Posted on 06/23/2013 8:56:36 PM PDT by Nachum
According to Syrian Truth’s Facebook page, the above photo is of a toddler living in the Deir ez-Zor Governate in eastern Syria, bordering Iraq. She was tied up by members of the U.S.-supported “Free Syrian Army” — which is dominated by foreign, Sunni jihadis — and made to watch as her mother and father were killed for being Shia. Here is how the Obama administration is using your tax dollars — mockingly in the name of “freedom.”
(Excerpt) Read more at atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com ...
Here in the emergency room, we see a lot of nasty stuff, stuff that would make most people very uncomfortable. Eventually, after enough exposure to it, it doesn’t bother you anymore-it’s routine. Honestly, that’s where I’m at it with Islam. Nothing they do shocks me and it’s just too fatiguing to care anymore.
Yes, blasting her to smithereens with hellfire missiles is far more humane. btw.
She looks almost old enough to marry Mohammad. Sick people.
The point was we don't deliberately target the children. But we can't say that about those who practice the barbaric cult known as radical islam.
Dead is dead. Was this Syrian child killed?
I agreed and pointed out how that is different from what barbaric muslims do. If you're now refusing to accept, comprehend and/or acknowledge that stark difference even though you yourself originally pointed it out you're hopeless.
Circular arguments don't make your case. They just make you look weak and foolish. Have a nice day.
He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.
Inarguably true.
However, I contend there is an enormous moral difference between intentionally cutting the throat of a child and accidentally killing a child while attacking legitimate military targets.
However, I do think Americans are sometimes too accepting of a high level of collateral damage. As long as its our enemies, not us, who's being damaged.
At this point, it's naught but an interesting and, potentially, useful dialectic to me mind you which is the only reason I'm continuing. This isn't personal to me and as such I'm not interested in making enemies out of FRiends over it.
There are several moral aspects involved in this situation which have been obscured by various party members for various party interests. First and foremost, from the Democratic party side, we have a President who, immediately upon being elected President after a campaign that involved demonizing George Bush as a warmongering war criminal, received a Nobel Peace Prize.
The Nobel Peace Prize: Since 1901, it has been awarded annually (with some exceptions) to those who have "done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses."
So, 9 months after being elected POTUS, Barack Obama is handed the most prestigious award on earth for having done the most to promote fraternity and peace in the world. 4 years later it has been estimated by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism that his escalation of the drone war has killed upwards of 216 children to say nothing of those who were left burned, scarred, maimed, blinded, deafened, orphaned, etc.
So, there in lies a bit of hypocrisy. First and foremost, on the part of the Norwegian Nobel Committee for awarding the Prize to Barack Obama with, in hindsight, an incredible lack of appreciation for his true character and then to Barack Obama for demonizing his predecessor as a war monger in his Presidential campaign and then going on to continue the policy of war mongering. Also, and most especially, on the part of the Democratic voters who have contributed immensely to the demonization of George Bush and Republicans in general. They will never again enjoy the moral high ground in any national election.
If you have made it this far, I would also point out a bit of moral obfuscation on your part Mr. Sherman Logan. You contend that A.) Muslims are intentionally "slitting the throats of children" and B.) that we are "accidentally killing" children in the course of bombing what we perceive to be legitimate military targets.
I know Muslims are capable of evil and don't put anything past them but what specific account of a child having his throat slit to you refer to and; furthermore, how is it an accident when we know there are children in the vicinity of the legitimate military target and choose to blow the vicinity up anyways in order to kill the legitimate military target? That's not an accident. that's a matter of expediency and while Barack Obama and the CIA might not make the distinction, God does and, rightfully, so do I. Your moral obfuscation is an attempt to whitewash the reality. I don't like whitewashed reality. I like hard, brutal, painful, honest, reality which is why I have spent the past hour stringing these words together. it is fitting that thunder rumbles overhead as I post this.
I was not referencing particular incidents when I referred to the cutting of children’s throats, but rather to the most hands-on intentional type of killing I could think of.
