A ridiculous video title. For one, Hitchens has talked favourably about Murray, and Murray has returned the sentiment. You don't have to agree with someone all the time to respect them. Murray respects Hitchens despite a difference of opinion on waterboarding. Also, although Hitchens concluded waterboarding was torture in his opinion, it doesn't mean he thinks the information you get from it is invalid.
Christopher Hitchens was waterboarded and unequivocally stated it was torture. Murray is very keen on violence like many neo-cons are despite being the leat likely people to actually experience violence, they have rightly earned themselves the nickname chicken-hawk.
@nathfrancis01 Nonsense. Hitchens concluded it was torture, but he too was in favour of the war on Iraq and was in favour of bringing terrorists to justice, which people like you who like to use terms such as 'chicken-hawk' argue is also torture. People have differences in opinion, fine, but you attempt to portray Murray in a bad light by using the Hitch as a standard, when infact Hitch would support a lot of what Murray has to say - and indeed he did when he was alive.
@DancinJim Let me tell you somthing, if I cornered Murray in a dark alley, we'd soon see how much he favoured violence and confrontation. The people who do the fighting are never the Douglas Murray's of this world, if that were so there would be no wars.
@nathfrancis01 what you have said is simply an emotive outcry and not a valid rebuttal. In addition to this, you are also talking nonsense. Douglas Murray, I, you, or anyone else doesn't have to fight in a war, be part of a war, or anything like that, in order to qualify to give an opinion.
@DancinJim I'm not saying that anybody has to fight in a war to have an opinion. to quote Chomsky "If you don't believe in freedom of expression for the people you most despise, you don't believe in it at all", Murray is dfinitely aa peson I despise but would never suggest he is not entitled to his pea brained moronic opinions and would never suggest anybody should be suppressed or curtailed in speaking whaever radical beliefs they may hold.
@nathfrancis01 How telling that someone who can hardly keep track of what is happening makes a random Chomsky quote... Chomsky is the pop idol of the leftist loonies. Just re-read what you said in the last comment - it was pure emotion, no logic.
I strongly believe Douglas Murray is undercover muslim and an al qaeeda sympathiser. I have proof if you want it, and by waterboarding him i'll get the confession of truth. Its not barbaric if its going to save lives
@enigma7able He may give 'straight answers' but telling it like it is? I don't think Douglas Murray is equipped to do that as his views suggest he doesn't live in the real world
@Dendiol hmmm well in the real world we have terroists who would love to kill u or I so why should we be protecting them from waterboarding when it could be proventing terroist attacks and saving innocent people
@enigma7able Torture cannot be justified. And we have to look at why the terrorists want to kill us. Perhaps it's because America continues to impose democracy on other countries by force and thinks nothing of killing civilians. To quote Tony Benn: "There is no moral difference between a stealth bomber and a suicide bomber. Both kill innocent people for political reasons".
@Dendiol but most of the people in dictatorship countries want to be free. theres a saying u cant make an omlette without breaking some eggs meaning that things are bad just now but hopefully in 10 years time people in these countrys can have basic human rights which they dont have now, dont know if you watch the news but liyba was crying out for democracy.
@enigma7able It is not up to America to enforce and spread democracy. It is the right of individual nations to self determination and to decide their own path. NATO bombing Tripoli into submission and killing civilians in order to help the rebels does nothing to protect human rights.
@Dendiol iraq and afghanistan was differant, we went to war with iraq because saddam led us to belive he had weapons of mass destruction and afghanistan was to do with 9/11
@enigma7able I could reel off a long list of questionable wars the US has been involved in, right from Vietnam to removing democratically-elected left wing regimes in South America and putting dictatorships in their place. The Iraq War was illegal as no evidence was ever found of WMD to justify military action, and do you honestly think it's logical or right to kill hundreds of thousands of civilians in retaliation for the deaths of 3000 on 9/11?
@Dendiol ask the victims familys of 9/11 that and ok there was no WMD found however saddam led us to belive he had them by refusing the UN access to his country
@enigma7able Human lives are of equal value, whether they are 9/11 victims or civilian victims of war. And you really need to read up on Iraq, as you're still in denial.
@Dendiol Tony Benn: "There is no moral difference between a stealth bomber and a suicide bomber. Both kill innocent people for political reasons".... worth repeating.
@jacksawild ...but a suicide bomber often DELIBERATELY targets innocents. A stealth bomber would rather kills the terrorists if they could choose. Accuracy is an issue, admittedly, but intent clearly shows one side wants to kill the terrorists and the other wants to kill the innocents. The suicide bombers are clearly the ones who are in the wrong.
@DancinJim I put it to you that it isn't an "either or" issue. Both are reprehensible acts and as the right honourable Tony Benn points out, both are murder for political reasons.
@DancinJim Do you think that mothers who lose children because of bombings care about the motives of the bomber or the intended targets? Of course not they only care about the consequences. I challenge you to give me an adequate definition of the word terrorism that implicates muslim extremists but does not implicate western governments, without saying that states cannot carry out terrorist acts because they clearly can.
Are we supposed to say 'please sir can you give me the information thank you'. waterboarding has no prolonged physical effect nor mental effect. it simulates drowning, not nice but that is the whole point of it. It will get the answers, and save all your hippies ass.These are dangerous people, and given a chance they well blow you to pieces If this method did not exist and a terror attack happens all the hippies will be asking - why did you not know ? why bla bla bla. come back to the real world
its almost like decent ordinary democratic people are feeling sorry for these fundamentalists? these are people who incite hatred, provoke the world. Bigots who feel they are special. Would you really disagree with water boarding if the results pinpointed an al qaeda stronghold?do i think that terrorists who threaten my safety with violence and hatred be subjected to torture? yes.this is not to say torture is a nice experience, but a necessary one.
Only someone who really HATES Douglas Murray would assume this video humiliates him. Actually he comes quite well out of this quite well, in defending an impossible position. Raises 3 points, 1, that torture could always be justified from a utilitarian point of view, 2 that the important thing is the law, that governments don't break it. And 3, that America's cruelty is enthusiastically exaggerated by its critics. Not sure if last point is true, though; were only 3 waterboarded?
Torture is wrong because: it gives dictators ammunition against us to criticise OUR human rights record; erodes our civil liberties; serves a HUGE injustice to an innocent person; causes us to go against our own values and most of all; if your are trying to torture information out of someone who doesn't actually have it they will make something up to get the torture to stop. That could mean a mundane mistake, or it could mean the bombing of a school instead of an arms dump.
Torture isn't specifically prohibited under the U.S. Constitution. The U.N. says that the U.S. should also ban guns, well does a country have a right to do things that not every other country necessarily does?
But the gentleman to his left was correct, Hitchens decided that it was undoubtedly torture and a form of (actual) drowning, only slower. I didn't know Murray was capable of being such a fool..it's a pity he didn't join Christopher in his waterboarding; then perhaps he could have stopped himself from acting like such a fucker.
There is nothing "grey" about it, America executed Japanese soldiers in WW2 for waterboarding US soldiers. It was torture then and it's torture now. Isn't it funny that a lot of those who think it's OK have never served a minute in any kind of life threatening situation. Armchair Generals
@lector0003 I have a great deal of respect for Christopher Hitchens and when he wrote this article it would have been heavily influenced, (my opinion) by the fact that on that shit day in 2001 he was on the other side of the country and unable to be with his family, distressing for anyone. My use of "armchair generals" was in itself not intended to be generic. Christopher himself is unerring in his position that water-boarding is indeed torture and that was the point I was making.
@kramdoogs - I referred you to Hitchen's article because it dismantles the "armchair general" charge. It's a silly attempt to silence those on the basis they haven't had the opportunity to physically kill a person. I think "discussion" would almost entirely disappear if we were restricted to talk about that which we personally "experienced".
@lector0003 I am referring to torture and I think that these days war might entirely disappear if those that invoke it had to actually participate in the reality. Silencing the discussion, what discussion? Of all the congressmen and women in the US that voted for invasion one and only one has a child serving in Iraq yet they were very eager to allow others children to serve/die or become maimed physically, mentally. You talk about discussion but it does not exist, example "The Patriot Act 1 & 2
@kramdoogs - "if those that invoke it had to actually participate in the reality."
Have you never heard of Jihad, martyrdoom, heaven and ones duty to fight for Allah. Don't be naive. Some people in this world are prepared to die for a cause greater than themselves, and you think they'll be put off by the sight of blood?! Also, I find it contemptable to use dead soldiers to advance a political viewpoint. I dont think we're not going to agree, so I leave it here.
Just in response to your' 'if all else fails, resort to using an example from fiction', ok then pal, are you aware that US Navy SEALS are waterboarded as part of their training? Does the US torture its own troops?!
@GoldenbanjoDJ yes, the us uses one of the few tortures that don't inflict permanent injury to train the navy seals in a complete training course called SERE, that stands for Survival Evasion Resistance & Escape and that puts the soldier in a scenario where he has been captured and has to avoid giving any information (if he does the training ends but so does his carrer) and to survive whith very little food water and other techniques to destroy its will. So yes US tortures SEALS "just in case"
No, the logic I was using was that if water boarding is torture, then therefore the US military tortures its own troops. That is the only logical conclusion presented in that post, and as such I think you will find that it is not faulty whatsoever.
