The Reign in Spain is Mainly Giving me a Pain

The BBQ Pit
1

From 11/24 New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/24/international/europe/24SPAI.html
Spain is not sending troops to fight terrorism. They’re not paying toward the effort. They did finally arrest some terrorists who had been permitted to operate in their country. BFD. Now, they’re imposing their own ideas regarding the type of court and the death penalty. According to the Times, other European nations may follow.

There are certainly good arguments against the death penalty and against the military tribunals (as well as good arguments for them). These issues are being debated here in the US. But, where does Spain come off enforcing their preferences on us? We’re fighting terrorism, with money, weapons diplomacy, and public relations. American armed forces are bleeding and dying, in order to protect the whole civilized, which presumably includes Spain. Meanwhile, Spain meddles. Adding insult to injury, no doubt they feel morally superior. :rolleyes:

I’m also pissed off at Amnesty International. They’ll get no financial support from the december family this year. They do good work, but they’ve gotten a bee in their bonnet over the death penalty. They stupidly equated it with torture and other atrocities. That exaggeration has made it easier for the Europeans to get in the way of the US effort to fight terrorism.

Finally I’m pissed off at US pundits who go off the deep end, like Frank Rich. His column in today’s NY Times compares John Ashcroft to Osama bin Laden, Fidel Castro and Augusto Pinochet. It includes a spin statement implying that biological weapons information is routinely disseminated at gun shows. It implies nefariousness in the termination of Mary Jo White, omitting to point out that a Democratic prosecutor in that position would routinely resign when a Republican is elected President. The article also raises the possibility that anthrax is being spread by a right-winger and the possibility that Ashcroft is intentionally limiting his investigation to protect that hypothetical right-winger – both without a scintilla of evidence.

This sort of over-the-top writing encourages left wingnut Europeans to make mischief, at a time when the grownups are doing serious work. No doubt George Bush and Colin Powell will some way to deal with this issue, but they really have enough on their plates without this nonsense.

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Well, well, well, looky what I find here. Howya doing december? You remember how I said in this page how thsi executive oreder could become a problem with other countries? It seems like it’s happened sooner than we thought, huh? Let’s see…

>> Spain is not sending troops to fight terrorism

Wrong. Spain has offered something like a couple thousand troops and they have been told to deploy them in Kosovo, where Spanish troops are already doing major peacekeeping, so that other troops may be deployed from Kosovo to the Afghan operations. Please get your facts straight.

>> They’re not paying toward the effort

You have a cite for this? I am not sure if these operations are paid by each government, in which case Spain is paying for the peacekeeping in Kosovo and now these added troops, or if they are paid through the UN in which case I believe Spain has been paying their dues on time unlike some other country which is located between canada and Mexico… but I wouldn’t want to rub that in.

>> They did finally arrest some terrorists who had been permitted to operate in their country

Permitted? Well, in the same sense the US “permitted” the guys who blew up the WTC to operate in the USA. I will have you know shortly after the WTC attack Spain notified the US that they had some evidence of people linked to the terrorists and the US blew them away. It has taken the arrest of these guys and the disclosure that the terrorist network was wider than at first thought for the US to take notice.

>> Now, they’re imposing their own ideas regarding the type of court and the death penalty. According to the Times, other European nations may follow.

How dare they? What do they think they are? Independent sovereign nations or something?

>> But, where does Spain come off enforcing their preferences on us?

What? They aren’t. The US wants the guys? Spain can set any conditions they want. Just as the US does all the time. Spain is not a US colony you know?

>> We’re fighting terrorism, with money, weapons diplomacy, and public relations.

A number of European countries, including Spain, are doing the same thing for which you should be grateful because Spain was not attacked by alQaeda.

>> American armed forces are bleeding and dying,

Please don’t get so melodramatic. They are not “bleeding and dying”. They are dropping bombs from a safe distance while they let the Northern Alliance do the dirty work.

>> in order to protect the whole civilized, which presumably includes Spain.

They are protecting primarily American interests and secondarily western insterests. Spain is participating together with other European countries. I can’t see why you feel the rest of the world should thank America for letting them live.

>> Adding insult to injury, no doubt they feel morally superior.

As I have expressed in the other thread I do believe the executive order which allows military tribunals is a step back. It seems most Europeans and many Americans feel that way. I think they should be allowed to feel morally superior for preferring due process over military tribunals.

Your post comes off like a Wildest Bill rant. The USA is not alone in the world and it is not the world boss. It has to cooperate with other countries. I can assure you Colin Powel understands this much better than you do and he is doing an excellent job of keeping the coalition together.

