[extropy-chat] Krugman on the state of play

[Samantha Atkins]

Actually, all that is needed is to act like sensible, balanced,
responsible people again.  In some parts of the world this may be a
first for us.


On Fri, 1 Oct 2004 14:52:49 -0500, Kevin Freels <megaquark at hotmail.com> wrote:
> I agree. The way to make America appear better in the eyes of the
> internatioanl community is to tell everyone in the world that we will do as
> they think we should. Better yet, let's just say whatever needs to be said
> to get people to like us and change our minds whenever someone gets mad at
> us.
> 
> "We can already see one example of this when we look at the question of
> > torture. Abu Ghraib has largely vanished from U.S. political discussion,
> > largely because the administration and its Congressional allies have been
> > so effective at covering up high-level involvement. But both the
> > revelations and the cover-up did terrible damage to America's moral
> > authority. To much of the world, America looks like a place where top
> > officials condone and possibly order the torture of innocent people, and
> > suffer no consequences."
> 
> By the way. Why is it that people think that "torture" and "abuse" are the
> same thing? Torture is what Saddam did. Our prisoners in Abu Ghraib were
> abused. I am not condoning this behavior, but it's not like these prisoners
> were being beheaded with a knife, having limbs cut off, being electrocuted,
> or starved to death.

Do you for a moment believe that we never use torture directly or send
prisoners elsewhere for torture?  Does the training some of our forces
receive in such techniques exist just for their information?

-s