I think the conservative is right. If it works and saves lives and gains intel, then use it. I don't give a flying shit about their fucking rights. They're being interrogated for fuck sake.
@str33twarrior22 It works and it gains intel. Even if it only works once in 50 times. I'm down with that. In any case it is going to carry on regardless of whatever you lentil nibbling liberals thinks. Water boarding is not torture.... it's an interrogating technique... it's not punishment. Torture is punishment, waterboarding interrogating is a device used to probe information. Very different. - one to harm, one to submit.
@SilverBars42 no, you're missing the point. it rarely does work. in the 1700's the spanish inquisition used torture to "prove" that hundreds of people we jews (when most of them were not). another example is the salem witch trials. if you torture someone untill they confess they are a part of some fighter organisation you are none the wiser because people will say anything to avoid pain. the percieved strength of torture is actually a weakness. i couldn't give a shit about torture being evil.
@SilverBars42 personally i don't think torture is intrinsically evil. but as a method for gathering intelligence it is poor, very poor. but anyway i asume you agree that waterboarding is torture which is what the video was about.
@SilverBars42 in a short term ticking bomb situation it doesn't work because a person can lie and you can be none the wiser. as for gain information firstly you run the risk of torturing an innocent person which is unnacceptable or just keep going round in circles with some misinformation because nothing a tortured person says is worth listening to. the only time when torture works is when you already know something and know that they know it and can force them to confess, which is rare.
@SilverBars42 yeah, like all those witches we caught in the 1600's! if i tortured you i could make you say absolutley anything, i could say you were the bastard son of a chimp and a baboon. the words of a tortured man are meaningless because people will say anything, regardless of whether it is true, to avoid unbearable pain.
@Elcristoph From wiki, (not the be all and end all of knowledge but a good start)
"In 2005 he published a defence of neoconservatism, Neoconservatism: Why We Need It. During the course of a related promotional tour of the USA gave an interview to the New York Sun in which he outlined his "instinctive" support for Israel and was dubbed a "self-described neoconservative and Zionist" as well as "Britain's only neoconservative."
He doesn't understand why it's bad because it's psychological torture. He is a Tory, thus he has no brain, thus he has a natural immunity to psychological-anything.
The love affair between leftists & Muslim fundamentalists is a real treat to watch..
It's the old belief that "The enemy of my enemy is my friend",they both hate Western civilization in general & the US in particular,so they band together.
Murray is a a great man. Shame on this poster for being so immature and ignorant as to call him an 'idiot'. The fact is, Murray would destroy them in a debate.
@tedatlas Saying waterboarding is not torture is stupid. If he's so smart, he wouldn't say idiotic things like that. It's not a mater of agreeing or disagreeing. The people who think that waterboarding is not torture are just plain wrong.
@BelfastAtheist Any ideology that agrees to outright militant intervention in order to impose its "democratic values" on other nations is a shamefaced ideology indeed. It lacks humanity, plain and simple. Moreover, neoconservatism is a hybrid of conservative and liberal ideology. But it has the backbone of militant conservatism (neo=new). Therefore, you idiotic empire-hugging fuck, you don't have clue about what you are talking about. Get back to your crude and shallow learning.
Conservatism and Liberalism are diametrically opposed. Hence, Neo-Conservatism and Conservatism are two radically different schools of Political though.
'' It lacks humanity, plain and simple''
It's not ''Plain and simple'' unless you tell me why..
As for Militant Conservatism, I wouldn't know. I'm afraid we don't really have much of that in Great Britain, ask an American; they'll tell you all about it. Even our Conservative Party is Progressive.
@BelfastAtheist The ideology of neoconservativsm is actually a hybrid of neoliberal economics and the Blair/Bush doctrine concerning foreign intervention. Therefore, it involves a move to the centre from both the right and the left. Moreover, you obviously fail to understand that there are many variant of liberalism - classical liberalism for example is aligned very closely with conservatism. They both believe in "free markets", self-reliance and a small role for the welfare state. Similar.
@BelfastAtheist Plain and simple explained: 1) it is predicated on neoliberal economics, itself derived from rational choice theory and the neoclassical tradition. This tradition sees individuals as utility maximisers and nothing more, forgetting conveniently that human beings retain a collective aspect to their identities. Neoclassical structures do away with the human "for the sake" of the system. As long as pleasure maximisation is being attained and egos tickled, it wins out.
@BelfastAtheist 2) Intervention fo any sort contravenes the sovereign rights of nations. We have no right to "impose" our ideology on another country. If, however, a country wishes to accede to "our" way of looking at things, then that is quite a different matter. In fact, this idea is specifically against notions of a just war: primarily wars of defence. Democracy cannot be exported though the barrel of a gun. Reasonable dialogue us by far more preferential.
''We have no right to "impose" our ideology on another country''
Presuming you're referring to Iraq there..whose 'ideaology' are you referring to? Poland, Australian, Britain, American and the IDF all have different ideaologies, you see.
'' If, however, a country wishes to accede to "our" way of looking at things, then that is quite a different matter''
@BelfastAtheist Pure babble? Why so? We have no right to meddle in the internal politics of a nation state, unless that state is our own. Otherwise we are mere vandals, nothing. And when I say "our" ideology, I mean the ideology that is promoted by the expansionist agenda of neoliberalism "and" neoconservatism" which have managed to garner support from the left and the right.
@BelfastAtheist I am referring to the ideology of neoliberalism. If we move from the left and seek refuge in the liberal centre, we get neoliberalism. If we do the same from the right, we get neoconservatism. Both strands come together once more to give us an ideology of imperialistic interventionism. Furthermore, most countries - if you know political economy at all - subscribe to neolliberal economics and the interventionist policies suggested by it.
''In fact, this idea is specifically against notions of a just war: primarily wars of defence''
This is a factoid. If you look the Political speeches made by Powell and Bush and throughout the Senate, you'll find; there were actually a number of arguments on why the War was necasarry. WMDs were only a factor of the argument, however I'll concede they were over-stated (Not lied...over-stated). Though as I said, Hussein WAS in the process of trying to procure Atomic weaponry.
@BelfastAtheist You no nothing about just war theory, ergo, there is no further point indulging your ignorance. The Bush/Blair doctrine constituted a major re-revison of this theory and in fact argued that intervention IS justifiable. May I also remind you that no WMDs were found and that they were supplied by the west in the first place? Kind of blurs the lines doesn't it? There is NO evidence to prove that Hussein was trying to procure atomic weaponry. Using your own phrase: pure babble.
By Bush/Blair Doctrine, I'll presume what you actually meant to say was Bush/Blair/Kaczynski/Howard Doctrine...
Incidentally, would you care to achknowledge that your original implication that the Iraq/Afghanistan Wars were Imperialist - was completely untrue? If not, I'm afraid I'll have to deduct a point from you; for intellectual dishonesty.
''May I also remind you that no WMDs were found '' I believe I already made the converse statement to that..
@BelfastAtheist A war is imperialist if an empire, or country posing as an empire, seeks to invade and rule another country. It is imperial also in the sense that imperial denotes actions that are imperious and domineering: again, see Iraq and Afghanistan. And while your at it, see further evidence of US meddling in Nicaragua (Iran Contra affair), Chile and Colombia. All signs of an "imperial" and "imperious" mentality. I retract nothing. Further, if no WMDs were found, someone was lying!
Also, if we cared about "humanitarian intervention", we'd be in Bahrain, Yemen, Darfur...We are NOT concerned with these things. We are concerned, and moreover careful, that we make are arguments appear to be in "the human interest", but we are not concerned with humanitarian intervention per se. Blair and Bush said they were concerned with Hussein's human rights violations, but they weren't concerned with those committed by Israel or Egypt. We preach humanity and open Guantanamo. Fitting.
Also, I have already made the proposition that WMDs were only a *factor* of what made the Iraq War necasarry. I'll ask you this - Do you really believe that Hussein's (actual) Imperialist days were over? We all know he wanted to attack India and to destroy the Hindu Religion, for example. Not only that, but he still had his eyes on Persia. How about we swap format here: You tell me your own reasons why you think the Iraq War was unjust and I'll tell you my reasons why it wasn't?
@BelfastAtheist Oh really, they were but ONE element of it. I seem to recall they were a bloody big element of it. Hence the dodgy dossier, the sexing up of intelligence, the need to create a fabricated existential threat - see Blair speech to parliament of stating that Hussein possessed missiles that could be dispatched within 45 minutes. This evidence WAS vital in order to get the Security Council to sign off on the resolution for war. No other reason was given for removing him.
''Democracy cannot be exported though the barrel of a gun. Reasonable dialogue us by far more preferential. ''
I'll finding it REALLY difficult to take you seriously now..
So basically you're suggesting, we should have held better Diplomatic relations with the Afghani-Taliban Goverment? (The people who buried gays alive, killed men without beards, killed women without Hajiibs, threw acid in the faces of little girls for trying to go to school, banned music, banned literature..)
