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On June 24 2016 00:04 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On June 23 2016 23:24 SolaR- wrote:I wonder if advocating for killing terrorist's families and burning religious books has grouped me under the crazy column?  I mean, I don't personally agree or think that it would work out well, but Trump did have at least one important indirect point that he highlighted when making the argument: sometimes you have to play dirty and accept collateral damage when battling terrorism. There are three historically successful means of fighting against a guerilla army: fight for decades until they ultimately wither under constant pressure, bomb aggressively and indiscriminately so that they cannot hide among the populace, and cut them off from all support structures and bleed them dry. Trump is basically advocating for the second one, and while that does not conform well to modern ideas of human rights, it is probably the most feasible way to fight terrorism in the modern era.
Thank you, my point exactly. The logic is there it just depends on the individual and how they prioritize their values.
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I attach zero intrinsic value to human life, so I say go to town on them if it gets the job done. But if stuff like that ends up making things worse, that's another issue. I wouldn't mind huge collateral damage if it was successful, but there aren't many indications that it has long-term success.
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I love when people talk as if guerilla and terrorism were synonymous. But what do i expect when people accept calling a rebel army terrorists.
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United States43827 Posts
On June 24 2016 00:16 Mohdoo wrote:
I attach zero intrinsic value to human life, so I say go to town on them if it gets the job done. But if stuff like that ends up making things worse, that's another issue. I wouldn't mind huge collateral damage if it was successful, but there aren't many indications that it has long-term success.
It's the American Indians vs Catholic Irish outcomes. When you attempt ethnic cleansing if you do a really, really good job at is, so good that the victims can never, ever recover and can't even dream of anything other than dependent victim status, everything goes awesomely. But if you halfass it then you'll be dealing with the IRA for fucking years and studying that one Irish poet who wrote about nothing but the famine in school.
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On June 24 2016 00:19 Godwrath wrote:
I love when people talk as if guerilla and terrorism were synonymous. But what do i expect when people accept calling a rebel army terrorists.
So are you saying that the current terrorist movements are not guerilla in nature?
On June 24 2016 00:16 Mohdoo wrote:
I attach zero intrinsic value to human life, so I say go to town on them if it gets the job done. But if stuff like that ends up making things worse, that's another issue. I wouldn't mind huge collateral damage if it was successful, but there aren't many indications that it has long-term success.
The first step is always to eliminate the organization that is actively willing to fight, along with all of their co-conspirators (e.g. civilians who house them and supply them). Then, you have a chance to make the situation stable. Problem is, the MidEast is a horrible quagmire of political war games and cultural schisms that very likely wouldn't be solvable even if there were peace there for a 20 year period.
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On June 24 2016 00:21 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On June 24 2016 00:16 Mohdoo wrote:
I attach zero intrinsic value to human life, so I say go to town on them if it gets the job done. But if stuff like that ends up making things worse, that's another issue. I wouldn't mind huge collateral damage if it was successful, but there aren't many indications that it has long-term success. It's the American Indians vs Catholic Irish outcomes. When you attempt ethnic cleansing if you do a really, really good job at is, so good that the victims can never, ever recover and can't even dream of anything other than dependent victim status, everything goes awesomely.
This is how I understand it as well. However, I think that what is necessary would likely be even worse than the most hawkish politicians could stomach. I think we'd be talking millions of civilian casualties. We'd have to almost entirely destroy Syria, Iraq and Pakistan.
The question I always wonder is: Over the course of the next 200 years, how many people will die because of terrorism and the conflict that arises in response to it? If 10 million over the course of 200 years, is it ethical to kill 9 million today to prevent that? Is there something unethical about those lives being taken today, rather than allowing the conflict to take them later?
