Should the United States pay Ransom?

[Pure]

pathetic

desert p: //The ransom should be delivered late at night by SEALS coming out of the water. Knives are the best form of delivery.//

ami: Where there is an opportunity to criticize this administration, know that i will. In this case, the White House was silent, for day after day; that was and is perceived as weakness and indecision, whether that is the whole truth or not, it certainly gave cause for criticism.

desert p and amicus wanted the hostages rescued by force of arms. d p wanted the seals used.

this happened.

is the Prez to be praised?

certainly not! he didn't do it according to amicus and dp's timeline and is therefore condemned!

further, says ami, Obama's reasoning wasn't based in Rand's objective ethics, but in Christ's. so there's further reason to condemn him!

pathetic.

next stop, ami: how about a thread about the bow to the Saudi king?

or the whitehouse vegetable garden. after all, Hitler was a (more or less) vegetarian.

 

[amicus]

Or maybe the front page news in the Washington Post for Sunday, the new puppy in the White House?

I leave the small shit up to you and your myopic point of view.

Amicus

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

AMICUS

I sense the Usual Suspects arent thrilled about the hostage rescue.

Probably hoping the UN would take up the problem in the Fall.

You know, its too bad we didnt swap Hillary for the Captain. THAT woulda been a win-win for America without any violence.

 

[Liar]

And marshmallow peeps.

Got a houseful of the damned things and I'd love to share.

I think there's a UN resolution against that.

 

[Guest]

I think there's a UN resolution against that.

Damn it.

I'd wondered.

 

[DesertPirate]

Obama approved direct action, I am pleasantly surprised.

 

[amicus]

Hillarious Hilary indeed, however, JBJ, she is without discernible value and beyond breeding age, totally useless and even the irate pirates would know that.



ami

 

[JackLuis]

AMICUS

I sense the Usual Suspects arent thrilled about the hostage rescue.

Probably hoping the UN would take up the problem in the Fall.

You know, its too bad we didnt swap Hillary for the Captain. THAT woulda been a win-win for America without any violence.

Originally Posted by Liar

I think there's a UN resolution against that.

*******
I know there ought to be!

 

[Guest]

Obama approved direct action, I am pleasantly surprised.

 

[Boota]

Pretty much the way I expected it to unfold. It's the standard for hostage negotiation. They would have talked the pirates to death rather than risk the hostages life needlessly. Some would say it doesn't take balls to do that. I would argue that it takes balls to do the right thing when the "macho ass kicking way" would impress certain people more. Instead of showing how tough he could be, Obama showed how smart it could be handled. It's good to have a smart statesman running the show rather than that semi-retarded cowboy we've had.

 

[ishtat]

Istat...you and others may not, 'get it', but there is reason for concern over the lack of information provided by the White House during this event.

The, 'information age', instant communications world wide, has brought with it a great many ponderable possibilities.

From a cargo ship, far out at sea, an incident took place and hours, if not minutes later, the entire listening world was aware of it and questions began to come forth in rapid succession.

Totalitarian governments, China, Russia, North Korea, Cuba, never advise or inform their people of anything unless they want them to know.

This democracy is different. We The People, choose and support our government and our military because we freely choose to, but we do so with certain caveats: we insist on knowing, within security necessities, what the hell is going on.

If you do not understand the ominous silence from the nation's capitol, then that is your lack of understanding.

This new President, indeed his entire administration, exhibits, thus far, a disdain for the American people in terms of providing information about events that concern us all.

A proper President would have gone before the American people, through the media, the very day the incident occured to assure them that the basic principles of America were being carried out.

He did not.

He left it to his maladroit press secretary to fumble and stumble his way through a, 'have faith, all is well', rhetoric so common to closed societies.

You folks just don't have a clue as to how a free nation functions.

Now why does that not surprise me?

Amicus...

Ami, I understood well enough not to have made a premature call on Obama's leadership capacity.

Security of the captain clearly took precedence over your nonsensical argument for a so called right for (immediate) information.

Never mind, in the next week or so you can enjoy all the press coverage you can stomach:- of Obama congratulating Captain Philips, the Commander and crew of the Bainbridge, the Navy Seals. The news will be full of congratulations and medal pinning and that sort of stuff. And Obama will be there looking like a leader, like a statesman in fact a President.

I don't agree with a lot of Obama's programme but he clearly made the right call on this one as Desert Pirate had the courage to acknowledge on the other thread.