@BelfastAtheist You mean the government WE established. Of course we currently support a government of Uzbecki warlords and drug barons. How morally astute of us. I return to my original point: WE created the Taliban, WE created the "existential" threat that is apparently such a threat to the west. WE manufactured fundamentalism as a pretext for foreign wars for oil and natural resources. WE are the problem. How do we deal with it? We leave it to the people. We have done enough damage.
@BelfastAtheist There is no Taliban government, as such. There might well be a council but not a government. But if we had to negotiate, then yes, I'd agree to it. After all, WE created them. Let us never forget this fact. Therefore, it is up to us to seek dialogue with them - there are already reports that this is happening. Finally, what is the problem with seeking dialogue? Do you prefer outright war, the death of innocent civilians and the destruction of families, to dialogue?
@BelfastAtheist Also, please see this Unicol testimony from 1998 congressional record on afghanistan and its oil importance.
"Mr. Chairman, the Caspian region contains tremendous untapped hydrocarbon reserves. Just to give an idea of the scale, proven natural gas reserves equal more than 236 trillion cubic feet. The region's total oil reserves may well reach more than 60 billion barrels of oil. Some estimates are as high as 200 billion barrels."
Red Herring, you dodged the question. -1 for intellectual dishonesty. My second question (if you'll actually answer it) was going to be; do you or do you not stipulate that we should have held Diplomatic talks with Hussein; whilst he continued to commit genocide, harbour International terrorists and stand idly buy as he tried to procure Atomic weaponry for blackmail purposes?
@BelfastAtheist I answered in the affirmative. J.S. Mill stated that if a people did not have "a sufficient love of liberty to be able to wrest it from merely domestic oppressors, the liberty which is bestowed on them by other hands rather than their own, will have nothing real, nothing permanent". In other words, interventionist or manufactured liberty is not a way of maintaining that liberty. Diplomatic talks are better than no talks at all.
@BelfastAtheist More lucid commentary from Mill: "If a people - especially one whose freedom has not yet become prescriptive - does not value it sufficiently to fight for it, and maintain it against any force which can be mustered within the country, even by those who have the command of the public revenue, it is only a question of how few years or months that people will be enslaved." The people must rise up. We do not have the right to instigate rebellion, nor democratic reform.
@BelfastAtheist It's not about winning. It's about reaching an amicable conclusion. Healthy debate is what matters, debate toward a reasonable and reasoning conclusion. Better put, the thing that matters most is public reason and deliberation on matters of public concern. Critical thinking, what Kant referred to as the faculty of maturity, is the most important constitutive feature of rational human identity.
You're underestimating me if you think I haven't read A Critique of Pure Reason. Incidentally, my former comment was intended to be (obviously) sarcastic. But anyways, I asked you two questions; neither of which you have answered - both of which are pretty important to the debate. How about you answer those, then hit me with your own? That a suitable format?
@BelfastAtheist I'm not talking about the Critique of Pure Reason. That is his metaphysical treatise. I'm talking about the Critique of Practical Reason and his essay What is Enlightenment? You evidently think you are cleverer than you really are. And please don't try to take me on Kant. I have an MPhil in him. I answered both of your questions in full. If you can't see it, then that is YOUR problem. You keep setting the questions up and I'll knock them down. Be as sardonic as you want.
@BelfastAtheist Oh, underestimating you! The horror! You have persuaded yourself that you are intelligent, and you, I presume, pontificate to others on this basis. It's a sad and lifeless pursuit and it is so far away from right reason that it is a pointless pursuit. Take your name for instance. "BelfastAtheist". Why would you want to be known by your position on faith issues (which I agree are irrational). It is because you want confrontation with idiots who you can dominate. Pathetic.
Thanks Sigmund, that psychoanalysis really does work! I appreciate you judging my quality of life; via reading my username - as opposed to answering the questions I posed. I myself, find it rather pathetic the lengths you seem to be going to; to avoid backing up your earlier claims. Anyways, why u mad?
Or perhaps you're saying we should have held better Diplomatic relations with Hussein; the man who had been shooting our planes down for over a decade?
You mean the same Saddam Hussein who we supported during the Iran-Iraq war, the same leader who was morally neutral when we gave him chemical munitions, but suddenly morally disgusting a few years later. You did see the photos of Rumsfeld with Hussein, didn't you? Yet again, intervention leading to morally bankruptcy. The trend is not looking so good.
Incidentally, I called you a disingenuous fuck because I thought you were disingenuously speaking..nothing more, nothing less. I could have been wrong, however there's no need to insult my intellect. If the Ad Hominem is your first choice of debating strategy, I think I've already won this one.
As for it being 'humanity' to free 31 million people in Iraq from a Despot who killed over 50,000 of their children, as well as 450,000 of their other citizens.
@BelfastAtheist In fact, the ad hominem came at the end, and was in response to your own. Before that came an exposition of what neoconservatism is. Alas, nothing will dissuade you from your lack of reason. Over 1 million people died in the Iraq more. Millions were exiled and many become immigrants. The oil fields were co-opted by western forces who then conveniently "lost" the national wealth of the country. We are talking about a brutal attack. Recall also how the west armed Saddam.
@BelfastAtheist Wait, a mere 50, 000 reserves remain. How bloodly generous of us! The Pentagon can't account for 8.7 billion dollars in Iraq funds. Convenient? I think not.
Do you even know people like live in Afghanistan? Calling me an 'Empire-hugger' really is so fatuous, on so many levels. First of all, the Iraq/Afghanistan interventions were not Imperialist. Our troops have already left Iraq (50,000 reserves still remain..for the time being) the day after they announced their immediate departure, office blocks all around the country were struck by suicide attacks. As for Afghanistan, our troops will be gone in less than a year.
@BelfastAtheist Neoliberalism is connected to ideas about reviving the western Empire, specifically the American Empire. Therefore, if you back the neoliberal agenda. you back just such an Empire.
Set out logically:
1) Neoconservatism is an ideology of empire
2) You support neoconservatism
3) Therefore you support an ideology of empire.
Further reference: see "the British neoconservatives" by John Kampfner.
@BelfastAtheist You seem to think that the above interventions were humanitarian. But you are mistaken. 1) Iraqi oilfield have been of interest to the west for years. The attack on the US gave the right pretext for an invasion of this reason (some horrendous arguments attempting to suggest the presence of Al-Qaeda in Iraq ensued). Following the war, major US oil companies - like Haliburton - made billions in subsidies in terms of oil extraction, patents and exportation. It was all for oil.
@BelfastAtheist 2) Afghanistan gave the west the chance to clean up the mess it created during the 1980s, when it armed and bankrolled the Taliban. But it also provided something much more valuable: a geo-strategic position next door to China (the next empire). Aside from this, the west wanted a position close to Russia and had plans to construct the Trans-Afghan pipeline (this plan was rejected due to instability in the region). In earnest, Al Qaeda is merely a convenient straw man.
To get further confirmation on the oil gluttony of the west, see this article dated 17-3-2005 on the BBC's website, titled "Secret US Plans for Iraq's Oil." Enlighten yourself, please.
If you really think the Iraq/Afghanistan interventions were Imperialist; then you ARE disingenuous. Nobody who has done any objective research into the subjects could call it Imperialist. Research the Vietnam War...that's what an Imperialist War looks like. Also; is toppling a dictator that our Goverments helped into power really 'Imperialist' ?
Sounds fair and square to me, he was our problem. He fired at our Coalition planes every day for over a decade.
@BelfastAtheist Afghanistan, as a conflict zone, would never have emerged it it wasn't for the fact that the west bankrolled the taliban - see operation cyclone. WE created this force, and WE encouraged it to its fullest degree? And why? Because we wanted a buffer between us and the Russians. Now it is coming back to haunt is, and proves beyond a doubt that we should not meddle in other states affairs. In fact, we are currently supporting Uzbeck warlords and drug barons. Not brining peace.
As well as attempting to shoot down every one of our planes in the No-Fly Zone, Hussein attacked 4 other countries, committed genocide, harboured international terrorists, tried to procure an Atomic arsenal from North Korea. (These are the 4 stipulations in EU Law which permit an intervention).
I do find the irony that you're calling me disingenuous, when you just called the Iraq/Afghanistan Wars Imperialist..lol
@jennywhojenny Exactly. The owner of this video is clearly not very well-educated on politics if he/she thinks a Conservative and a Neo-Conservative is the same thing. Douglas Murray is a legend and a true champion of fearless free-speech.
@DMarksmanLima21 It is Murray who brings these issues up for public scrutiny, not the other way round. He instigates the debates the mainstream are frightened to talk about.
In the UK, many politicians are frightened to bring up any sensitive issues. They like to try to occupy the middle ground on most things. The 2 main political parties were accused of being one and the same at the last election. Murray isn't a politician, and doesn't particularly like any of them. He debates controversial social issues in public, and says things that others don't have the gumption to say. Some people hate him for this. Islamic Extremists set him up for attack at a phoney debate.
@DancinJim He sounds like a good man. I like Ron Paul for the same reason. He mixes the political pot so we can see what shit floats to the top. I believe in the Constitution...which means...I believe the Federal Reserve is UnConstitutional. The same goes for the Patriot Act, lies given to invade Iraq(which I believed at the time). With tears in my eyes...I read the Constitution, The Bible and I press on trying to wake the rest of us. BTW Thanks for the Post.
