Stanford-NYU Report: Drone Attacks Illegal, Counterproductive

trbdavies writes "In 'Living Under Drones,' investigators from Stanford and NYU Law Schools report on interviews with 130 people in Pakistan about U.S.-led drone attacks there, including 69 survivors and family members of victims. The report affirms Bureau of Investigative Journalism numbers that count '474 to 884 civilian deaths since 2004, including 176 children' while 'only about 2% of drone casualties are top militant leaders.' It also argues that the attacks violate international law and are counterproductive, stating: 'Evidence suggests that US strikes have facilitated recruitment to violent non-state armed groups, and motivated further violent attacks One major study shows that 74% of Pakistanis now consider the U.S. an enemy.'"

Comments

74% of Pakistanis now consider the U.S. an enemy.

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, I guess it's time to hang up the drones, and dust of the ICBMs.

What % always considered us the enemy?

[HornWumpus]

Without the baseline information the summary is clearly propaganda.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[ThatsMyNick]

Ok I will rephrase the question. How many considered USA their enemy before the drone attacks?

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[Anonymous Coward]

What percentage of Americans consider Pakistan our enemy?

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[LifesABeach]

Cultural evidence implicates that if the Drones had only killed the single target in the group of people, that the people's views would not have changed much. What we have is a classic case of the Hatfields verses the McCoys. In Pakistan, the Taliban, and Al Qaeda are not the bad guys. The pervasive attitude is, "bin Laden, a hero, was murdered, and by the very people that made him a hero."

What surprizes me is that the CIA/DOD are using Drones, maybe for future readyness? I'm ask the question, "which is cheaper? Drone Kill Logistics? Or 1,000,000 iPads with free connection service?" The one method works and makes a lot of noise, but the other REALLY WORKS, and makes more noise.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[cdrnet]

What % of them actually cared about us enough to consider us as enemy in the first place? That is, before the drone attacks?

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[Darinbob]

Except that there are people in Texas (presumably they can find it on a map) who fervently believe all muslims are innately enemies of the US. There are people in California that believe this. By lumping everyone together they presumably lump Pakistan and Taliban together. Islam has replaced communism as the bogeyman used to get voters anxious and pliable.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[sl149q]

And how many after the recent YouTube video?

Pretty much anything can and will be used by various factions to garner support for their causes. Hatred is such a motivating force to get people on your side.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[Mitreya]

The pervasive attitude is, "bin Laden, a hero, was murdered, and by the very people that made him a hero."

Yep. That's the attitude. It has nothing to do with things like
"The US practice of striking one area multiple times, and evidence that it has killed rescuers, makes both community members and humanitarian workers afraid or unwilling to assist injured victims."
because that's a minor detail no one would worry about.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[Anonymous Coward]

At the bottom of it, the problem is the US ideology that seeks to dominate and by design cannot peacefully coexist with any other.

If you knew anything about Islam (and religion in general) you would understand that this is true of their ideology as well. Domination or death: there's no middle ground when God's on your side.

And if you knew anything about 21st century technology, you would understand that there is no way that violent religionists of any stripe can possibly win. Drones are only the first toy the Pandora's box that Uncle Sam is going to open on these barbarians.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[Type44Q]

What a stupid post, you must be american.

No, he's partially right; he just neglected to mention that the same thing applies to lots of other ideologies as well.

...the problem is the US ideology that seeks to dominate

The real problem (which you ought to be able to figure out for yourself, if you're much brighter than the parent poster) is that the elite of the world have been playing everybody else off against each other since the beginning of time... and the vast majority of the populace anywhere are generally too stupid to see it. As my man Lucius Annaeus Seneca once said,

Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[ganjadude]

My questio nis why are we making such a big deal about "drones" these "drones" are not skynet. These drones are human controlled. So because we dont have a man in danger of losing his life it somehow makes it different? how is that any different than the having body armor against those using 1800 rifles?

the only rules in war, are win. and win big. In the revolution it was said that the americans were bad because they engaged in gorilla warefar, I see no difference here.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Seems to be that you're flat out wrong, so you must be one of the uneducated rabble being manipulated by your leaders.

The US in general gets along very well with the countries that don't burn its flag constantly or kill its diplomats or go into a homicidal rage at every little insult to their religion. The Bush family (including the President most hated by Muslims, George W.) was reportedly good family friends of the king of Saudia Arabia, Egypt was a US ally until the people revolted, and 2.5 million Muslims live and practice Islam in the US without the extreme levels of hatred that those in most Middle Eastern countries have (to be sure, there is hate, but it isn't enough for them to go out rioting every couple of months).

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[ganjadude]

and there are people in muslim countries who think that all americans believe what they see in some video* and therefore kill over 30 of us for it...

* anyone who thinks these attacks are because of some video are fucken retarded, simple as that. I cant put it any nicer. When we have multiple attacks, on 9/11, its not cause of a movie that was out for like 3 months, it was planned.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[DigiShaman]

You know what? I don't give a damn! If these quite peace loving Muslims can't or won't address their own public image by chastising the renegades that put their cult in bad light, then they deserve to let the West address the problem for them. Shit or get off the pot. Take a stand. Draw a line in the sand. But above all, make it known loud and clear that we aren't going to take their violent intolerance any more.

If they won't acknowledge their brethren, by God they will listen to the rest of the civilized nations on planet Earth.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[anagama]

Ah yes -- the favored tactic of terrorists and gangbangers. What a bastion of light we are.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[anagama]

Except you don't win anything by murdering a few innocent people here and there. All you do is sully your reputation and make enemies. If you want to win a war, this drone thing is as retarded as it gets, not to mention fucking immoral. It makes the US nothing but a terrorist bully.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[Vintermann]

The drones has lowered the threshold for when airstrikes are being used. Drones also allow greater detachment for the pilots, making it easier to get them to do stuff like bombing funerals without blowing the whistle, going amok on an airbase or getting shipped home with PTSD.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[sociocapitalist]

Without the baseline information the summary is clearly propaganda.

You don't need a baseline for it to be useful information.

As well, if another country were sending in thousands of drone attacks and killing Americans you would consider that country your enemy just as the Pakistanis are considering America their enemy.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[sabbede]

Absolutely, but there iis another issue that makes this meaningless. Since this is a study of the impact of a military action on public opinion, we need to be able to compare it to conventional action. I propose an experiment! Conduct actions with special forces teams, regular (and therefore larger) forces, manned air strikes and drone strikes and compare the effects. Even still, it will be difficult (nearly impossible?) to control all the variables, but given that military operations are necessary, and that minimizing the negative effect on public perception of these operations is desirable, shouldn't we test to see what type of operation is going to have the least impact?

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[AvitarX]

Interestingly, I heard a news story where they talked to the drone pilots, and a lot of them have more issues, as they are killing much more often and in some ways much more personally than other pilots. They are literally sitting there and watching the carnage.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[kill-1]

Since when are the USA at war with Pakistan?

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[Alioth]

The problem with drones is twofold:

1. in the eyes of Pakistanis, I'm sure using drones rather than sending soldiers makes the US look extremely yellow and cowardly.
2. It makes war politically a lot easier to wage.

On the second point, people back home will get less upset when pilots and soldiers aren't coming home in body bags. It makes it much easier, therefore, for politicians to wage war (or war-like actions) since they know the opposition back home will be very small.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[WillgasM]

I'm just shocked that 100% of them don't consider us an enemy. Cuz, I mean, we kinda are.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[HornWumpus]

If they were our enemy in the first place then clearly the drone attacks are the correct move.

If they were peace loving people then clearly the drone attacks were the wrong move.

Knowing they are our enemy now is useful information, knowing they were already our enemy before we attacked is also useful information. You don't want to make new enemies. You also don't want to let old enemies control your actions with threats, you want to kill them.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[HornWumpus]

Duh. They were before the first drone attack. We've been their enemy sense the founding of Israel. It's just a fact.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[sociocapitalist]

If they were our enemy in the first place then clearly the drone attacks are the correct move.

So we should kill anyone who is our enemy regardless of any other consideration, legal or otherwise?

If they were peace loving people then clearly the drone attacks were the wrong move.

Knowing they are our enemy now is useful information, knowing they were already our enemy before we attacked is also useful information. You don't want to make new enemies. You also don't want to let old enemies control your actions with threats, you want to kill them.

In this day and age, one does not have the legal right to kill one's enemy just because they are your enemy. There are laws that civilized nations are expected to follow although we have been ignoring them at our convenience. When we violate those laws, we are no better than those we call terrorists. America has not declared war on Pakistan and, as such, has no legal right to attack their territory. Attacks that kill civilians are can justifiably be considered to be terrorist attacks. Our attacks on Pakistan, which are not legal and which kill civilians, are no better than terrorist attacks against us.

Re:What % always considered us the enemy?

[ganjadude]

I am not saying that drones should be the only way but that anything a pilot fighter or bomber is going to do a drone can do, deliver the same results, and not put any of our people in danger. I see nothing wrong with that.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[ShanghaiBill]

If they don't want to get slaughtered they shouldn't live in Pakistan.

Or at the very least, they shouldn't invite militant leaders into their homes.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[trout007]

And it would help to stop being brown and start worshipping Jesus.

So let's see...

[Anonymous Coward]

Of the 176,745,364 people in Pakistan (according to World Bank), they chose 130 and managed to get more than half who were related to the "474 to 884" people who've died. You know, I could continue to point out the problems here, but it doesn't seem necessary. This entire "investigation" is complete and utter bullshit.

Re:So let's see...

[Anonymous Coward]

There's no claim that this was a random survey. From the article:

Following nine months of intensive research—including two investigations in Pakistan, more than 130 interviews with victims, witnesses, and experts, and review of thousands of pages of documentation and media reporting—this report presents evidence of the damaging and counterproductive effects of current US drone strike policies.

These interviews provided useful information about various things, such as the "double tap" attacks on rescuers:

Another interviewee, Hayatullah Ayoub Khan, recounted a particularly harrowing incident that he said he experienced while driving between Dossali and Tal in North Waziristan.[163] He stated that a missile from a drone was fired at a car approximately three hundred meters in front of him, missing the car in front, but striking the road close enough to cause serious damage.[164] Hayatullah stopped, got out of his own car, and slowly approached the wreckage, debating whether he should help the injured and risk being the victim of a follow-up strike.[165] He stated that when he got close enough to see an arm moving inside the wrecked vehicle, someone inside yelled that he should leave immediately because another missile would likely strike.[166] He started to return to his car and a second missile hit the damaged car and killed whomever was still left inside.[167] He told us that nearby villagers waited another twenty minutes before removing the bodies, which he said included the body of a teacher from Hayatullah’s village.[168]

Crucially, the threat of the “double tap” reportedly deters not only the spontaneous humanitarian instinct of neighbors and bystanders in the immediate vicinity of strikes, but also professional humanitarian workers providing emergency medical relief to the wounded. According to a health professional familiar with North Waziristan, one humanitarian organization had a “policy to not go immediately [to a reported drone strike] because of follow up strikes. There is a six hour mandatory delay.”[169] According to the same source, therefore, it is “only the locals, the poor, [who] will pick up the bodies of loved ones.”[170]

The dissuasive effect that the “double tap” pattern of strikes has on first responders raises crucial moral and legal concerns. Not only does the practice put into question the extent to which secondary strikes comply with international humanitarian law’s basic rules of distinction, proportionality, and precautions, but it also potentially violates specific legal protections for medical and humanitarian personnel, and for the wounded.[171] As international law experts have noted, intentional strikes on first responders may constitute war crimes.[172]

and the psychological effect of living in an area targeted for aerial attacks:

One of the few accounts of living under drones ever published in the US came from a former New York Times journalist who was kidnapped by the Taliban for months in FATA.[198] In his account, David Rohde described both the fear the drones inspired among his captors, as well as among ordinary civilians: “The drones were terrifying. From the ground, it is impossible to determine who or what they are tracking as they circle overhead. The buzz of a distant propeller is a constant reminder of imminent death.”[199] Describing the experience of living under drones as ‘hell on earth’, Rohde explained that even in the areas where strikes were less frequent, the people living there still feared for their lives.[200]

Community members, mental health professionals, and journalists interviewed for this report described how the constant presence of US drones overhead leads to substantial levels of fear and stress in the civilian communities below.[201] One man described the reaction to the sound of the drones as “a wave of terror”

Re:So let's see...

[Beetle B.]

Of the 176,745,364 people in Pakistan (according to World Bank), they chose 130 and managed to get more than half who were related to the "474 to 884" people who've died.

Not at all sure what your point is. I haven't read the report, but your comment is without merit.

They targeted a lot of people who were relatives of the deceased. They didn't randomly sample the country and then happen to get over 65 who were related to the deceased.

And the problem with that is...?

Re:So let's see...

[Beetle B.]

Yes there is. Here's what it says in the slashdot quote: "One major study shows that 74% of Pakistanis now consider the U.S. an enemy."

The summary is discussing several studies. This isn't the one where they interviewed 130+ people.

Re:So let's see...

[darkmeridian]

That's a pretty bad example of a double tap attack. The first missile MISSED THE CAR. It shouldn't be surprising that a second missile would be fired. Note that the first missile left the target alive, and the second missile hit the car and finished him off. That's trying to get the target, not a malicious attempt to snag a first responder.

What did they expect?