 

[amicus]

Ishtat, one cannot ignore the results and I understand and will attempt to ignore the coming weeks congratulatory ritual.

My original point of the five day lapse in any formal announcement by the White House will leave doubt in the minds of many, both domestic and abroad.

Years after many of the 'sensational' kidnapping, hostage events, such as Munich and Entebbe, we learn of the behind the scenes machinations of government and military and how they eventually worked out.

The Israeli's have said and given evidence that they will not pay ransom and will use the force necessary. I cannot say that same thing about this leader.

That is my opinion, because I express it, does not make me all bad.



amicus...

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Originally Posted by Liar

I think there's a UN resolution against that.

*******
I know there ought to be!

IT IS A LITTLE OVER THE TOP. I CAN IMAGINE THE PIRATES SAYING, LETS JUST SHOOT OURSELVES AND SPARE OURSELVES A SLOW AND PAINFUL DEATH.

 

[oggbashan]

Poor old Oggbashan, lives in some lala land beyond reach of reality.

You might recall disembarcation day, D-Day, the beaches of Normandy, with both Winston and Ike making announcement TO THE MEDIA as the events unfolded.

...
Amicus

Ike had two announcements drafted. So did Churchill. Ike's other announcement would have been one of regret that the invasion had been unsuccessful.

Neither made announcements until it was clear that the landing had been reasonably successful and had not been repelled.

Both left the interpretation that another landing in the Pas-De-Calais area (the major invasion) was still a possibility. The Pas-De-Calais landing, supposed to be commanded by General Patton, was a significant disinformation ploy that kept German reinforcements away from Normandy in the days and weeks after D-Day.

What was said was very carefully controlled and in those days the media understood that premature release of information cost troops' lives.

Og

Edited for PS: In 1943 Winston Churchill reportedly told Joseph Stalin that "truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies." That is still true today. You do not tell your enemies what you are going to do - unless you are a fool.

PPS: You might be able to hear Ike's words if you are in the US: Interrupted for Eisenhower

 

[oggbashan]

Apology

I am sorry if my edited PS above implied that Amicus is a fool.

I should have said: "It is of course self-evident and an axiom that Amicus is a fool who would give the state's enemies useful information because he thinks that the public's right to know is more important than individual troop's lives."

Og

 

[Guest]

I am sorry if my edited PS above implied that Amicus is a fool.

I should have said: "It is of course self-evident and an axiom that Amicus is a fool who would give the state's enemies useful information because he thinks that the public's right to know is more important than individual troop's lives."

Og

Bows to the King.

 

[Tricialen]

Why is it that it always seems to come down to name calling? Can't a person have different beliefs and different thoughts than "you", whom ever "you" is? Why can't people just agree that they disagree? Both sides have good ideas, do good things. Just as both sides have bad ideas and do bad things. Why is it necessary to call names and then say 'hooray'......it's mean...it's a mean spirit to have and it's a sad way to live.

 

[oggbashan]

Why is it that it always seems to come down to name calling? Can't a person have different beliefs and different thoughts than "you", whom ever "you" is? Why can't people just agree that they disagree? Both sides have good ideas, do good things. Just as both sides have bad ideas and do bad things. Why is it necessary to call names and then say 'hooray'......it's mean...it's a mean spirit to have and it's a sad way to live.

Perhaps I shouldn't, but Amicus continually puts words into my mouth and attacks me for beliefs I don't hold.

In a post above he states: Poor old Oggbashan, lives in some lala land beyond reach of reality.

He is continually regurgitating the same old rubbish about liberals. By UK standards I'm not a liberal, nor are many US-based posters Amicus refers to as the "usual suspects".

If I don't call him when he distorts the truth then someone has to.

Og

 

[Tricialen]

Perhaps I shouldn't, but Amicus continually puts words into my mouth and attacks me for beliefs I don't hold.

In a post above he states: Poor old Oggbashan, lives in some lala land beyond reach of reality.

He is continually regurgitating the same old rubbish about liberals. By UK standards I'm not a liberal, nor are many US-based posters Amicus refers to as the "usual suspects".

If I don't call him when he distorts the truth then someone has to.

Og

Of course you must set the record straight and you must defend yourself...but when names are called ...whether in anger or just to demean...it puts you in the same place that person is in...does that make sense? I just think that there has been a lot of nastiness here and it's a shame.

 

[oggbashan]

...I just think that there has been a lot of nastiness here and it's a shame.

