US fury after Baghdad court frees al-Sadr ally linked to killing spree

You can run but you can't hide. Law? What law? Expect to hear of this soon.

of those who should be standing trial for war crimes.

And after all we've done for them!


After bringing them all that fresh democracy and freedom?!?!


And helping them with their over-population problems?!?!


- The nerve!

Or are you saying that you don't care if he is or not - that it would have been justifiable for a Lebanese man to go to Iraq to kill Americans and Britons?

Torture, drone attacks, the Bush War Criminals walking around free with no hope of ever being brought to justice!!!

This country lost the moral high ground a long time ago...

The man may be guilty as sin, but the US has the blood of innocent Iraqis and Afghans...filling buckets!

When we do something about CIA torturers, and the torture advocates like Yoo and Judge Bybee, then we can be furious about crap like this!

The US, UK, Israel...are all above international law when we act. Those laws are meant for every other nation except the Three Bully nations. I love my country and I feel like I have a right to criticize it...but most folks here and around the boards don't feel that way. I loved my bullying brother too, but I didn't like him and the things he did. I said so at home and got slapped in the mouth by my dad and scorned by my mother when we were kids. I guess that's the way families are? Beats me.

You're right, I can't see a 'moral equivalent' argument here. There's pretty good evidence this guy was involved in the murders - for instance, the kidnappers demanding the release of the other two, in return for releasing one kidnappee and the bodies of the other 4. No, I cannot see that justifiable outrage about the decisions of Bush, Blair etc. gives carte blanche to anyone in the world to kill Americans.

Go ahead. Try to explain it.

when the Iraqis let murderers in Iraq go free. We have no moral high ground to speak from. The hypocrisy should be pretty obvious.

...who believed that Iraq had anything to do with harming Americans on 911. Everyone knows that it was the Saudis, the CIA and the BFEE.

I stand corrected -- you must indeed think we should have been there exposing our troops to maiming, death and disease based upon THOSE LIES.

I said nothing about whether this man's innocent or not.

That point is irrelevant since we should never have been there to begin with!

I'm saying that one person's terrorist is another person's patriot.

It depends what side of the TRUTH you're on.

And sometimes if you even know what the TRUTH is.

What I DO KNOW is that we were in Iraq because of a group of lying-ass warmongering fuckers told a bunch of goddamned lies and got away with it, okay? And a weak, bought-off Congress went along with it. And a fourth estate, owned and operated by rich bastards who are at this very moment further enriching themselves of the plunder we got for those dead American troops -- used the media as a rah-rah bully pulpit to promote these FUCKING LIES. And I believe that this man would likely never have killed anyone if we'd had just minded our own goddamned business.

I ALSO KNOW that until we stop causing the wars -- then they will never end. WE ARE THE CAUSE OF THESE DEATHS!!! This nation and no one else!!! Understand!?!?!

We have evolved into a nation of stupid-ass citizens who support and do whatever the greedy fuckers running this shit tell us to do. That's why American troops got killed there and for no other reason.

People need to Wake the Fuck Up!

Now, I hope this clears my position up for you.

- Feel free to put me on IGNORE if my beliefs bother you so..........

and it's stupid to accuse me of thinking that it is. This is about whether it's OK for a Lebanese man to go to Iraq and kill Americans. You think it is. That would not make him a 'patriot'. So he is not a patriot - not even yours.

No, it was not just the USA who caused those deaths. The men who pulled the triggers did too; they are primarily responsible, and you're ecstatic that they (whether or not they are these particular men) get away with it. Although it's clear you want an open season on Americans until you feel the country has been punished enough for the sins of its politicians, that is not how justice works.

It's disgusting to see you end with a quote from the bible about peace, when it's you cheering on the murder of Americans, because you seem to think this clears up your feelings of guilt about your own country.

I can't even imagine what it's like inside your brain. Forget I said anything -- there's no point trying to reach someone so disconnected from reality.

Have a nice life.

I know very well you don't think there was a connection, and neither do I. So I can't see why you've brought up 9/11 in a discussion about Iraq.

Or is this one of those cases where those who aren't innocent are to be denied all their rights, and "innocence" is a group phenomenon.

Would you feel that it was okay if you went to another country and because of the Haditha acquittal you were arrested, tortured, and killed? After all, you're a member of the guilty group, guilt is primarily a collective thing, so collective punishment meted out to individual members of a group is the way to go.

Some Americans do a bad thing, so it's okay for members of the other group--in this case, "Muslims"--to hurt a different set of Americans. After all, Americans did a bad thing so no American has grounds for moral indignation.

Some Jews do a bad thing, so it's okay for members of the other group to find a random Jew--let's say he's a reporter in Pakistan--and kill him. After all, at least some Jews did a bad thing so no Jew has grounds for moral indignation.

A black does a bad thing, so it's okay for members of the other group to find another, random black and kill him. After all, at least some blacks must at some point have done a bad thing so no black has grounds for moral indignation.

I don't like your reasoning. I think it leads to really, really absurd conclusions at the end. I would need to believe that X is both a moral imperative and a moral abomination, both justified in spades and execrable, the morality of either depending entirely upon who the people involved are. A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of narrow minds. A reasoned consistency, however, is a fairly nice way of keeping the hobgoblins to a minimum.

and I don't fully get the point of your examples, since that is exactly what happened in the massacre (Marines lost a comrade; that night they mete out punishment to random local families they knew had nothing to do with it)...

And what's not to like about my reasoning? If you want to demand justice diplomatically, you damn well better practice it when the roles are reversed -- And so far the U.S. has had a pretty shady record in that regard...