[stevez67]

They ask terrorists (the "victims" of the drone attacks) how they feel about drones and you get the expected response. The number of "civilian" casualties cannot be confirmed or even reliably estimated since the terrorists dress like civilians. This piece of alleged journalism comes from the Bureau of Investigative Journalism which is a highly euphemistically named organization that is about as fair and balanced as Fox News.

Re:What did they expect?

[Mitreya]

They ask terrorists (the "victims" of the drone attacks) how they feel about drones and you get the expected response.

You sort of have a point here. Except for implying that entire Pakistan is comprised of terrorists without exception(?)
Should have stayed with "victim".

The number of "civilian" casualties cannot be confirmed or even reliably estimated since the terrorists dress like civilians.

And you totally lost it. Maybe true, but is sufficient justification to stop worrying about it??
How about US try to estimate the civilian casualties, instead of considering every adult male a "militant"?

Re:What did they expect?

[ganjadude]

their government jailed the man who led us to bin laden

and we still give them billions of dollars

so i wont say ALL of them are terrorists, but their government are terrorist sympathizers.... so fuck them

Re:What did they expect?

[pete6677]

Drones are a hell of a lot better than 100,000+ troops on the ground in every way.

Re:What did they expect?

[aconfusedone]

This piece of alleged journalism comes from the Bureau of Investigative Journalism

No, this comes from "Stanford and NYU Law Schools", and their findings affirm the statistics from Bureau of Investigative Journalism. I also looked for evidence of TBIJ bias but could not find much supporting your claim.

why wouldn't they?

[Anonymous Coward]

When the guy who helped us find Bin Laden is stuck in jail, why would anyone want to help us out and be on 'our' side? There is no reason at all to support America, because they will not support you back when things get rough.

Re:why wouldn't they?

[Black Parrot]

When the guy who helped us find Bin Laden is stuck in jail, why would anyone want to help us out and be on 'our' side? There is no reason at all to support America, because they will not support you back when things get rough.

Also, if some foreign country had drones flying over my country blowing stuff up, I'd have a bit of trouble thinking kindly of them.

Re:why wouldn't they?

[Darinbob]

If Moscow starts bombing us, maybe they'll have a good reason. If they say they really intended to bomb Canada but the trainee got lost then we should thank them for realizing it was a mistake. We'll start eating more pirozhki and thank them for saving us from our Russian hating neighbors.

Re:why wouldn't they?

[Anonymous Coward]

When the guy who helped us find Bin Laden is stuck in jail, why would anyone want to help us out and be on 'our' side? There is no reason at all to support America, because they will not support you back when things get rough.

Also, if some foreign country had drones flying over my country blowing stuff up, I'd have a bit of trouble thinking kindly of them.

Well, Taliban and Al Qaeda are using Pakistan as a base of operations in a shooting war in Afghanistan.

Either Pakistan WON'T stop that, which is an act of war, or Pakistan CAN'T stop that, which is a de facto loss of sovereign control over their territory.

Since the Taliban were and are Pakistani proxies, the truth is probably a lot closer to the "won't stop it".

Does that make Pakistan an enemy of the US? Not really - Pakistan is acting in what they think is THEIR best interest, being squeezed between China, India, and Iran.

Who was it that said nations don't have allies, they have interests?

So to change Pakistani behavior, you have to change there calculation regarding what's in their interests.

How to change Pakistan's interests? Work with India. Give the Pakistanis a list of Taliban and Al Qaeda leaders - a BIG list. For every week someone that list is alive and free, 1,000 more Indian troops arrive in Afghanistan. And they'll stay until India decides to bring them home.

In other words - tell Pakistan that if they want to keep playing with Islamist nutcases, they'll lose control of Afghanistan to the nearest and utterly hated rival. Permanently. And to stop that, the Pakistanis have to sell out and betray their proxies - to their death.

Re:why wouldn't they?

[shutdown -p now]

Either Pakistan WON'T stop that, which is an act of war, or Pakistan CAN'T stop that, which is a de facto loss of sovereign control over their territory.

Since the Taliban were and are Pakistani proxies, the truth is probably a lot closer to the "won't stop it".

It's much more complicated than that.

Taliban started as Pakistani proxy, yes (and the mujahideen warlords that eventually merged into it, like Hekmatyar, also started as Pakistani and American proxies during Soviet-Afghan war). To be more specific, it was an ISI project, with CIA assistance during the war. However, as time went on, it kinda backfired - promoting radical militant Islamism to combat the Soviets caused many people in ISI itself to convert to the cause. Now, Taliban is not fighting a war in Afghanistan alone, they also pretty much took over the Tribal Zone in Pakistan proper (aka Islamic Emirate of Waziristan). The official government of Pakistan is fighting the insurgency there, but a good chunk of ISI and the army is underhandedly supporting the rebels.

How to change Pakistan's interests? Work with India.

What, exactly, would be Indian interest in Afghanistan? Do you think they're looking forward to inheriting that basket case and fighting to support even the modicum of stability there?

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[dzelenka]

And it would help to stop being brown and start worshipping Jesus.

Jesus was brown.

The US and law

[OzPeter]

If the US was interested in following the spirit (if not the letter) of the law, then you wouldn't have things like "Special Rendition". That the US use drone attacks in a country where it doesn't even have a "police action" going on is not surprising. This is just an example of the "Same ol' same ol' ..Ends justifies the means" that has been used for decades (if not since the beginning of the 20th century).
 
And yes .. I know .. anti-american foreigner and all that. Been there, heard the criticism and got the free T-shirt. But if you won't listen when your friends say "Woooo dude .. that's way out of line there", then pretty soon you aren't going to have any friends left.

Re:The US and law

[Arker]

Are you a foreigner? You sound like someone that would make a Good American. Someone that understands Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine. We need more like you. This country has been overrun by fools and buffoons, and their inevitable masters.

Re:The US and law

[cold fjord]

Anyone who cares to know understands that both Al Qaida and the Taliban take refuge in Pakistan. From there they rest, rearm, and return to the fight in Afghanistan. They are attacking targets in Pakistan with growing frequency. They are fighting against the Pakistani army in the tribal terratories where they threaten and oppress the local Pakistanis. They try to destabilize nuclear armed Pakistan in the hopes that the government will fall, they'll seize control, and thereby acquire nuclear arms. They train visiting new members in the techniques of terrorism before they return to the many different countries from which they came, including European nations. They even attempt to strike directly at the United States from Pakistan.

Against all this, you somehow think it is illegitimate for the United States to strike at their mutual enemies with the approval of the government of Pakistan. You want sanctuary from the United States for it's enemies to continue unmolested in their campaigns of terror, murder, violence and hate.

So, if you fancy yourself a "friend" of the United States, what kind of friend are you? You might be the sort that only shows up at your "friend's" funeral, savages the reception buffet, drains the liquor, and leaves, having offered no assistance to the deceased in life, and no comfort to the survivors in death, other than the assurance that it all would have been better if only he had listened to you. Mmmm, no thank you.

Perhaps this cause needs some help.

Re:The US and law

[Arker]

Nope, I am a 'friend' of the USA only to the extent that, you know, being a citizen and all, I would kind of like them to be, say, less than total douchebags?

And in all seriousness, if you are bombing innocents because you think there might just be a 'bad guy' in the group... you ARE the bad guy. You're worse than most of them, better than none. If you are out there being just as much of a bad guy as the bad guys, and claiming to do this in my name, for my benefit? Then FUCK YOU.

Re:The US and law

[argStyopa]

I don't think you're an antiamerican foreigner at all.

I think you have an excessively optimistic view of what the USA is. The US isn't special. Like ANY/EVERY country, it pursues its own geopolitical goals to the utmost limit of its power and influence. A powerful, dominant country can 'get away with' more. It's true today, as it's been true forever.

If Liechtenstein was the worlds global superpower, and saw the need to do this, they would do it too.

If anything, I'd argue that - as clumsily as the US has behaved over the last 50-60 years - they've acted with more restraint than any other potential superpower in our system. I doubt the Soviets/Russia, China, or India would self-restrain, or self-criticize nearly as much as the US does.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[ThatsMyNick]

I have seen people claim Jesus was Aryan, some claim Jesus was of black African decent, but have never heard of a brown Jesus theory.

Other opinions

[kamapuaa]

On the other hand the Pakistan Military allowed the US to use Pakistani airbases for the drone strikes until 8 months ago, requested increased use of drone attacks in 2008, still offer tacit support for the drone attacks, and have themselves said most of those killed in drone strikes were terrorists, despite the political inconvenience of admitting this (by contrast, Pakistan always denied their connection to terrorists working against India in Kashmir, even when the connection was obvious).

The souring of relations with Pakistan centers on the raid on bin Laden, and just the natural friction between the US and a nation with a record of selling nuclear secrets on the black market, supporting the Taliban, and supporting terrorist actions against India.

Re:Other opinions

[HornWumpus]

Anybody ever believed they were unrelated? ISI carried CIA money to the mujaheddin. Half of who are now Taliban. The other half are opium dealers.

Former head of the ISI wrote a tell all ('Bear Trap') back when it was vaguely triumphal for Americans. Full of stories of Casey and his presumably (to any Bond fan, I dare not Google Image search) smoking hot daughter and a black C-5 full of stingers. Book used to be on line. Still on Amazon last I looked.

The obvious choice after 9/11 was to hand weapons, training and air support to the opium dealers. But it hasn't worked out as well as we expected. There are growing suspicions that the Taliban and the opium dealers may not be that separate.

Re:Other opinions

[Arker]

Pre-2011 the Pakistanis were co-operating under the radar while still begging the US to stop the strikes.

You are correct the bin Laden raid was when that went sour, and it sounds like the Pakis have every reason to be upset about it. They provided the intel that led to him, they were told it didnt go anywhere (lied to) and then one day a US team drops into Islamabad and embarrased the hell out of them. Imagine if our foreign 'partners' took intelligence we gave them and it lead to their number one enemy - ensconced in a comfortable house in West Point, NY - and they told us it was a dead end, then dropped out of the sky without warning to raid that house in West Point, without permission, without consultation, unilaterally. How would we feel about the relationship at that point?

Whether we really want our government to be going around the world corrupting other governments (which is what was going on pre-2011, before our government pushed too hard and too rudely) or not is another question, perhaps, but even forgoing it, it's quite disingenuous to pretend that the decay in relations was all the other guys fault. The Pakis havent been hostile, indeed they have been lap-dogs for years, until insult piled on top of insult to the point where they simply could not continue to take it laying down without being voted out of office. Pakistan is a democracy too, after all.

IT IS WIN + WIN !!

[Anonymous Coward]

We win because there are fewer bad guys trying to kill Americans !! They win because they become martyrs, relocated to a land of milk and honey and naked women !! Win + Win !!

Re:IT IS WIN + WIN !!

[Khith]

The only problem is that it does not reduce the number of "bad guys". If you bomb someone, their friends and family are going to be angry and take up arms against you. If you kill them too, THEIR friends and family will take up arms against you. You're literally creating enemies because they want revenge\justice. The better option is to stop killing them and withdraw our troops. They can't kill us if we aren't there. They'll still be angry and some may still take up arms against the US, but they'd have to come here to do that. This is what a military is meant to protect us from.

Imagine it this way: If a foreign country started using drones or occupying troops to kill people in the US that it considered to be dangerous, don't you think that we'd be angry? I would hope that Americans would be angry and fight back. How many of you would say "Oh well. They're killing our people, but it's none of my business."?

Re:IT IS WIN + WIN !!

[Khith]

Even if killing civilians or even killing them all WORKS, how does that make it right? These are human beings we're talking about, not mindless robots or monsters. This isn't like a video game where you win if you completely destroy the opposing side. If you go around intentionally killing innocent civilians, that is an evil act according to most of the world. You might win the battle, but you end up becoming what you had opposed.

Sadly, some people just chant "USA! USA!" and think that we can do no wrong. They'd cheer even if we bombed and killed everyone in the country. With this sort of black and white thinking, they're just "bad guys" deserving of death. If you are one of the people who thinks this way, I doubt that I could convince you otherwise.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[ilguido]

Jesus was brown.

We can't know for sure. Judes are pretty white, many Levantines are pretty white, by the time Jesus was born there was a lot of Greek, Roman, Hittite and Galatian blood in the area. Arab and turkish invasions happened a few centuries later...

Prodigy

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks, President Obama, for increasing the Predator drone program beyond Dick Cheney's wildest dreams. Thanks for keeping Habeas Corpus rolled back. Thanks for throwing your deep knowledge of the US Constitution into the toilet. You make Mr. Cheney proud.

Re:Prodigy

[Black Parrot]

Actually, it is terrible. Truly, war in its purest, economic form (at least for our side), but without risk and blood, we'll now never have the chance to end the military adventurism we've become so loved for.

They went us one better in an old episode of Star Trek.

Re:Prodigy

[farble1670]

so bush is still running the country? amazing. i guess he is smarter than we all thought.

Re:Prodigy

[Anonymous Coward]

Obama didn't kill bin-Laden. The SEALs did and they were operating under orders from Bush which were never rescinded by Obama.

Actually I'm fairly certain that Obama was the one who gave the "go-ahead" order and that it didn't really take the SEAL team THREE YEARS to gear up and launch the attack.

Re:It's a video game

[ShanghaiBill]

So much technology, so much death.

People were killing each other when a rock lashed to a stick was considered "hi-tech."

If anything, technology is making war less bloody. Compare the casualties from these drone strikes to the bombing of Dresden, Tokyo, Osaka, etc.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[Anonymous Coward]

Duh, everybody knows when you combine black jesus and white jesus, he comes out brown!

