Re: OT: Physicians for a National Health Program

[Frank Olson <use_the_email_links@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Edmund Fitzgerald wrote:

>>
>>> [....]
>>>> How do you "stop" someone from doing this?  How do you stop someone like
>>>> "Robert Pickton", "Bill Gacy", "Charles Manson"?  Timothy McVeigh?
>>>
>>> Here's how you "stop" them.  First you apprehend them.  Then you give
>>> them a fair trial.  Then you give them due process under law.  Then you
>>> execute them.
>> Fair comment.  You've apprehended a number of them.  I don't see anything
>> happening "trial wise" (fair or unfair), and the "due process" certainly
>> isn't "proceeding".
>>
>
> You seem to be referring to unlawful combatants.  I am referring to the
> serial killers that you named. I don't get the connection between them and
> unlawful combatants.

The question was "how do you stop someone from doing this?".  You threw
in the "red herring" about "unlawful combatants".  How do you stop a
terrorist from completing his mission when he doesn't "advertise" his
presence until it's too late.  The answer is "you don't" - unless you
identify them or their target *and* the time of their planned attack
(one is no good without the other).   How do you stop a serial killer
from killing?  The only resource we have for either won't be able to
intervene in time.  There is no way anyone would have been able to
identify, "detain", and properly interrogate a suspected member of a
terrorist group in time to prevent members of that group from completing
a planned attack without the help of a "snitch".  I believe that's what
happened recently in a couple of high profile cases in Great Britain.
And I believe that only happened because someone on the "inside"
informed on them (reference is made to the "good Muslims" comment you
made later in this response).


>
>
>>> That brings them to a dead stop.
>> Check.
>>
>>
>>> I've never heard of Pickton.  And I didn't bother to Google him.
>> Willy Pickton was just convicted in a New Westminster Court of murdering
>> six women.  He bragged that the cops nailed him too soon.  He'd actually
>> "done" 49 and wanted to finish with 50.  The remains of over twenty of his
>> victims were recovered from his pig farm.  He'd apparently butchered the
>> women, fed some of their parts to the pigs and delivered the rest to a
>> local rendering plant.  Google "Missing Women in Vancouver".
>>
>>
>>> But John Wayne Gacy was a serial killer [1970's] called the clown killer.
>>> Manson ordered [1960's] his "family" of misfits to kill people for kicks
>>> and to prove their loyalty to him.
>> Not much different from what Bin Laden did, eh?
>>
>
> Huh?

There are distinct (in my view) similarities between the "Muslim
extremists" in the Bin Laden "camp" and the "family of misfits" tied to
Manson.  I guess that's a bit too much of a "stretch" for you, eh?  :-)


>
>
>>> McVeigh [1990's] was pissed off at the ATF and Janet Reno for what they
>>> did to Koresh..  As the liberals would say, he expressed his anger
>>> inappropriately.  Got the chair for it too.
>> Actually he was executed by lethal injection.  Gacy got "the chair".
>>
>
>
> Doesn't matter to me.  I have little compassion for these cold blooded
> serial killers.  To me they are like rabid dogs that must be put down for
> the good of society.

What "good" did it do society to kill them??  Did it bring any of the
victims back?  Did it provide satisfaction to their families?  I can
understand putting down a rabid dog, but a human being??  Why not
lobotomize them and set them to work making license plates?  That way
they'll contribute something useful to society and never be able to
formulate another twisted idea.


> With me it's not a question of  them deserving it or
> not, or getting revenge or not, but one of not endangering society by having
> these mad dogs running loose.

So...  jailing them forever isn't enough?  We have to kill them too?


> Manson is up for parole.  If California had
> govenor like Hucklebee he would probably be on the loose again.

Now you're fear mongering.  Manson will never be freed.  He knows this.
  I'm surprised you don't.


>
>>> I hope you aren't trying to equate these individuals to al Qaeda.
>> Nope.  Not all of them.  I figure the closest to Bin Laden would be
>> Manson.
>
> What's up with that?  It makes no sense at all.

Bin Laden and Manson both "inspired" the loyalty necessary to carry out
a plan of attack that involved the murder of innocent people.


>
>
>  McVeigh acted pretty much alone (formulated his own terrorist
>> plot).
>>
>
> I do recall that there was some kind a conspiracy theory about a Muslim man
> that some claim was seen with McVeigh when he bought the fertilizer.  But
> that never went anywhere.

