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A chief prosecutor of Nazi war crimes at Nuremberg has said George W. Bush should be tried for war crimes along with
Saddam Hussein. Benjamin Ferenccz, who secured convictions for 22 Nazi officers for their work in orchestrating the death squads that killed more than 1 million people, told OneWorld both Bush and Saddam should be tried for starting "aggressive" wars--Saddam for his 1990 attack on Kuwait and Bush for his 2003 invasion of
Iraq.

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Originally posted by Sven:
What's the likelihood of that happening, FM? Approximately zero.

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Yup. Which raises an interesting, though offensive (to some) question: if civilised methods of distributing justice are ineffective or impracticable because of power relationships, what steps are others justified in taking to punish wrongs of this magnitude? If a powerful actor wishes to use the anarchy of the international system to thier advantage in order to commit massive crimes, are others justified in ignoring civilised procedures in fighting back?

I don't know how we can make Bush be held responsible for killing so many people. Economic interests are the reigning 'god' and that 'god' just happens to be the US. I think if we see the collapse of the US dollar and the US debt continues to increase other countries will not be so keen to helping out a failing super power everyone knows is corrupt to the core.

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Originally posted by otter:
Of course there will be authors who ruminate about this idea for generations to come. But i suspect that if the people of the u.s. had a referendum on the idea both Bushwhacker and Chainlink would be up against the wall.

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Don't give the people of the U.S. too much credit, otter. In 2004 the vast majority of them voted for two candidates for president, both of whom supported the right of the U.S. to invade Iraq and neither of whom was calling for withdrawal of U.S. troops 18 months later.

But how do you bring the world's supreme dictator of dictators who basically enjoys defacto diplomatic immunity on a global scale to justice?

Kidnap him and take him to Brussells?

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Don't give the people of the U.S. too much credit, otter. In 2004 the vast majority of them voted for two candidates for president, both of whom supported the right of the U.S. to invade Iraq and neither of whom was calling for withdrawal of U.S. troops 18 months later.

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While I certainly do share some of this cynicism of the US population, I don't think you can ignore the fact that US "democracy" is so restricted and subdued, especially in terms of economic and strategic decision-making, that people have so little choice or credible information on which to even make a choice.

I lived in the US for five years, during the Reagan fiasco. I saw first hand what a sham their whole electoral system is.

First, it's a rigid and closed two-party system that makes it almost impossible for a third party or independent to get on the ballot. It's a hugely expensive and bureaucratically daunting effort (while the two official parties have full access to tax-funded resources to do all this).

Second, the corporate media is almost completely geared to recognize only these two parties and is only interested in covering, and promoting these two. Legally media outlets are required to provide air time or print space (at full price, of course) tot he two parties. No one else gets that right. Add to this, that the corporate media has become increasingly devoted to the Republican Party with little critical journalism.

Third, if you think big money dictates election outcomes in Canada (it certainly does), wait until you go through an election campaign in the US! Major corporate and rich elite backing of candidates is a must in order to pay for the huge fees and campaign expenses. And graft is a regular day in US politics (as in, I'll give you money if you give me special consideration for this, or a big contract for that, or, etc.) As long as it can't be proven that anyone is breaking existing influence-peddling laws (which are pretty slack), it's OK to basically by and sell political support.

Fourth, the electoral process itself in so fraught with loopholes and authoritarian intervention rules it makes the whole thing a big joke. There is something called the Electoral College in the US that was created in the early 1800s to supervise federal elections, especially involving the president, to ensure the “right people” got elected.

It was given special powers after blacks and property-less people got the right to vote in the late 1800s, and again in 1919, when the Woodrow Wilson government feared the election of socialists, after teddy Roosevelt called for an elected US senate in 1913.

The college has the power to close polls early and, if the vote for a candidate is within a 12 per cent margin, can decide who wins regardless of how many votes they got (within the 12 per cent margin).

Fifth, the balloting process is especially corrupt. So, Bush and Chaney “won” in 2000 and 2004. Reagan and Bush (Sr.) “won” in 1984, etc. But did they? In the 2004 vote alone, according to the US electoral office, there are over 500,000 ballots they think were cast that are unaccounted for.

In addition, if there are people still waiting in line to vote by the time the polls close (and there are usually up to a couple million in most elections), they are either sent home without voting, or given “provisional ballots” were they can vote, but they won’t be counted unless the College, or the supreme court re-open or extend the voting times—which is almost never. In the 2004 vote, there were over a million provisional ballots issued that never got counted.

Add to this there were over a million absentee ballots cast (by US citizens living abroad—including my son-in-law), none of which have ever been verified as being counted. (The son-in-law sent in his ballot well before the deadline and never heard anything back—never got a receipt, or any confirmation that his ballot was received, let alone counted).

Furthermore, there are the estimated six million Americans in the US military that supposedly have the right to vote, as reports from various US journalists I have either read or heard from say US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan were ordered to vote for the Republican Party as a security and safety precaution. So much for “electing” (which actually means “to choose).

And let’s not even get into the whole screwed up primary and fomentation process within the two parties. I have read here some of the Americans complaining that it’s only the center-right candidates that win Democratic Party nominations. I hear them! And it’s easy, given what the political systems are like, to see why.