Captcha was dueling. Apt comparison for how brown jesus came about.

Justified

[bhinesley]

The number of "civilian" casualties cannot be confirmed or even reliably estimated since the terrorists dress like civilians.

That's right, they could all be terrorists. Best to just kill them all.

Re:Justified

[Hentes]

I don't feel sorry for "civilians" hiding, feeding and arming terrorists. The local authorities could be a lot more effective with less collateral damage than drone strikes if they actually did something.

Re:Justified

[farble1670]

no one is interviewing the survivors of 9/11 to determine if americans hate islam either. duh.

Re:Justified

[wierd_w]

*gets asbestos suit on, affixes thermally resistant aluminum tape hat*

By that reasoning, it could be stated "I don't feel sorry for 'civilians' working for the financial entities behind the abuses in our country"

Just thought I should point that out. The twin tower destruction plan was a strategic one, as well as a terrorist attack. Bin Laden may have been an assfuck, but he wasn't a completely stupid one. He chose the trade center because it was a symbol of american led international business activity; something he directly associated with the continuing problems he saw in his part of the world.

The (suspected) muslims in this thead are right: the problem is the US's insatiable desire to control foriegn markets to hold up a faulted domestic business model. That model? "Cheap energy and heavy consumerism are A-OK, and need to continue forever, no matter what the price."

Want to see the hate in the middle east dry up? Multilateral withdrawl of all financial and military interests in the middle east by *all* western powers.

They will exhaust their resources, and poof... dry up and blow away.

The US won't get as many terrorists, we won't have to keep killing brown people, and things will be way better politically.

Oh, but then it would cost you 10$/gal to fill your hummer?

What a shame.

Re:Justified

[Hentes]

The twin tower destruction plan was a strategic one, as well as a terrorist attack.

Or because it was vulnerable to a plane impact? Or because it contained a high concentration of Jews? You assume too sophisticated tought of these goatherders. Now American economic pressure can be a problem, but especially the Middle East is very good at resisting it (at least until they are offered a sufficient price). The OPEC is quite independent from the US and had many conflicts with it.

Want to see the hate in the middle east dry up? Multilateral withdrawl of all financial and military interests in the middle east by *all* western powers.

Sure, it worked well for the French to stay out of Iraq...oh wait, it didn't. You are very naive if you rely on the terrorists to stop of their own goodwill. Terrorists don't want to end the war because that's the reason of all the influence they have. Why don't you think Gaza wants peace with Israel? Because the terrorists will stay in power for only as long as there is a war.

They will exhaust their resources, and poof... dry up and blow away.

You think the West is their only costumer? Russia and China will happily maintain relations with them and supply them with more then enough guns. They will continue to emigrate to the West and try to kill our civilians because we don't let them eradicate Israel or because of some made-up reason like this film now.

Re:Justified

[deimtee]

It's costing $10/Gal now. It's just that most of it is hidden in your tax bill, or racked up as US debt.

Re:Justified

[Anonymous Coward]

Goatherders? You are aware, I hope, that the alleged* mastermind of the twin towers attack had an expensive education from a US university, right?

*alleged because instead of bringing bin Ladin to trial and let him answer for his crime, the brave US military shot him, unarmed, in the head and dumped his corpse in the ocean.

Re:Justified

[tilante]

You really think so? Let's take a look at that....

The US currently uses about 9 million barrels of gasoline a day. 42 gallons per barrel, 365 days a year gives about 138 billion gallons a year used.

Current average gas price in the US is $3.88. Subtract that from $10, and the government would have to be subsidizing $6.12 a gallon. Multiply that by the 138 billion gallons, and that's an outlay of a tad over $844 billion a year.

The total US government budget for 2012 is $3.7 trillion... which would make this gasoline subsidy be about 23% of the total US government budget. I submit that an expense of this magnitude would be extremely difficult to hide, and therefore, gas isn't 'really' costing $10 a gallon.

Re:Justified

[shutdown -p now]

You assume that drone strikes are ever only called on terrorists. Don't you think that, even purely from a statistical perspective, there were sufficiently many that more than one has likely hit civilian targets that are not in any way related to terrorists?

You also assume that all involved civilians are willingly hiding, feeding, and arming terrorists. You would do well to remember the interesting clause in US Bill of Rights, namely that "No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law" - and the reason why it appeared there to begin with.

The gov wants enemies

[future assassin]

how else will the contractors make money?

Re:The gov wants enemies

[Black Parrot]

how else will the contractors make money?

By building body scanners and anal probes.

Re:The gov wants enemies

[ThatsMyNick]

Simple, create fictional ones at home. Talk about sleeper terrorist cells right at home. You will literally have unlimited funding to defend the US from its own people. Security theater is still pretty small in the US, it can easily be a 100 billion dollar per year industry. If the security theater industry joins forces with the private prison industry, it can be even larger.

It's almost like...

[MrEricSir]

...you can't just go around killing people without making a few enemies.

Illegal

[rossdee]

If you are fighting a war against terrorists, and you play by the rules, and they don't, you are going to lose.

Re:Illegal

[Black Parrot]

If you are fighting a war against terrorists, and you play by the rules, and they don't, you are going to lose.

However, it does not follow from that that if you *don't* play by the rules you'll win.

At some point you have to stop and think about what's smart, rather than what you have the might and the "right" to do.

Re:Illegal

[Anonymous Coward]

If you are fighting a war against terrorists, and you play by the rules, and they don't, you are going to lose.

And after we win, what will remain to distinguish us from them?

Re:Illegal

[trout007]

If you are fighting insurgents you are most likely in the wrong side.

Re:Illegal

[Anonymous Coward]

And this right here folks is why Americans shouldn't be allowed at the grown-ups' table.

Yes you can "play by the rules" and get the right result. In fact, in Ireland it was only once the British really stopped breaking the rules and adopted a more respectful pose that they made progress. Not playing by the rules just gives ammunition and recruits to your opponents - after all they're painting you as the aggressor here.

How many civilian casualties would have been OK for a drone strike on Timothy McVeigh? Should the Brits have bombed areas of Belfast? How about some extraordinary rendition for anyone who gave money to NORAID (a US based fund directly given to the IRA)?

Drone strikes like these don't reduce the number of enemies - they increase them. Every innocent civilian killed (and they are to be presumed innocent until proven guilty) is a klaxon call to take up arms. When fathers and brothers are killed, who do you think people turn to when they need a new guiding figure in their lives? Would you accept the deaths of your spouse and children because they were in the same region as a terrorist?

Acting like you're some kind of cowboy sheriff isn't going to fix things. This isn't the wild west - it's a country of hundreds of millions of people. Going in guns blazing just makes you the enemy to more and more people, and all the time the terrorists can hold up pictures of the dead innocents as proof that you are the indeed the great Satan that they claim.

You know there are two reasons why the police get hauled over the coals when they break the rules. The first is that people, even guilty ones, have rights. But the second reason is to protect the police themselves: Once they are seen to be corrupt their legitimacy shatters. When this happens they lose the support of the ordinary people, who will stop complying with them. This leads to a total breakdown of law and order, as has been seen countless times across (eg) African nations.

So play by the rules. Breaking them is immoral, it is repugnant, and even worse than all that: It doesn't work.

Re:Illegal

[Mitreya]

If you are fighting a war against terrorists, and you play by the rules, and they don't, you are going to lose.

Oooh, I know one more rule about "war against terrorists"!

If you are fighting a war against terrorists, you are never going to win because that's one of the least defined terms. If we were at least talking about one organization... but we are talking about an extensive list of unrelated organizations that changes periodically (usually growing).

It's akin to "War against Drugs" and "War against Poverty", which coincidentally also tend to skim the rules for the greater cause.

Re:Illegal

[Arker]

Actually you could not have gotten that more backwards. If you are fighting terrorists, and you dont play by the rules, they win. Simple as that.

Their entire goal is to trigger disproportionate/oppressive responses. Our rules, our Constitution, our tradition of Law, are our greatest assets in this fight, and they are desperate to convince us to surrender those assets. When we do what they want, we lose.

Re:Illegal

[ThatsMyNick]

If you are fighting a war against terrorists, and you play by the rules, and they don't, you are going to lose.

.... and if you dont play by the rules, you becoming the terrorist.

Re:Illegal

[Arker]

You know what?

I agree with you. Pretty much every substantial thing you said.

Oh, I also support the IRA, at least in a relative sense. The UK government has spent over 800 years now brutally dominating Ireland, and among many others they did their damndest to exterminate my own family in the process. You think we wont take an opportunity to stick it to the UK? You are living in a freaking dreamworld if you think we would hesitate for the tiniest fraction of a second.

After WWII I understand a lot of hand-grenades made it over via regular postal service... and if you think any of the old folks in my neighborhood might have a pang of conscience, you can put that right out of your head. They might have been several generations removed, but they were pretty damn solid on the point that anyone wearing a UK uniform needs to die, ASAP, and no one should ever feel sorry about helping out on that front.

But your post is right on. The lessons the UK had to learn are the same ones the US now needs to learn. Lessons like "you may be an arrogant SOB but you still need to act like a real human being to curry support." And how about "it's their country quit being such an obnoxious jackass." That would be a good one.

Still, the bedrock bottom-dollar take away is always going to be "go home" and the quicker that advice is taken the better for all involved.

Re:Illegal

[rossdee]

"How do you imagine that you can lose a war against terrorists, playing by the rules? There aren't very many of them"

15 suicidal fanatics armed with box cutters couldn't possibly kill thousands of people and do billions of dollars worth of immediate damage to buildings could they?

Re:Illegal

[rossdee]

"If you are fighting a war against terrorists, you are never going to win because that's one of the least defined terms. If we were at least talking about one organization... but we are talking about an extensive list of unrelated organizations that changes periodically (usually growing)."

So you would just give up, and let them keep attacking you?

I agree with many people who think we should pull out of Afghanistan as soon as possible, we have already gotten out of Iraq.
However at the time of 9/11 we had not invaded any Muslim country,( our forces were in Kuwait and Saudi arbia at the request of the Saudi Government) and we still got attacked.

Anyway an isolationist foreign policy is not an option on the ballot, if we vote Romney in, we will probably end up in a war with Iran.

Re:Illegal

[IamTheRealMike]

I assume you're also American? You just made the posters point about not being allowed to the grown-ups' table.

The number of Americans who supported the IRA consequence-free is one of the reasons the "war on terror" has made the word American synonymous with hypocrisy.

Re:Illegal

[Arker]

I dont 'support' people that kill people and probably my words there were poorly chosen. But what became the UK has indeed an 800 year history of colonisation in Ireland, and that should be appreciated. The footprint is strong and clear, and it just makes no sense to talk about the violence without acknowledging the historical causes behind the violence.

And yes, I dont treat the native american issue differently. There are a few things that are clear cases of right or wrong and broken treaties are among them.

Re:Illegal

[WillgasM]

First, there's a difference between fighting terrorism and fighting terrorists. You can kill all the terrorists you want, but it won't stop until you quash the reasons to be a terrorist. Put yourself in their shoes. If some other country decided to establish a military presence in your back yard and began carrying out strikes that, intentionally or not, resulted in the death or injury of your friends and family; I would hope you'd be willing to rise up against your aggressors. What's the difference between what the US does and terrorism? 1) We do it on a larger scale. 2) our motives are less ideological and more financial. 3) We're us and they're them.

Re:Illegal

[shutdown -p now]

Supposing you're right. This implies that if you don't play by the rules, you're going to (or at least can) win.

Now, can you describe what said victory will look like, and how we will know that it's finally won?

Drones are cheaper.

[raehl]

Maintaining the network would be impossible. The Taliban (or whoever) just kills the family of whoever is supposed to do the tech work to keep the network up.

Re:Drones are cheaper.

[jamstar7]

Number of countries the US has military bases in: 60-130, depending on who you believe.
Total number of foreign US military bases: on the order of 650.
Number of foreign countries who have military bases in the US: None, although command of NORAD changes between an American general and a Canadian general every 2 years. And we train a lot of foreign military at our bases here in the States.

And people wonder why the US spends more on 'defense' than the next 26 countries combined when 25 of them are nominally allies.

Re:Drones are cheaper.

[foniksonik]

A lot, the vast majority I'd say of those military bases were requested by the host nation. Those countries want our military invested in their region as a preventative measure to keep their neighbors peaceful. I'm sure the bases also keep those countries on their toes regarding US relations as well.

Re:Drones are cheaper.

[jamstar7]

The bases in Germany, Italy, and Japan were installed after WW2 for the occupation. Last I heard, the occupation is long over, but the bases remain.

And what's this about building bases in Iraq? I thought we were leaving, regime changed, economy destroyed, puppets in place, job done...

Re:Drones are cheaper.

[bhiestand]

The bases in Germany, Italy, and Japan were installed after WW2 for the occupation. Last I heard, the occupation is long over, but the bases remain.

I am sure you will recall that history didn't end at WW2. Germany rather wanted American bases there for some reason. I think it had something to do with a hostile neighbor?

Okinawa has some issues with American bases (mainly the USMC and noise concerns), but Japan as a whole doesn't want the bases to go anywhere. Japan gets to benefit from a strong military while spending very little on their own. Between PRC, DPRK, and all the other volatility in the region, pretty much everyone wants the public good only the US is willing to pay to provide.

Re:Drones are cheaper.

