Is America Cruel?

Posted by straight man:

Country by country:
•Canada has something comparable to Guantanamo – namely Guantanamo. Its compliance in the treatment of Canadians has led to some pretty serious shit up here. Also, the Patriot Act has an equivalent in Canada, by which all of the plotters in that ridiculous kill-the-PM plot are being held. So yes, “Canada!!!”
•In fact, the Patriot Act has equivalents in a number of other countries, including Australia and the UK, France, etc. You (should) get the idea.
•Listing Chile was probably a mistake, given that their anti-terror stuff is worse than America’s by far (yes, I did have to look that up. Interesting reading, I’m learning here.)
•Italy has exported someone to a country where they had been tortured, and I believe it’s yet another US-compliant country.

Incidentally, speaking as a Canadian, I reject your ridiculous notion that there are other “countries in the same cultural league” as the United States. Extreme power and wealth, a cultural tradition of self-help, and lots of other “Americanisms” have a role to play in America’s perceived interests that simply don’t exist for other countries. Hence, you get different results.

Another (disjunct, sorry) thought. If you care about human rights, then incorrectly moralizing about the United States is harmful to your goal, in that it destroys your credibility. Alternatively – and your dubious contributions to other threads would support this idea – you like to scapegoat the US, and you’re brutally misinformed. You’re not alone in that feeling –hell, too many Canadians are with you – but it’s a pretty useless worldview. Frankly, the world has too many moralists as it is.

Thank you, straight man!
Thankfully, I’m not the only intelligent person on this board.

We are going over the same points which were discussed a couple of months ago in this thread: Does the US Lead in Anything? - Great Debates - Straight Dope Message Board

This thread is not about your or me or any other posters so please leave the personal remarks out of it. The place to talk about your intelligence is the pit. There we often have great fun with people like you. Feel free to open a thread there any time.

This link http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A18868-2004Oct8.html (which I got from a thread in the pit) is representative. We often see things like this in America which would be extremely unusual in Europe (I’m not saying they could not happen). America has a very tough attitude towards crime. And crime is anything, no matter how small, which does not fit the letter of the law.

that story also reminds me of that video we saw of a paraplegic person being dumped on the floor of a police station by police. Again, I think America just has a very tough attitude and excuses things which would not be excused elsewhere.