@DMarksmanLima21 Sorry it had to be such a brief description of him, but YouTube doesn't allow many words in a post and I had to struggle to fit the basics in! I am very interested in American politics, but I have to admit I am probably quite ignorant on it in comparison to American citizens. I am still learning quite a lot, and I watch a lot of debates on here, on various American issues. I've also listened to Christopher Hitchens describe his waterboarding experience, with great interest.
huh Its very much on border line.. and the logic behind (Murray's) thick head is that Mr Bush was told by his advisor's that it isn't so it isn't.. Only 3 people have been identified because we didn't come to hear the stories about rest by mainstream media.. Thing is If Murray's sense of logic happens to be like Bush advisers then why not he just flipping leave UK and go live in US??
@Reptile0000 We will be glad to accommodate Mr Murray ,Freedom of Speech is protected by the Constitution,unlike in Britain & rest of Europe where you could get sued/arrested over hurt feelings..
water-boarding and "enhanced interrogation techniques" used on terrorists helped to break up plots aimed at targets in America as well as at Heathrow Airport and Canary Wharf in London.
@Reptile0000 If torturing one or a few of these will save the lives of American and British citizens as they do their shopping, go to work and otherwise continue to exist peacefully,then yes,it can be justified.
@wraithmarine The big deal is the fact that waterboarding is regarded as torture under the Geneva Conventions, under the International Human Rights Committee, under the Rome Statutes and other legal instruments. Positive law, as the expression of the people's will, is definitive on this issue. You either agree with the social contract under which you are a subject, or you reject it: in which case you can set up a nation of your own.
First torture does work, people find it hard to lie in the best of circumstances. To keep a consistent believable lie that fits with known facts going under *any* significant stress is impossible. This is the whole premise of normal everyday police interrogations.
So sure believe that torture or water boarding is wrong or that it should not be done, but don't claim that it doesn't work. It does.
@DavidKB123 Give me one example of when waterboarding has worked. Just one. Moreover, if you accept waterboarding - illegal under international law - do you accept extraordinary rendition without trial, military tribunals, illegal detention? International law must stand for something. The only way to make sure it is credible and binding is to make sure that it is followed to the letter. This means that western countries should uphold the laws that they have subscribed to. Especially the UK
@BeholdZeus Torture works. Period. People break under pressure, you can cross reference what new information they give you with information you already know is true to see if they are being truthful. Thats it its simple, it works. HOWEVER this does NOT mean its right or should be done that nor does that mean it is wrong or shouldn't be done. That is a SEPARATE question involving morality that is INFORMED by the fact that torture works. You can be for or against it and still know that it works
@DavidKB123 Matthew Alexander, a US senior military interrogator who conducted over 1300 in Iraq and Afghanistan said last week, torture is the way to guarantee bad intelligence as those suffering will say anything to stop the torture and that "anything" they say often leads to wild goose chases by the intelligence officers on people who are conjured up in the minds of the tortured detainees! I think the guy knows what he is talking about! if the taliban were waterboarding our troops is that ok?
@antiwarcampaigner Yeah, but that doesn't make any logical sense, since you always use 'control' questions (questions that you already know the answer to) to see if the person you are interrogating is telling you 'what you want to know'. So I'm afraid I still haven't heard a rationale why enhanced interrogation/torture would not work.
@DavidKB123 Wow, you are an arrogant and ignorant little boy arnt you? Matthew Alexander interrogated over 1300 detainees on the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan for the US military and he flatly contradicts what the idiots in this video AND you yet here you are telling us all about what you read in an Andy McNab book as evidence of what works and what doesnt work? i see you didnt answer my question about what if our troops were subjected to waterboarding, would you be in favour?
@antiwarcampaigner Well to what ever Matthew Alexander believes there are self evidently at least the same amount people who believe the opposite, otherwise these interrogations would never have been recommended and carried out. If it really is so obvious that it doesn't work then it must be pretty easy to explain why it doesn't.
@DavidKB123 yep thats right, keep your head in the sand and avoid the questions too. America and its allies tried Japanese soldiers in WW2 for war crimes because they waterboarded our soldiers yet now we tell the world its ok? well what goes around comes around and its people like you and the idiot in this video that make the world a much more dangerous world for us all because it fuels hatred for the west all over the world.
@DavidKB123 I guess you are not able to comprehend logic nor recall my initial post about people who are tortured making up anything to stop the torture. what are people like you going to say when our troops are held and waterboarded by the insurgents to get "valuable information" from them? I doubt its going to be "hey, its not torture, its enhanced interrogation and its legal." what goes around comes around and i hope one day hypocrites like you get a taste of it too.
@antiwarcampaigner and as I have stated its not really possible just to make up stuff, information you get is cross referenced with other confirmed bits of intelligence. Even under the least stressful conditions of everyday life its hard to make something up that can stand up to any degree of scrutiny. You appear to confuse torture used to genuinely seek out real information with torture in the 'Inquisition CONFESS' sense.
A ridiculous video title. For one, Hitchens has talked favourably about Murray, and Murray has returned the sentiment. You don't have to agree with someone all the time to respect them. Murray respects Hitchens despite a difference of opinion on waterboarding. Also, although Hitchens concluded waterboarding was torture in his opinion, it doesn't mean he thinks the information you get from it is invalid.
DancinJim 2 weeks ago
Christopher Hitchens was waterboarded and unequivocally stated it was torture. Murray is very keen on violence like many neo-cons are despite being the leat likely people to actually experience violence, they have rightly earned themselves the nickname chicken-hawk.
nathfrancis01 3 weeks ago
@nathfrancis01 Nonsense. Hitchens concluded it was torture, but he too was in favour of the war on Iraq and was in favour of bringing terrorists to justice, which people like you who like to use terms such as 'chicken-hawk' argue is also torture. People have differences in opinion, fine, but you attempt to portray Murray in a bad light by using the Hitch as a standard, when infact Hitch would support a lot of what Murray has to say - and indeed he did when he was alive.
DancinJim 2 weeks ago
@DancinJim Let me tell you somthing, if I cornered Murray in a dark alley, we'd soon see how much he favoured violence and confrontation. The people who do the fighting are never the Douglas Murray's of this world, if that were so there would be no wars.
nathfrancis01 2 weeks ago
@nathfrancis01 what you have said is simply an emotive outcry and not a valid rebuttal. In addition to this, you are also talking nonsense. Douglas Murray, I, you, or anyone else doesn't have to fight in a war, be part of a war, or anything like that, in order to qualify to give an opinion.
DancinJim 1 week ago
@DancinJim I'm not saying that anybody has to fight in a war to have an opinion. to quote Chomsky "If you don't believe in freedom of expression for the people you most despise, you don't believe in it at all", Murray is dfinitely aa peson I despise but would never suggest he is not entitled to his pea brained moronic opinions and would never suggest anybody should be suppressed or curtailed in speaking whaever radical beliefs they may hold.
nathfrancis01 1 week ago
@nathfrancis01 How telling that someone who can hardly keep track of what is happening makes a random Chomsky quote... Chomsky is the pop idol of the leftist loonies. Just re-read what you said in the last comment - it was pure emotion, no logic.
DancinJim 2 days ago
@DancinJim
DancinJim is a BNP supporter BTW, he believes mixed-race babies are a form of “genocide”.
NigNogPoIice 6 days ago
@NigNogPoIice Well-done on asserting your presence as a complete cretin. When you want to talk adult politics, feel free to let me know.
DancinJim 2 days ago
This has been flagged as spam show
@DancinJim
DancinJim is a BNPiggy. Don't deny it, treacle.
NigNogPoIice 1 day ago
Did we elect this man? Can we take it back?
MrLunitunz 1 month ago
Douglas murray isnt the idiot, you are.
Stevo6452 1 month ago 10
Why are these people allowed to exist...
Jugman10000 2 months ago
@Jugman10000 Becasue they are people and they represent a view!
IronMarsGaming 2 weeks ago
@IronMarsGaming That doesn't answer my question...
Jugman10000 2 weeks ago
Let me waterboard him and i'll get you the proof
Barerra1 2 months ago
I strongly believe Douglas Murray is undercover muslim and an al qaeeda sympathiser. I have proof if you want it, and by waterboarding him i'll get the confession of truth. Its not barbaric if its going to save lives
Barerra1 3 months ago
@Barerra1 i want the proof :)
gQuaresma07 2 months ago
ok there was no wmd found however in 2003 it was the right thing to do because and il repeat myself again saddam led us to belive he did have them
enigma7able 3 months ago
Liberals are against waterboarding admitted terrorists, but they don't seem to mind flying predator drones into the homes of suspected terrorists.
tomthefunky 3 months ago
Douglas Murray and his neo-con nonsense is irrelevant. Why Question Time keep inviting him back I don't know.
