satipera, Don’t like saying it but you’re pretty much on the mark. I was stationed in Europe at the time and can well remember the “what the hey” as stories bounced around with finger pointy looking for a quick goat to soothe public outrage.
satpera, very interesting what you have posted. It seems with Humph cooberating there are 2 reliable reports over the politics of this. You gave us very reasoned info on why this fellow might not be guility. If he bit the bullet to bring Libya in from the cold then he deserves Libya’s respect.
Make it three. The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission in 2007 stated that “Megrahi may have suffered a miscarriage of justice.”
The Iranian angle was never completely investigated (in retaliation for the US destroying the Iranian airliner & killing 290).
oldlegodad: Had the guts…? Pffft.
Read again what Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission in 2007 stated:”The applicant (Megrahi) may have suffered a miscarriage of justice.”
No European nation has the death penalty anymore. I (we) oppose it on principle. Revenge, and that is all capital punishment now entails, is not justice.
About time the US enlightened itself and joined the majority of nations on this earth who abolished it.
You make a very interesting observation. You say, no European nation does this or that and yet we in the US are different.
The US leads the world in science, Nobel prizes, patents, business etc etc. We are different from Europe and pride ourselves on our differences. My personal default is if Europe does it we should not unless a strong argument is convincing.
Every time you have a serious problem you run to us to bail you out. See WWI and WWII. The question came up during the questioning of Sotomayor whether we should follow European legal judgments. She is a very intelligent woman and wanted to be confirmed so she said what the majority wanted to hear. No, we do not follow European judiciary rulings.
The best, the brightest, most entrepreneurial left the UK, etc. in 1770 and 1890 and 1946 because we didn’t want to follow European mores. Now liberals reading this will disagree but they wouldn’t have migrated here back in 1770 because they oppose the Wild West philosophy on which this country was founded. See our 2nd Amendment.
satipera. Some of your opinions have been ninety degress to mine. I was raised in southern Virginia which was based on the three tiered English social system and took some abuse because of my “people”. This was really brought home while serving with the BOAR. I guess you didn’t rub the blister but you’ve bumped up aginist it.
GNW: I’m no Europhile although I’m also European. I am foremost an African but attach no silly “pride” to either. You attach great pride in being American.
I simply do not understand this concept: pride as your own in what others collectively achieved, usually for humankind?
Patriotic Pride usually blinds one to the faults of one’s nation and leads to crass nationalism and ethnocentrism which you display rather glaringly. You are the Ugly American personified.
My comment regarding no European nation having capital punishment was a reply to oldlegodad suggesting Britain should have put a bullet in Megrahi’s head. The fact is that MOST nations in the world no longer have or practice capital punishment, never mind countries in Europe. I even said so in my last post.
From wikipedia (I know, lousy source but for the matter at hand):
” 94 have abolished it.
58 countries maintain the death penalty in both law and practice.
10 retain it for crimes committed in exceptional circumstances (such as in time of war).
35 permit its use for ordinary crimes, but have not used it for at least 10 years and are believed to have a policy or established practice of not carrying out executions or is under a moratorium.”
To have abolished capital punishment is to have an enlightened position. To retain it, is barbaric.
To counter this particular criticism with the usual “Every time you have a serious problem you run to us to bail you out. ” is just silly.
France bailed out the 13 colonies out in the US independence war, gave your country the ideals of liberty, equality and fraternity, and gave the statue of liberty in recognition of your adoption of these “ideals”, yet you manage to denigrate them at every turn. Rather ungrateful.
The USA entered the 1st WW in 1917, 3 years after its start.*
Both my mother country and the US reluctantly entered the 2nd WW (the US only after it was attacked by an axis power, mine only to provide more resources to the allies than the axis powers). My mother country has the world’s longest standing alliance yet chose to initially remain neutral. Pffft, not worth the paper it was signed on. See, I can criticise my nationalities without worrying about silly patriotism getting in the way.
The French I have met are grateful for all allies that assisted them in both WWs. However, it seems from many Americans’ point of view, including yours, only Americans had a hand in the defeat of the enemy in both world wars. The rest of the world did not count. Note: WORLD WARS. This is a glaring omission of the recognition of the sacrifices most of the world suffered.
Yet you take personal pride and as a personal accomplishment the sacrifices made by fellow Americans from past generations. It wasn’t you, mate. No-one should be grateful to you.
