POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN THE NEW YORK TIMES
And if you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you.
We know perfectly well that America has been using drones and Hellfire missiles to kill many people, without charge or trial or conviction of anything.
Remember, too, Rumsfeld's bloody Nazi-like words about killing or walling away America's al Qaeda prisoners in Afghanistan.
It wasn't long after that that 3,000 prisoners disappeared.
They are said to have been loaded into trucks and driven out into the desert to suffocate, then being buried in mass graves. This was done by one of the warlord's men while American soldiers watched and picked their noses.
And let's not forget the war crime of the Iraq invasion. A million killed, a couple of million refugees created, a modern society set back for decades. Results no different to having used a few nuclear weapons against a people who did absolutely nothing against America.
So why would there be any hesitation over this? The American establishment has demonstrated a lawless disregard for international law for eight years.
Of course, there wasn't, and I'd bet it was that ghastly Dick Cheney who headed the operation and perhaps the new commander in Afghanistan who managed it.
America has no claim to any kind of ethics or democratic values in light of recent years.
The election of Obama has not changed this position at all, other than offering a friendly smile and a good mind in place of a pathetic lump.
A great deal of effort will be required to restore America's tattered reputation, and I see no efforts indicating that effort is underway.
