| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free 16:25 - Aug 21 with 8667 views | FDC |
Funny old world. |  | | |  |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 13:39 - Aug 22 with 1565 views | Kendo_Nagasaki |
Fascism is alive and well , they also want to bang up Snowden whose "crime" was to tell the world that the US is illegally spying on all of us. |  |
| Psycho killer Qu'est-ce que c'est? |
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| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 14:05 - Aug 22 with 1543 views | Northernr |
On the lighter side of the news, Manning has released a statement saying he is now a woman called Chelsea and should be addressed as such. Beginning hormone replacement therapy at the first possible opportunity.
Not sure this boy's all there. |  | | |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 14:06 - Aug 22 with 1543 views | hoof_hearted |
Oh this is good.
Manning has announced that he plans to live as a woman and change his name to...wait for it... Chelsea
A new byword for unscrupulous weirdos. |  | | |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 14:06 - Aug 22 with 1543 views | FDC |
Holy shit. I agree with you Clive. | | | |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 14:53 - Aug 22 with 1517 views | hoopstilidie |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 14:05 - Aug 22 by Northernr |
On the lighter side of the news, Manning has released a statement saying he is now a woman called Chelsea and should be addressed as such. Beginning hormone replacement therapy at the first possible opportunity.
Not sure this boy's all there. |
So he's UnManning. |  |
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| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 15:21 - Aug 22 with 1494 views | FDC |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 14:53 - Aug 22 by hoopstilidie |
So he's UnManning. |
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| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 15:32 - Aug 22 with 1485 views | Kendo_Nagasaki |
If he'd have shot an unarmed black kid he would have walked free.
If that country was a dog it would be put down. | |
| Psycho killer Qu'est-ce que c'est? |
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| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 15:46 - Aug 22 with 1475 views | MrSheen |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 14:05 - Aug 22 by Northernr |
On the lighter side of the news, Manning has released a statement saying he is now a woman called Chelsea and should be addressed as such. Beginning hormone replacement therapy at the first possible opportunity.
Not sure this boy's all there. |
One man/woman went to (Guantana)Mo |  | | |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 15:50 - Aug 22 with 1471 views | NW5Hoop |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 13:30 - Aug 22 by gueRRilla |
Because of the documents Manning released, the Iraq Body Count project added another 11,000 deaths to its total.
If making the world aware of the deaths of 11,000 people isn't the right thing to do then I just don't know what is. |
The court could not and should not have sentenced on that view: that's not the law. His crime, under the laws as constituted, was unarguable and serious. Thus the stiff sentence. |  | | |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 15:52 - Aug 22 with 1409 views | NW5Hoop |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 13:39 - Aug 22 by Kendo_Nagasaki |
Fascism is alive and well , they also want to bang up Snowden whose "crime" was to tell the world that the US is illegally spying on all of us. |
I have a lot more sympathy for Snowden, simply because he was a civilian and not part of the chain of command. | | | |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 15:56 - Aug 22 with 1402 views | TW_R |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 14:53 - Aug 22 by hoopstilidie |
So he's UnManning. |
Soon to be WoManning |  | | |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 16:05 - Aug 22 with 1395 views | FDC |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 15:50 - Aug 22 by NW5Hoop |
The court could not and should not have sentenced on that view: that's not the law. His crime, under the laws as constituted, was unarguable and serious. Thus the stiff sentence. |
But the 'stiffness' of the sentence is totally unprecedented; it's not simply a case of Crime A = Sentence B. The sentencing (and lets not forget the long periods of solitary confinement in the build up) is clearly political - he's regarded as an enemy of the state, and this is how the enemy is treated: with cruelty and as an example. Fck with us and we'll do this to you.