And rightly so.  I don't subscribe to "conspiracy theories".  I try to
get facts.


>
>>> If so you are either oblivious to reality or just grasping at straws.
>> I'm trying to make a point.  Read my question again.
>>
>>
>>> Unlawful combatants aren't arrested by cops, read their rights, given
>>> lawyers, with trials by their peers, and due process of law through the
>>> US court system..
>
>> I remember the US Government complaining about the treatment of the
>> American soldiers taken prisoner by the Viet Cong.  The Viet Cong
>> considered them "unlawful combatants" too and as such didn't accord them
>> the rights as prisoners under the Geneva Convention.
>
> I haven't researched this and I don't really care to .  But I don't think
> what you are saying is true.

It's very true.  Unfortunately.


> American soldiers were considered prisoners of
> war, but the North Vietnamese, who had agreeded to follow the Geneva
> Convention - didn't.  And we complained.  Nothing new there.

You're sadly misinformed.


>
> An unlawful combatant is a cilivan who is not a member of an army, but takes
> a role in hostilites without benefit of combat immunity.  Why would the
> North Vietnamese claim our prisoners of war were unlawful combatants when it
> is obvious to every one (except perhaps to you)  that they aren't?

Simple.  The Viet Cong never recognized there was "a war" probably
because no "war" was ever declared.


>
> I don't believe any enemy we have faced has followed the Geneva Convention
> rules.  So much for the if we we follow the Geneva Convention our enemies
> will follow suit theory.  That belief is nothing more than a liberal pipe
> dream.

So because others haven't followed the rules, that makes it "alright"
for us not to as well?  Right...


>
>
>   It's interesting
>> how what goes around comes around, isn't it??  I think the US should be
>> setting an example for humane and just treatment of prisoners of war and
>> "non-combatants".  Instead, we have people held incognito, without charge,
>> and without representation.  And they're probably being tortured to boot.
>> That just plain *sucks*.
>
> Our enemies look at sentiments such as this and sense only weaknesses to be
> exploited.

"The truth will make you strong."  "In God we trust."  Take a moment to
consider these words.


>
>
> The unlawful combatants, like the 75 at Gitmo are entitled to be tried by
> the military commission President Bush established or the government of the
> country where the unlawful combatant was taken into custody.  They are
> treated humanly enough at Gitmo for Sicko Michael Moore to have taken a smal
> boat load of folks from 9/11 there for movie health care saying it was
> better than US citizens received.

I've never watched anything Michael Moore has produced after watching
the disrespectful way he treated Charlton Heston.  I didn't even watch
that to the end, but turned it off in disgust.


>
>
>>>> Who's the "enemy"?  How do you positively identify them?
>>>>
>>> You ought to at least know the enemy by name by now.
>>> Islamic Jihadist/Terrorist (as you prefer).
>> I know twenty enemies by name and picture.  Bin Laden's the only one still
>> alive.  The other nineteen immolated themselves when they crashed their
>> hijacked jets.  I have no other identifiable enemies and neither do you.
>
>
> You could easily get  plenty of  names of both live and dead enemies if you
> really wanted them.

I'm not sure whom you'd consider "my enemy".


>
>
>>
>>>  Individual identification can be difficult because as you have so
>>> astutely pointed out they do not wear "identifiable uniforms" plus they
>>> hide behind civilians.
>
>>
>>> For this reason it would behoove the "good" Muslims to root the Islamic
>>> Jihadist/Terrorist out from their midst to avoid  unfortunate
>>> misunderstandings during search and destroy missions.
>> Better yet...  forget the "search and destroy" stuff.  Get out of Iraq.
>> Killing only brings more killing.  I thought we were done with the "eye
>> for an eye" and "life for a life" bullshit.
>
>
> The words "search and destroy" set you off don't they.

Only because of what those words imply.  Some 19 or 20 year old soldier
is going to "judge" what and whom to "search" and he's going to be
motivated by what?  A CinC that's demonstrated a decided lack of
judgment, integrity, and honesty...  Right...


>
> Sorry break the one to break the news to you Frank, but it's clear we're are
> killing a lot more of them than than they are of us.

And how many are "innocent"?  How long will that "killing" go on?  When
we kill ten, they'll kill twenty-two.  The body count keeps rising.
It's time to admit Bush erred and bring our troops home.