Originally shared by +Avinash Kaushik
So this is what is has come to. We, the United States of America, are promising Russia (!) that we won't torture or kill Edward Snowden.
This makes me sad because we should not have to say this, we are the shining city on the hill, we are the beacon of hope, we are the FREAKING United States of milk and honey!
There might be a reason/excuse/justification, or at the least sub optimal thinking, for waterboarding Khalid Sheik Mohammed 183 times. He had done bad things, maybe we thought 182 times simulated drowning combined with 180 straight hours of being kept awake was not enough.
There is less of a reason/excuse/justification of treating our own citizens with punitive harshness without any judicial rights a US Citizen has under our constitution. Even the United Nations has in recent occasions noted that we have tortured some of our own citizens (beyond their noting of what we have done in Afghanistan, Iraq etc.)
I believe in the strength of our values, our constitution and I'm Absolutely Convinced that if we treat people, our citizens, with full rights accorded by our judicial system, we will convict every deserving bad person. I have utmost faith in the women and men that run our judicial system.
We should never, because of our track record, have to tell Russia, in writing, that we won't torture our own citizens. We are the shining city on the hill.
Image Source: http://goo.gl/ckQRdm
I'm not sure calling ourselves the shining city counts.
If we were that country we'd have shot him in the damn airport. It's not like the CIA can't get a guy in there with a gun if they want to…haven't you people read the Bourne series?
I don't think I'd believe anything our government said right now.
+Tom Ledford the opening sentence was a quote from +Avinash Kaushik and I just assume irony was involved in the making..
LOL! Obama is so funny.
+Patrick Kitchell Absolutely. But it really requires a major shift in thinking and overcoming years of programming to conclude that the parties now share the same agenda. I think it's really beyond the majority of Americans ability to make that shift.
This would have gone so much easier for Snowden if he had just tattooed secrets on his penis and sent a picture to his girlfriend to share with the world. He could be running for office right now.
He would be erected by now +Dirk Talamasca
As long as Snowden does not get a free special US rendition and waterboarding via a "friendly" country as part of his all inclusive flight package on Uncle Sam Airlines
I'll say it until I'm blue in the face… Wake up America – you haven't been the land of the free for decades and as long as you allow abuses like Guantanamo Bay – as long as you allow money to override the constitution – you will NEVER get that back. I'd rather holiday in Turkey or Saudi Arabia right now than the USA.
The scenic route +Paul Wooding ….
wow. That must one of the most (painfully) ironic headlines I've ever seen. The land of exceptionalism, "the free" and the moral high ground, is reduced to this? Reality is catching up, wonder if the typical NYT reader 'gets' it?