[EuclideanSilence]

Okinawa has some issues with American bases (mainly the USMC and noise concerns), but Japan as a whole doesn't want the bases to go anywhere. Japan gets to benefit from a strong military while spending very little on their own. Between PRC, DPRK, and all the other volatility in the region, pretty much everyone wants the public good only the US is willing to pay to provide.

Of course "Japan as a whole" doesn't want the bases to go anywhere. The majority of the US presence in "Japan" is actually on the islands of Okinawa. Ten Percent of the land in Okinawa is US military bases. Understand what that means. TEN PERCENT of an island nation is taken up by a foreign military power, and islands aren't known for having a lot of spare land.

Mainland Japan won't help Okinawa because
1) They'd have to acknowledge responsibility for allowing things to get this far out of hand in the first place
2) They have to move the bases to mainland Japan instead of dumping their problem onto some poor island nation.

Okinawa has wanted the American bases gone or reduced for a long time. Mainland Japan doesn't give a shit about Okinawa. But because Okinawa legally became a province of Japan after WWII, people say "Japan doesn't mind the US military presence." Well, nice, that's an accurate statement. But the people of Okinawa who have to put up with our military certainly do mind.

Re:Drones are cheaper.

[bhiestand]

Of course "Japan as a whole" doesn't want the bases to go anywhere. The majority of the US presence in "Japan" is actually on the islands of Okinawa. Ten Percent of the land in Okinawa is US military bases. Understand what that means. TEN PERCENT of an island nation is taken up by a foreign military power, and islands aren't known for having a lot of spare land.

I am quite aware of the size and impact of American bases on Okinawa (estimates I saw were closer to 20% of Okinawa main island, 10% of the prefecture). There are also problems with various illicit activities, bars, drunk drivers, and occasional issues with rapes, molestation, and plenty of others. The rates really aren't very high considering the large number of personnel stationed there, but Okinawans understandably get quite upset about it.

However, the situation is far more complicated than that. Many Okinawans benefit from the US Dollars pouring in. Landlords, restaurant owners/employees, shops, service providers, auto dealers, etc. all benefit from the US presence. Real estate developers and tourism operators believe they will benefit from an American departure/relocation. I don't have current polling data, but I suspect a low percentage feels very strongly either way and that the majority follows news coverage (Marine punches a baby, everyone wants US gone... a year later 20% want US gone). Most of the protests in Okinawa feature a small crowd posing in front of a base for 2 minutes for a photo opp, after which the crowd returns to work (some of them on base). A few also try to troll Americans into hitting them. This happened to a friend of mine, who was smart enough to notice the other "activist" filming.

Given Okinawa's economy and resources, I doubt they would actually be able to replace all of the lost US revenue. What they really seem to want is a better deal: either reduced US impact on Okinawa or greater compensation for the burden. Most seem to understand the role the US plays in the region and want that to continue to benefit Japan.

Okinawa has wanted the American bases gone or reduced for a long time. Mainland Japan doesn't give a shit about Okinawa. But because Okinawa legally became a province of Japan after WWII, people say "Japan doesn't mind the US military presence." Well, nice, that's an accurate statement. But the people of Okinawa who have to put up with our military certainly do mind.

I absolutely agree that many Okinawans take exception to that burden (with some caveats). However, my reply was to jamstar7's complaint that the bases were built for occupation, with the implication that they are no longer needed (or serve some sort of imperial purpose?). My response, which I believe you would agree with, was an attempt to show that [West] Germany and Japan rather wanted US bases during the Cold War... and also that Japan (nationally) continues to desire a strong US military presence. Although the domestic politics certainly don't favor the Okinawans, who deserve more than they get from the deal.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[Empiric]

It would help more for the so-called "Religious Right" to read what Jesus actually said about money and one's neighbor, and stop letting the Military-Industrial Complex run amok under its own financial inertia.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[raehl]

Duh, everybody knows when you combine black jesus and white jesus, he comes out brown!

Did they cut art classes in your school? Jesus was obviously grey.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[Black Parrot]

If the Pakistanis Muslims respect the Christians, why do they persecute the Christian minorities in their country?

'Cause you know, Muslims would never be persecuted in our country.

(Or Sikhs that the hate-mongers are too stupid to realize aren't Muslims.)

Immoral and counter-productive, yes.

[John Hasler]

"illegal", no. The aerial bombing (the bombers being unmanned is irrelevant) of Pakistan would be an act of war were it not being done with the permission of the Pakistani government (they are neither trying to shoot down the bombers nor filing official complaints with the UN). As it is being done with permission, it is legally a bilateral Pakistani and USA affair. It is, unfortunately, not a violation of USA law and evidently not a violation of Pakistani law either. Until the givernment of Pakistan tries to stop it by, at minimum, formally demanding that it stop it is not legally anyone else's business (which is not to say it is not wrong: it is).

Re:Immoral and counter-productive, yes.

[ceoyoyo]

The report says "current US targeted killings and drone strike practices undermine respect for the rule of law and international legal protections and may set dangerous precedents." Killing people the government deems inconvenient, with no oversight, legal process or warning, and collateral damage to boot, might not be strictly illegal but it's certainly against the spirit of both US and international law and custom,and sets a dangerous precedent.

Re:Immoral and counter-productive, yes.

[DeadCatX2]

Is there an agreement with the government of Somalia? Where it's so congested that a drone nearly crashed into a large passenger plane?

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[Empiric]

You just need to know who to ask...

Though, if you were actually going for a +5 Funny... well played, sir.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[Anonymous Coward]

Right, because there is systematic and widespread persecution of Muslims in the USA. Stop drinking the koolaid, stop letting the media brainwash you, take your tinfoil hat off, and go outside and meet people. Even in Texas, in one of the most conservative towns (where I live), people have nothing but respect for Muslims.

Persecution of Christians

[Taco Cowboy]

If you really want to know how the Christian minority in Pakistan are being treated, here are some links you should explore:

http://www.pakistanchristianpost.com/headlinenewsd.php?hnewsid=2556

http://www.pakistanchristianpost.com/headlinenewsd.php?hnewsid=3659

http://www.pakistanchristianpost.com/vieweditorial.php?editorialid=23

http://www.pakistanchristianpost.com/headlinenewsd.php?hnewsid=3765

http://www.compassdirect.org/english/country/pakistan/15560

All the above links are all based on what actually had happened. They are not propaganda.

Unlike the liberals in the US who lives on anti-US propaganda, the Christian minority in Pakistan have no luxury at all living in the world of propaganda.

Every single day of their lives they have to go through the gauntlet of threats and insults.

Every single day some one from their community got beaten up or killed or raped or forcibly converted into Islam.

Every single day in their lives tragedy happens.

But you do not get to read any of that in the main stream media, do you?

That is because the Western main stream media, - from New York Times to Le Monde of France, - are being controlled by the liberals who hate Christianity more than anything else.

They will not report any news on the persecution of the Christian minority in Indonesia or in Pakistan.

But if ever there is a single case of Muslim being hurt or killed, you bet on the next day those liberal controlled main-stream-media will have their BIG HEADLINE blaring "Evil Christian killing peace loving Muslims !!!"

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Grygus]

I guess I don't understand your point. Let's say you are completely correct; so what? Aren't we, as Americans, supposed to hold ourselves to higher standards of behavior, particularly in terms of tolerance of different races and belief systems? Saying that a militant theocracy acts in a certain horrific way doesn't mean we get to act that way, too;. it means that it's a good thing we're not a militant theocracy. Additionally, criticizing another nation for not adhering to our standards of behavior seems pointless to me, while criticizing ourselves for the same reason seems like a good idea.

What am I missing?

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Anonymous Coward]

His point is that drawing equivalency between persecutions of Muslims in the US vs. Christians in Pakistan is ridiculous. Calling drone actions by the gov't as persecution of Muslims when civilians are hit is illogical as well, as Christians can just as easily be "collateral damage"

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Anonymous Coward]

Christian, Muslim, irrelevant. Its secretarian violence. It's not covered by "mainstream" media because your narrative is a crock shit. "Christian Persecution" is just a very minor part of a big problem and doesn't deserve any special attention in itself.

What is worth noting here, is the social media manipulation that's artificially inflated the the moderation score of this post.
In other words - Fuck off, shill.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[farble1670]

That is because the Western main stream media, - from New York Times to Le Monde of France, - are being controlled by the liberals who hate Christianity more than anything else.

sure, some people hate christians, but that's not what you're talking about. you are talking about people who don't live their lives and change the laws of the US to be in accordance with your religious beliefs.

the US was founded with freedom of religion. but that's not enough for some people. no where in the world will you find the variety of religions practiced in freedom in the US. it's not perfect. bad people do bad things, like that christian who recently killed all of the sikhs, but in general we're pretty tolerant.

however, some folks aren't happy with being able to worship in freedom and peace - aren't happy until everyone either believes what they believe, are is forced to act in accordance with it whether they believe it or not.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[TheGratefulNet]

pakistan is, by strong definition, a muslim country.

why a non-muslim would *want* to live there, I can't fathom.

but I sure as hell would not complain about being a minority if you have the ability to leave. I assume you are not held captive there?

some countries have bullshit concepts that they run their society on. pakistan is, imho, one of them. I would not be caught dead in that country or any like it. I know what they stand for and I want no part of it, at all.

I get that you feel repressed but why stay where the majority *clearly* does not want you, does not like you and will never fully accept you?

there are lots of places to live in the world. if that one sucks, move!

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Type44Q]

What am I missing?

That you're confusing the issue by mentioning facts. :p

Re:Persecution of Christians

[AK Marc]

Every single day some one from their community got beaten up or killed or raped or forcibly converted into Islam.

Every single day in their lives tragedy happens.

Sounds like Tuesday for gays in Texas in the 1980s, with the only difference now being you don't invite the sheriff to the lynching today.

Is that the real reason we are so upset? They remind us of what we used to do, but we are all high and mighty about it now, because we stopped "allowing" it last year?

When our "undesirable" minorities have the same rights as everyone else, then we can talk. Sure, it's down to now the fags can't get married, and it's harder for a gay couple to adopt than for a single man to adopt (for anywhere that allows singles to adopt), and the routine killings are less frequent. But I've not seen anyone argue they are equals. The activists claim they are treated poorly, and the anti-gays claim they don't deserve protection because God hates gays, and their beliefs in God are already protected.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Taco Cowboy]

I am not from Pakistan, but I have been there.

About what you said ---

there are lots of places to live in the world. if that one sucks, move!

I guess you may be able to find the answer in the following link --

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3139989&cid=41446099

Re:Persecution of Christians

[interkin3tic]

That is because the Western main stream media, - from New York Times to Le Monde of France, - are being controlled by the liberals who hate Christianity more than anything else.

Or, you know, because westerners in general don't care about Pakistan in general, and the idea of Christians in Pakistan is confusing to us, and goes against our simplistic worldview. But no, we'll go with your conspiracy theory that we liberals hate Christianity to the point of liking Islamic fundamentalists. Who, in turn, just LOVE liberal atheists.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Arker]

Eh, the thing is, Pakistani christians are just as pakistani as anyone else. Just as native. A family may have been Christian since before Mohammed. It's not right to imply they should leave, particularly when many may have no practical option to leave, but even if they all did - would you leave your homeland like that? That line of thought is all wrong.

Now that said, I dont think it is the duty or the legitimate business in any way of the US to go around trying to dictate how other countries work. If I were in the government I would be very careful with my words as a result. But as a private citizen I dont need to do that and I do find religious discrimination anywhere, against anyone, unacceptable, and thus I find your defense a bit offensive.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Arker]

Well if that's correct his points are nonsense. Religious persecution is religious persecution, prejudice is prejudice, in any country. There is nothing ridiculous about it. Civilians murdered are civilians murdered, regardless of their religion. And if I bomb civilians in an area I know is 98% Muslim, the implication that I am deliberately murdering Muslims would seem a fairly strong one, whether or not I manage to kill a Christian or two in the process.

As a side note, apparently there was a memo I missed, and Eastern rite christians dont really count as Christians. At least Western rite Christians dont seem to care at all when they are murdered or dispossessed. In the last dozen years we (as in the USA) has essentially eliminated Christianity from Iraq, something many centuries of Muslim and even Mongol rulers have never been able to do. Al Queda thanks you, US Government!

Re:Persecution of Christians

[phantomfive]

I think his point is that the vast majority of Muslims living in America are not actually harassed for their religion. Unlike Christians in Pakistan, who are harassed daily, to the point of being kidnapped, raped, and murdered.

I don't know if he is right, but I believe that is his point.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[hairyfeet]

I don't think they hate Christians so much as they hate pretty much anything to do with white people, and if they are white they probably hate themselves. Its classic liberal white guilt, where you appease any group you can claim were "wronged", no matter how far back you go, try going to HuffPo and show those links and see how quickly they bring up the crusades. Yeah that was what? 600 years ago?

I'm not right or left, I actually lean towards socialist, but the path of appeasement is a path of death and failure. Nobody has EVER gotten anywhere with appeasement, its a failed policy and no matter whether you dress it up with terms like white guilt or political correctness or tolerance its still the same thing, classic appeasement policy.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[DNS-and-BIND]

Nope. The position you advocate would result in Americans holding themselves higher than other nations, something that has been disallowed for some time now. Americans are not permitted to think themselves better than anyone. As a matter of fact, Americans are always worse. Why?