Meanwhile, a court in Washington has found the NSA guilty of illegally spying on 1000s of "wholly domestic communications". I some how suspect that since this was the state committing the act of espionage, no one will be sent to jail for the majority of their life. | | | |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 16:31 - Aug 22 with 1375 views | six_foot_two |
He swore an oath of to his country then betrayed it. The traitor got what he deserved. |  | | |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 16:33 - Aug 22 with 1371 views | jamois |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 09:59 - Aug 22 by WarfieldHoop |
Manning leaked classified military documents to Wikileaks. He knew what he was doing and quite rightly so will now pay for it. No sympathy. |
If Bradley Chelsea decided that the military he/she signed up for, and the country whose rights he thought were worth protecting, had in fact deceived him and billions around the World and was actually an insidiously corrupt imperialist, should he have resigned from the military first and then leaked his documents? Would that have made it any more acceptable to you? If not, what should he have done? |  |
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| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 16:34 - Aug 22 with 1370 views | FDC |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 16:31 - Aug 22 by six_foot_two |
He swore an oath of to his country then betrayed it. The traitor got what he deserved. |
"Swore an oath his country then betrayed it"
This is almost too stupid to contend with. So i'll post this instead:
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As a true patriot, I would gladly die in battle defending my homeland. I love my country more than my own life. But I would also be more than willing to give my last breath in the name of, say, Mexico, Panama, Japan, or the Czech Republic. The most honorable thing a man can do is lay down his life for his country. Or another country. The important thing is that it's a country.
Like those heroes who spilled their blood fighting for independence against the British Empire, I, too, would forfeit everything to win for my countrymen the right to be governed by politicians in our own capital instead of in a capital located further away. Nothing is more profound or more sacred than to die for one's country, an adjacent country, or some other, foreign country.
The truth is, there are a lot of countries, each of which is the most noble cause possible to die for. I only regret that I have but one life to lose for but one country.
I would not hesitate to give my life for or against any other noble nation. Come to think of it, I would even die for a neutral third party caught in the crossfire during a heroic peacekeeping effort, just so long as my death would be in some way related to a country of some kind. That's how committed I am to the concept of nationalism.
The bottom line is that the current boundaries of a nation are worth protecting at all costs. Otherwise, what would so many brave and patriotic souls have lost their lives for?
I was lucky enough to be born in one of the 200 greatest countries in the world, and I promised myself long ago that I would never forget it. I can only hope to someday have the privilege of protecting this great land against whomever may seek to do it harm. Or to defend some other country against whomever may seek to do it harm. And vice versa.
Ideally, I'd like to die for a country that was at least in the Western hemisphere but it'd be just as heroic to expire bravely on the end of a pointed stick deep in the jungles of Africa. My wife would be widowed and my children orphaned, but they would take solace in the knowledge that I had given my life to a cause that the people of some nation believed in.
I only ask that I be given a soldier's funeral so that I may be buried holding the flag or flags of wherever it was I was fighting for.
There comes a time when all of us, no matter who we are, heed the call to the battlefield. It is a call we cannot and should not ignore, no matter where it is coming from. And if I must die, in the service of this or that country, I only hope I can at least take as many of the enemy with me as possible before I fall and breathe my last. Unless of course, they're also fighting for a country. In which case, their deaths, at my hands, will have been honorable–because they, like me, would have died for a country.
Without nationalism, our deaths in the countless wars we constantly wage to defend our own nations against others defending their own nations against us would seem arbitrary, almost meaningless. But as long as we have a higher purpose–the love of whatever country we happen to be fighting for–we will always know we did not lose our lives in vain.
http://www.theonion.com/articles/im-prepared-to-give-my-life-for-this-or-any-cou [Post edited 22 Aug 2013 16:34]
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| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 16:36 - Aug 22 with 1367 views | NW5Hoop |
I'm not celebrating anything. But the rule of law is undermined when you pick one offence and say: right, he broke the law, and did so seriously, but we're going to let him off. The rule of law is a more important principle to protect than, arguably, any other in a democratic society.
And there is no right of an ordinary citizen not to be punished for breaking the law. | | | |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 16:38 - Aug 22 with 1362 views | Monahoop |
Sod the exposing national secrets fiasco. This oddballs biggest crime is wanting to call him/herself Chelsea. If that doesn't warrant a 35 year jail term then I don't know what does? |  |
| There aint half been some clever bastards. |
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| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 16:42 - Aug 22 with 1355 views | pomanjou |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 12:21 - Aug 22 by WarfieldHoop |
He was a serving soldier by his own choice and he chose to put at risk not just the security of the middle east (which we're spending countless amounts on regardless) but the security of our home countries (not to mention any other western targets around the world) to reprisals. This is not just a simple case of whistleblowing at work, he deliberately passed on highly classified details regardless of the consequences.