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On June 24 2016 00:09 SolaR- wrote:Show nested quote +On June 24 2016 00:04 LegalLord wrote:On June 23 2016 23:24 SolaR- wrote:I wonder if advocating for killing terrorist's families and burning religious books has grouped me under the crazy column? I mean, I don't personally agree or think that it would work out well, but Trump did have at least one important indirect point that he highlighted when making the argument: sometimes you have to play dirty and accept collateral damage when battling terrorism. There are three historically successful means of fighting against a guerilla army: fight for decades until they ultimately wither under constant pressure, bomb aggressively and indiscriminately so that they cannot hide among the populace, and cut them off from all support structures and bleed them dry. Trump is basically advocating for the second one, and while that does not conform well to modern ideas of human rights, it is probably the most feasible way to fight terrorism in the modern era. Thank you, my point exactly. The logic is there it just depends on the individual and how they prioritize their values.
kwizach had a very long post about the state of research into exactly the question whether dealing with terrorism in this way is effective (the post got completely ignored of course). Turns out it is almost universally seen as ineffective or counterproductive and if effective then only in very narrow circumstances that are not met in this situation (of course the outcry of the world would also be a predictable effect with very real negative consequences for the US).
Now, you and LegalLord can of course ignore this or declare the research faulty (I can imagine that you both would argue that it's tainted by modern conceptions of human rights and thus biased or something) but the question would remain how you would determine the effectiveness of such a strategy.
And how small (or counterproductive) the effect would have to be for you not to support this approach. Maybe in the end it is not that much about the actual effect but more about emotions ("at least we are doing something", "we are showing them", "an eye for an eye").
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United States43827 Posts
On June 24 2016 00:28 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On June 24 2016 00:21 KwarK wrote:On June 24 2016 00:16 Mohdoo wrote:
I attach zero intrinsic value to human life, so I say go to town on them if it gets the job done. But if stuff like that ends up making things worse, that's another issue. I wouldn't mind huge collateral damage if it was successful, but there aren't many indications that it has long-term success. It's the American Indians vs Catholic Irish outcomes. When you attempt ethnic cleansing if you do a really, really good job at is, so good that the victims can never, ever recover and can't even dream of anything other than dependent victim status, everything goes awesomely. This is how I understand it as well. However, I think that what is necessary would likely be even worse than the most hawkish politicians could stomach. I think we'd be talking millions of civilian casualties. We'd have to almost entirely destroy Syria, Iraq and Pakistan. The question I always wonder is: Over the course of the next 200 years, how many people will die because of terrorism and the conflict that arises in response to it? If 10 million over the course of 200 years, is it ethical to kill 9 million today to prevent that? Is there something unethical about those lives being taken today, rather than allowing the conflict to take them later?
Of course it's not ethical to do ethnic cleansing to avoid conflict between races. Sure, you end up with no racial tension but equally you end up in a world populated exclusively by the kind of assholes who do ethnic cleansing so people like Ayn Rand get to stand up and say that it's okay that the Native Americans were wiped out because they weren't using the land properly (read as "they didn't have railroads controlled by daring railroad magnates with dark eyes and powerful manly attributes") so they needed to get out of the way to make room for America.
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I'm kinda curious as to WTF the prosecutors are doing in the Freddie Gray trials. I don't know whether its over-charging or just horrible trial advocacy (or a combination of both), but I'm surprised that it looks like no one is going to be convicted of anything.
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On June 24 2016 00:25 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On June 24 2016 00:19 Godwrath wrote:
I love when people talk as if guerilla and terrorism were synonymous. But what do i expect when people accept calling a rebel army terrorists. So are you saying that the current terrorist movements are not guerilla in nature? That's exactly what i am saying. It's community backlash which gets confused or twisted as an act of war for political reasons (including the very own movement on itself).
Terrorism is stopped when their community no longer feel the desire to support them. In this specific case, where islamic communities do live in most of the western world aswell, by bombing them indiscriminately, you will be spurring the recruitment all over the world.
If you are able to tell me a feasable way to accomplish the complete "pacification" of islamists all around the globe through force and why it's a better way than long term assimilation, negotiations and compromises, i am all ears.
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On June 23 2016 23:55 BisuDagger wrote:Show nested quote +On June 23 2016 23:42 BallinWitStalin wrote:On June 23 2016 23:24 SolaR- wrote:I wonder if advocating for killing terrorist's families and burning religious books has grouped me under the crazy column? 100%, I actually think you're a sociopath (at the least) for advocating those things. When Stalin's ballin friends are calling someone a sociopath, then maybe one should ponder and self reflect for a moment.
