Submitted by Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger
With apologies to Archbishop of Canterbury John Morton, I’m offering this version of his famous “fork”:
You’re a young idealist standing for the highest office in the land. Against many odds you’ve offered a candidacy of hope and change to an electorate tired of both war and the prior Administration that got them into those wars. There are rumors of widespread atrocities committed by that Administration in response to a horrific terrorist attack on American soil where thousands of your countrymen died. In your capacity as an US Senator, you’ve been briefed on several of these and you see a pattern developing. You’re a Constitutionalist; a lawyer; and a principled man, but you recognize the nation faces a real threat of nuclear holocaust at the hands of committed, well-funded terrorists supported and protected by renegade states and even some of our allies. These terrorists have a fanatical zeal and value martyrdom above self-preservation. You believe that if they acquire weapons of mass destruction the question will not be if millions of people will die, but which millions of people will die.
Riding a groundswell of promise and belief in your promises to restore American values, the electorate sends you to the nation’s capitol to change the way things have been done. During the course of the election, it has become clear that the drain on the economy caused by war, corruption, and old-fashioned greed has left the country in dire financial straits.
On January 16th you are briefed by the nation’s intelligence communities. You are told definitively that the intelligence community has engaged in extraordinary measures to fight America’s enemies which you conclude amount to torture, illegal renditions, detaining innocent people, and even Executive Orders approving the killing of persons deemed enemy combatants. You’ve inherited a Gulag within sight of the American coast and during the campaign you’ve vowed to close it. You are told that many senior members of the permanent intelligence community were aware of and approved the illegal measures employed in defense of the country. Losing these people would severely cripple efforts to defend the country as they form a sizable amount of the intelligence community’s institutional knowledge and memory. You’re also told that these senior intelligence officers have been promised immunity for their actions by the earlier Administration.
You convene your economic advisors who explain to you that the emergency measures adopted by your predecessor and designed to prop up the failing economy may well work but it will take time,and any shock to the nation could disturb this fragile trust building process. If the stimulus fails, the resulting shock could send the nation and Europe into a full-blown depression crippling the efforts to fight terrorism.
Moderate governments in the Mideast have come to you seeking aid to fight the fundamentalist movements that are fueling terrorist recruitment and sponsorship. They tell you that to continue the fight means more money and intelligence from the US or their efforts will be severely handicapped.
What do you do?
A. Continue the illegal policies of the past Administration reasoning that this is war and that your primary goal is to defend the nation at all costs. These repugnant policies seemed to have had some effect in curtailing the terrorist threat and your calling off the dogs is a real risk to your viability as a leader if you’re wrong and another deadly attack occurs on US soil. Another successful attack could throw the markets into a death spiral and the recovery might not occur for decades. You continue with the stimulus program and avoid any investigation of earlier illegal acts concluding that any shock to the fragile economy caused by the turmoil will reap more evil than it alleviates. You also avoid any investigation to eliminate the possibility of crippling the intelligence community. You share money and both illegally obtained and legally obtained intelligence with the friendly Arab states.
B. You reason that principle trumps expediency and stop all illegality. You immediately order investigations into the prior Administration’s handling of the war. You make public the results and bring indictments against wrongdoers. You do so even in the face of prior pledges of immunity reasoning they are void ad initio given our treaty obligations and on principles of international law. You make Herculean efforts to replace the intelligence officers lost to the investigations and you build morale by explaining your policies as being in the nation’s long-term best interest. You do what you can to stabilize the economy but you will not compromise in your efforts to prosecute those who have violated the law. You tell friendly states and Europe you understand their concerns about such a policy but you adhere to the adage that “let justice be done though the heavens fall.”
C. You adopt a middle ground approach reasoning it is best for the country that the economic recovery not be affected by criminal investigations of the American intelligence community and the prior Administration. You believe any move otherwise could lead to a weakening of American strength at the worst time and make that nuclear holocaust against an American city more likely. You change the illegal policies of the prior Administration to stop torture, curtail renditions and if absolutely necessary only to countries that will not use torture. You employ death warrants abroad and only against those your intelligence agencies tell you present a clear and present danger to the US. You fully support friendly states abroad against extremists and provide intelligence to them as well as cash.
D. Your Choice.
Now, the tough part: Defend your choice — and no changing facts that you don’t like in our “hypothetical situation.”
~Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger
Tony C:
I agree completely with that statement.
When you attack your neighbor, you better be willing to take the consequences of your actions. If you cant fight, you better not start the fight.
Typically it is not liberal democracies which attack their neighbors, usually it is totalitarian societies done at the behest of their leader.
Fidel Castro views on the Republican presidential primaries, Time 2/13 issue:
“The greatest competition of idiocy and ignorance that has ever been.”
@Bron: By the same token, the land was lost in WW II, and to the victor go the spoils. Right?
Personally, I think that between countries or between persons, it is the attacker that assumes the risk for their life and everything they own. Those countries on the wrong side of WWII risked their land, and the victors awarded the land to Israel. Those that then attacked Israel risked their land to do it, and Israel had the right to take it.
I say the same for all countries, including ours: If you do not want to risk the loss of your country, land, property or citizens, do not bet them on a war, declared or undeclared.
Mespo:
OK, then give your land back to the Pamunkeys. Your ancestors stole it and you have benefited from that theft. You say your ancestors werent here then and you had no direct responsibility? You took stolen land, isnt there a law against receiving stolen property?