Fortunately, I do not believe all Americans have your point of view for I have met so many who roll their eyes at such pompous nonsense. I’m glad to say there are many here on this forum. The funny thing is, I often defend Americans. I often think the US is the world’s punching bag (sometimes deservedly so) for anything & everything, and by pointing a finger at US mistakes, accusers distract from their own guilt.
x* Interesting to note: Whenever the US mentions the length of the WWs, especially WWII, it usually measures the length of its involvement. Thus, WWII lasted 4 years, not 6. Start date was Dec 1941, not Sept 1939. I read this all the time in articles measuring the current US military involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan. Very, very interesting and rather telling
wow satipera, humphs & omQR I wasn’t aware of any of that … must have missed it …. so thanks for bringing to my attention … I’ll have to do some reading
I just gotta say something here … I sure wish I could have the opportunity to sit down and shoot the bull over a cup of joe with a few of the posters here (and two of ‘em should be obvious from prior posts)
BCS - yeah, I’d go to that party.
On the death penalty point, Amnesty International says the US is the only country in the Americas that executes regularly, but even then has started to move away from it; Europe is death-penalty-free except for Belarus; and indeed only 25 of the 59 countries that still officially have it actually carried out executions.
The countries with the most executions in 2008, in decreasing order of absolute numbers of executions (not per capita) are:
China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, USA, Pakistan, accounting between them for 93% of all executions worldwide.
Not the company I want to keep.
http://tinyurl.com/m27hzh
I agree with satipera4. That guy was just another patsy tapped to take the fall. Even if he knew about this intelligence operation, he was never given details, resources, or authority to act alone. He was merely following orders handed down from a higher authority. His job was to get caught and go to jail for it. He did his part.
I don’t why everyone is so up-in-arms over this. He’s still going to die a horrible death. The man has cancer, a beast that is going to ravage him soon enough.
Neither of us was on the jury that convicted him, while acquitting his cohort.
The commission was referring to ‘extenuating circumstances’ when it suggested that there might have bee a miscarriage of justice.
The Scots would be on a much higher moral ground if they declared him innocent, and released him.
Releasing a convicted murderer as they did, on however a compassionate grounds, without even obtaining a single scintilla of an explanation is morally repugnant.
He will take the truth to his grave …well done, you morally confused liberals.
satipera, two for three. “my people” referes to the habit the Virginians had of asking “whose your people” to those who weren’t considered to be of the proper breeding and ment to put them in their place, character, responsibility and achievement had nothing to do with the call, only that you had the right “blood” line.
«The US leads the world in science, Nobel prizes, patents, business etc etc. We are different from Europe and pride ourselves on our differences. My personal default is if Europe does it we should not unless a strong argument is convincing.
Every time you have a serious problem you run to us to bail you out. See WWI and WWII.»
Interesting, my dear colleague ! Familiar with the Bible as I’m sure you are, you will perhaps not be surprised to hear that after reading your posting, it was Proverbs 16:18 that first came to mind. Aside from your being wrong about both WW I and WW II (you may not like to hear that in Europe, the latter was won on der Ostfront, where the Germans had concentrated 90 % of their troops, but it remains a fact). How are you going to manage to reconcile yourself to the fact that the brief period of US world dominance that arose due the exhaustion of the other Powers after WW II is now coming to a close ?…
As an atheist not at all familiar with the Bible. Fascinating that you should write today just after my reading Volokh.com post on today being the 70th anniversary of Stalin/Hitler Pact. It was proposed that WWI was a total stalemate until the US entered (Wilson’s Folly?) and lead to the victory.
Agree we are seeing the end of America’s total dominance but that is because statists have taken over and allowed us to become europeified.
“I notice you have not disagreed with me about the UK and USA governments withholding evidence.”
I didn’t, precisely because I don’t do what you accuse me of doing: “If you are going to comment on something take the time to find out about it first.”
On the other hand, I found not a scintilla of evidence in published reports, that would confirm your allegation that there is more data coming from the Libyan(s).
satipera, ref petegrt, seems like more stories coming to light then a “Kennedy conspiracy”. One that circulated here about the time of the trial was, that after days of tedious searching at the crash sight an alrm card from a clock was found at the crash sight. The serial number number identified it as Swiss made and it was traced to a jewler, who was even identified as Swiss I believe, who identified al Megrahi as the purchaser. Now how the heff that fits together is like something the eighteen year olds would like to see come out of Hollywood.
GNWachs over 14 years ago
I have no special knowledge one way or the other but why was he being treated as a hero upon his arrival?
parkersinthehouse over 14 years ago
sat - what’s convinced you that he’s not guilty of murder?
HUMPHRIES over 14 years ago
satipera, Don’t like saying it but you’re pretty much on the mark. I was stationed in Europe at the time and can well remember the “what the hey” as stories bounced around with finger pointy looking for a quick goat to soothe public outrage.
deadheadzan over 14 years ago
satpera, very interesting what you have posted. It seems with Humph cooberating there are 2 reliable reports over the politics of this. You gave us very reasoned info on why this fellow might not be guility. If he bit the bullet to bring Libya in from the cold then he deserves Libya’s respect.