...(satire/sarcasm)....
Name is generally in poor taste (welcome to the interwebs).
Stalin was an asshole, and definitely an evil sociopath (dude definitely didn't mind murdering collateral innocents).
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On June 24 2016 00:30 silynxer wrote:Show nested quote +On June 24 2016 00:09 SolaR- wrote:On June 24 2016 00:04 LegalLord wrote:On June 23 2016 23:24 SolaR- wrote:I wonder if advocating for killing terrorist's families and burning religious books has grouped me under the crazy column? I mean, I don't personally agree or think that it would work out well, but Trump did have at least one important indirect point that he highlighted when making the argument: sometimes you have to play dirty and accept collateral damage when battling terrorism. There are three historically successful means of fighting against a guerilla army: fight for decades until they ultimately wither under constant pressure, bomb aggressively and indiscriminately so that they cannot hide among the populace, and cut them off from all support structures and bleed them dry. Trump is basically advocating for the second one, and while that does not conform well to modern ideas of human rights, it is probably the most feasible way to fight terrorism in the modern era. Thank you, my point exactly. The logic is there it just depends on the individual and how they prioritize their values. kwizach had a very long post about the state of research into exactly the question whether dealing with terrorism in this way is effective (the post got completely ignored of course). Turns out it is almost universally seen as ineffective or counterproductive and if effective then only in very narrow circumstances that are not met in this situation (of course the outcry of the world would also be a predictable effect with very real negative consequences for the US). Now, you and LegalLord can of course ignore this or declare the research faulty (I can imagine that you both would argue that it's tainted by modern conceptions of human rights and thus biased or something) but the question would remain how you would determine the effectiveness of such a strategy. And how small (or counterproductive) the effect would have to be for you not to support this approach. Maybe in the end it is not that much about the actual effect but more about emotions ("at least we are doing something", "we are showing them", "an eye for an eye").
You are correct that I would have probably ignored a long kwizach post, a stance I take from experience. Between the misrepresentation of opposing positions, misrepresentation of sources, stonewalling, and general unpleasant manner of arguing, I generally don't see much value in reading his posts. They tend to annoy and irritate me even when I actually agree with his main point. If you want to summarize it or offer sources, be my guest - otherwise I'll simply have to treat this as a phantom assertion that "someone else proved you're wrong but I don't want to actually show you where."
I'm sure that we could agree that dealing with ethnic strife in the long term is a problem that none of us have a good answer to. In the short term, guerilla movements fail when you destroy their organization. Dissent is one thing, active militants is another.
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I think determining that line between "their organization" and "their family" is kinda important here...
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On June 24 2016 00:52 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On June 24 2016 00:30 silynxer wrote:On June 24 2016 00:09 SolaR- wrote:On June 24 2016 00:04 LegalLord wrote:On June 23 2016 23:24 SolaR- wrote:I wonder if advocating for killing terrorist's families and burning religious books has grouped me under the crazy column? I mean, I don't personally agree or think that it would work out well, but Trump did have at least one important indirect point that he highlighted when making the argument: sometimes you have to play dirty and accept collateral damage when battling terrorism. There are three historically successful means of fighting against a guerilla army: fight for decades until they ultimately wither under constant pressure, bomb aggressively and indiscriminately so that they cannot hide among the populace, and cut them off from all support structures and bleed them dry. Trump is basically advocating for the second one, and while that does not conform well to modern ideas of human rights, it is probably the most feasible way to fight terrorism in the modern era. Thank you, my point exactly. The logic is there it just depends on the individual and how they prioritize their values. kwizach had a very long post about the state of research into exactly the question whether dealing with terrorism in this way is effective (the post got completely ignored of course). Turns out it is almost universally seen as ineffective or counterproductive and if effective then only in very narrow circumstances that are not met in this situation (of course the outcry of the world would also be a predictable effect with very real negative consequences for the US). Now, you and LegalLord can of course ignore this or declare the research faulty (I can imagine that you both would argue that it's tainted by modern conceptions of human rights and thus biased or something) but the question would remain how you would determine the effectiveness of such a strategy. And how small (or counterproductive) the effect would have to be for you not to support this approach. Maybe in the end it is not that much about the actual effect but more about emotions ("at least we are doing something", "we are showing them", "an eye for an eye"). You are correct that I would have probably ignored a long kwizach post, a stance I take from experience. Between the misrepresentation of opposing positions, misrepresentation of sources, stonewalling, and general unpleasant manner of arguing, I generally don't see much value in reading his posts. They tend to annoy and irritate me even when I actually agree with his main point. If you want to summarize it or offer sources, be my guest - otherwise I'll simply have to treat this as a phantom assertion that "someone else proved you're wrong but I don't want to actually show you where." I'm sure that we could agree that dealing with ethnic strife in the long term is a problem that none of us have a good answer to. In the short term, guerilla movements fail when you destroy their organization. Dissent is one thing, active militants is another.