But there are certainly plenty of examples of children being intentionally killed by Muslim terrorists.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beslan_school_hostage_crisis
http://www.debbieschlussel.com/34299/israeli-baby-decapitated-by-palestinian-partners-for-peace/
What I was trying to express in my post was the importance of intent in moral calculus. When someone attacks a school, as in Newtown, with the intention of killing children, that is morally quite different from a military operation in which schoolchildren get caught in the crossfire. Their being killed, in the second case, is indeed accidental, since it was not intended.
If our enemies can obtain absolute security simply by hiding behind children, they will certainly do so. And to a quite considerable extent, they already do.
If I hide behind children and shoot at armed men, and they return fire, who is responsible for their deaths? Me, or the people who defended themselves against me?
Oddly enough, I agree with you to a considerable extent, as I believe I implied in my original post. I think Americans are much too sanguine about “collateral damage” when it happens to someone else. On FR there are posters who frequently call for the “kill them all and let God sort them out” approach to conflict. Which I find completely immoral, and which they would also, if applied to their own families. In fact, you can make a case that 9/11 was exactly that.
So while I agree that a child killed by “accidental” collateral damage is just as dead as one killed by intentional targeting, I believe there is a significant moral difference between the people doing the killing. There is to my mind a significant though not enormous moral gap created by the intent.
You may certainly come to a different conclusion, but I don’t believe that I am obfuscating, at least not conciously.
I think it's easier to perform the moral calculus when you are the ones blowing up children and not the ones having your children blown up. I think, upon a little contemplation, you would have to agree.
You may certainly come to a different conclusion, but I don’t believe that I am obfuscating, at least not conciously.
Here lies the obfuscation. Are they "hiding behind children" or is it our tactic to seek them out in their residences where children are bound to be present? The latter I think. If I come for you in your home and then kill your family trying to get to you, I am not morally superior in any way. Quite the opposite in fact.
Their being killed, in the second case, is indeed accidental, since it was not intended.
There are no accidents. That is where you varnish the truth. There are tactics and weapons and opportunities and choices. If the first casualty of war is innocence, the truth is the second.
You get it exactly right when you mention 9-11 though. I'm sure they felt morally justified then just as we do now and just as Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev felt justified when they attacked Boston. You will recall that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev bluntly stated that their actions were retaliation for our attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan and the casualties were, in his exact words, "collateral damage". Was he morally superior too then? Obviously not. I also want to point out that I predicted within hours of the attack that the Boston attack was retaliation for our drone strike policies right here at FR, well before Dzhokhar Tsarnaev wrote his bloody little message in that boat confirming it. when the unvarnished truth is your ally, you are able to see and describe events a little more clearly and that is why I yet argue this point (or any point really).
On one end of the scale you have, IMO, a Boston bomber who intentionally and with malice aforethought sets his bomb down in a crowd of civilians, right behind a six year old boy.
On the other end you have an American drone operator who launches a missile strike at a car he knows is carrying a person who encourage the Boston bomber to strike. Unbeknownst to him, there is also a six year old boy in the car.
The BB is intentionally killing children. That’s what he sets out to do. The drone operator is intentionally killing adult enemies of Americans, and unintentionally kills a child.
There is obviously a complete spectrum of moral responsibility in between, but to my mind there is most definitely a difference between the moral guilt of these two men.
Few missions can be launched without some risk of collateral damage, which means be definition few missions will be launched OR we determine some level of collateral damage is “acceptable.”
I think we can agree that using a nuke on Baghdad to take out Saddam would have been “unacceptable.” Where to draw the line between that and giving up (which is what you would have to do if all CD is unacceptable) is the moral dilemma.
Just thought of a better analogy, I think.
In WWII the Nazis intentionally killed millions of children in their camps and elsewhere.
Meanwhile the Allies killed hundreds of thousands, possibly a million or more, in bombing attacks on nuclear and conventional German and Japanese cities and otherwise. Now I happen to think many of these attacks were not fully justified morally, but I hope you will agree there is a difference in the degree of moral culpability.
That should of course be “nuclear and conventional bombing attacks.”
If you’d like to be on or off, please FR mail me.
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Again I ask, where hte hell is Obastard getting the money to do this? Did Congress just authorize a couple hundred billion dollars and call it “Obama’s stash to be used at his discretion”. NO!
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