OmqR-IV.0 over 14 years ago
Make it three. The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission in 2007 stated that “Megrahi may have suffered a miscarriage of justice.” The Iranian angle was never completely investigated (in retaliation for the US destroying the Iranian airliner & killing 290).
OmqR-IV.0 over 14 years ago
oldlegodad: Had the guts…? Pffft. Read again what Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission in 2007 stated:”The applicant (Megrahi) may have suffered a miscarriage of justice.”
No European nation has the death penalty anymore. I (we) oppose it on principle. Revenge, and that is all capital punishment now entails, is not justice. About time the US enlightened itself and joined the majority of nations on this earth who abolished it.
GNWachs over 14 years ago
omQR
You make a very interesting observation. You say, no European nation does this or that and yet we in the US are different.
The US leads the world in science, Nobel prizes, patents, business etc etc. We are different from Europe and pride ourselves on our differences. My personal default is if Europe does it we should not unless a strong argument is convincing.
Every time you have a serious problem you run to us to bail you out. See WWI and WWII. The question came up during the questioning of Sotomayor whether we should follow European legal judgments. She is a very intelligent woman and wanted to be confirmed so she said what the majority wanted to hear. No, we do not follow European judiciary rulings.
The best, the brightest, most entrepreneurial left the UK, etc. in 1770 and 1890 and 1946 because we didn’t want to follow European mores. Now liberals reading this will disagree but they wouldn’t have migrated here back in 1770 because they oppose the Wild West philosophy on which this country was founded. See our 2nd Amendment.
HUMPHRIES over 14 years ago
satipera. Some of your opinions have been ninety degress to mine. I was raised in southern Virginia which was based on the three tiered English social system and took some abuse because of my “people”. This was really brought home while serving with the BOAR. I guess you didn’t rub the blister but you’ve bumped up aginist it.
Buzzy-One over 14 years ago
GNW, check your calender. It’s no longer 1951.
OmqR-IV.0 over 14 years ago
GNW: I’m no Europhile although I’m also European. I am foremost an African but attach no silly “pride” to either. You attach great pride in being American. I simply do not understand this concept: pride as your own in what others collectively achieved, usually for humankind? Patriotic Pride usually blinds one to the faults of one’s nation and leads to crass nationalism and ethnocentrism which you display rather glaringly. You are the Ugly American personified.
My comment regarding no European nation having capital punishment was a reply to oldlegodad suggesting Britain should have put a bullet in Megrahi’s head. The fact is that MOST nations in the world no longer have or practice capital punishment, never mind countries in Europe. I even said so in my last post. From wikipedia (I know, lousy source but for the matter at hand): ” 94 have abolished it. 58 countries maintain the death penalty in both law and practice. 10 retain it for crimes committed in exceptional circumstances (such as in time of war). 35 permit its use for ordinary crimes, but have not used it for at least 10 years and are believed to have a policy or established practice of not carrying out executions or is under a moratorium.”
To have abolished capital punishment is to have an enlightened position. To retain it, is barbaric. To counter this particular criticism with the usual “Every time you have a serious problem you run to us to bail you out. ” is just silly. France bailed out the 13 colonies out in the US independence war, gave your country the ideals of liberty, equality and fraternity, and gave the statue of liberty in recognition of your adoption of these “ideals”, yet you manage to denigrate them at every turn. Rather ungrateful.
The USA entered the 1st WW in 1917, 3 years after its start.*
Both my mother country and the US reluctantly entered the 2nd WW (the US only after it was attacked by an axis power, mine only to provide more resources to the allies than the axis powers). My mother country has the world’s longest standing alliance yet chose to initially remain neutral. Pffft, not worth the paper it was signed on. See, I can criticise my nationalities without worrying about silly patriotism getting in the way. The French I have met are grateful for all allies that assisted them in both WWs. However, it seems from many Americans’ point of view, including yours, only Americans had a hand in the defeat of the enemy in both world wars. The rest of the world did not count. Note: WORLD WARS. This is a glaring omission of the recognition of the sacrifices most of the world suffered. Yet you take personal pride and as a personal accomplishment the sacrifices made by fellow Americans from past generations. It wasn’t you, mate. No-one should be grateful to you.
