reliably that the United
> >States should only take action abroad with UN approval.
> >
> >Now, once the United States is actually committed to some foreign
> >adventure approximately 50-55% will support their country (right or
> >wrong) but that is an artifact of contested loyalties overwhelming
> >personal belief under circumstances of actual conflict. It is not an
> >expression of what these people desired as preferable prior to open
> >hostilities.
> >
> >There is a body of international law that permitted removing Saddam
> >Hussein from power though the UN and trying him under the authority
> >of the ICC. However, that idea does not sit well with the
> >chauvinists presently running the United States (and to be fair, most
> >of the other governments of the world), who perceive one set of
> >standards for themselves and another, quite different, for the rest.
> >No, the idea that ruling sovereigns, even from forth rate countries
> >like Iraq, might be taken to the dock for mistreating their own
> >citizens and threatening their neighbours must have caused blood to
> >run cold in many that hold high office, both in the United States and
> >abroad. So it is not surprising that the UN presently can do little.
> > It is a case of the powerful having to choose between what they have
> >and what they want.
> >
> >Naturally they want to get what they desire and also to keep what
> >they have. However, past experience shows that in great events this
> >is an unlikely outcome. So the present unsatisfactory state of
> >affairs will continue, until the growing cost in blood and gold
> >impresses itself upon the public consciousness and popular political
> >pressure to end it becomes too dangerous to resist.
> >
> >And what will be the result do you think? Do you believe that the
> >rest of the world thinks higher of, or is more fearful of, a super-
> >power with 300 million citizens that cannot impose its will on a
> >single impoverished state with fewer than 30 million? Do you believe
> >that the rest of the world is now more inclined to follow
> >Washington's lead on anything? Do you believe that the public
> >opinion of the rest of the world's population is of such
> >inconsequence that it may safely be ignored or mocked? Do you think
> >that this type of behaviour actually furthers the interests of the
> >United States? Do you think that the United States can afford the
> >bill? For someone who hates taxes as much as you have evidenced in
> >the past you are not really thinking this through.
> >
> >No, the law, for all its faults, is the only way to go for it is the
> >only thing that proves socially durable, or affordable. The problem
> >is that for now the United States is unwilling, and perhaps unable,
> >to pay the political price that consent to the law necessitates.
> >However, the present mess in Iraq is representative of the
> >alternative and the next one will be worse. Eventually, the value of
> >the freedoms lost to submission to the rule of law will come to be
> >viewed as less than the costs of resisting. At that time, change
> >will occur.
> >
> >One last point on semantics, it is impossible by definition for
> >sophistry to be pure since the art hinges on substituting variable
> >meanings for words that are used throughout the argument. If rather
> >you intended its meaning in the modern sense of false argument then
> >again your statement fails, since no postulate can ever be formulated
> >free of imprecision. Thus all true assertions must contain elements
> >of falsehood and all false ones, elements of truth. Purity therefore
> >is an unachievable ideal. In any case, asserting that ones
> >opponents' arguments are nought but sophistry requires recourse to
> >logic in either displaying the fundamental falsehoods expressed or
> >the changes of meaning employed. This is notably lacking in your
> >response. Indeed, consider the impossibility of rationally
> >establishing the truth or falsehood of many of your own opinions
> >given as evidence but falling outside the realm of objectively
> >determinable fact.
> >
> >
> >--
> >
> >*** e-mail is NOT a secure channel ***
> >James B. Byrne mailto:ByrneJB.<token>@Harte-Lyne.ca
> >Harte & Lyne Limited http://www.harte-lyne.ca
> >9 Brockley Drive vox: +1 905 561 1241
> >Hamilton, Ontario fax: +1 905 561 0757
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> >
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