Dendiol 3 months ago
@Dendiol I love it when he's on the show because he gives good straight answers and tells it the way it is
enigma7able 3 months ago
@enigma7able He may give 'straight answers' but telling it like it is? I don't think Douglas Murray is equipped to do that as his views suggest he doesn't live in the real world
Dendiol 3 months ago
@Dendiol hmmm well in the real world we have terroists who would love to kill u or I so why should we be protecting them from waterboarding when it could be proventing terroist attacks and saving innocent people
enigma7able 3 months ago
@enigma7able Torture cannot be justified. And we have to look at why the terrorists want to kill us. Perhaps it's because America continues to impose democracy on other countries by force and thinks nothing of killing civilians. To quote Tony Benn: "There is no moral difference between a stealth bomber and a suicide bomber. Both kill innocent people for political reasons".
Dendiol 3 months ago 3
@Dendiol but most of the people in dictatorship countries want to be free. theres a saying u cant make an omlette without breaking some eggs meaning that things are bad just now but hopefully in 10 years time people in these countrys can have basic human rights which they dont have now, dont know if you watch the news but liyba was crying out for democracy.
enigma7able 3 months ago
@enigma7able It is not up to America to enforce and spread democracy. It is the right of individual nations to self determination and to decide their own path. NATO bombing Tripoli into submission and killing civilians in order to help the rebels does nothing to protect human rights.
Dendiol 3 months ago
@Dendiol america dident force they were begged
enigma7able 3 months ago
@enigma7able I highly doubt the people of Iraq and Afghanistan 'begged' to be bombed into democracy by the US and NATO.
Dendiol 3 months ago
@Dendiol iraq and afghanistan was differant, we went to war with iraq because saddam led us to belive he had weapons of mass destruction and afghanistan was to do with 9/11
enigma7able 3 months ago
@enigma7able I could reel off a long list of questionable wars the US has been involved in, right from Vietnam to removing democratically-elected left wing regimes in South America and putting dictatorships in their place. The Iraq War was illegal as no evidence was ever found of WMD to justify military action, and do you honestly think it's logical or right to kill hundreds of thousands of civilians in retaliation for the deaths of 3000 on 9/11?
Dendiol 3 months ago
@Dendiol ask the victims familys of 9/11 that and ok there was no WMD found however saddam led us to belive he had them by refusing the UN access to his country
enigma7able 3 months ago
@enigma7able Human lives are of equal value, whether they are 9/11 victims or civilian victims of war. And you really need to read up on Iraq, as you're still in denial.
Dendiol 3 months ago
@Dendiol Tony Benn: "There is no moral difference between a stealth bomber and a suicide bomber. Both kill innocent people for political reasons".... worth repeating.
jacksawild 1 month ago
@jacksawild ...but a suicide bomber often DELIBERATELY targets innocents. A stealth bomber would rather kills the terrorists if they could choose. Accuracy is an issue, admittedly, but intent clearly shows one side wants to kill the terrorists and the other wants to kill the innocents. The suicide bombers are clearly the ones who are in the wrong.
DancinJim 2 weeks ago
@DancinJim I put it to you that it isn't an "either or" issue. Both are reprehensible acts and as the right honourable Tony Benn points out, both are murder for political reasons.
jacksawild 2 weeks ago
@DancinJim Do you think that mothers who lose children because of bombings care about the motives of the bomber or the intended targets? Of course not they only care about the consequences. I challenge you to give me an adequate definition of the word terrorism that implicates muslim extremists but does not implicate western governments, without saying that states cannot carry out terrorist acts because they clearly can.
nathfrancis01 1 week ago
Can I waterboard you?
shervman 4 months ago
I bet he wouldn't like to be waterboarded. I'd volunteer to let him give it a try.
oeokosko 5 months ago
@oeokosko but why would he want to be waterboarded
enigma7able 5 months ago
douglas murray talks alot of sense, if waterboarding save's life's then theres nothing wrong with it.
enigma7able 5 months ago
@enigma7able By that logic, if killing you would save one life there would be nothing wrong with that.
IanM1984 3 months ago
@IanM1984 i really cant answer that, because its such a stupid question
enigma7able 3 months ago
douglas.....you stupid cunt.....I hope i never have to see you on my 52 inch again......
lumpfish99 5 months ago
Just a fine example of the tory's view of the world.
Georgio16100 6 months ago
I would probably confess to many horrible things I didn't do just to make it stop. This is why it doesn't work.
INatalkaI 6 months ago
what's wrong with pulling finger nails out to get information from terrorists?
cirosuperiore 8 months ago
Are we supposed to say 'please sir can you give me the information thank you'. waterboarding has no prolonged physical effect nor mental effect. it simulates drowning, not nice but that is the whole point of it. It will get the answers, and save all your hippies ass.These are dangerous people, and given a chance they well blow you to pieces If this method did not exist and a terror attack happens all the hippies will be asking - why did you not know ? why bla bla bla. come back to the real world
thevictory12345 8 months ago
its almost like decent ordinary democratic people are feeling sorry for these fundamentalists? these are people who incite hatred, provoke the world. Bigots who feel they are special. Would you really disagree with water boarding if the results pinpointed an al qaeda stronghold?do i think that terrorists who threaten my safety with violence and hatred be subjected to torture? yes.this is not to say torture is a nice experience, but a necessary one.
prisspross32 9 months ago
@SurlyCalifornia hmmm? What are you talking about?
DavidKB123 9 months ago
Hows about we water board this idiot Murray. He comes from a so called ~"think- tank", but that name should be changed to "AMAZINGLY THICK CUNT TANK"
Munnchbunnch 9 months ago
@wraithmarine The big fucking deal is that waterboarding is torture.
str33twarrior22 10 months ago
normaly i always agree with murray, but this time the guy disappointed me....never thought bullshit would come out of his mouth, wow
Serpico261 10 months ago
Only someone who really HATES Douglas Murray would assume this video humiliates him. Actually he comes quite well out of this quite well, in defending an impossible position. Raises 3 points, 1, that torture could always be justified from a utilitarian point of view, 2 that the important thing is the law, that governments don't break it. And 3, that America's cruelty is enthusiastically exaggerated by its critics. Not sure if last point is true, though; were only 3 waterboarded?
CBfrmcardiff 10 months ago
Torture is wrong because: it gives dictators ammunition against us to criticise OUR human rights record; erodes our civil liberties; serves a HUGE injustice to an innocent person; causes us to go against our own values and most of all; if your are trying to torture information out of someone who doesn't actually have it they will make something up to get the torture to stop. That could mean a mundane mistake, or it could mean the bombing of a school instead of an arms dump.
Riiye 10 months ago
Torture isn't specifically prohibited under the U.S. Constitution. The U.N. says that the U.S. should also ban guns, well does a country have a right to do things that not every other country necessarily does?
anikinippon 11 months ago
Damn, I usually love Murray..
But the gentleman to his left was correct, Hitchens decided that it was undoubtedly torture and a form of (actual) drowning, only slower. I didn't know Murray was capable of being such a fool..it's a pity he didn't join Christopher in his waterboarding; then perhaps he could have stopped himself from acting like such a fucker.
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
There is nothing "grey" about it, America executed Japanese soldiers in WW2 for waterboarding US soldiers. It was torture then and it's torture now. Isn't it funny that a lot of those who think it's OK have never served a minute in any kind of life threatening situation. Armchair Generals
kramdoogs 11 months ago
@kramdoogs - It's funny. Hitchens has an essay that refutes what you have just said ... slate.com/id/2073772/
lector0003 11 months ago
@lector0003 I have a great deal of respect for Christopher Hitchens and when he wrote this article it would have been heavily influenced, (my opinion) by the fact that on that shit day in 2001 he was on the other side of the country and unable to be with his family, distressing for anyone. My use of "armchair generals" was in itself not intended to be generic. Christopher himself is unerring in his position that water-boarding is indeed torture and that was the point I was making.
kramdoogs 10 months ago
@kramdoogs - I referred you to Hitchen's article because it dismantles the "armchair general" charge. It's a silly attempt to silence those on the basis they haven't had the opportunity to physically kill a person. I think "discussion" would almost entirely disappear if we were restricted to talk about that which we personally "experienced".
lector0003 10 months ago
@lector0003 I am referring to torture and I think that these days war might entirely disappear if those that invoke it had to actually participate in the reality. Silencing the discussion, what discussion? Of all the congressmen and women in the US that voted for invasion one and only one has a child serving in Iraq yet they were very eager to allow others children to serve/die or become maimed physically, mentally. You talk about discussion but it does not exist, example "The Patriot Act 1 & 2
kramdoogs 10 months ago
@kramdoogs - "if those that invoke it had to actually participate in the reality."
Have you never heard of Jihad, martyrdoom, heaven and ones duty to fight for Allah. Don't be naive. Some people in this world are prepared to die for a cause greater than themselves, and you think they'll be put off by the sight of blood?! Also, I find it contemptable to use dead soldiers to advance a political viewpoint. I dont think we're not going to agree, so I leave it here.
lector0003 10 months ago
Douglas Murray is always right.
bolius1 11 months ago
Douglas Murray 's logic won out here.
Just in response to your' 'if all else fails, resort to using an example from fiction', ok then pal, are you aware that US Navy SEALS are waterboarded as part of their training? Does the US torture its own troops?!