I will add one more point. Spain has had a terrorist problem for 25 years now. The basque terrorist group ETA has killed many people and continues to kill. Just in the last few days it has set off two bombs in Madrid and assasinated a judge and two officers (one male one female) of the basque police. This has been going on for decades and with some help and shelter coming from the USA. In the past the USA did not seem to care about this since it did not affect them directly. A few of the terrorists found asylum in the US (although most went to other countries for refuge). The USA has not helped in the least with this so Spain would be very entiltled to now say “Screw you!” to the US. Suddenly the USA has decided to lend a hand with fighting terrorism in Spain. I wonder why? Suddenly the US has become aware of the problem terrorism represents. I wonder why.

december, your posts are so ignorant of the facts and so jingoistic they would make wildest bill proud. Face it: America is one more country in the world, it is not the boss of the world. It has some good things but it is not the best in everything. Europeans have some pretty good reasons to feel proud and not using military tribunals like the USA has decided to do is a pretty good reason if you ask me.

I am not going to address the rest of your post as this is too long already. I’ll just remember to contribute double to Amnesty International this year to make up for your withholding.

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A relevant cite from the Washington Post:

So it is not Spain specifically but the European Union who have agreed not to extradite “suspects to countries where judicial norms are seen as falling below those in the 15-nation bloc”. The executive order allowing for military tribunals is starting to produce effects sooneer than we thought, even if they are not the desired effects.

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But I thought Pinochet just got a bad rap?
:rolleyes:

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Most European countries do not have the legal authority to extradite accused criminals when they face the death penalty. This is not something that they have an option about short of changing their laws. For some reason Europeans find the death penalty barbaric and morally indefensible. So do I.

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The US has not formally requested the extradition and therefore Spain has not denied it.

so, december, you are getting all worked up over that fact that if the USA were to request the extradition it may be denied? wow, you must have had a bad day.

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As do I. Another cite (from a French court) is the case of Ira Einhorn recently of Philadlphia. If I’m not mistaken the French court decided they would let him return, but the US must retry him. Usually I find fault with our European friends, but in the case of the death penalty, they are far, far ahead of us.

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Yes, I did have a bad day. The bad day was Sept. 11. Two people I know were killed horribly and a third friend lost a son. Co-workers saw people jumping to their death right around them.

However, we were lucky. The terrorists didn’t use nuclear weapons. However, given time, they will.

This is a serious business. It’s no time to play games over some ally’s use of a particular penalty or the specific type of trial they use.

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Sailor owns this thread.

:smiley:

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I’ll admit that Spain has a somewhat easier position to preach their opinions on prisoner treatment from, and is indeed likely to have acted with less concern for the rights of the accused if it was Spain that was attacked. However, things such as the right to due process are important to defend at times such as this, when the temptation to abandon them is greatest, and if it takes a more detached point of view to remind the US of its own Constitutional guarantees, and the principles embodied in them, I’m all for it.

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Personally I see no reason for the US to even extradite them. We are after all trying to make this a global thing and Spain seems to have a good handle on the situation.

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Well, they theoretically did take part in a conspiracy to commit murder in the US. Whether that’s a more compelling reason than Spain might have for prosecuting them is another issue.

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I don’t anymore. Maybe if there weren’t so many raving lunatics bent on killing us all…

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So, december; your argument is that when something bad happens that’s justification to quit thinking with a brain?

Or have you always been as ignorant as your recent posts paint you?

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Born and raised in Spain, I couldn’t help but take umbrage with the opening rant by december. Fortunately, after reading the comprehensive rebuttal written by sailor, I see that there’s little left to add.

Other than saying: excellent posts, sailor.

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Hey, if Spain wants us to try them in criminal court, I got no problem with that. But I don’t think we should take the DP of the table for them or anybody else. That should be for a jury here to decide.

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Spooje, that would mean Spain won’t be able to extradite them and rightly so. If a country views the death penalty as wrong, how could it allow extraditon to a country where someone might receive it?

Oh, and Sailor - excellent post. Just excellent.

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So if I commit a grisley double-murder and want to escape the DP, all I gotta do is get my ass to Spain! Or France. Or one them European countries that thinks their judicial norms are above ours. I’m sorry, that sticks in my craw a little bit.

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Well, look at it this way. Lets say a person is accused of a crime in a country where torture is an accepted interrogation practice. That person then flees to the US. Should we extradite that person back to the country, knowing that if we do, he will be tortured, and that we believe the use of torture to be cruel, and that it is a human rights violation, or should we, before extraditing him, get assurances from his government that they will not use torture on him? If we request such assurances, are we saying that our “judicial norms are above” theirs? Are they? Do we have a responsibility to comply with the nation’s request, or is our greater responsibility to maintain the ideals and the standards of justice that we believe in?

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Would we have an extradition treaty with such a country? Would we consider them an ally? We should honor our agreements in our treaty.

Are we the torturous barbarians in this little analogy? Spain is not alleging these guys could not get a fair trial in the US. If they are guilty, the DP is a just punishment

Anybody know what our extradition treaty is with Spain?