A pervasive argument appearing in the post-colonial paradigm is that of Moral Equivalence. In the case of Islamic terrorism the dynamics of moral equivalence can be seen among some figures of the western intelligentsia in their vociferous moral indignation at the behavior of Western nations that, they allege, led to acts of terror, and their understanding attitude towards the terrorist acts themselves (HRC). Even if they do not intentionally excuse terrorism, such writers produce the unhappy consequence of explaining Islamic terrorism in terms of Western misdeeds and faults, and of framing the debate in terms of what the West did to deserve such attacks and, therefore, reverse the moral equation. The Westâ(TM)s âoewrongsâ come to be seen as more reprehensible than the reaction (however âoeharshâ and inexcusable) by terrorists. The easy moral challenge is: âoeAre we not hypocrites, when we do the same thing?â

At some level, this is a pathology of self-criticism (MOS) â" it is all our fault, and if we were better, then we could fix everything. Meanwhile, while we demand the highest standards of ourselves, we treat the terrorists as morally challenged, who canâ(TM)t even understand the questions of intention and cannot be expected to self-criticize. We become incapable of making the distinction between victims and perpetrators, and end up blaming the victim.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[no-body]

...Unlike the liberals in the US who lives on anti-US propaganda,
... are being controlled by the liberals who hate ...
... those liberal controlled main-stream-media...

I just hope that you are aware that your abstractions I quoted above are identical to the other's here - Christians, Muslims and other's elsewhere
Communist, Your label, Centrist, Conservative, Fascist and on other believe system imprints - Your label, Your label, Hindus, Buddhists

It does not go beyond blame of facts happening.

The underlying reasons why humans can be imprinted to allow themselves doing atrocities and who benefits from that are far from being touched.

Are you falling in the same trap too?

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Anonymous Coward]

The question at hand is not about who hates who more or who mistreats who more. It is about Pakistan running Drones in US air space and killing indiscriminately the general public in the name of fighting terrorism. No I did not type it wrong, how would you feel if Pakistan or some other country did this in the US? What right do we as a group have to kill people in other countries under any rationale and don't you think the same rational could be used by other countries to do those exact same things withing US?

Is it unfathomable because Pakistan/Syria/Iran etc don't have such military might?

Re:Persecution of Christians

[ohnocitizen]

Logical fallacy there. I don't see how these incidents not showing up in the mainstream media is evidence of a liberal bias, let alone liberals who hate Christianity more than anything else. There are a lot of things they'd have to hate less! Republicans! The Tea Party! Mitt Romney! Conservative Democrats! The coming bacon shortage! Jersey Shore! People who suddenly stop walking on the sidewalk right in front of you with no damn warning! Corporations! The Koch Brothers! etc.....

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Vintermann]

Calling drone actions by the gov't as persecution of Muslims when civilians are hit

Wait, Muslim is an antonym of civilian now?

I think the point is that if Pakistan was a Christian-dominated country, the drone policy that's being implemented (attacking public assembly so often the victims are afraid to attend funerals, weddings or assist the wounded after a drone strike) would simply not be feasible. There'd be an uproar of dimensions.

But it's still not really religious bigotry, but cultural bigotry, with religion being the prime cultural marker.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Vintermann]

As a side note, apparently there was a memo I missed, and Eastern rite christians dont really count as Christians. At least Western rite Christians dont seem to care at all when they are murdered or dispossessed.

This is because to the hawks, religion in itself isn't important, it's only important as an identity marker. And while Iraqi Christians may be Christians, they aren't in on the hawks' grand civilization identity project.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Arker]

Well all I can say in response to that is that these 'hawks' of yours are bloody morons. One of these days there might be a real clash of civilisations to worry about, and I hope to hell every one of these morons that's been associated with the US government over the last few years winds up on the other side, because DAMN it sucks when the only option is obvious fraud, huh?

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Anonymous Coward]

If I was 19 years old and a predominantly christian nation sent a drone that killed my cousin, I would probably hate christians too.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Anonymous Coward]

Refraining from deploying flying death robots and killing/rendering/torturing anyone who looks at you funny is not "appeasement".

Re:Persecution of Christians

[sociocapitalist]

All the above links are all based on what actually had happened. They are not propaganda.

All newspapers have spin and are mechanisms of propaganda. You can't know what actually happened for sure unless you were there.

I am not saying that Pakistani christians aren't being persecuted. There is persecution of minorities in every country in the world to one degree or another often resulting in degraded living conditions and death for those of the minority. Muslims persecute Christians, Christians persecute Muslims, blacks persecute whites and whites persecute blacks, Chinese / Japanese, Jews / Palestinians...the list goes on without end and that's just today, never mind what happened in the middle ages. Not much of it makes it into the news because it happens all the time which means it isn't sensational and as such doesn't 'sell papers'. Only when there are genocides (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bosnian_Genocide ; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rwandan_Genocide ) do such items make it into the news.

But you do not get to read any of that in the main stream media, do you?

That is because the Western main stream media, - from New York Times to Le Monde of France, - are being controlled by the liberals who hate Christianity more than anything else.

They will not report any news on the persecution of the Christian minority in Indonesia or in Pakistan.

Putting your obvious right wing religious basis aside for a moment, I'll just say that you don't get stories on such topics in the US mainstream media because you get almost nothing in the US mainstream media of any substance unless it directly affects the US or US interests. This is not specific to any particular set of minority bashing (or any other number of subjects that get ignored in the US), but is a general reality for the media.

But if ever there is a single case of Muslim being hurt or killed, you bet on the next day those liberal controlled main-stream-media will have their BIG HEADLINE blaring "Evil Christian killing peace loving Muslims !!!"

This is just wrong. The American media, for instance, plays down what Israel does in Palestine all the time to the point where Americans generally haven't got the slightest clue of what actually goes on there.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[DNS-and-BIND]

No, Christian persecution is not covered by the MSM as it is the WRONG narrative. There are oppressors and there are victims, and everyone knows who is who. Portraying Christians as victims messes up the narrative. The fact that it's true - well when the hell has that been part of news-gathering in the last 10 years?

Also quite telling that you are beyond convinced that the post was up to +5 due to manipulation. How would you even jump to such a conclusion, out of the blue? Why, does your side of the argument continuously engage in this reprehensible behavior?

I note in passing the implied violence and explicit profanity in your thoughts. Those in power get very angry indeed when contrary thoughts correctly challenge their pre-established convictions.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Alioth]

If you're a person of normal means, immigration requirements of other countries (and the cost of moving) make it nearly impossible to move.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[tilante]

Yes - because everyone knows that anyone can move at any time they wish. There's no expenses involved in moving at all. There's no risk involved in moving to another country. No countries in the world have immigration requirements, work visa requirements, or anything like that -- anyone who wants to is free to move into any country and just start working there!

Not.

For most people, moving is a major undertaking. You have to sell your home or be willing to abandon it. If there's a mortgage on it, you have to hope that you can actually get enough money out of selling it to pay it off -- otherwise, you're going to be stuck paying for a home that you don't even have any more. Then there's the expenses involved in actually transporting yourself, your family, and any stuff that you want to keep.

And, of course, before you move, you probably want to have a place to move to. Let's see... if you're in Pakistan, the surrounding countries are Iran, Afghanistan, and India. So, two nations that are also Muslim-dominated and not extremely friendly to non-Muslims -- one of which is currently a war zone as well -- and a nation where your ethnic group (if you're a Pakistani) is hated.

Yeah.

So you're not going to be able to just move into a neighboring country. That means you're looking at a trip by sea or air, for you and your family -- and that's expensive. Once you get there, you'll need to find a place to live, get a work visa, and find a job that makes enough money to support you and your family. And you need to have enough money accumulated to support yourself for the time that it will take to do all that. Oh, and don't forget about all those things that most civilized countries expect when you move into somewhere, like security deposits, service connection fees, and the like.

Of course, some people do the thing of "move somewhere else, get a job there, send back money to my family until I can save up enough for them all to move as well". But that carries a lot of risk -- you're leaving those you care the most about in the hell-hole you were trying to get out of. And you're separated from your family for that time, which is likely to be months or years.

You can do some groundwork ahead of time -- go to the embassy of the country you want to move to and apply for a visa there, for example, and use the Internet to search for a job in the place you're moving to. With some countries, this leads to a chicken-and-egg problem, where many employers don't want to offer a job to someone who doesn't already have a work visa, but the government doesn't want to give you a work visa unless you already have good job prospects. If you have valuable skills, that'll help, but not everyone has those. And, of course, not everyone lives close to an embassy, or has unrestricted Internet access.

This whole problem is part of why "ethnic neighborhoods" spring up -- people leaving the country move to where relatives who have already left the country are, so they can have a place to stay, contacts to help them find a job, etc. Of course, that only works if you have relatives who have left the country, and they've gone somewhere that you think will actually be better, and they're willing to help you. If you're part of a small minority in your home country, these things are statistically less likely for you.

Oh, and for security, if you're part of a persecuted minority, you may need to keep your preparations secret, since others may see you as an easier target ("He's going to be leaving the country, he won't be able to go to court against me!") or a more fruitful one ("He's got to be saving a bunch of money to take with him! We could get it all!") because of them. Or people who hate you may try to trump up something against you to keep you from leaving. Of course, keeping your preparations secret may make it hard to do things like find a buyer for your home, so you may be faced with a choice between risking what people might do if they learn you're trying to leav

Re:Persecution of Christians

[hairyfeet]

Uhhh...didn't bother to actually READ the GP or check his links before posting did you? Sadly the fact that 2 people marked you insightful means they didn't read the GP either, they really do need to redesign the layout of this site so that GPs are easier to see but until then I'll fill you in on what you missed.

The GP asked why the media is completely ignoring the fact that Christians in Pakistan are being raped and murdered daily simply for being Christian and the answer to that is...white guilt from the elites in the media. It is no different than how if a white man hits a black man its a "hate crime" yet if 30 blacks go walking down the street robbing and beating its a "flash mob".

You see with white guilt and the path of appeasement you get "protected classes" which as far as they are concerned can do no wrong. Again post the GP's links to HuffPo and I'm sure you'll find several who not only bring up the crusades but who blame 9/11 on the USA. If "we'd only do what they want" they say, "then they'd leave us alone!" except, and not to Godwin, simply pointing out the last time this EXACT train of logic was used...it didn't work and that was of course with Germany in the 30s.

If someone doesn't respect you, respect your right to speak or even exist? Then appeasement will NOT make them respect you, they will simply see you as prey. We have seen this over and over throughout history, if you follow the path of appeasement with those that don't respect you then they simply push harder, demand more appeasement, and when you finally reach the point you won't appease them anymore they WILL attack you.

Look at what appeasement has already cost the EU and UK, there are places in both where a woman can't walk uncovered or a man drink a beer without being attacked, why? Are they not being appeased? no its because nothing but TOTAL victory is acceptable to them and they know nobody will stop them, they'll get a slap on the wrist by cowardly politicians that don't want to be labeled "racially insensitive". Well I have news for you, respecting individual rights is NOT racially insensitive, its the fricking core of democracy!

But we will get that lesson shown to use very soon, at current birth rates and immigration policies a good chunk of the EU will end up majority Muslim and then you'll see how much respect they have for you. the ALREADY have "Sharia ghettos" in most major cities in the EU, where they live just as barbarically as they do in the ME, those will simply spread, because appeasement NEVER works.

Re:Persecution of Christians

[Vintermann]

Oh, drone operators only fire when "they're" being fired upon! I didn't know that. Silly me, here I have been worrying.

And I didn't know that the police executed everyone in mafia funerals, in case there was an outstanding warrant on one of the executed. But you're right, it makes sense! (in crazy land).

Re:Persecution of Christians

[veliath]

Americans are not permitted to think themselves better than anyone. As a matter of fact, Americans are always worse.

Americans can certainly think themselves better. But it is hopelessly naive to think the American government is any better, human-rights wise, than the governments of the places they are invading/bombing.

Pakistan was an Islamic nation to begin with in 1947. Zia-Al-Huq with the tacit and monetary support of the Saudi and American governments dragged the country, its foreign policy and its strategic direction into a fundamentalist interpretation of Islam along the lines of the Wahhabists in the late 1970s. This is obvious in how they chose who they armed in Afghanistan, how they created the Taliban from the orphans of the war there, the slow seepage of Saudi style cloistering of women behind high walls and burqas.

So the Pakistani people are paying twice for American government policy decisions. Once for being saddled with the fundamentalism imported from Saudi Arabia in the 1970s and very much alive to this day. And again by fiery barely discriminate death from the skies and the chaos of a decade of hostilities as the American government tries to clean up Blowback.

veliath

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[Anonymous Coward]

Dissatisfaction with the current incompetent administration != hatred of the USA

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[ceoyoyo]

All of whom would be "brown" to the average idiot who says stuff like the OP did.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[xevioso]

To make Brown Jesus, you'd need to mix Red Jesus, Yellow Jesus, and Blue Jesus.

If you are making a watercolor Jesus, you'd need something like veridian Jesus and alizarin crimson Jesus mixed together. I'm not sure what the easiest RGB Jesus values would give you a Brown Jesus, but it shouldn't be too hard to find.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[Darinbob]

By "they" you mean every single Pakistani? May as well talk about Americans because "they" made that stupid video, "they" pissed all over dead bodies, and "they" treat the middle east like a video game. As for liberals if you think they hate the country then you're clearly listening to too many one editorialists masquerading as journalists and should go out and talk to actual Americans and realize that they can cover a diverse range of political views without "hating" their country. If the wife wants you to fix up the leaky pipes do you complain that she hates your house, or do you just realize instead that you don't live in a perfect house and want to make it better?

