roachboy

uh---i don't see how this is an ethically tenable position, ace, particularly since unless you have yourself been waterboarded, you are speculating--so have you been subjected to this yourself?

if not, then you're aestheticizing the pain of another (by making it an abstract entity that you can contemplate, like a thing a toaster or a towel) on the one hand, and then diminishing it by comparing what you imagine it to be against some arbitrary standard---it'd be like having someone shove a pin into your fingernail while telling you that it didn't *really* hurt.

seems an ugly road to go down if the only real basis for your position is that you think the bush people acted in good faith when they decided to make the argument that this was not torture--which was linked to their claim that the geneva conventions were "quaint"...and it doesn't seem to me that you have any actual information to go on beyond this assertion of good faith--hell, even the frontline series "bush's war" provides you with enough information to bring this assertion into serious question. i'd suggest you at least watch it.

because the argument is the usual argument: these standards apply when they affect american troops--but when the states is reacting, anything goes. nearly. this is such a horrific idea, such a ridiculous precedent to set--think about it.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite