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Originally Posted by host
If we lean towards an attitude where we do not fully embrace the work and the statements of Ben Ferencz...that now is the time, sixty years after the Nuremberg prosecutions.....to insist on a preference for the rule of law over the rule of force......if we do not take issue with the absurd irony of someone posting here, to complain that the loss of Bolton as the US "face" at the UN, leaves no strong "defender" of the US..... against UN "insults"....when the US executive branch has violated the core principles that justified the Nuremberg verdicts, and launched the life's work of Ben Ferencz, what then, do others who disagree with ace.....stand for?
What outrages you? Do you not accept Ferencz's opinion that the Bush administration seems to have perpetrated an illegal war of aggression, a crime against humanitY?
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Host, your own wording shows how weak your platform is, that Bush "seems" to have perpetuated an illegal war. Interesting but if memory serves, Bush had the authorization of Congress, and I am curious how you would try and bind him by laws that have no jurisdiction over him.
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IMO, the issue is clear....if you do not agree with Ferencz's opinion, and his goals, where does that place you, in relation to Bolton and Bush?
Ferencz warned publicly, in summer, 2002, and right before the 2003 Iraq invasion, that war. without a specific UN resolution to authorize it, would clearly be illegal. If you diagree with Ferencz. do you embrace his work of 60 years?
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Why is it clearly illegal? Now the next statement I make could no doubt garner a response from RB arguing semantics and "constructs", but the UN as a body has no political authority, it has no authority period, it can't enforce its own rules and it certainly cannot properly regulate its own house/operation; how then should it be that America must be beholden to it?
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It seems, for some of you, the arguments of Ferencz, with the addition of the examples of other crimes....Abu Ghraib....the deliberate destruction of Fallujah and it's hospitals and infrastructure, the use there of prohibited weapons and the videotaped execution of wounded unarmed individuals by US soldiers, are, in the opinion of Ferencz. other crimes against humanity that are a direct result of illegal and aggressive war in Iraq, ordered by Mr. Bush, under false pretenses of non-existent threats....WMD...etc....ARE NOT ENOUGH.
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I'm not going to comment on Abu Ghraib, not much can be argued there, but the only problem with Fallujah was that it took America so long to respond to the situation there. Perhaps the illegal enemy combatants we fight there should consider new methods for fighting as such it wouldn't be necessary to level an entire city, maybe they shouldn't feign death trying to kill America GI's. You can argue the pretenses all day, but the bottom line is you in no way shape or form can prove beyond a perpondernce or a reasonable doubt that Shrub knowingly lied, as such your whole illegal aggresive war comments and argument are moot.
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Where does Ferencz have it wrong? How can anyone take Bush and Bolton as bearers of legitimate diplomacy? If all of us, here, who oppose Bolton, do not vigorously embrace the core issue....the legitimacy for our government's policy of illegal use of force over support for rules of law, who will embrace Ferencz's principles and goals?
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Where does Ferencz have it wrong? He has wrong in trying to subjegate(sp) Americans to a foreign ICC that is not consitent with American sovereign law or tradition. It pisses me off how people like you Host piss and moan about the treatment of terrorists, insurgents, and those deemed illegal combatants, yet you would have American citizens culpable to a court that grants few if any of our protections that you so fervently wish to grant to our enemies; tell me how us abiding by a court that has no protection against things such as double jeopardy, being forced to bare witness against yourself, no guarentee that the accused can face his/her accuser, a non-impartial judiciary with virtual "judicial omnipotence" (namely that they are judge/jury/executioner, and there is no separation or impartial when it comes to investigation/prosecution/trial/appeal), ex post facto prosecution, no guarentee of impartiality in respect to prosecution, supercession of authority as it relates to state sovereignty, no means of regulation by sovereign/popular consent, is a good thing? The court is further laughable in that countries like Sudan and Zimbabwe are both signators.
/endrant