This may be one of those odd cases where the right answer is counterintuitive, like cutting tax RATES to increase tax REVENUES and giving hyperactive children stimulants, but let’s look at precedents:

Romania and Italy got rid of their dictators summarily, and both did OK.

Serbia’s dictator got a trial — and spent literally years playing the courts, rousing his supporters, stalling and wasting everyone’s time and resources. In the end, Milosevic got the last laugh by up and dying on them.

Iraq has plenty on its plate already; they really didn’t NEED to have to deal with their former oppressor taking every chance he has to grandstand, to praise the insurgency, to boast about his crimes, to rationalize them away in ways designed to give encouragement to the terrorists.

Howard Dean was once asked about Bin Laden, and said he wasn’t convinced he was guilty; he thought he deserved a trial, with the best lawyers he could get (and you KNOW they’d be lined up to do it pro bono, or better yet on the government’s dime). Dean was an ass for saying that.

Criminal trials are for CRIMINALS. Dictators are not criminals in the common sense; they usually don’t break the laws of their own nation (largely because they WRITE those laws), and “international law” is nothing more than a polite fiction UNLESS someone is willing to attempt to enforce it. And when someone around the world dials 911, it rings in Washington, DC.

J.

J.

Says the black guy with a icon of a white guy and pretends to be a writer. Hah.

Oh, and Oliver? It’s “non sequitur.” Latin, “does not follow.”

J.

Remember though, this blog does good things for Media Matters….I would guess they like having another “portal” to spew their nonsense.

More importantly though, you succinctly summarize the OW style….don’t actually present an argument. Just put down a quote from someone or a news article, following with a short bit of snark, then let everyone “decide for themselves” what he meant. It helps prevent his statements from coming back to bite him later….he can always say “I didn’t mean” or “show me where I said that…”.

It is a wonderful rhetorical trick, dishonest and lacking character, but a good trick none the less.

I’m not full of steam like conservative bloggers. I don’t believe in writing 1,000 words when 3 will suffice (I love the sound of my own voice like any egotist, but not that much). Your argument boiled down to – we should shoot bad guys. I say we should have trials for them that make it clear to the world what they did is wrong, because we are civilized and they are not. It’s not just a battle of dueling manhood.

You are correct, though, when you say I didn’t “shred your argument.” You didn’t present one to shred. You lifted a single line out of context, pronounced yourself morally superior, and ended it right there. You didn’t address a single point I made, so I should have just accepted that you didn’t challenge any of them. That was an error, and I apologize.

Oh, and “conspiracy?” Please. One of my favorite aphorisms is “never ascribe to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity,” and I believe that a major element of paranoia is rampant egotism — one has to think that one is worth conspiring over in the first place. The real masters of conspiracy theories are on the Left, who see Karl Rove behind everything.

As a commenter over at Wizbang pointed out, another outstanding example is Nicolae Ceausescu, the former Romanian dictator. He was hauled out of his palace and shot sans trial, and the Romanians are doing pretty well since. Yet another would be Benito Mussolini, who danced at the end of the piano wire without the benefit of a conviction.

If you’d like to argue the issue, I’m willing to continue. If you want to cherrypick lines out of context and run me down, be my guest. It’ll just be more admission of your intellectual bankruptcy. I’ve been called worse names by better people than you. And they are at least entertaining.

J.

I always was taught that no justice for someone was no justice for anyone, but I guess that’s radical leftist thinking in Bush’s America.

We can’t have gone over to liberate Iraq and still be the people who have tortured and raped the prisoners. One or the other…we’re either Captain America or we’re Conan the Barbarian.

And if you want the latter, I suppose that’s your right. But it makes me weep for the country.

I don’t know myself whether or not I’m willing to make the leap that Jay makes. But he certainly brings up good points about Slobo and Saddam’s trials. His post was intended to make the reader think.

As we all know, that’s not possible for Oliver.

First of all, I appreciate your pointing out that my position is more honest than yours. We both agree that Hussein is obviously, flagrantly guilty of some of the most heinous crimes against humanity. I say kill him, you say “let’s give him a fair, impartial, trial and THEN kill him.” We’ve both pre-judged him, rendering us guilty of prejudice; you just want to maintain the facade of fairness, while I say let’s be honest and dispense with a sham trial. Justice delayed, after all, is justice denied — witness Milosevic.

Secondly, to cite a few examples of people being “too civilized:” where to begin? How about the convicted child molester who was paroled in Massachusetts after numerous offenses as long as he moved out of state. He went to Montana, where he promptly kidnaped, molested, and then murdered a little boy. How about the numerous cultures that fell before the Mongol hordes. (These examples are a little tougher to cite; they didn’t survive to write their stories, and the Mongols tended to destroy those that pre-dated their attacks.) Or the Greeks, vs. the Roman Empire. The Roman Empire itself.

Or, since you brought up the Superman angle, I feel free to cite fantastic fiction myself. From Star Wars, the Jedi Order and the planet Alderaan. From Star Trek, the Mirror Universe Halkans.

Finally, I have to say I was surprised at the contempt you show your readers. “All You Need To Know” about an essay of mine is the penultimate sentence. They don’t need to know any of the context, the history I cited, the examples I used, or even that I limited the scope of my piece to three brutal, genocidal dictators. (And in a nod to diversity, I chose a European, and Arab, and an African.)

Like it or not, Oliver, the International Court of Justice is NOT the heir to the Nuremberg trials, Guantanamo is. Military tribunals of the victors imparting justice on the defeated. To the victor go the spoils — the court was made of Americans, Russians, British, and French. Poland, Belgium, the Netherlands, Czechoslovakia, Norway, and all the other nations who were conquered by the Nazis weren’t invited to participate in the trial, only the major powers who fought and defeated the Nazis sat in judgment.

I could go on, but (as usual) I’ve spent far more time and effort and done a far better job shredding your argument than you spent on it in the first place. Also, Frank_D, DrPedro, Dugger, and Duros62 hit a lot of great points before I had a chance to respond — thank you, folks.

Finally, Wurmser, about that comment you cited:
1) I sincerely doubt it’s the same Buckhead who first noted that the Texas Air National Guard CBS aired were obvious forgeries, an attempt by a major media outlet to illegally sway a presidential election.
2) I find myself wondering what would happen if Oliver and I were to compare your IP with the one used to place that comment. Of course, that would necessitate Oliver and I cooperating to expose a bit of sock-puppetry, and I doubt he’d be interested in making one of his supporters look bad even if they deserved it. After all, one of his favorites once reprinted a private e-mail from me in his comments without my knowledge or permission, and Oliver let that stand.

J.