Fortunately, I do not believe all Americans have your point of view for I have met so many who roll their eyes at such pompous nonsense. I’m glad to say there are many here on this forum. The funny thing is, I often defend Americans. I often think the US is the world’s punching bag (sometimes deservedly so) for anything & everything, and by pointing a finger at US mistakes, accusers distract from their own guilt.
x* Interesting to note: Whenever the US mentions the length of the WWs, especially WWII, it usually measures the length of its involvement. Thus, WWII lasted 4 years, not 6. Start date was Dec 1941, not Sept 1939. I read this all the time in articles measuring the current US military involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan. Very, very interesting and rather telling
believecommonsense over 14 years ago
wow satipera, humphs & omQR I wasn’t aware of any of that … must have missed it …. so thanks for bringing to my attention … I’ll have to do some reading
believecommonsense over 14 years ago
humphs, three questions: 1) what’s the three-tiered social system; 2) who are your “people” and 3) what’s BOAR?
believecommonsense over 14 years ago
oldlego, Wild @ssed Guess?
believecommonsense over 14 years ago
I just gotta say something here … I sure wish I could have the opportunity to sit down and shoot the bull over a cup of joe with a few of the posters here (and two of ‘em should be obvious from prior posts)
Motivemagus over 14 years ago
BCS - yeah, I’d go to that party. On the death penalty point, Amnesty International says the US is the only country in the Americas that executes regularly, but even then has started to move away from it; Europe is death-penalty-free except for Belarus; and indeed only 25 of the 59 countries that still officially have it actually carried out executions. The countries with the most executions in 2008, in decreasing order of absolute numbers of executions (not per capita) are: China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, USA, Pakistan, accounting between them for 93% of all executions worldwide. Not the company I want to keep. http://tinyurl.com/m27hzh
covertrage over 14 years ago
I agree with satipera4. That guy was just another patsy tapped to take the fall. Even if he knew about this intelligence operation, he was never given details, resources, or authority to act alone. He was merely following orders handed down from a higher authority. His job was to get caught and go to jail for it. He did his part.
I don’t why everyone is so up-in-arms over this. He’s still going to die a horrible death. The man has cancer, a beast that is going to ravage him soon enough.
petergrt over 14 years ago
Neither of us was on the jury that convicted him, while acquitting his cohort.
The commission was referring to ‘extenuating circumstances’ when it suggested that there might have bee a miscarriage of justice.
The Scots would be on a much higher moral ground if they declared him innocent, and released him.
Releasing a convicted murderer as they did, on however a compassionate grounds, without even obtaining a single scintilla of an explanation is morally repugnant.
He will take the truth to his grave …well done, you morally confused liberals.
Dtroutma over 14 years ago
The three leading causes of death in humans: disease, religion, nationalism.
HUMPHRIES over 14 years ago
satipera, two for three. “my people” referes to the habit the Virginians had of asking “whose your people” to those who weren’t considered to be of the proper breeding and ment to put them in their place, character, responsibility and achievement had nothing to do with the call, only that you had the right “blood” line.
believecommonsense over 14 years ago
motive, you’d be welcome, too!
petergrt over 14 years ago
“Actually he will not take the truth to his grave, he will be releasing new evidence through his solicitors quite soon.”
???
mhenriday over 14 years ago
«The US leads the world in science, Nobel prizes, patents, business etc etc. We are different from Europe and pride ourselves on our differences. My personal default is if Europe does it we should not unless a strong argument is convincing.
Every time you have a serious problem you run to us to bail you out. See WWI and WWII.»
Interesting, my dear colleague ! Familiar with the Bible as I’m sure you are, you will perhaps not be surprised to hear that after reading your posting, it was Proverbs 16:18 that first came to mind. Aside from your being wrong about both WW I and WW II (you may not like to hear that in Europe, the latter was won on der Ostfront, where the Germans had concentrated 90 % of their troops, but it remains a fact). How are you going to manage to reconcile yourself to the fact that the brief period of US world dominance that arose due the exhaustion of the other Powers after WW II is now coming to a close ?…
Henri
GNWachs over 14 years ago
MHenri
As an atheist not at all familiar with the Bible. Fascinating that you should write today just after my reading Volokh.com post on today being the 70th anniversary of Stalin/Hitler Pact. It was proposed that WWI was a total stalemate until the US entered (Wilson’s Folly?) and lead to the victory.
Agree we are seeing the end of America’s total dominance but that is because statists have taken over and allowed us to become europeified.
petergrt over 14 years ago
“I notice you have not disagreed with me about the UK and USA governments withholding evidence.”
I didn’t, precisely because I don’t do what you accuse me of doing: “If you are going to comment on something take the time to find out about it first.”
On the other hand, I found not a scintilla of evidence in published reports, that would confirm your allegation that there is more data coming from the Libyan(s).
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6806482.ece
HUMPHRIES over 14 years ago
satipera, ref petegrt, seems like more stories coming to light then a “Kennedy conspiracy”. One that circulated here about the time of the trial was, that after days of tedious searching at the crash sight an alrm card from a clock was found at the crash sight. The serial number number identified it as Swiss made and it was traced to a jewler, who was even identified as Swiss I believe, who identified al Megrahi as the purchaser. Now how the heff that fits together is like something the eighteen year olds would like to see come out of Hollywood.