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[hey!]

Is the Pakistani government an enemy of the US and often works against US interests?

Yes.

Is the Pakistani government an ally of the US that shares intelligence with the US and often allows US military to operate on Pakistani soil?

Yes.

Isn't that schizophrenic?

Yep.

Like the US, Pakistan has an elected government. Unlike the US, it has governmental organs that aren't fully under the control of civilian elected officials. The Pakistani military and intelligence services are independent national institutions (Egypt is this way as well) and within those institutions you have various fiefdoms and power centers. The Egyptian military is this way as well, almost forming a distinct society within the society with its own economic and social welfare programs.

Imagine you have a country governed by warlords. There might be some order of precedence or honor which theoretically unifies the country, but still some of the those warlords might be your "friends" and others your enemies. There's nothing mystifying about that. Now imagine those petty rulers aren't warlords who control territory, but bureaucrats that control various state functions. It's not that different.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[jamstar7]

So they should all move to the US?

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[SternisheFan]

Christ had hair "like wool", which kinda' rules out that he looked anything like the 'white guy' in the pics shown in my catholic church.

------------

"I was brought up Roman Catholic, until I reached the age of reason." - George Carlin

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[FudRucker]

what the religious right do not understand is they are feeding the beast, they wont be counted a friend when christ comes back, the USA and Israel are both going to be in BIG trouble with the lamb of god

A counter article. Drone strikes are effective.

[hibji]

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/03/opinion/bergen-drones-taliban-pakistan/index.html

Re:74% of Pakistanis now consider the U.S. an enem

[loneDreamer]

The other 26% already had that opinion...

2% is not bad

[khallow]

'only about 2% of drone casualties are top militant leaders.'

Most wars would stop fast, if 2% of casualties from the war were top leaders. It says something impressive both about the targeting ability of the US military and the resilience of the "militants" being targeted.

Re:2% is not bad

[khallow]

with your logic than it is fine to make suicide bomb which kill 10 people with only 1 US military as a victim. that is 10%.

It's 0% unless that victim just happens to be a "top leader". But if you blew up fifty people, including the President of the US, well, that's pretty effective as such things go.

Re:2% is not bad

[IamTheRealMike]

The US has in the past defined the word "militant" to mean anyone killed by drone strikes, so I'd take any reporting on the proportion of "militant leaders" killed with a gigantic pinch of salt. No, scratch that, I'd just not believe it at all.

Anyway, by definition you can't really prove somebody was guilty of being "a militant" (whatever that means) without safeguards like evidence, a trial and so on, otherwise you really have no idea if they were or weren't. As being blown up remotely offers no such safeguards, there's no way to know who is dying out there, especially as the double-tap strategy means nobody dares go near a strike zone to find out who got killed.

Re:2% is not bad

[khallow]

Anyway, by definition you can't really prove somebody was guilty of being "a militant" (whatever that means) without safeguards like evidence, a trial and so on, otherwise you really have no idea if they were or weren't.

Then we're at an impasse since there's no way to collect evidence to the standard of a court trial. First, they are in a foreign country, Pakistan which won't cooperate with the US on the gathering of evidence. Second, whose lives are you going to endanger to collect this evidence and who will die while foes continue to kill during this process? Third, what crime is actually happening by which one could be tried in a court?

As I see it, there are two rival interpretations. First, that the laws of war heavily and unfairly favor established, large military powers like the US. Second, that the Taliban and other "militants" are illegally conducting war and hence, shouldn't have protection, much less some completely unrealistic and unworkable court standard.

Re:2% is not bad

[shutdown -p now]

Most wars between states would be. Those mujis don't have a proper state, though, and they don't have a rigid power structure. Their commanders are not some kind of segregated elite, they come from the ranks based on merit and respect from the people involved. If you kill one such guy, well, he becomes a martyr in the name of Allah and is revered and emulated, and another field commander steps up to take his place.

The problem with the whole "war on terrorism" is that it can't be fought in the same way as a traditional war, where you only have to cripple, beat into submission or take over the power structure. You literally have to exterminate every single muji on the planet to win it.

Totally illegal

[Arker]

Yes, in the early years the Pakistani government was tacitly (but not expliclity) co-operating, providing intelligence and even a base to operate from. That arrangement ended in early 2011. They have since repeatedly demanded that the attacks cease, and been steadfastly ignored by both the US Government and US media for their trouble.

Re:Jesus more than likely didn't exist.

[SternisheFan]

I'm calling bullshit on this ac. There is ample historical proof that Jesus Christ was born, lived and died. As to whether he is the only true son of God? That's open to debate. Christ himself said he was no different, not 'special'. In that regard, aren't we all sons/daughters of God?

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[Type44Q]

Even in Texas, in one of the most conservative towns (where I live), people have nothing but respect for Muslims.

I live next door, in a very conservative town that only a normal person (i.e. not a Texan or an Okie) would even be able to tell apart from a "conservative Texas town" ...and you can bet your anonymous ass that people (thanks to a combination of tee-vee and closet-homosexual preachers) fear and distrust Muslims... not that they'd know the difference; these people wouldn't know a Muslim if one crawled up their ass and made ham sandwiches...

Re:74% of Pakistanis now consider the U.S. an enem

[psherman2001]

When I read a couple years ago that a strike had killed "mostly" militants, then the next day bombed everyone at the funeral... I felt suddenly empty. Who in their right mind would NOT think badly of the country responsible?

I love my country and consider myself quite patriotic, but these drone attacks are shameful. They should be stopped. Aside from the obvious moral imperative, there is the practicality of it: every time we kill another "al-Qaeda #2" with these cowardly half-blind strikes from the sky we create many more enemies.

Why do I hear so little protest here in the US? What can the average Joe do to raise hell about it?
And where is the press on all this? I'm tired of hearing about Mitt Romney's taxes and President Obama's birth certificate. Let's get real.

We've met the enemy...

Family

[WhackAttack]

Certainly better than your family members going to fight. To clarify: Would you rather have, for example, your son going to war with a significant chance they may not return? Or would you rather have them safe and sound next to you? Just making a point, not trying to start an argument.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[fche]

What a strange thing to say. The videos/pictures/transcripts I read of tea party events were about as unabashedly patriotic as any.

Not so bad...

[Guru80]

That's still about 25% more Pakistanis that see American's as allies than American's that see Pakistanis as such.

if your playing the percentages...

[NemoinSpace]

Since Sept 11 attacks killed 2,996 non combatants.
So I'm guessing your murder rate is a teeny weeny bit less justifiable.
assholes.

Re:if your playing the percentages...

[ThatsMyNick]

If you are playing percentages, the US can destroy the entire world and still the percentages would be better than 9/11.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[Omestes]

So the solution is to replace them with even bigger idiots?

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[Arker]

The only Jews that are white are the ones whose lineages underwent a long exile in a northern climate. Greek and Roman culture spread more as culture than lineage - the Greek language spread across west asia but Greek DNA did not, at least to any measurable degree. If anything has significantly lightened middle eastern skin, it would be the millions of slaves imported throughout the middle ages, mostly of eastern and northern european extraction, and occuring long after the time in question. So, sorry, you are wrong. Were Jesus a historical figure, he would certainly have been a very brown man. Probably significantly darker than your typical Palestinian "Arab" today and certainly not significantly lighter.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[Darinbob]

These are riots and not an act of war. An act of war would have to involve a government leading or promoting the attacks on embassies.

Re:Jesus more than likely didn't exist.

[Arker]

There is ample historical proof that Jesus Christ was born, lived and died

There is precisely zero proof of any kind for that thesis. I defy you to produce anything that even vaguely looks like proof of such a thing.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[Arker]

And well he should, since he's a mythological remake of Joshua, who was a late bronze age Tiger Woods himself.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[dgatwood]

The media is a joke, they are in the admins back pocket, and they have been forever.

No, not forever. George W. Bush started that trend. Before that, the media were remarkably critical of the administration. Remember the whole Monica Lewinsky thing?

That all changed the day Bush Jr. got into office. He seriously curtailed the White House press corps, punishing people who asked tough questions by pushing them to the back row, threatening to remove media outlets entirely if they were too critical of the administration, etc. Since then, if Helen Thomas's comments are any indication, Obama has only cranked up the abuse a notch further.

It won't end until the public demands an apolitical regulatory body to oversee membership in the press corps and enforce fairness during press briefings.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[pete6677]

Muslims are treated many times better in the western world than Christians are in ANY predominately Muslim country.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess that depends on whether or not shouting, "all the mex-ee-cans are the turrurists and the muslaams want to eat our childrun" is unpatriotic, if you're wearing an american flag like a dirty t-shirt.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[Fjandr]

I think this level of understanding of foreign policy matters in countries like Pakistan exceeds most of the staff of both the Defense and State Depts.

You better come up with proofs

[Taco Cowboy]

Tea Partiers hate far more than just the current administration. They hate women's rights, they hate gay rights, they hate minority rights

You better come up with solid proof of what you said.

The term "TEA" stands for Tax Enough Already

The TEA party is about TAX - yes, TAX

It has nothing to do with hating women rights, or hating gays, or hating minority.

If you can't come up with solid proof of what you said, you are nothing but a pathetic liberal troll !

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[anagama]

Obama Admin spin to protect Hillary. There was no riot at all outside the Libyan embassy. It was a planned attack -- had nothing to do with a stupid youtube video either. It's about getting revenge on people who kill you. You'd do the same thing given half a chance to a Chinese embassy if China treated us like we treat others.

Anyway, the whole lie about the embassy is "anchor and adjust" -- tell a lie to get people anchored to an idea, then when the truth comes out, people will adjust their thinking to maintain belief in the original bullshit, like "a video is all it takes for an attack -- such savages!"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/sep/20/obama-officials-spin-benghazi-attack

Re:74% of Pakistanis now consider the U.S. an enem

[anagama]

Also remember that what the Obama administration means when it says "militant", is a man or a boy killed by a drone. It will revert that to civilian if it is conclusively proven after the fact the person was innocent by some mystical secret standard. In other words, a great many of the "militants" really weren't.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/29/world/obamas-leadership-in-war-on-al-qaeda.html?pagewanted=4&_r=2
from page 4

"It bothers me when they say there were seven guys, so they must all be militants," the official said. "They count the corpses and they're not really sure who they are."

You keep using that word...

[Anonymous Coward]

...I do not think you know that it's an ethnic slur.

Re:You keep using that word...

[Anonymous Coward]

Not GP, and I can understand your message very well (hell I live on other side of the border, in India) and I believe Paki is a ethnic slur too. You probably dont want to keep using it. And whats with the attitude towards the person who tried to help you?

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the original point was that 70 year old women that yells angry things about our tax code is somehow just as hateful as the muslims blowing places up with human beings inside. Ridiculous, of course. I mean... the latest excuse-of-the-day for savage murder is provocation by YouTube.

We've all been trying real hard to make excuses for the psychotic, religious fuckbags in those places for decades now. It hasn't helped, and it's really getting old. I'm starting to drift over to the, "fuck it, let them all kill each other" side. I call it the Western Europe approach.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[anagama]

Obama defines militant as "a man or boy killed by drone". You can either modify your thinking, or accept the fact that you are an evil fuckwad who supports random murder. Those are your two choices.

http://www.salon.com/2012/05/29/militants_media_propaganda/

Re:Is KDawson back?

[anagama]

Obama Democrats: The NEW GOP, now with MORE evil than ever before!

Why doesn't pakistan like US?

[k8to]

We shot up their villages and sent bombs etc. Isn't that good enough? What more do they want.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[Immerman]

I think you're confusing "idiots" with "tyrants". Stripping us of our civil liberties without without triggering a revolt or even widespread protests is hardly the accomplishment of an idiot.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[colinrichardday]

In rgb.text, brown is 165 42 42, which is #A52A2A in hexadecimal. It would appear to require red, green, and blue.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[colinrichardday]

Then why can't Tiger stop the sun so that he can finish his round in daylight?

2%? WTF?

[Yvanhoe]

How can a lethal technology have a 98% error rate?

Re:2%? WTF?

[Guru80]

Because they are asking the relatives of victims of such violence and such. Easy to see where those discussions and statistics are going to lead without asking the first question.

Re:Jesus more than likely didn't exist.

[Arker]

Oh man you think I didnt see that one coming? It's comical.

Josephus reported after Jesus supposedly lived, and indicated that there were people around that thought he lived, many decades earlier. That doesnt cover the last item, it doesnt get anything thrown in for free, it's just pathetic. No one questioned whether there were Christians around in Josephus lifetime, only whether there is as claimed 'proof' of his historical existence.

And there is not.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[cavreader]

Seeing that the facts for the article's report was diligently gathered from all those Pakistanis that just happened to standing a bit to close the target makes the report sound pretty weak. We might as well go back to carpet bombing since the results would hardly be worse than they are now. As it stands the vast majority of the US public doesn't give 2 shits about anyone in the middle east and prefer to spend their time dealing with their own problems. On the other hand if you want to talk to some folks who really hate Pakistan and anything associated with Pakistan go ask an Indian for his views on that wonderful country.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[Arker]

Well, apparently , while Joshua can be accurately described as a late bronze age Tiger Woods, Tiger himself canNOT be accurately described as a modern Joshua.