GoldenbanjoDJ 1 year ago
@GoldenbanjoDJ yes, the us uses one of the few tortures that don't inflict permanent injury to train the navy seals in a complete training course called SERE, that stands for Survival Evasion Resistance & Escape and that puts the soldier in a scenario where he has been captured and has to avoid giving any information (if he does the training ends but so does his carrer) and to survive whith very little food water and other techniques to destroy its will. So yes US tortures SEALS "just in case"
Nemomain 11 months ago
@GoldenbanjoDJ Your logic is faulty. Many navy seals would tell you that waterboarding is a form of torture
str33twarrior22 10 months ago
@str33twarrior22
No, the logic I was using was that if water boarding is torture, then therefore the US military tortures its own troops. That is the only logical conclusion presented in that post, and as such I think you will find that it is not faulty whatsoever.
GoldenbanjoDJ 10 months ago
I think the conservative is right. If it works and saves lives and gains intel, then use it. I don't give a flying shit about their fucking rights. They're being interrogated for fuck sake.
sportsportsport 1 year ago
@sportsportsport It doesn't work, and it doesn't gain intel.
str33twarrior22 10 months ago
@str33twarrior22 It works and it gains intel. Even if it only works once in 50 times. I'm down with that. In any case it is going to carry on regardless of whatever you lentil nibbling liberals thinks. Water boarding is not torture.... it's an interrogating technique... it's not punishment. Torture is punishment, waterboarding interrogating is a device used to probe information. Very different. - one to harm, one to submit.
sportsportsport 10 months ago
I actually like Douglas Murray, and although I say Water Boarding is a form of torture he does have a point..
Elcristoph 1 year ago
@SilverBars42 no, you're missing the point. it rarely does work. in the 1700's the spanish inquisition used torture to "prove" that hundreds of people we jews (when most of them were not). another example is the salem witch trials. if you torture someone untill they confess they are a part of some fighter organisation you are none the wiser because people will say anything to avoid pain. the percieved strength of torture is actually a weakness. i couldn't give a shit about torture being evil.
loz1023 1 year ago
@SilverBars42 personally i don't think torture is intrinsically evil. but as a method for gathering intelligence it is poor, very poor. but anyway i asume you agree that waterboarding is torture which is what the video was about.
loz1023 1 year ago
@SilverBars42 in a short term ticking bomb situation it doesn't work because a person can lie and you can be none the wiser. as for gain information firstly you run the risk of torturing an innocent person which is unnacceptable or just keep going round in circles with some misinformation because nothing a tortured person says is worth listening to. the only time when torture works is when you already know something and know that they know it and can force them to confess, which is rare.
loz1023 1 year ago
@SilverBars42 yeah, like all those witches we caught in the 1600's! if i tortured you i could make you say absolutley anything, i could say you were the bastard son of a chimp and a baboon. the words of a tortured man are meaningless because people will say anything, regardless of whether it is true, to avoid unbearable pain.
loz1023 1 year ago
stupid tory cunt!
MonsterMozz 1 year ago
@MonsterMozz hes not a tory
Elcristoph 1 year ago
@Elcristoph From wiki, (not the be all and end all of knowledge but a good start)
"In 2005 he published a defence of neoconservatism, Neoconservatism: Why We Need It. During the course of a related promotional tour of the USA gave an interview to the New York Sun in which he outlined his "instinctive" support for Israel and was dubbed a "self-described neoconservative and Zionist" as well as "Britain's only neoconservative."
MonsterMozz 1 year ago
Water boarding is not as bad as bering blown to smithereens by a suicide bomber. Torture is 'Anything that causes mental pain'?? Pathetic.
alekcy 1 year ago
He doesn't understand why it's bad because it's psychological torture. He is a Tory, thus he has no brain, thus he has a natural immunity to psychological-anything.
thealmightypidgeon 1 year ago
The love affair between leftists & Muslim fundamentalists is a real treat to watch..
It's the old belief that "The enemy of my enemy is my friend",they both hate Western civilization in general & the US in particular,so they band together.
hayden50 1 year ago
Don't liberals realize that Islam is not liberal ?
Liberals and Islamists do have some common concepts/goals.
Both hate the USA and want to see it destroyed.
Both hate Israel and Jews and want to see them destroyed.
Both hate Christianity and Christians and want to see them destroyed.
Both are virulently and violently intolerant of differing/opposing views.
hayden50 1 year ago
Comment removed
hayden50 1 year ago
Murray is a a great man. Shame on this poster for being so immature and ignorant as to call him an 'idiot'. The fact is, Murray would destroy them in a debate.
DancinJim 1 year ago
I don't understand how you could call Douglas Murray an idiot, he's anything but. Disagree with him all you like, but he's not stupid.
tedatlas 1 year ago
@tedatlas Indeed.
DancinJim 1 year ago
@tedatlas Saying waterboarding is not torture is stupid. If he's so smart, he wouldn't say idiotic things like that. It's not a mater of agreeing or disagreeing. The people who think that waterboarding is not torture are just plain wrong.
str33twarrior22 10 months ago
@stevendentten Anyone who writes a book entitled "Neo-Conservativism: Why We Need It" is clearly in the Conservative Camp!!
BeholdZeus 1 year ago
@BeholdZeus No, Neo-Conservatism is not the same as Conservatism. Infact, Neo-Conservatives often hold many Liberal values.
DancinJim 1 year ago
@BeholdZeus
Neo-Conservatism and Conservatism are two radically diferent schools of Political thought, you disingenuous fuck.
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist Any ideology that agrees to outright militant intervention in order to impose its "democratic values" on other nations is a shamefaced ideology indeed. It lacks humanity, plain and simple. Moreover, neoconservatism is a hybrid of conservative and liberal ideology. But it has the backbone of militant conservatism (neo=new). Therefore, you idiotic empire-hugging fuck, you don't have clue about what you are talking about. Get back to your crude and shallow learning.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
Conservatism and Liberalism are diametrically opposed. Hence, Neo-Conservatism and Conservatism are two radically different schools of Political though.
'' It lacks humanity, plain and simple''
It's not ''Plain and simple'' unless you tell me why..
As for Militant Conservatism, I wouldn't know. I'm afraid we don't really have much of that in Great Britain, ask an American; they'll tell you all about it. Even our Conservative Party is Progressive.
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist The ideology of neoconservativsm is actually a hybrid of neoliberal economics and the Blair/Bush doctrine concerning foreign intervention. Therefore, it involves a move to the centre from both the right and the left. Moreover, you obviously fail to understand that there are many variant of liberalism - classical liberalism for example is aligned very closely with conservatism. They both believe in "free markets", self-reliance and a small role for the welfare state. Similar.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist Plain and simple explained: 1) it is predicated on neoliberal economics, itself derived from rational choice theory and the neoclassical tradition. This tradition sees individuals as utility maximisers and nothing more, forgetting conveniently that human beings retain a collective aspect to their identities. Neoclassical structures do away with the human "for the sake" of the system. As long as pleasure maximisation is being attained and egos tickled, it wins out.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist 2) Intervention fo any sort contravenes the sovereign rights of nations. We have no right to "impose" our ideology on another country. If, however, a country wishes to accede to "our" way of looking at things, then that is quite a different matter. In fact, this idea is specifically against notions of a just war: primarily wars of defence. Democracy cannot be exported though the barrel of a gun. Reasonable dialogue us by far more preferential.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
''We have no right to "impose" our ideology on another country''
Presuming you're referring to Iraq there..whose 'ideaology' are you referring to? Poland, Australian, Britain, American and the IDF all have different ideaologies, you see.
'' If, however, a country wishes to accede to "our" way of looking at things, then that is quite a different matter''
Pure babble.
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist Pure babble? Why so? We have no right to meddle in the internal politics of a nation state, unless that state is our own. Otherwise we are mere vandals, nothing. And when I say "our" ideology, I mean the ideology that is promoted by the expansionist agenda of neoliberalism "and" neoconservatism" which have managed to garner support from the left and the right.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist I am referring to the ideology of neoliberalism. If we move from the left and seek refuge in the liberal centre, we get neoliberalism. If we do the same from the right, we get neoconservatism. Both strands come together once more to give us an ideology of imperialistic interventionism. Furthermore, most countries - if you know political economy at all - subscribe to neolliberal economics and the interventionist policies suggested by it.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
''In fact, this idea is specifically against notions of a just war: primarily wars of defence''
This is a factoid. If you look the Political speeches made by Powell and Bush and throughout the Senate, you'll find; there were actually a number of arguments on why the War was necasarry. WMDs were only a factor of the argument, however I'll concede they were over-stated (Not lied...over-stated). Though as I said, Hussein WAS in the process of trying to procure Atomic weaponry.
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist You no nothing about just war theory, ergo, there is no further point indulging your ignorance. The Bush/Blair doctrine constituted a major re-revison of this theory and in fact argued that intervention IS justifiable. May I also remind you that no WMDs were found and that they were supplied by the west in the first place? Kind of blurs the lines doesn't it? There is NO evidence to prove that Hussein was trying to procure atomic weaponry. Using your own phrase: pure babble.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
By Bush/Blair Doctrine, I'll presume what you actually meant to say was Bush/Blair/Kaczynski/Howard Doctrine...
Incidentally, would you care to achknowledge that your original implication that the Iraq/Afghanistan Wars were Imperialist - was completely untrue? If not, I'm afraid I'll have to deduct a point from you; for intellectual dishonesty.