If we've all read them, then so have every extremist individual, group, affiliates and would be jihadists in the world and this is the sort of material they crave. It's classified for a reason. |
Spot on, well said, got what he deserved and if he now creeps out in 7 years as reported in some places it will be a disgrace. |  |
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| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 16:44 - Aug 22 with 1525 views | FDC |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 16:36 - Aug 22 by NW5Hoop |
I'm not celebrating anything. But the rule of law is undermined when you pick one offence and say: right, he broke the law, and did so seriously, but we're going to let him off. The rule of law is a more important principle to protect than, arguably, any other in a democratic society.
And there is no right of an ordinary citizen not to be punished for breaking the law. |
That still avoids the issue of the disproportionate sentencing, and mistreatment prior to trial i.e. the overtly politicised process of this case.
"The rule of law is a more important principle to protect than, arguably, any other in a democratic society."
I think this gets at something very interesting actually, although maybe a bit of a tangent for this thread. But I would contend that the rule of law is more important than any other principle in *our* society - not necessarily a democratic society, unless we're very clear about what we mean by "democratic" i.e. people often use "democratic" as short hand for "societies built upon a western liberalised market political economy". Which is not the same thing as "democracy". And yes, law is very important, not least because it codifies private property rights. | | | |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 17:30 - Aug 22 with 1489 views | Brightonhoop |
Interesting thread with some interesting intelligent thought, along with the usual reactionaries...
I've not seen the 11,000 odd documents he released but one confirmed a helicopter gunship killing a group on the ground, Reuters journalists among them, and the crew celebrating. It's a political sentence clearly. Anders Brevek for context murdered 77 including children, albeit in a western democracy outside the US, and got 21 years. And Blair and Bush remain at liberty despite Genocide...funny old world indeed. |  | | |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 17:39 - Aug 22 with 1485 views | SomersetHoops |
Governments and the laws they pass lose all credibility when they themselves don't adhere to them. If they don't why should anybody else. What the documents Manning passed on demonstrated were the lies and misdeeds of the American government and its forces. For the laws governments pass to mean anything they should applaud people who draw attention to the times that they break them and broadcast lies to their citizens and put them right. What this heinous sentence means is that anyone who exposes such lies and wrongdoing will pay a high price. Its only one step removed from having him killed by the CIA, but that would not serve the purpose of preventing other people risking exposing government wrongdoing. Is America a democracy? Of course it isn't and this episode underlines that more than anything and the fact that their government is riddled with corruption and their armed forces are full of people who are gung-ho and put no value on civilian lives. |  |
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| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 18:50 - Aug 22 with 1453 views | WarfieldHoop |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 16:33 - Aug 22 by jamois |
If Bradley Chelsea decided that the military he/she signed up for, and the country whose rights he thought were worth protecting, had in fact deceived him and billions around the World and was actually an insidiously corrupt imperialist, should he have resigned from the military first and then leaked his documents? Would that have made it any more acceptable to you? If not, what should he have done? |
The fact that he was a serving soldier is mostly irrelevant but my point was that I'm sure the US forces make their policies on classified information clear to them and I'm sure they're supposed to take some sort of oath when they sign up. What should he have done? Not leaked highly classified military communications into the public domain. | | | |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 18:51 - Aug 22 with 1453 views | zicoshoops |
I know the world's a wicked old place, but sometimes you can't help smiling.
Totally non-PC, but...............
It may be as simple as one or two explanations to the whole story.
1.
The Fella/Sort has always been a female.
In which case how could she have been expected to keep a secret? Never mind eleven thousand of them.
2.
He's been told he's looking at sharing a Cell with 'Bubba' and 'Big Errol,' both weighing in excess of 300lbs and neither has clapped eyes on a young lad for the past 20 years.
So he's says he's now a 'Sort,' ends up doing 35 years in a women's prison.
Result?...................................Happy days.
There is a TV series, book, and probably a movie in there somewhere.
What's going on?
We should be told.
Sort it out. | | | |
| Manning = 35 years; Mubarek = free on 19:06 - Aug 22 with 1437 views | hoopstilidie |
"I would like to be treated as a woman"
Not the exact words I would be using before being locked in a building with thousands of rapists for 35 years. | |
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