[ 28 August 2008: Message edited by: sgm ]

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President Bush and his Attorney General agree that under existing laws and treaties Bush is a war criminal together with many members of his government. To make his war crimes legal after the fact, Bush has instructed the Justice (sic) Department to draft changes to the War Crimes Act and to US treaty obligations under the Geneva Conventions.

One of Bush's changes would deny protection of the Geneva Conventions to anyone in any American court.

Bush's other change would protect from prosecution any US government official or military personnel guilty of violating Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions. Article 3 prohibits "at any time and in any place whatsoever outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment." As civil libertarian Nat Hentoff observes, this change would also undo Senator John McCain's amendment against torture.

Eugene Fidell, president of the National Institute of Military Justice says that Bush's changes "immunize past crimes."

Under the US Constitution and US legal tradition, retroactive law is impermissible. What do Americans think of their President's attempts to immunize himself, his government, CIA operatives, military personnel and civilian contractors from war crimes?

Apparently, the self-righteous morally superior American "Christian" public could care less. The Republican controlled House and Senate, which long ago traded integrity for power, are working to pass Bush's changes prior to the mid-term elections in the event the Republicans fail to steal three elections in a row and Democrats win control of the House or Senate.

Meanwhile, the illegal war in Iraq, based entirely on Bush administration lies, grinds on, murdering and maiming ever more people. According to the latest administration estimate, the pointless killing will go on for another 10-15 years.

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[ 29 August 2006: Message edited by: M. Spector ]

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Originally posted by Fidel:
But a vote for Nader equates to a vote for the war party.

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I think Harper's had a good cover story eighteen months ago on the criminal case against the Nixon secretary of state, his name escapes me.

Edit: Henry Kissinger

[ 29 August 2006: Message edited by: 500_Apples ]

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Sven asksWhat's the likelihood of that happening, FM? Approximately zero.

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It is similar to the possibility that dictators like Pinochet might ever be arrested for their crimes. After all, he was fully supported by the US.

Or that the Soviet Union would just disappear.

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Originally posted by jeff house:

It is similar to the possibility that dictators like Pinochet might ever be arrested for their crimes. After all, he was fully supported by the US.

Or that the Soviet Union would just disappear.

We can safely discount these possibilities.

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Originally posted by 500_Apples:
M> Spector, political alignment in different countries tend to be different. Your analogy is bunk...

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Canadian conventional wisdom:
The only way to stop Harper from winning the plurality that allowed him to form a government would have been to vote Liberal. Voting NDP instead of Liberal is like voting for Harper.

USian conventional wisdom:
The only way to stop George W. Bush from winning the Presidency was to vote for Al Gore or John Kerry. Voting for Nader instead of the Democrats is like voting Republican.

Canadians vote strategically, and so do Americans. Quite a few voters protested both old line parties in the U.S. and Canada and voted with their hearts. And those people knew full-well what Nader's and the NDP's chances were. We need proportional democracy in the last western-most politically conservative nations in the world where Republicans have resorted to stealing elections, and the CPC's didn't elect one MP from any of Canada's major cities in 2006. Since the cold war economies are no more, the old line parties can't count on old line support anymore either.

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Originally posted by 500_Apples:
Simple, the NDP is a real party in Canada, and for the most part they only cost the liberals seats where the conservatives would not have won regardless.

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The reason the NDP "costs the Liberals seats" is that millions of Canadians vote NDP. If those millions could be bullied into voting Liberal (the way you would like to see Nader supporters being bullied into voting Democrat), the Liberals would win more seats than the current combined total of NDP and Liberal seats.

Your position amounts to the simplistic and tautological proposition that progressives in the USA should not vote for Nader because not enough people vote for him. This is exactly the kind of "thinking" that will ensure that no party of the left will ever be elected in the USA. It is not the Greens but the idiots like you that ensure the perpetual duopoly of the two conservative parties in the USA.

[ 29 August 2006: Message edited by: M. Spector ]

After all, Americans, as I understand things, vote directly for president, while we Canadians don't vote directly for Prime Minister.

Given the different systems, it seems to me that the range of choices may not be quite the same in each instance.

Not trying to be a jerk here, but I'm thinking of Chomsky's argument that a candidate in an American presidential election who says, 'Vote for me even if it means your swing-state vote will help elect Bush,' is effectively saying the following:

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These [differences between Bush and Kerry] may not look like huge differences, but they translate into quite big effects for the lives of people. Anyone who says 'I don't care if Bush gets elected' is basically telling poor and working people in the country, 'I don't care if your lives are destroyed. I don't care whether you are going to have a little money to help your disabled mother. I just don't care, because from my elevated point of view I don't see much difference between them.' That's a way of saying, 'Pay no attention to me, because I don't care about you.' Apart from its being wrong, it's a recipe for disaster if you're hoping to ever develop a popular movement and a political alternative."

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For my own part, I'd stress differences rather than similarities between the Canadian and American situations, but I would be interested nevertheless in a serious discussion of American vs. Canadian analyses of 'tactical' or 'strategic voting.'

So, if you'll permit me, here's my proposition for debate, to begin in this thread, pro or con:

BIRT: The progressive Canadian 'strategic voter' faces exactly the same set of choices as her American counterpart at general election* time.

*Let's assume, for the sake of the debate, that we're talking about an election cycle during which an American president will be chosen.

Any takers?

[ 29 August 2006: Message edited by: sgm ]