Obama announcement at 10:30 p.m. - Bin Laden Dead

Not enough better if the only justification you have is that two wrongs make a right.

 

Yep. YF and others are asking questions that we'd ask regarding how to handle a criminal suspect. Bin Laden is not a criminal suspect. He is a war enemy and a legitimate target whose death has many strategic benefits.

 

But you could say that about any criminal.

"Hey, we illegally searched him and illegally seized evidence. But he broke the law first, so it was anything goes at that point."

Those aren't our principles. Otherwise, criminal (in this case, international) law means nothing.

 

At least Obama did it aboveboard. How many people/leaders in our history do you think the US has taken out in secret?

 

Please explain (a) how the right circumstances would have ever existed (b) why the intelligence that Osama would give us under those circumstances cannot be gotten by other means and (c) how those right circumstances would not inflame AQ sentiment -- increasing attacks -- against America because we were mistreating and torturing their spiritual leader.

 

Can I go ahead and agree with you that international law means nothing?

 

That post proves Clinton knew the organization was dangerous and was ineffective in taking any action against them. One mission isn't exactly taking action to shore up our nation's lacking defense pre-9/11.

 

And, isn't that what we said all along about KSM?

He wasn't a criminal suspect either -- though Holder wanted to give him all of the protections of the US Constitution and try him in open court in NYC.

 

I agree it's not a one-to-one comparison. We're using domestic criminal law to hypothesize because we aren't as familiar with international law. Hell, maybe everything about it was all well and good. I just want to know. And then we could move on to debating whether the policy is the right one and not whether it was or was not followed.

 

You won't get an anti-assassination argument from me. It's justified in this case. Of course, somebody will twist that and say "I said assassinations are OK" in regards to another, not similar case. That's the nature of these discussions.

 

It's frickin' fantasyland. Maybe we could have offered him a deal where he drops dime on the entire Al Qaeda organization in exchange for entering the witness protection program and being given a 7-11 to run.

Maybe in Kalamazoo near Elvis' Burger King

 

I don't think it is a wrong. I think it was a necessity.