Generally, that is how I see kwizach as well. It is nice he provides sources and obviously has a lot of knowledge and experience to support his own agenda. However, I feel like his entire motive is his agenda and he doesn't really seem objective or open minded to anything that doesn't fall into his perspective.
In that post, he only provided secondary sources. While they are scholarly sources, they all fit in line with his opinions. History can be very interpretative and you can find different scholars using the same facts to support completely different assertions. Or they purposely include certain facts that support their arguments but purposely disclude others that work against their argument.
I skimmed through it but didn't find anything convincing enough to make me think with absolute certainity that his reasoning is correct.
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On June 24 2016 00:52 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On June 24 2016 00:30 silynxer wrote:On June 24 2016 00:09 SolaR- wrote:On June 24 2016 00:04 LegalLord wrote:On June 23 2016 23:24 SolaR- wrote:I wonder if advocating for killing terrorist's families and burning religious books has grouped me under the crazy column? I mean, I don't personally agree or think that it would work out well, but Trump did have at least one important indirect point that he highlighted when making the argument: sometimes you have to play dirty and accept collateral damage when battling terrorism. There are three historically successful means of fighting against a guerilla army: fight for decades until they ultimately wither under constant pressure, bomb aggressively and indiscriminately so that they cannot hide among the populace, and cut them off from all support structures and bleed them dry. Trump is basically advocating for the second one, and while that does not conform well to modern ideas of human rights, it is probably the most feasible way to fight terrorism in the modern era. Thank you, my point exactly. The logic is there it just depends on the individual and how they prioritize their values. kwizach had a very long post about the state of research into exactly the question whether dealing with terrorism in this way is effective (the post got completely ignored of course). Turns out it is almost universally seen as ineffective or counterproductive and if effective then only in very narrow circumstances that are not met in this situation (of course the outcry of the world would also be a predictable effect with very real negative consequences for the US). Now, you and LegalLord can of course ignore this or declare the research faulty (I can imagine that you both would argue that it's tainted by modern conceptions of human rights and thus biased or something) but the question would remain how you would determine the effectiveness of such a strategy. And how small (or counterproductive) the effect would have to be for you not to support this approach. Maybe in the end it is not that much about the actual effect but more about emotions ("at least we are doing something", "we are showing them", "an eye for an eye"). You are correct that I would have probably ignored a long kwizach post, a stance I take from experience. Between the misrepresentation of opposing positions, misrepresentation of sources, stonewalling, and general unpleasant manner of arguing, I generally don't see much value in reading his posts. They tend to annoy and irritate me even when I actually agree with his main point. If you want to summarize it or offer sources, be my guest - otherwise I'll simply have to treat this as a phantom assertion that "someone else proved you're wrong but I don't want to actually show you where."I'm sure that we could agree that dealing with ethnic strife in the long term is a problem that none of us have a good answer to. In the short term, guerilla movements fail when you destroy their organization. Dissent is one thing, active militants is another.
I couldn't have said it better myself. Half of the time he just throws out a wall of sources claiming that they stand for proposition X when there is no realistic possibility of verifying either the claim that the source actually stands for that proposition, or that the source cited is sound/unimpeachable. I did take the time to look at some of the stuff that he posted in his most recent wall of bullshit post, and I found it highly wanting. Points were misrepresented, sources were over-cited, and some of the sources were just ridiculous. If I had several free days, I could have posted a meaningful response if I was so inclined. And I'm not. The only result would be the complete shitting up of this thread with stuff that basically no one cares about.