There has been nastiness because someone I will not name again has made it very clear that he will use all and any means to attack the present US administration and the President.

I did not agree with some specific acts of the previous administration because I saw them as being against the wider and long-term interests of the US in particular and the western democracies generally.

That did not lead me into wholesale attacks on the then administration and certainly not to attacks on the US as a whole.

He whom I will not name attacks European countries (which he lumps together as an amorphous socialist whole), the UK's National Health Service, and many Lit people indiscriminately. If I thought that he was representative of a reasonable American I would despair. But I know he is not. The Americans I have met, the D-Day veterans who liberated Europe, the tourists I have encountered in the UK and in Europe, have none of them shown any of the hatred that he whom I will not name repeats daily.

I can agree to disagree with posters on a whole variety of subjects. I know that the majority of US citizens are unhappy with a UK-style National Health Service but worried by assuming a massive tax bill. How you organise your health care is your concern. If only he whom I will not name would leave us to deal with our NHS and its known problems.

But I am getting slightly irritated with the constant carping that is so woefully ill-informed.

Og

 

[Tricialen]

There has been nastiness because someone I will not name again has made it very clear that he will use all and any means to attack the present US administration and the President.

I did not agree with some specific acts of the previous administration because I saw them as being against the wider and long-term interests of the US in particular and the western democracies generally.

That did not lead me into wholesale attacks on the then administration and certainly not to attacks on the US as a whole.

He whom I will not name attacks European countries (which he lumps together as an amorphous socialist whole), the UK's National Health Service, and many Lit people indiscriminately. If I thought that he was representative of a reasonable American I would despair. But I know he is not. The Americans I have met, the D-Day veterans who liberated Europe, the tourists I have encountered in the UK and in Europe, have none of them shown any of the hatred that he whom I will not name repeats daily.

I can agree to disagree with posters on a whole variety of subjects. I know that the majority of US citizens are unhappy with a UK-style National Health Service but worried by assuming a massive tax bill. How you organise your health care is your concern. If only he whom I will not name would leave us to deal with our NHS and its known problems.

But I am getting slightly irritated with the constant carping that is so woefully ill-informed.

Og

I don't blame you...and I understand your frustration ....sending you a hug...just because everyone needs one

 

[Huckleman2000]

As the only one to vote "yes", let me just clarify that I simply mean that we shouldn't rule out every option out of principles that have no meaning to the "pirates". Nothing is ever so simple as you think.

Why We Don't Condemn Our Pirates
by K'naan

Can anyone ever really be for piracy? Outside of sea bandits, and young girls fantasizing of Johnny Depp, would anyone with an honest regard for good human conduct really say that they are in support of Sea Robbery?

Well, in Somalia, the answer is: it's complicated.

The news media these days has been covering piracy in the Somali coast with such
lop-sided journalism, that it's lucky they're not on a ship themselves. It's true that the constant hijacking of vessels in the Gulf of Aden is a major threat to the vibrant trade route between Asia and Europe. It is also true that for most of the pirates operating in this vast shoreline, money is the primary objective.

But according to so many Somalis, the disruption of Europe's darling of a trade route, is just Karma biting a perpetrator in the butt. And if you don't believe in Karma, maybe you believe in recent history. Here is why we Somalis find ourselves slightly shy of condemning our pirates.

Somalia has been without any form of a functioning government since 1991. And although its failures, like many other toddler governments in Africa, sprung from the wells of post-colonial independence, bad governance and development loan sharks, the specific problem of piracy was put in motion in 1992.

After the overthrow of Siyad Barre, our charmless dictator of twenty-some-odd years, two major forces of the Hawiye Clan came to power. At the time, Ali Mahdi, and General Mohamed Farah Aidid, the two leaders of the Hawiye rebels, were largely considered liberators. But the unity of the two men and their respective sub-clans was very short-lived. It's as if they were dumbstruck at the advent of ousting the dictator, or that they just forgot to discuss who will be the leader of the country once they defeated their common foe.

A disagreement of who will upgrade from militia leader to Mr. President broke up their honeymoon. It's because of this disagreement that we've seen one of the most decomposing wars in Somalia's history, leading to millions displaced and hundreds of thousands dead.

But war is expensive and militias need food for their families, and Jaad (an amphetamine-based stimulant) to stay awake for the fighting. Therefore, a good clan -based Warlord must look out for his own fighters. Aidid's men turned to robbing aid trucks carrying food to the starving masses, and re-selling it to continue their war. But Ali Mahdi had his sights set on a larger and more unexploited resource, namely: the Indian Ocean.