And that explains the whole thing, does it not?

Drones unpopular among targets

[mveloso]

Gee, you think? Why not say something like:

"guns, bullets unpopular with shooting victims and their relatives."

Re:Drones unpopular among targets

[khallow]

Gee, you think? Why not say something like:

"guns, bullets unpopular with shooting victims and their relatives."

Because that wasn't what I wished to say.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[Kreigaffe]

I WAS watching the news during Clinton, and the news was NOT hard on him. The news was laughing about it. The news said it was silly to go after Clinton for doing what European leaders do all the time, gosh, it's just a blowjob.

Alternatively, GW was called a monkey incessantly.

People who say the media has a liberal bias aren't making that up. It does. Realistically, it doesn't matter, but it's there.

I would avoid bringing Helen Thomas's comments into anything at all. The poor woman's age has caught her and her mind is not and has not been what it once was, and to throw her words around is nothing but making a mockery of her senility.

Re:Jesus more than likely didn't exist.

[Arker]

Now THAT is an intelligent response!

Are you the same AC I was talking with earlier?

It's true that it is very difficult to come up with anything approximating proof that ANYONE in particular was really alive 2k years ago.

The AC I was originally talking with claimed to have plenty of PROOF that J.C. was a real person 2k years ago. Just on general principles, we should immediately suspect that AC is a liar. And in fact, it's obvious that AC really is a liar, because there is sure as hell no clear proof of that. Even if we assume that it is true, we wouldnt expect it to be easily provable.. making that first AC not just a liar, but a bad liar.

Any comments?

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[Omestes]

I'm sick of the know-better Christian Right and of Zion Israelis, and would never think that killing them is an acceptable idea, I also think both groups are as harmful as the insane zealot Muslim minority.

The second that mass murder sounds like a good solution, you are no better than whoever you hate.

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[ohnocitizen]

Militant Leader: Hello, sir, may I enter your home please?
Innocent Civilian Child: Can't you just point a gun at my head and force your way in, using me as a human shield?
Militant Leader: Oh ho hoooo, no. We militants are like vampires, we need to be INVITED in!

Coming this Fall: Let the Right One In 2: Drone Wars in Pakistan

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[sFurbo]

Countries are squeamish about their embassies, probably because they know how easy it is allow riots to destroy one. Not protecting an embassy properly is, if not an act of war, a casus belli for the country whos embassy it was. If I can trust my media (and I am not sure I can), some of the embassies were overrun by far smaller demonstrations than what the police have earlier demonstrated that they could control. It could simply be failing to predict the size of the riots, and the US certainly doesn't want worse relationships with the north African/middle eastern countries, so it will be played down, but had there been a different level of international tension, these riots would be bad for international relationships, to the point where wars could be started over them.

Is this the same group who

[SmallFurryCreature]

Is this the same 74% who wanted to lynch a 14 year old mentally handicapped christian girl for burning pieces of paper she had found as litter? Who was framed as proven by Pakistans own police force by a Muslim cleric? The girl that even after the police said there was no case at all, still has to be in hiding from these 74% of Pakistanies AND defend herself in court for something that didn't happen and the police says so?

Well. fuck them then. Pakistan was a hell hole long before drone strikes, read up on the dark ages and then condense the centuries into a couple of decades. That is Pakistan. I am wrong? Then show me the immigration vs emmigration numbers. Any place that has more people leaving then coming in, can't be a nice place.

Que down mod by a bleeding heart who loves Muslims but not so much as to live the same neighborhood and is against the war for oil but drives a SUV.

Re:Is this the same group who

[citizenr]

I TOTALLY get your point.

Remember that little incident at Kent State? Something about kids "burning pieces of paper they had found as litter"? And about police+military basically EXECUTING them on sight? Man I wish some liberating force, lets say from Soviet Union, invaded and eradicated those bad bad men, with drones or nukes. That would be grand, wouldnt it?

Re:Is this the same group who

[shutdown -p now]

Pakistani society may well be extremely backwards and oppressive, but I don't see how that justifies the drone strikes when they don't have, or intend to have, any effect towards fixing that society. To remind, officially Pakistan is still an American ally in this region, and US supports its legal government - complete with hudud laws and all the other nice stuff.

Eheh

[SmallFurryCreature]

And maybe if Pakistan was a Christian country, it wouldn't be in the same state as it is.

It is racism, just not the redneck kind.

[SmallFurryCreature]

Arabs make good soldiers, if led by white officers. Opinion given by several British leaders.

This is not quite the same kind of racism as Americans denying blacks fighting positions in the army because of bad night vision and other silly things (since a common prejudice is that blacks are stronger, larger and more violent, they would make the logical choice for grunts) but not a lot.

The so-called intellectuals think of those lesser then them as children that can't be hold to the same standards. They see those that disagree with them as people who need education to be brought up to the same level as them. You are not wrong for disagreeing them, just not enlightened enough.

And Muslims to them are eternal children whose antics you just ignore expecting the nanny to sort out the mess. On occasion the nanny is instructed to ready one child for presentation and this child is then expected to perform or else. Just watch these people deal with any Muslim who dares to agree with un-enlightened and have criticism of extremists and those that appease them. They are THE ENEMY, who should be destroyed for their wrong views!

This kind of racism is very hard to destroy because a normal racists knows he is racist and might be persuaded by facts or kept in line by laws.

But there are no laws against hugging a group into submission.

Think of this. The most powerful man on earth is black. Yet how many still think blacks need lots of handholds to achieve anything as complex as a steady job? And I do mean blacks NOT people who are under privileged or come from a bad background, those people could just as easily be white or brown or green. No, check for people who still think people with a black skin need their hands hold BECAUSE they are black. Regardless of how well an individual might be doing, they see a black person, they see a person in need of aid.

That is just as racist as seeing a black person and seeing a lesser person. But you can proof yourself against those racists by excelling. You cannot escape the "awh, you poor thing, let me help you" racism.

Heh

[ThatsNotPudding]

Imagine you have a country governed by warlords.

I don't have to imagine. USA! USA! USA!

Sowing seeds

[wcrowe]

We are sowing the seeds for the next war, and it ain't gonna be pretty.

Re:Jesus more than likely didn't exist.

[SternisheFan]

There is ample historical proof that Jesus Christ was born, lived and died

There is precisely zero proof of any kind for that thesis. I defy you to produce anything that even vaguely looks like proof of such a thing.

What do you want, a polaroid? There are enough witnesses who wrote down their meetings with Jesus Christ. It's accepted that there was a man named Jesus Christ that lived, oh, just around 0 A.D. to at least 33 A.D., and possibly longer if he woke up in that cave, realized they almost killed him, and split town to go live his life out in another place. You want proof that the holocaust happened too? Find it on your own, flameboy.

Apologizing for America

[caseih]

When I read a report like this, or hear about "collateral damage" in drone strikes and other US operations, I feel a constant need to apologize to my foreign friends for what the US has started to stand for. It's appalling, really. A bit ironic that Obama has been accused of apologizing for America while all this time ratcheting up the drone strikes. I have little evidence that Romney would end the conflicts, either. In fact his hard line on Israel and Iran indicates we're likely not going to see the end of conflict anytime soon. So no matter who gets elected, I want the world to know I am truly sorry!

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[ilguido]

I would not be so sure about this very subject. The European slave afflux was as much, if not more, consistent and surely more prolonged in Northern Africa than in Syria/Lebanon/Palestine, yet the usual modern Libyan or Tunisian is not whiter than a modern Syrian.

This is probably an Egyptian Jew of the I/II century AD from Fayum, he's not significantly darker than a typical Palestinian Arab, he is not even darker than a typical modern Egyptian Arab for that matter...

Re:74% of Pakistanis now consider the U.S. an enem

[doesnothingwell]

Osama bin shithead punches biggest bully on the planet in the nose. Your country hides aforementioned shitheads, then screaming techno death reigns down from the sky. Try to look outraged when other bullies look the other way.

Moral: don't associate with shitheads, their death magnets.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[NewYork]

But these warlords unite to fight against "infidels".

Re:74% of Pakistanis now consider the U.S. an enem

[darkmeridian]

When news recently broke about President Obama signing death warrants for American citizens without judicial review, Republicans were outraged because they thought this made the President look too awesome. It's crazy that the Executive Branch has usurped the right to secretly review the evidence against an American then blow him away by droneâ"the executioner has become the judge.

This was the logical consequence, by the way, of the decision to hold military tribunals (under the Executive Branch) for suspected terrorists rather than a proper Article III (i.e., Judicial Branch) Court in New York. We are in the era of the unitary Executive Branch, which has the power to try suspects in secret and execute them if necessary.

I agree with you. Why can't we have an opposition party that focuses on important things rather than bullshit like Obama's birth certificate or whether gays can marry?

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[Omestes]

First, that's bullshit. I'm not even a little religious, but the worst of the christians in this country are mousey little librarians by comparison. We did that, in part, by lopping religion off at the knees. And let's be clear, nobody is advocating for mass murder except foreign muslims.

This is arguable, considering the theological bent of America, and some of our actions abroad. Further, our resident Christians (not all of them, obviously, probably not even a majority, but a very powerful and vocal minority) are also slowly ramping up the crazy at home. They're already targetting gays, women, and children, and have the sights set higher. Sure they aren't as big of a threat yet, but given a chance they would be just as bad.

Sure, we "lopped religion off at the knees", but as any of the Libertarians or Tea Party folk (I'm neither) will tell you, the Constitution can be ignored, and mostly is. It isn't a protection from destructive "know better" nuts.

I'm saying that I'm tired of dealing with a massive percentage of the world population that doesn't care about anything more than destroying everything around them in the name of allah.

This is my problem. The percentage isn't really that massive. Islam is the second biggest religion on earth, and is more fractuous than Christianity or Judism, so its hard to really tell how massive the percentage of would-be terrorists actually is. Even in countries with pretty terrible Govermnents (Saudi Arabia, or Iran, to state the most obvious), its hard to tell how many of the people living in these countries support, or even give a damn, about terrorism. Think of America, I could easily decide that we're a country of anti-science, pro-war, ignorant Christian Evangelicals. As an American dove, atheist, nerd, who mostly associates with a large group of well educated, sceptical types, I can say that this is wrong. Further, looking at my family, most of them don't care about big politico-philosophical ideals, since they are too busy trying to make a living, raise their families, and generally get along during their breif span on this planet. I'm guessing the average resident of Iran is in the same boat as my average relatives.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[TemporalBeing]

+infiniti

one of the few times I really wish I had some mod points...

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[Arker]

Well I wasnt implying that the european slaves actually 'lightened' the populations to a significant degree, I was just pointing out that if ANYTHING did so, it would have to be that, and the timeframe was wrong for that to help the other posters argument.

In reality skin colour tended to track very quickly to the climate, before modern medicine, it's just not a good indicator of ancestry because it is so sensitive to climate.

Your Egyptian is well within the current range in the same area, which is exactly what I would expect.

Re:Jesus more than likely didn't exist.

[Arker]

You say many witnesses wrote down meetings? Yet where are these writings? If what you say were true, you would be able to produce them. You cannot. You pontificate but produce no evidence at all. You fall back on 'it is generally accepted that' and that's true but that is still zero evidence that it's actually true.

So we are right where we were before you posted. Zero proof of any kind.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[hey!]

But these warlords unite to fight against "infidels".

I know it makes things simpler to lump all Muslims in together; but don't forget, the Pakistani Taliban is hostile to the government in Islamabad, and it kills other Pakistani Muslims pretty much exclusively. It particularly targets Sufi pilgrimage sites which are wildly popular there.

Imagine you're an ambitious senior military officer with a secular lifestyle, a career dependent upon US military aid, and a Punjabi family with Sufi religious affiliations. Would you want to help a fanatical Pashtun tribesman who just blew up a bunch of your family members while they were worshiping? Or his Arab ally who wants to make Pakistan part of an Arab dominated caliphate? Hell no. If this guy had Osama bin Laden in his crosshairs we could count on him to pull the trigger. The problem is this guy probably has people working for him who are Taliban sympathizers, and they don't necessarily advertise the fact. That's why we had to send US SEALs to kill OBL, but in doing so we handed our friendly officer a triple humiliation, demonstrating that the Pakistanis couldn't find OBL, couldn't be trusted with the whereabouts of OBL, and couldn't stop America from doing whatever the hell we pleased on Pakistani soil.

The drone strikes are similar. There's good reasons to do them, but at the same time they humiliate and weaken our allies and radicalize everyone else. It is possible that those strikes are the right thing to do, but we have to be realistic about the unintended consequences. Pakistan is uniquely dangerous in that it is a nuclear power in an unstable region with significant potential for radical power shifts. We do not want to screw this up.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[shutdown -p now]

Do you think that American drones over Pakistan have some kind of Christian/Muslim detector that is used before making a strike, or something?

Re:US military doctrine is simple to understand...

[shutdown -p now]

When a group of bearded guys waving AKs and RPGs around comes to your home and not so politely says that surely you'll be willing to share it for the sake of jihad, and by the way that's a nice daughter you have here, I don't think you have much choice on the matter.

Re:A counter article. Drone strikes are effective.

[shutdown -p now]

US unilaterally declares any male victim of a drone strike to be a "militant" by default, unless there's any evidence presented to the contrary.

Re:Is KDawson back?

[shutdown -p now]

Why shouldn't people be attacking the Obama administration for the things that it clearly fucks up?