Long story short, there's a reason why kwizach is ignored by many of the veteran posters in this thread.
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On June 24 2016 00:58 JinDesu wrote:
I think determining that line between "their organization" and "their family" is kinda important here...
Sure. And I don't agree with Trump's point that we should seek out and target their families. But his more general and nuanced point, that we need to hammer their support structures and accept that fighting terrorism is never going to be as humane as we want it to be, is spot on.
On June 24 2016 00:49 Godwrath wrote:Show nested quote +On June 24 2016 00:25 LegalLord wrote:On June 24 2016 00:19 Godwrath wrote:
I love when people talk as if guerilla and terrorism were synonymous. But what do i expect when people accept calling a rebel army terrorists. So are you saying that the current terrorist movements are not guerilla in nature? That's exactly what i am saying. It's community backlash which gets confused or twisted as an act of war for political reasons (including the very own movement on itself). Terrorism is stopped when their community no longer feel the desire to support them. In this specific case, where islamic communities do live in most of the western world aswell, by bombing them indiscriminately, you will be spurring the recruitment all over the world. If you are able to tell me a feasable way to accomplish the complete "pacification" of islamists all around the globe through force and why it's a better way than long term assimilation, negotiations and compromises, i am all ears.
They are pretty much by definition guerilla. They certainly aren't a standing army with established military infrastructure, though perhaps you could make the case for ISIS specifically (I would say they are still guerillas).
Terrorism stops when you get rid of the terrorists, and their suppliers. If Al Qaeda, ISIS, and all of the other rebel groups were to just die right now, then there wouldn't just be another terrorist movement that would come out of the woodwork. Sure, the resentment would remain. And most certainly, the political entities that benefit from stirring up strife into an active war would still be around. But the majority of people (I'd say a smaller majority in the Islamic world than in the non-Islamic world, but still a majority) would prefer to live in peace and not in a state of eternal civil war. Resentment will remain, but the first step of dealing with resentment that leads to armed rebellion, is ALWAYS to kill the rebel movement.
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On June 23 2016 23:41 SolaR- wrote:Show nested quote +On June 23 2016 23:26 zlefin wrote:On June 23 2016 23:24 SolaR- wrote:I wonder if advocating for killing terrorist's families and burning religious books has grouped me under the crazy column. Given your emoticon, I'm not sure whether you want an answer to this or not; also the lack of a question mark. Do you want an answer? Sure thing. All in good fun though.
The first one marks you as crazy. The second, only a tiny bit maybe.
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On June 24 2016 00:28 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On June 24 2016 00:21 KwarK wrote:On June 24 2016 00:16 Mohdoo wrote:
I attach zero intrinsic value to human life, so I say go to town on them if it gets the job done. But if stuff like that ends up making things worse, that's another issue. I wouldn't mind huge collateral damage if it was successful, but there aren't many indications that it has long-term success. It's the American Indians vs Catholic Irish outcomes. When you attempt ethnic cleansing if you do a really, really good job at is, so good that the victims can never, ever recover and can't even dream of anything other than dependent victim status, everything goes awesomely. This is how I understand it as well. However, I think that what is necessary would likely be even worse than the most hawkish politicians could stomach. I think we'd be talking millions of civilian casualties. We'd have to almost entirely destroy Syria, Iraq and Pakistan. The question I always wonder is: Over the course of the next 200 years, how many people will die because of terrorism and the conflict that arises in response to it? If 10 million over the course of 200 years, is it ethical to kill 9 million today to prevent that? Is there something unethical about those lives being taken today, rather than allowing the conflict to take them later?
Well in this year alone we've had a lot more attacks on the west itself than usual. There's been a lot of failed attacks, lone wolf attacks, attacks thwarted, minor attacks, and major attacks actually being pulled off rather successfully. (Almost all of these had plans for more casualties of course). If this trend continues, I wonder how much longer the west will put up with it. I'm sad to say I think people will just get used to the shittier conditions. "This is the new normal, many lone wolf attacks and 2+ major terrorist attacks per year on western soil every year on western soil." So we sacrifice greater prosperity and unity for the sake of not being murderous cunts.