Personally, I think what Harry Truman did was pretty stupid but what is done is done and the facts are as they are. And the Palestinians are a bunch of nitwits who could have played the sympathy card 50 years ago and they would have had a state by 1970. But they chose death and destruction instead.
The Jews won that land in 3 different wars, I would say to the victor belongs the spoils and I would also say since most of the Arab world supported Hitler during WWII they dont have much moral standing and they have yet to distance themselves from their desire for the destruction of an entire country.
Then who was he demanding liberty from if everyone already agreed with him?
ekera:
“What happened to give me liberty or give me death?
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That was Patrick Henry. He was in the majority.
Mespo,
“The majority in society always sets the principles – for better or worse. You know that didn’t you?”
You let the majority determine what principles you live by? That sounds like a terrible way to go through life.
What happened to give me liberty or give me death?
I’ll not contest the power of the image. 😀
Gene H:
Good point Gene. I like your language better, but, like Blouise, I like my image.
“That’s Prep Boy Biff logic and again evinces that ‘life started when I was born’ mentality.”
You expected something else from an Objectivist, mepso? They are the center of the universe, the standard by which all else is measured. That’s what happens when you worship your own ego.
Bron:
“From my understanding there is no “Palestinian” people, they are indigenous Arabs.”
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Not sure what you mean by indigenous Arabs, but Palestine is one of the first known inhabited areas of the world. It includes Israel, the West Bank, Lebanon and much of Syria and Jordan. It’s traces its heritage back 3000 years to the Caananites. The Romans expelled the Jews from the area in about the Second Century BCE. By 1800 BCE, Jerusalem was a massive fortified city populated by Palestinian people. In the 7th Century the Moslems converted the mostly agrarian locals to their faith. By the end of the 7th Century the area was mostly populated by Arabs. In 1919, there were 700,000 Palestinian Arabs living there. No one really disputes they inhabited the land they live on and the lands they were displaced from for thousands of years before the Israelis arrived. The Balfour Declaration of 1917 promised a Jewish homeland and “Britain’s high commissioner for Palestine, John Chancellor, recommended total suspension of Jewish immigration and land purchase to protect Arab agriculture. He said ‘all cultivable land was occupied; that no cultivable land now in possession of the indigenous population could be sold to Jews without creating a class of landless Arab cultivators’…The Colonial Office rejected the recommendation.”
Bron,
“From my understanding there is no “Palestinian” people, they are indigenous Arabs.”
You mean they could be compared to the indigenous people of North America? We all know how the settlers from Europe took their lands from them because the indigenous people weren’t “real” Americans.
First definition given for “indigenous”–taken from The American Heritage Dictionary of the English language:
“Originating and growing or living in an area or environment.”
“Come to think of it, Ron Paul would look good in a beanie hat and crest (-j)blazer. Maybe he should run a prep school.” (mespo)
I know it was written in jest but quite frankly, sums it all up nicely.
Bron:
“It is like saying that since you are white and living in the south, you must be complicit in owning slaves.”
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No, Bron it’s like saying you like who you like because you like them. Bottom line– there are no angels in that situation and yet you choose to make one side angelic. Palestine is where the State of Israel was in 1922. That’s the point and that’s why it’s gray not black and white. Sorry, but the world and its inhabitants aren’t so simple. And simplistic solutions usually result in more chaos. That’s Paul’s basic problem: he sees the peaks but the rest of the mountains elude him. History’s no consideration because, as you say, not many folks are around who were there then. Problem is those descendents aren’t so easily convinced that the attrocities committed against their ancestors aren’t relevant today. The world didn’t start when Ron Paul and his supporters were born. Thats frank’s problem along with those who would seek to solve complex problems with “simple” solutions they invariably believe they thought of first.
As to the slave issue, the analogy would be you live on a plantation built off the sweat and blood of African slavery but feel no obligation to rectify the wrongs of the past that benefitted you and your ancestors directly. That’s Prep Boy Biff logic and again evinces that “life started when I was born” mentality.
Come to think of it, Ron Paul would look good in a beanie hat and crest blazer. Maybe he should run a prep school.
From my understanding there is no “Palestinian” people, they are indigenous Arabs.
The US should not spread democracy, in fact the US should leave most countries it currently supports.
It doesnt matter if some Palestinians are not suicide bombers, I am sure some Germans were not Nazis. It is irrelevant and a distraction.
Mespo:
how many of those people alive in 1922 are alive today? Maybe 1 or 2? That is an inapposite statement. It is like saying that since you are white and living in the south, you must be complicit in owning slaves.
Bron:
“On the one hand you have a democracy dedicated to individual liberty. On the other hand you have a totalitarian society dedicated to human subjugation.”
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The Jewish terror gangs were formed in 1922 and ultimately they killed many Arabs and 400 British peacekeepers. The blew up the SS Patria in Haifa harbor and the King David hotel. They also murdered Count Bernadotte who saved over 10,000 Jews from the holocaust. Hamas and the PLO were guilty of similar attrocities. Which group of “terrorists” are you supporting? Or maybe you judge only by the final result. You can’t see much history with blinders on.
Frank,
At the moment, I’m not supporting anyone.
I’m sure you must have weighted pros and cons carefully to reach your decision . I don’t agree with everything that Ron Paul says , but the reasons you mentioned above are overriding factors for me . I cannot support anyone who has no respect for the due process and constitution . To me honesty and the things you mentioned are non negotiable .
I respect Your right to arrive at Your own conclusion .