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[bhiestand]

I think this level of understanding of foreign policy matters in countries like Pakistan exceeds most of the staff of both the Defense and State Depts.

Since we're attacking people today, I can understand why you wouldn't know your head from your ass with your head so far up your ass.

State and Defense are both filled to the brim with people who understand foreign affairs. Unless your last name is Waltz, there's a pretty good chance they understand it a hell of a lot better than you do. Even the average grunt in Afghanistan has a good understanding of the situation.

If you want to see complete ignorance of foreign cultures, I recommend the following: mainstream media coverage, Fox News, Mitt Romney 2.0, and the Tea Party. To cure your own ignorance, talk to a few foreign service officers and a few vets.

Re:Even without the drones. Pakistanis don't like

[dgatwood]

The fact that the media were also critical of hypocrites who attacked people for doing the same thing that they themselves were doing does not negate the fact that the media were critical of Clinton and made minor celebrities out of Linda Tripp and Monica Lewinsky, often going into detail that was downright disgusting and inappropriate for younger viewers in an almost "if it bleeds, it leads" sort of way, rather like sharks circling an injured sea lion. The fact is that the media made a big deal out of what should have been a private matter between the President and his wife. The Republicans certainly fanned the flames, but the media were quite complicit. If that's being "in the administration's pocket", I'd hate to think what a truly independent media would have done. I mean, they'd have had a hard time creating more negative press for Clinton short of airing a sex tape during prime time.

I also remember the rather unflattering media coverage of Whitewater, somewhat excessive coverage of Bill Clinton's brother, and (back in the Reagan years) extended coverage of Iran Contra. None of those stories were flattering to the sitting President at the time. And Watergate? The news media basically ran Nixon out of town on a rail. Don't give me that "It has always been this way" crap. Things have backslid pretty severely as of late. We can argue about the time scale, but the media is definitely a much less effective watchdog today than it was thirty or forty years ago.

Honestly, a big part of the blame rests on highly partisan news outlets like Fox News. By presenting such severely biased reporting as news, they have almost single-handedly undermined the credibility of news reporting. By convincing such a large number of people that their skewed reality is truth, it doesn't matter how many other news outlets give truly balanced reporting—a significant chunk of the population will continue to believe that Obama wasn't born in the U.S. or other outright fabrications.

And the end result of their skew was that the other side had to come up with a counter-skew, a.k.a. MSNBC, that skews the news firmly in the opposite direction. So now we have a big chunk of people getting their news from an outlet skewed way to the left and another getting their news from an outlet skewed way to the right, and everybody else trying to achieve balance—not by calling both sides on their lies and praising them for their truths, but by presenting both sides' lies as though they were equally valid truths. And in the end, you're left with Comedy Central being one of the most unbiased sources of news because they're the only ones who aren't afraid to editorialize and call politicians on the utter bulls**t that comes out of their mouths.

No, news coverage of politics is much, much worse than it was in the 80s and 90s. What we have now is just a pale shadow of what we used to have.

The drones are ultimately ironic too...

[Paul Fernhout]

http://www.pdfernhout.net/recognizing-irony-is-a-key-to-transcending-militarism.html
===

Military robots like drones are ironic because they are created essentially to force humans to work like robots in an industrialized social order. Why not just create industrial robots to do the work instead?

Nuclear weapons are ironic because they are about using space age systems to fight over oil and land. Why not just use advanced materials as found in nuclear missiles to make renewable energy sources (like windmills or solar panels) to replace oil, or why not use rocketry to move into space by building space habitats for more land?

Biological weapons like genetically-engineered plagues are ironic because they are about using advanced life-altering biotechnology to fight over which old-fashioned humans get to occupy the planet. Why not just use advanced biotech to let people pick their skin color, or to create living arkologies and agricultural abundance for everyone everywhere?

These militaristic socio-economic ironies would be hilarious if they were not so deadly serious. Here is some dark humor I wrote on the topic: A post-scarcity "Downfall" parody remix of the bunker scene. See also a little ironic story I wrote on trying to talk the USA out of collective suicide because it feels "Burdened by Bags of Sand". Or this YouTube video I put together: The Richest Man in the World: A parable about structural unemployment and a basic income.

Likewise, even United States three-letter agencies like the NSA and the CIA, as well as their foreign counterparts, are becoming ironic institutions in many ways. Despite probably having more computing power per square foot than any other place in the world, they seem not to have thought much about the implications of all that computer power and organized information to transform the world into a place of abundance for all. Cheap computing makes possible just about cheap everything else, as does the ability to make better designs through shared computing. I discuss that at length here: http://www.pdfernhout.net/post-scarcity-princeton.html

There is a fundamental mismatch between 21st century reality and 20th century security thinking. Those "security" agencies are using those tools of abundance, cooperation, and sharing mainly from a mindset of scarcity, competition, and secrecy. Given the power of 21st century technology as an amplifier (including as weapons of mass destruction), a scarcity-based approach to using such technology ultimately is just making us all insecure. Such powerful technologies of abundance, designed, organized, and used from a mindset of scarcity could well ironically doom us all whether through military robots, nukes, plagues, propaganda, or whatever else... Or alternatively, as Bucky Fuller and others have suggested, we could use such technologies to build a world that is abundant and secure for all. ...

Re:The drones are ultimately ironic too...

[Rich0]

Almost all of those "ironies" make the same falicious assumption - that just because two applications of a technology share the same underlying technology, they must be equally expensive.

why not use rocketry to move into space by building space habitats for more land?

With a single nuclear ICBM I can force an entire nation to bend to my will - an area of hundreds of thousands of square kilometers for a medium-sized country, let alone a big one. With the same ICBM I could lift a habitat not much bigger than a tent into space and maybe keep it supplied for a few months.

For all the talk of history in this article, you miss a fairly important principle - it always has been much easier to destroy than to create. I've heard it said that those who beat their swords into plowshares will till the earth for those who do not.

Sure, I'm all for getting the US out of all those interventionist wars. However, that won't magically turn the US into a post-scarcity society. And, even if that happens, unless something changes it will simply mean that we'll all end up serving those who own the machines.

Re:74% of Pakistanis now consider the U.S. an enem

[metaforest]

I'm probably not going to get much love for saying so, but my cynical side says, "That is exactly what is expected." The MIC wins, financially when their products generate more conflict than they suppress.

The powers that be won't loose the ICBMs, but I have little doubt that agitating the ME states with drones is quite desirable, from a economic standpoint.

Re:Jesus more than likely didn't exist.

[SternisheFan]

Alright, you know what? Caeser never was. Nor King Henry the VIII. Nor any other historical figure. To your logic.

Re:Jesus more than likely didn't exist.

[Arker]

No, that's not my logic, that's just you squirming and throwing out red herrings. Do you have evidence or dont you?

Re:Jesus more than likely didn't exist.

[SternisheFan]

Last time. To your needs, there is no "proof" the world existed before you. Good luck in life. SF

Transcending more irony

[Paul Fernhout]

Thanks for the comment, and you make several good points. Still, the fictional character "Atticus Finch" said in "To Kill a Mockingbird", "The easiest way to get shot is to carry a gun". These days, the easiest way to get nuked (or invaded or quarantined) is to have a nuclear ICBM or start building one. With one ICBM, you'd be the world's next North Korea. I know you were probably just saying that to make a point, but as a counter-point, is nuclear blackmail really the way you would want to get your liveliehood if you could do it? Do you want to be the next tin-pot dictator always waiting for the assassin's blow? Do you want to preside over a land where people are starving to death (like North Korea in the past) because you care more about power than the people? Here you are using the most advanced communications system for sharing knowledge the world has ever known (the internet, and sites like slashdot) and what you have shared right now is a strategy for nuclear blackmail. It also sounds a bit like you are trying to dissuade others from trying to make the world a more joyful and healthy and more secure place (by over-emphasizing the point that there are some anti-social people out there)?

As I write in that essay, there are new ways of thinking about security.
http://www.pdfernhout.net/recognizing-irony-is-a-key-to-transcending-militarism.html
"The big problem is that all these new war machines and the surrounding infrastructure are created with the tools of abundance. The irony is that these tools of abundance are being wielded by people still obsessed with fighting over scarcity. So, the scarcity-based political mindset driving the military uses the technologies of abundance to create artificial scarcity. That is a tremendously deep irony that remains so far unappreciated by the mainstream. We the people need to redefine security in a sustainable and resilient way. Much current US military doctrine is based around unilateral security ("I'm safe because you are nervous") and extrinsic security ("I'm safe despite long supply lines because I have a bunch of soldiers to defend them"), which both lead to expensive arms races. We need as a society to move to other paradigms like Morton Deutsch's mutual security ("We're all looking out for each other's safety") and Amory Lovin's intrinsic security ("Our redundant decentralized local systems can take a lot of pounding whether from storm, earthquake, or bombs and would still would keep working")."

I am advocating for mutual security and intrinsic security. It sounds to me like you are re-affirming the old ways towards security, like unilateral dominance through a big military, which will be ultimately self-defeating with modern technology. What good is a US aircraft carrier in battle when one small smart missile could sink it?
http://exiledonline.com/the-war-nerd-this-is-how-the-carriers-will-die/
http://www.usni.org/news-and-features/chinese-kill-weapon
Or where it could someday be infiltrated by a nanotech-based rust monster? :-)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rust_monster
What good is your nuclear ICBM when someone (or something) figures out how to explode it in the silo or retarget it at your home city to make you the slave?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colossus:_The_Forbin_Project

The balance is changing. The world is a smaller place. I don't like to use "overpopulation" to describe the process because that implies the solution is to get rid of lots of people. I better term might be "under-resourced" or "under-landed" or "under-expanded".
http://www.juliansimon.com

Re:Transcending more irony

[Rich0]

I'd never use nuclear blackmail to assert power over somebody else. However, there are plenty of people that would. Sure, I agree that the world would be a lot nicer if everybody just got a long. The problem is that lots of people aren't content with that, and as a result we live under a constant threat of attack, which can only be deterred by a threat of counterattack.

I'd love to live in the kind of world you describe, the problem is that a fairly large number of people would not allow me to do so. And it isn't like any of us are morally perfect either - to some extent we all perpetuate the problems that manifest themselves at the level of society.

Re:Jesus more than likely didn't exist.

[Arker]

Absolutely false, and again you are just trying to change the subject because you dont want to answer the question. Providing proof of the existence of a historical figure is harder than people think, but it's not impossible and it can be done in many cases. So when someone comes along confidently asserting there is 'plenty of proof' and in fact, there is none, I am not supposed to challenge that?

Metaphysics of cooperation and competition

[Paul Fernhout]

To agree first with your second point, that none of us are morally perfect (and taking "perfect" as meaning some paragon of altruistic virtue?), there are two aspects of that I might call metaphysical and economic. After commenting on those, I will respond to your first point on defectors or parasites.

A metaphysical point about moral imperfection is that some level of competition seems inherent in our physical and temporal universe. This seems to derive from the limits of physical resources in an area at a particular time as processed by a sense of identity with certain biochemical and intellectual limits (and in the presence of other entities with a different sense of identity to some degree). For example, an oak tree may be a wonder of trillions of cells cooperating to reach up hundreds of feet in the air, but a tree will also brutally shade out all other plant life below it causing a dead zone underneath with no other plants. So, a tree is passively competitive for the resource of sunlight even when it seems like nothing is going on. A tree may also put put chemicals in the soil to inhibit the growth of other plants, and yet it may invest massive amounts of resources as seeds like acorns to create a next generation of on average just one more tree (while also feeding a bunch of squirrels). The human condition is no different. The human body is also a miracle of cooperation of trillions of cells, but the human immune system of even the most altruistic soul will still kill off bacteria and viruses that it identifies as "not self". Some cells go "cancerous" and start multiplying on their own at a cost to the whole. So cancer is basically an individual cell defecting from an obedient cooperative role in the body. The human "body" is also something like 90% bacteria by numbers (mostly in the gut). The human immune system and human cellular matrix essentially acts a bit like a constitution and infrastructure to support that bacterial ecosystem (including rejecting some bacterial processes). So, this issue of life (identity?) seems to involve in practice some mix of cooperation and competition. This complexity of both cooperation and competition seems inherent in the metaphysics of this plane of realty as best we know. Whether we can fully transcend that competitive aspect on this plane of existence is a deep spiritual question to which I do not have a definitive answer. Even a choice to stop killing plant cells by eating them is a choice to let trillions of human and bacterial cells die in your own body, as well as a choice to limit future thoughts for possible better solution or future actions to help others and the planet (like by creating lunar greenhouses for more plant life). There just is, so far as I know, no easy answer to this metaphysical issue of competition amidst cooperation -- even though plenty of people would be more than happy to supply such an answer or to accept one as some form of a pre-thought-out religion. Since a life lived in existential angst and conflict will generally reduce fecundity, there are even evolutionary arguments for the success of religions that deny evolution: :-)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_origin_of_religions

The economic point about moral imperfection is that as long as we try to be an economic actor in the current economic system, we are essentially morally compromised due to what is easy or difficult economically as we make various tradeoffs. For example, if you are a plumber, you are in a noble profession that has probably done more for human health over the last century (through improved sanitation) than all the doctors in the world. But if the plastic piping you install today did not have all of the true costs of oil paid up front (pollution, war, uncertainty), then you are to some extent contributing to the problem of an immoral economy via an "externality" (an unpaid cost passed on to others). If you are a software developer making entertaining games