Since 2012 France has really seen a lot of extra terrorist activities. Some of whom claim this increased frequency in attack is due to their involvement in the Libyan strikes. Hell, the terrorists themselves shout it. But what can France do to stop it at this point and what should they do? While I'd love to immediately respond with extreme force to get one side to capitulate, sadly the ME is too complicated for that.
It's sad because even other nations could sponsor terrorist attacks on your country though if they know you'll be hamfisted and start slaughtering an entire country if they attack you to achieve their own goals.
France March 20, 2012 – Toulouse and Montauban shootings in France. 7 dead, 5 injured.
France May 23, 2013 – 2013 La Défense attack. An Islamic extremist wielding a knife attacked and wounded a French soldier in the Paris suburb of La Défense. 1 wounded.
France December 20, 2014 – 2014 Tours police station stabbing. A man yelling Allahu Akbar attacked a police office with a knife. He was killed and three police officers were injured.[81]
France December 21, 2014 – 2014 Dijon attack. A man yelling Allahu Akbar ran over 11 pedestrians with his vehicle. 11 injured
France January 7–9, 2015 – A series of five attacks in and around Paris kill 17 people, plus three attackers, and leave 22 other people injured.
France January 9, 2015 – The Porte de Vincennes hostage crisis kills 4 and injures 9 people.
France April 19, 2015 – A 32-year Frenchwoman is murdered by a gunman whose plot to attack a church is foiled shortly after.[104]
France June 26, 2015 – Saint-Quentin-Fallavier attack – Beheading in a factory near Lyon, head marked with Arabic writing and Islamist flags. Gas canisters planted provoked a fire. 1 dead, 11 injured.[131]
France August 21, 2015 – 2015 Thalys train attack Shooting and stabbing in train traveling from Amsterdam to Paris injures 5. The incident is believed by French police to be an Islamist terrorist attack.[143]
France November 13, 2015 – A series of terrorist attacks in Paris kill 137, and wound 368. They involved a series of coordinated attacks which consisted of mass shootings and suicide bombings. This incident was the most fatal event on French soil since World War II.[169]
France January 7, 2016 – In the January 2016 Paris police station attack an Islamist from Morocco wearing a fake explosive belt attacked police officers with a meat cleaver. He was shot dead.[209]
France January 11, 2016 – A 15-year old Turkish ISIL supporter attacked a teacher from a Jewish school in Marseille with a machete. 1 injured.[212]
France June 14, 2016 - Two french citizens, a police officer and his wife were stabbed to death in Magnanville, France by a man swearing his allegiance to ISIS.[237]
I wish I knew what the answer was, but I like the idea of common sense border policy (closing borders for a short period of time) and whether or not to take extreme military actions is another matter. No single males may enter the country posing as children, that's for sure. Sweden and Germany are full of 14-17 year olds that are 20-40 years old now so that they can't get deported.
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On June 24 2016 00:46 xDaunt wrote:
I'm kinda curious as to WTF the prosecutors are doing in the Freddie Gray trials. I don't know whether its over-charging or just horrible trial advocacy (or a combination of both), but I'm surprised that it looks like no one is going to be convicted of anything.
I am also pretty shocked. They didn’t even get manslaughter or reckless endangerment. But it wasn’t a jury trial, so maybe it’s just a shit ruling by a judge. I want to see the written decision itself.
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Since 2012 France has really seen a lot of extra terrorist activities. Some of whom claim this increased frequency in attack is due to their involvement in the Libyan strikes. Hell, the terrorists themselves shout it. But what can France do to stop it at this point and what should they do? I think it's clear I'd rather have a show of such supreme force that the threat is real.
Because clearly, Mohammed and his self radicalized terrorist cell in Toulouse will give plenty of fucks when you guys bomb plenty of innocent civilians.
That'll show them.
Sidenote, is there a chart or something i can look at to see how much of a problem islamic terrorism in the US actually is, compared to "white dudes with mental health issues"? Would be interesting.
edit: actual numbers please, not some Breitbart crap and the like.
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EPT