''May I also remind you that no WMDs were found '' I believe I already made the converse statement to that..
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist A war is imperialist if an empire, or country posing as an empire, seeks to invade and rule another country. It is imperial also in the sense that imperial denotes actions that are imperious and domineering: again, see Iraq and Afghanistan. And while your at it, see further evidence of US meddling in Nicaragua (Iran Contra affair), Chile and Colombia. All signs of an "imperial" and "imperious" mentality. I retract nothing. Further, if no WMDs were found, someone was lying!
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
Also, if we cared about "humanitarian intervention", we'd be in Bahrain, Yemen, Darfur...We are NOT concerned with these things. We are concerned, and moreover careful, that we make are arguments appear to be in "the human interest", but we are not concerned with humanitarian intervention per se. Blair and Bush said they were concerned with Hussein's human rights violations, but they weren't concerned with those committed by Israel or Egypt. We preach humanity and open Guantanamo. Fitting.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
Also, I have already made the proposition that WMDs were only a *factor* of what made the Iraq War necasarry. I'll ask you this - Do you really believe that Hussein's (actual) Imperialist days were over? We all know he wanted to attack India and to destroy the Hindu Religion, for example. Not only that, but he still had his eyes on Persia. How about we swap format here: You tell me your own reasons why you think the Iraq War was unjust and I'll tell you my reasons why it wasn't?
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist Oh really, they were but ONE element of it. I seem to recall they were a bloody big element of it. Hence the dodgy dossier, the sexing up of intelligence, the need to create a fabricated existential threat - see Blair speech to parliament of stating that Hussein possessed missiles that could be dispatched within 45 minutes. This evidence WAS vital in order to get the Security Council to sign off on the resolution for war. No other reason was given for removing him.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
''Democracy cannot be exported though the barrel of a gun. Reasonable dialogue us by far more preferential. ''
I'll finding it REALLY difficult to take you seriously now..
So basically you're suggesting, we should have held better Diplomatic relations with the Afghani-Taliban Goverment? (The people who buried gays alive, killed men without beards, killed women without Hajiibs, threw acid in the faces of little girls for trying to go to school, banned music, banned literature..)
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist You mean the government WE established. Of course we currently support a government of Uzbecki warlords and drug barons. How morally astute of us. I return to my original point: WE created the Taliban, WE created the "existential" threat that is apparently such a threat to the west. WE manufactured fundamentalism as a pretext for foreign wars for oil and natural resources. WE are the problem. How do we deal with it? We leave it to the people. We have done enough damage.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist There is no Taliban government, as such. There might well be a council but not a government. But if we had to negotiate, then yes, I'd agree to it. After all, WE created them. Let us never forget this fact. Therefore, it is up to us to seek dialogue with them - there are already reports that this is happening. Finally, what is the problem with seeking dialogue? Do you prefer outright war, the death of innocent civilians and the destruction of families, to dialogue?
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist Also, please see this Unicol testimony from 1998 congressional record on afghanistan and its oil importance.
"Mr. Chairman, the Caspian region contains tremendous untapped hydrocarbon reserves. Just to give an idea of the scale, proven natural gas reserves equal more than 236 trillion cubic feet. The region's total oil reserves may well reach more than 60 billion barrels of oil. Some estimates are as high as 200 billion barrels."
Mr. John J. Maresca, VP of Unocal Corporation.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
Red Herring, you dodged the question. -1 for intellectual dishonesty. My second question (if you'll actually answer it) was going to be; do you or do you not stipulate that we should have held Diplomatic talks with Hussein; whilst he continued to commit genocide, harbour International terrorists and stand idly buy as he tried to procure Atomic weaponry for blackmail purposes?
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist I answered in the affirmative. J.S. Mill stated that if a people did not have "a sufficient love of liberty to be able to wrest it from merely domestic oppressors, the liberty which is bestowed on them by other hands rather than their own, will have nothing real, nothing permanent". In other words, interventionist or manufactured liberty is not a way of maintaining that liberty. Diplomatic talks are better than no talks at all.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist More lucid commentary from Mill: "If a people - especially one whose freedom has not yet become prescriptive - does not value it sufficiently to fight for it, and maintain it against any force which can be mustered within the country, even by those who have the command of the public revenue, it is only a question of how few years or months that people will be enslaved." The people must rise up. We do not have the right to instigate rebellion, nor democratic reform.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist On that point -1 for observation.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
Damn, you win. :[
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist It's not about winning. It's about reaching an amicable conclusion. Healthy debate is what matters, debate toward a reasonable and reasoning conclusion. Better put, the thing that matters most is public reason and deliberation on matters of public concern. Critical thinking, what Kant referred to as the faculty of maturity, is the most important constitutive feature of rational human identity.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
Comment removed
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
You're underestimating me if you think I haven't read A Critique of Pure Reason. Incidentally, my former comment was intended to be (obviously) sarcastic. But anyways, I asked you two questions; neither of which you have answered - both of which are pretty important to the debate. How about you answer those, then hit me with your own? That a suitable format?
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist I'm not talking about the Critique of Pure Reason. That is his metaphysical treatise. I'm talking about the Critique of Practical Reason and his essay What is Enlightenment? You evidently think you are cleverer than you really are. And please don't try to take me on Kant. I have an MPhil in him. I answered both of your questions in full. If you can't see it, then that is YOUR problem. You keep setting the questions up and I'll knock them down. Be as sardonic as you want.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist Oh, underestimating you! The horror! You have persuaded yourself that you are intelligent, and you, I presume, pontificate to others on this basis. It's a sad and lifeless pursuit and it is so far away from right reason that it is a pointless pursuit. Take your name for instance. "BelfastAtheist". Why would you want to be known by your position on faith issues (which I agree are irrational). It is because you want confrontation with idiots who you can dominate. Pathetic.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
Thanks Sigmund, that psychoanalysis really does work! I appreciate you judging my quality of life; via reading my username - as opposed to answering the questions I posed. I myself, find it rather pathetic the lengths you seem to be going to; to avoid backing up your earlier claims. Anyways, why u mad?
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
Or perhaps you're saying we should have held better Diplomatic relations with Hussein; the man who had been shooting our planes down for over a decade?
Jesus Christ, your argument is fatuous..
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
You mean the same Saddam Hussein who we supported during the Iran-Iraq war, the same leader who was morally neutral when we gave him chemical munitions, but suddenly morally disgusting a few years later. You did see the photos of Rumsfeld with Hussein, didn't you? Yet again, intervention leading to morally bankruptcy. The trend is not looking so good.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
Incidentally, I called you a disingenuous fuck because I thought you were disingenuously speaking..nothing more, nothing less. I could have been wrong, however there's no need to insult my intellect. If the Ad Hominem is your first choice of debating strategy, I think I've already won this one.
As for it being 'humanity' to free 31 million people in Iraq from a Despot who killed over 50,000 of their children, as well as 450,000 of their other citizens.
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist In fact, the ad hominem came at the end, and was in response to your own. Before that came an exposition of what neoconservatism is. Alas, nothing will dissuade you from your lack of reason. Over 1 million people died in the Iraq more. Millions were exiled and many become immigrants. The oil fields were co-opted by western forces who then conveniently "lost" the national wealth of the country. We are talking about a brutal attack. Recall also how the west armed Saddam.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist Wait, a mere 50, 000 reserves remain. How bloodly generous of us! The Pentagon can't account for 8.7 billion dollars in Iraq funds. Convenient? I think not.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
Sigh...Red Herring, or just intellectual laziness. I brought up a number of points, all of which you have ignored.
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
Do you even know people like live in Afghanistan? Calling me an 'Empire-hugger' really is so fatuous, on so many levels. First of all, the Iraq/Afghanistan interventions were not Imperialist. Our troops have already left Iraq (50,000 reserves still remain..for the time being) the day after they announced their immediate departure, office blocks all around the country were struck by suicide attacks. As for Afghanistan, our troops will be gone in less than a year.
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist Neoliberalism is connected to ideas about reviving the western Empire, specifically the American Empire. Therefore, if you back the neoliberal agenda. you back just such an Empire.
Set out logically:
1) Neoconservatism is an ideology of empire
2) You support neoconservatism
3) Therefore you support an ideology of empire.
Further reference: see "the British neoconservatives" by John Kampfner.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist You seem to think that the above interventions were humanitarian. But you are mistaken. 1) Iraqi oilfield have been of interest to the west for years. The attack on the US gave the right pretext for an invasion of this reason (some horrendous arguments attempting to suggest the presence of Al-Qaeda in Iraq ensued). Following the war, major US oil companies - like Haliburton - made billions in subsidies in terms of oil extraction, patents and exportation. It was all for oil.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist 2) Afghanistan gave the west the chance to clean up the mess it created during the 1980s, when it armed and bankrolled the Taliban. But it also provided something much more valuable: a geo-strategic position next door to China (the next empire). Aside from this, the west wanted a position close to Russia and had plans to construct the Trans-Afghan pipeline (this plan was rejected due to instability in the region). In earnest, Al Qaeda is merely a convenient straw man.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
To get further confirmation on the oil gluttony of the west, see this article dated 17-3-2005 on the BBC's website, titled "Secret US Plans for Iraq's Oil." Enlighten yourself, please.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
If you really think the Iraq/Afghanistan interventions were Imperialist; then you ARE disingenuous. Nobody who has done any objective research into the subjects could call it Imperialist. Research the Vietnam War...that's what an Imperialist War looks like. Also; is toppling a dictator that our Goverments helped into power really 'Imperialist' ?
