Coming February 6, 2024 . . .
MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE
by Michael Wolraich
Pre-order at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop
Coming February 6, 2024 . . . MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE by Michael Wolraich Pre-order at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop |
I can't say that I blame them.
Comments
by artappraiser on Thu, 02/05/2015 - 10:13pm
by barefooted on Fri, 02/06/2015 - 1:09am
The reaction interests me a great deal for many reasons. This, from your link, is getting at one of them:
I have always been against the death penalty in the U.S. not so much on moral grounds, but because I don't think it works as a deterrent to the criminal minds of the extreme kind that it is most often applied to. To them, it's a reinforcement of their belief system, that those with power have the right to kill and they have a will to or desire for power over other humans.
But with terrorism, this gets so much more knotty and complex.. Because the end goal is to terrorize populations or governments into acquiescing to their will. Which is the reason for the whole don't negotiate with terrorists thing, where you've got to draw a line somewhere where it's "no deal, we won't continue to play." So hanging those already convicted, that the terrorists wanted, doesn't strike me as oneupmanship nor any confirmation of their ethos.
First, simplistically, it's not the same as burning someone in a cage, it wasn't meant to terrorize. Instead it's to say: no deal, never like that,our answer is: we are following through with the law. And in comparison, it is civilized.
Second. The alternate I usually support, life in prison, to show that the government doesn't use killing as a power metaphor, that just doesn't seem to work in this terrorism situation. It seems so wimpy, as if saying "we will continue to just put up with what you are trying to do to our civilization until you tire of it." No line in the sand, no point where you won't take it anymore.It's an opening to escalation rather than the retreat from escalation it might usually be.
by artappraiser on Fri, 02/06/2015 - 2:56am
This, from an earlier NYT article, gives background on the legal situation of the executions:
And this, from yet another NYT pieces, suggests another way already having been tried in the neighborhood:
by artappraiser on Fri, 02/06/2015 - 3:23am
NPR - UAE To Resume Anti-ISIS Airstrikes In Solidarity With Jordan
It's also safe to assume that the US moving search and rescue units to northern Iraq (WSJ) also figured in to their decision.
by barefooted on Sat, 02/07/2015 - 6:54pm
If ISIS is making the cause of death here up:
ISIS Declares Airstrike Killed a U.S. Hostage
Those in charge of the agitprop are cleverer than I thought.
by artappraiser on Sat, 02/07/2015 - 12:38am
It's too obviously convenient to be anything but questionable at this point. It also seems rushed - no flashy video, no body, no proof of anything. They have thus far made claims on a site frequented by ISIS and their supporters with a few photos of a bombed out building. They say it's in Raqqa, yet the US and Jordan officials have denied any airstrikes in that location over the timeperiod ISIS noted. Additionally, they claim no militants were injured, so we are left to assume their American hostage was all alone. There are many reasons to suspect their assertions. They're proven liars.
She may very well be dead, and could have been murdered at any time since her capture. They've never put her on camera to this point - what better way to use her death for propaganda purposes than to say Jordan killed her?
by barefooted on Sat, 02/07/2015 - 2:15am