Already by this time, local fishermen in the coastline of Somalia have been complaining of illegal vessels coming to Somali waters and stealing all the fish. And since there was no government to report it to, and since the severity of the violence clumsily overshadowed every other problem, the fishermen went completely unheard.

But it was around this same time that a more sinister, a more patronizing practice was being put in motion. A Swiss firm called Achair Parterns, and an Italian waste company called Achair Parterns, made a deal with Ali Mahdi, that they were to dump containers of waste material in Somali waters. These European companies were said to be paying Warlords about $3 a ton, whereas to properly dispose of waste in Europe costs about $1000 a ton.

In 2004, after a tsunami washed ashore several leaking containers, thousand of locals in the Puntland region of Somalia started to complain of severe and previously unreported ailments, such as abdominal bleeding, skin melting off and a lot of immediate cancer-like symptoms. Nick Nuttall, a spokesman for the United Nations Environmental Program, says that the containers had many different kinds of waste, including "Uranium, radioactive waste, lead, Cadmium, Mercury and chemical waste." But this wasn't just a passing evil from one or two groups taking advantage of our unprotected waters. The UN envoy for Somalia, Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, says that the practice still continues to this day. It was months after those initial reports that local fishermen mobilized themselves, along with street militias, to go into the waters and deter the Westerners from having a free pass at completely destroying Somalia's aquatic life. Now years later, the deterring has become less noble, and the ex-fishermen with their militias have begun to develop a taste for ransom at sea. This form of piracy is now a major contributor to the Somali economy, especially in the very region that private toxic waste companies first began to burry our nation's death trap.

Now Somalia has upped the world's pirate attacks by over 21 percent in one year, and while NATO and the EU are both sending forces to the Somali coast to try and slow down the attacks, Blackwater and all kinds of private security firms are intent on cashing in. But while Europeans are well in their right to protect their trade interest in the region, our pirates were the only deterrent we had from an externally imposed environmental disaster. No one can say for sure that some of the ships they are now holding for ransom were not involved in illegal activity in our waters. The truth is, if you ask any Somali, if getting rid of the pirates only means the continuous rape of our coast by unmonitored Western Vessels, and the producing of a new cancerous generation, we would all fly our pirate flags high.

It is time that the world gave the Somali people some assurance that these Western illegal activities will end, if our pirates are to seize their operations. We do not want the EU and NATO serving as a shield for these nuclear waste-dumping hoodlums. It seems to me that this new modern crisis is truly a question of justice, but also a question of whose justice.

As is apparent these days, one man's pirate is another man's coast guard.

 

[Dragonlipz]

Ishtat, one cannot ignore the results and I understand and will attempt to ignore the coming weeks congratulatory ritual.

My original point of the five day lapse in any formal announcement by the White House will leave doubt in the minds of many, both domestic and abroad.

Years after many of the 'sensational' kidnapping, hostage events, such as Munich and Entebbe, we learn of the behind the scenes machinations of government and military and how they eventually worked out.

The Israeli's have said and given evidence that they will not pay ransom and will use the force necessary. I cannot say that same thing about this leader.

That is my opinion, because I express it, does not make me all bad.



amicus...

If you had any managerial expertise you would know that any manager's best resource is his people. I've already posted on this and your silence will no doubt leave a question in the minds of many concerning your ability to respond to a situation or a crisis. Foreign and Domestic will question your fortitude and resolve.
Ciao

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

DRAGONLISP

Nonsense. 10% of employees do 90% of the work.

 

[Dragonlipz]

DRAGONLISP

Nonsense. 10% of employees do 90% of the work.

JBJ - Since this is one of the less abrasive comments you've posted, I've deigned to give you a more or less civil answer.

Many years ago, in a galaxy far, far, away a young tool designer began an assignment with the largest defense contractor in the United States (at that time)....
His first supervisor was a colorful, effusive, self-deprecating Puerto Rican about whom I could tell story after story but will confine my recollection to just this one:
He handed out some work assignments one morning and walked back to his desk expounding cheerfully to any and all:
"Remember Folks, this is McDonnel-Douglas where we have ten people to do three people's work. The only trouble with this system is that if those three people don't do their work, all ten are in trouble!" He was one of the best managers I ever had and remember him to this day. He ran a focused operation where everyone had fun, did a lot of work and learned one helluva lot about building a warplane.....I miss him and those old days.....