Sounds fair and square to me, he was our problem. He fired at our Coalition planes every day for over a decade.
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@BelfastAtheist Afghanistan, as a conflict zone, would never have emerged it it wasn't for the fact that the west bankrolled the taliban - see operation cyclone. WE created this force, and WE encouraged it to its fullest degree? And why? Because we wanted a buffer between us and the Russians. Now it is coming back to haunt is, and proves beyond a doubt that we should not meddle in other states affairs. In fact, we are currently supporting Uzbeck warlords and drug barons. Not brining peace.
BeholdZeus 11 months ago
@BeholdZeus
As well as attempting to shoot down every one of our planes in the No-Fly Zone, Hussein attacked 4 other countries, committed genocide, harboured international terrorists, tried to procure an Atomic arsenal from North Korea. (These are the 4 stipulations in EU Law which permit an intervention).
I do find the irony that you're calling me disingenuous, when you just called the Iraq/Afghanistan Wars Imperialist..lol
BelfastAtheist 11 months ago
@jennywhojenny Anyone who writes a book entitled "Neo-Conservativism: Why We Need It" is evidently in the Conservative camp!!
BeholdZeus 1 year ago
Just to reiterate Jennywhojenny's point, Douglas Murray is not a Tory. I suggest you change the title of the video.
stevendentten 1 year ago
@BeholdZeus Douglas Murray isn't a Tory. He hates all parties.
jennywhojenny 1 year ago
@jennywhojenny Exactly. The owner of this video is clearly not very well-educated on politics if he/she thinks a Conservative and a Neo-Conservative is the same thing. Douglas Murray is a legend and a true champion of fearless free-speech.
DancinJim 1 year ago
Thanks so much for uploading this. People who defend torture need to be brought out for public scrutiny!
DMarksmanLima21 1 year ago
@DMarksmanLima21 It is Murray who brings these issues up for public scrutiny, not the other way round. He instigates the debates the mainstream are frightened to talk about.
DancinJim 1 year ago
@DancinJim I live in the USA, so I don't even know who Murray is, his record/reputation etc.
DMarksmanLima21 1 year ago
Ok, I will give you some info on him in a post...
DancinJim 1 year ago
In the UK, many politicians are frightened to bring up any sensitive issues. They like to try to occupy the middle ground on most things. The 2 main political parties were accused of being one and the same at the last election. Murray isn't a politician, and doesn't particularly like any of them. He debates controversial social issues in public, and says things that others don't have the gumption to say. Some people hate him for this. Islamic Extremists set him up for attack at a phoney debate.
DancinJim 1 year ago
@DancinJim He sounds like a good man. I like Ron Paul for the same reason. He mixes the political pot so we can see what shit floats to the top. I believe in the Constitution...which means...I believe the Federal Reserve is UnConstitutional. The same goes for the Patriot Act, lies given to invade Iraq(which I believed at the time). With tears in my eyes...I read the Constitution, The Bible and I press on trying to wake the rest of us. BTW Thanks for the Post.
DMarksmanLima21 1 year ago
@DMarksmanLima21 Sorry it had to be such a brief description of him, but YouTube doesn't allow many words in a post and I had to struggle to fit the basics in! I am very interested in American politics, but I have to admit I am probably quite ignorant on it in comparison to American citizens. I am still learning quite a lot, and I watch a lot of debates on here, on various American issues. I've also listened to Christopher Hitchens describe his waterboarding experience, with great interest.
DancinJim 1 year ago
huh Its very much on border line.. and the logic behind (Murray's) thick head is that Mr Bush was told by his advisor's that it isn't so it isn't.. Only 3 people have been identified because we didn't come to hear the stories about rest by mainstream media.. Thing is If Murray's sense of logic happens to be like Bush advisers then why not he just flipping leave UK and go live in US??
Reptile0000 1 year ago
@Reptile0000 We will be glad to accommodate Mr Murray ,Freedom of Speech is protected by the Constitution,unlike in Britain & rest of Europe where you could get sued/arrested over hurt feelings..
water-boarding and "enhanced interrogation techniques" used on terrorists helped to break up plots aimed at targets in America as well as at Heathrow Airport and Canary Wharf in London.
hayden50 1 year ago
@Reptile0000 If torturing one or a few of these will save the lives of American and British citizens as they do their shopping, go to work and otherwise continue to exist peacefully,then yes,it can be justified.
hayden50 1 year ago
@wraithmarine The big deal is the fact that waterboarding is regarded as torture under the Geneva Conventions, under the International Human Rights Committee, under the Rome Statutes and other legal instruments. Positive law, as the expression of the people's will, is definitive on this issue. You either agree with the social contract under which you are a subject, or you reject it: in which case you can set up a nation of your own.
BeholdZeus 1 year ago
First torture does work, people find it hard to lie in the best of circumstances. To keep a consistent believable lie that fits with known facts going under *any* significant stress is impossible. This is the whole premise of normal everyday police interrogations.
So sure believe that torture or water boarding is wrong or that it should not be done, but don't claim that it doesn't work. It does.
DavidKB123 1 year ago
@DavidKB123 Give me one example of when waterboarding has worked. Just one. Moreover, if you accept waterboarding - illegal under international law - do you accept extraordinary rendition without trial, military tribunals, illegal detention? International law must stand for something. The only way to make sure it is credible and binding is to make sure that it is followed to the letter. This means that western countries should uphold the laws that they have subscribed to. Especially the UK
BeholdZeus 1 year ago
@BeholdZeus Torture works. Period. People break under pressure, you can cross reference what new information they give you with information you already know is true to see if they are being truthful. Thats it its simple, it works. HOWEVER this does NOT mean its right or should be done that nor does that mean it is wrong or shouldn't be done. That is a SEPARATE question involving morality that is INFORMED by the fact that torture works. You can be for or against it and still know that it works
DavidKB123 10 months ago
@DavidKB123 Torture doesnt work and i think you need to get an education before commenting.
antiwarcampaigner 10 months ago
@antiwarcampaigner How does it not work?
DavidKB123 10 months ago
@DavidKB123 Matthew Alexander, a US senior military interrogator who conducted over 1300 in Iraq and Afghanistan said last week, torture is the way to guarantee bad intelligence as those suffering will say anything to stop the torture and that "anything" they say often leads to wild goose chases by the intelligence officers on people who are conjured up in the minds of the tortured detainees! I think the guy knows what he is talking about! if the taliban were waterboarding our troops is that ok?
antiwarcampaigner 10 months ago
@antiwarcampaigner Yeah, but that doesn't make any logical sense, since you always use 'control' questions (questions that you already know the answer to) to see if the person you are interrogating is telling you 'what you want to know'. So I'm afraid I still haven't heard a rationale why enhanced interrogation/torture would not work.
DavidKB123 10 months ago
@DavidKB123 Wow, you are an arrogant and ignorant little boy arnt you? Matthew Alexander interrogated over 1300 detainees on the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan for the US military and he flatly contradicts what the idiots in this video AND you yet here you are telling us all about what you read in an Andy McNab book as evidence of what works and what doesnt work? i see you didnt answer my question about what if our troops were subjected to waterboarding, would you be in favour?
antiwarcampaigner 10 months ago
@antiwarcampaigner Well to what ever Matthew Alexander believes there are self evidently at least the same amount people who believe the opposite, otherwise these interrogations would never have been recommended and carried out. If it really is so obvious that it doesn't work then it must be pretty easy to explain why it doesn't.
DavidKB123 10 months ago
@DavidKB123 yep thats right, keep your head in the sand and avoid the questions too. America and its allies tried Japanese soldiers in WW2 for war crimes because they waterboarded our soldiers yet now we tell the world its ok? well what goes around comes around and its people like you and the idiot in this video that make the world a much more dangerous world for us all because it fuels hatred for the west all over the world.
antiwarcampaigner 10 months ago
@antiwarcampaigner So I guess you have no argument for why water boarding would not work?
DavidKB123 10 months ago
@DavidKB123 I guess you are not able to comprehend logic nor recall my initial post about people who are tortured making up anything to stop the torture. what are people like you going to say when our troops are held and waterboarded by the insurgents to get "valuable information" from them? I doubt its going to be "hey, its not torture, its enhanced interrogation and its legal." what goes around comes around and i hope one day hypocrites like you get a taste of it too.
antiwarcampaigner 9 months ago
@antiwarcampaigner and as I have stated its not really possible just to make up stuff, information you get is cross referenced with other confirmed bits of intelligence. Even under the least stressful conditions of everyday life its hard to make something up that can stand up to any degree of scrutiny. You appear to confuse torture used to genuinely seek out real information with torture in the 'Inquisition CONFESS' sense.
DavidKB123 9 months ago