Again, how do you reconcile your alleged belief in innocence until proven guilty, fair and just courts of law, rights to legal representation, access to evidence, cross examination, etc. with your repeatedly espoused belief in one party rule under a totalitarian system being the ideal form of government, where none of these are considered remotely desirable, and publically asking for them to be rights will have you sent for political re-education, if not simply killed. Do you intend to address this or will you again let your deafening silence as a response speak for you?
Well… it’s… and… you see… also “good faith imperialistic expansion” and, Glorious!, and authoritarian/totalitarian is awesome even when it leads to mass suffering and loss of basic services, and nations should be supported if they’re totalitarian and take care of basic services except when they don’t and then they should still be supported if Americans don’t like them, and nations should have the sovereign right to freedom which means that they should oppress their citizens and take away their freedoms but only if it’s a nation doing it to their own citizens unless it’s the Soviet Union, and someone can be a communist even if they support the torture and murder of any communists in a country and don’t subscribe to communist ideology and if you expect them to then you’re just like a racist, and also ya know The Empire Empire Empire Empire Empire and hey look over there!
I hope this clarifies matters for you.
Just like we all now understand why previously Commissar has said that anybody who isn’t a judge on the ICC is totally unqualified to make statements about the legality of anything under international law, but now he’s claiming that America’s actions are illegal under international law.
http://www.shfwire.com/node/4587 Only Commisar and the United States Supreme Court.
To point out the obvious Gonz, ruling that military tribunals are illegal is not the same as ruling that detention is illegal. Additionally, it should be obvious that the SCOTUS determines US law, and not international law.
I find that there is nothing to “reconcile.” Yes, I support proper authoritarian (note: not “totalitarian”) governments, and I recognize the vital importance of an impartial and fair judicial system. There is nothing inherent about the prior that would make them disregard the latter, so it is perfectly plausible and desirable to have both at the same time.
You may object that authoritarian states have a history of miscarriages of justice. True, I would admit, but then so do most non-authoritarian states, as well. You must keep in mind that a fair judicial system is and continues to be the exception rather than the rule. Take the US, for example. Apart from the miscarriage (nay, the abortion) of justice that is Guantanamo Bay, you have the long history of harsher treatment of racial minorities, the continued application of the death penalty almost solely to blacks and Hispanics, a very unequal access to quality legal representation based on class and wealth, the anti-Communist witch hunts that destroyed the lives of thousands of innocent US citizens (remember the Rosenbergs?), trials that are little more than media circuses, the exclusion of women and minorities from jury pools for hundreds of years… I could go on, but I’m sure you get the point. No nation is perfect, or even close to perfect, when it comes to having a fair legal system. That does not mean that we can ever stop trying.
You’re not fooling anyone, the list of countries whose governmental systems you proclaim to admire, i.e. North Korea, China, the former USSR are all totalitarian governments, not authoritarian. Pinochet and Fujimori’s governments were authoritarian, yet somehow I don’t think you’d laud them. None of your favored governments recognize the importance of fair and impartial judicial systems, and the very nature of these governments require they disregard having them. A fair and impartial judicial system would make rulings against the government, as you see happen in representative democracies all the time. This cannot be permitted in a totalitarian state, and in these states the judicial systems, such as it is, is an organ of the state.
Well, that was good for a laugh at least. The Rosenbergs, by the way, weren’t innocent. The states you admire and the system of government you find desirable do not even pretend to have fair legal systems, juries, or find them desirable, or work towards trying to make one. Gulags aren’t a sign of a free, fair, impartial legal system, or a government that considers itself bound by laws to protect its citizens from abuse by the government. Neither is show trials, nor is summary executions carried out by the thousands at a time. I note that you made no comment on either the Moscow show trials when Stalin purged the officer corps, or the massacre and summary execution of thousands of Polish officers and intelligentsia at Katyn. Surely if Gitmo is a miscarriage, nay an abortion of justice you must have some horrifically harsh words about Katyn. Or are these just imperialist, counter-revolutionary lies like the one about Gulags spread by that traitor Solzhenitsyn? You remember him, right? The one you claim was responsible for the lies about Stalin having murdered millions of Soviet citizens?
I notice that you keep asserting that authoritarian states “require” non-free judiciaries, but I have yet to see you prove or support this argument. I completely reject your premise. A free judiciary is good for the country regardless of whether or not the national government is a properly authoritarian one. Moreover, there is nothing inherent about a free judiciary that would make it unworkable in authoritarian states. Your claim that judiciaries rule against democratic regimes “all the time” is unfounded. When push comes to shove, courts tend to cave to governmental pressure, whether it is democratic or none. For starters, take a look at Korematsu v. US, and then tell me with a straight face that courts in democratic nations are immune to political pressure.
Sure, some mistakes have been made. Unlike you, I do not find it necessary to maintain that my favored governments are somehow immune to judicial errors. Mistakes happen, and we must constantly seek out ways to ensure that they are not repeated. The fact that mistakes have occasionally been made does not magically make us socialists incapable of appreciating a free judicial system, as you appear to be implying. In striving for a glorious future, we are not constrained by an imperfect past.
Feel free to disregard reality all you want, but totalitarian (not “authoritarian”) judicial systems are organs of the state, not free, fair or impartial.
Name me one ruling by a Soviet court contrary to Stalin’s wishes while he was alive and head of state. I dare you.
Ah, millions of deaths are “mistakes were made.” Gotcha. I like how you call summary executions by the thousands “judicial errors.” There was no judicial error; there was no judicial involvement at all. That’s what makes them summary executions.
Yes, but sometimes in democratic nations bad things happen and/or bad rulings get handed down and/or the governments do bad things. Meanwhile in the totalitarian systems Commissar supports, dictators punish free speech, and criticism of the government/simple requests to change the system are met with death and horror, there are few/no “bad rulings” because the secret police simply capture you in the dead of night and your family never sees you alive again or you get a show trial, and the government has instituted “bad things” as the rule rather than the exception because they need to keep the people in line.
Therefore, since both systems have a certain degree of not-good-things happening, they’re totally equal and you can’t say one is better than another. Just like if you’ve ever gotten a paper cut, you really can’t complain if your arms are hacked off by a machete.
Also, Empire Empire Empire Empire Empire Glorious!