9 ms·

One of the most negative longterm consequence of the G. W. Bush era is the erosion of high moral ground in human rights. The US, and consequently the western d

One of the most negative longterm consequence of the G. W. Bush era is the erosion of high moral ground in human rights. The US, and consequently the western democracies, lost the ability to genuinely criticize the bad guys for doing bad things like torture or kidnapping. Of course, the situation in China is not comparable to US, but we lost the argument.

mac01021 9y ago
You think the US was behaving morally through the 70s, 80s, and 90s?
- dandare 9y ago
  Of course not, there are several examples of democratically elected governments overthrown and replaced with brutal dictators, Tuskegee, MKUltra, COINTELPRO, Iran Contra, Dark Alliance. But most of these fuckups were illegal - or at least not officially sanctioned. That changed with 9/11 and Operation Iraqi Freedom. Until then the US never publicly sanctioned torture and kidnapping of individuals.
  - bshepard 9y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Tribunal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Tribunal
  - avar 9y ago
    > most of these fuckups were illegal > - or at least not officially > sanctioned. To people outside the US that are the subject of these campaigns this amounts to nothing more than obscure inside baseball. Unless something like war crime trials are held, or reparations are paid to the relevant countries it doesn't matter in the least for the end result, or for future such operations whether or not these operations were legal or sanctioned. Nobody involved of any significance ever got charged or convicted, and the US certainly didn't help reinstate the governments that had been overthrown. The only thing that happened post-9/11 was that the official narrative started more closely resembling the realities on the ground.
    - dandare 9y ago
      That is a good point.
- ASalazarMX 9y ago
  As native to one of the countries affected by Manifest destiny, I can assure USA's foreign policy never has had the moral high ground, but it just liked to say it did.
- dlwdlw 9y ago
  US cultural echo chamber :/
- ignoramceisblis 9y ago
  He's just giving you your daily dose of Republican bashing. Remember who the bad guys are.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
tziki 9y ago
>The US, and consequently the western democracies How is that? To me it seems Europe very much has the moral high ground.
- wazoox 9y ago
  Up until Sarkozy received several millions $ of illegal financing for the French presidential election from the hands of Gaddafi, and a little later decided to get rid of his former "friend", with his accomplices David Cameron and Barack Obama, and proceeded to destroy the country, assassinate Gaddafi and fuel Islamic chaos, wars, and migrations in the whole of Western and Central Africa. A hell of a moral high ground if you ask me...
  - mlok 9y ago
    This topic is taken care of by the Justice System at the moment, so this actually counters your point. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/20/nicolas-sarkozy-police-custody-french-president-campaign-funding-libya https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/20/nicolas-sarkoz... Mediapart is the Independant media that broke the story back in 2012, and has been attacked by Sarkozy. https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/france/300412/sarkozy-attacks-mediapart-over-gaddafi-funding-revelations https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/france/300412/sarkozy-at...
    - wazoox 9y ago
      Historically, former members of the government in France haven't ever been jailed. Chirac, Pasqua and others simply received a slap on the wrist, and Sarkozy will probably end the same. I hope, though, that this time Guéant won't get through because the evidence is so overwhelming, but we'll see. All in all, this delineates a clear picture of an extremely corrupt government, but alas still very well protected by state officials and the following governments in the name of "raison d'État". Mediapart is one of the very few media who isn't owned by plutocrats, most of them happening to be, by no coincidence, Sarkozy's friends (Bolloré invited Sarkozy on his yacht after his election; Dassault is a senator from Sarkozy's party; Drahi is a staunch supporter of Sarkozy; Bouygues is father-in-law of one of Sarkozy's sons; etc). Sarkozy never actually sued Mediapart, because the dossier is absolutely rock-solid. He constantly complains about "undeserved attacks" and "smearing" in his friends' complacent media, but he never actually sued the website. You have no idea how totally corrupt the French state is nowadays. It's truly terrible. Macron plans are even worse and will make France a true authoritarian state (exactly along the lines of Putin's Russia), by depriving MPs of the minority of almost all of their (very few) legislative rights and powers, opening the possibility of a third mandate for the president, etc.
Bromskloss 9y ago
> The US, and consequently the western democracies, lost the ability to genuinely criticize the bad guys for doing bad things like torture or kidnapping. Would such criticism have had an effect otherwise?
- kahnpro 9y ago
  Yes, it's very useful for motivating and mobilising people and nations to our cause. A banner to rally under. Now we have nothing besides plain old nationalism.
teh_klev 9y ago
I apologise if this sounds a wee bit snippy but I think you need to read some history books to find out what the US and western friends were getting up to prior to Bush Jr's time in office. Here's a couple of suggestions: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Overthrow-Americas-Century-Regime-Change/dp/0805082409/ https://www.amazon.co.uk/Overthrow-Americas-Century-Regime-C... https://www.amazon.co.uk/All-Shahs-Men-American-Middle/dp/047018549X https://www.amazon.co.uk/All-Shahs-Men-American-Middle/dp/04... Have a look for books on the US's covert (and slightly less covert) activities in Central and South America.
- dandare 9y ago
  See my reply to mac01021.
Slansitartop 9y ago
> One of the most negative longterm consequence of the G. W. Bush era is the erosion of high moral ground in human rights. One of the most negative longterm consequences is also the fact that HN seems unable to discuss Chinese human rights violations, and instead must derail all such threads into discussions about the US. Almost none of the comments here actually discuss topic of the OP. > The US, and consequently the western democracies, lost the ability to genuinely criticize the bad guys for doing bad things like torture or kidnapping. Of course, the situation in China is not comparable to US, but we lost the argument. This is absolutely not true. The US and Western democracies very much have the ability to criticize human rights abuses just with the caveats that 1) one doesn't have to be guiltless to criticize or call out bad behavior, 2) the US is not a unitary political entity [1], and 3) a hypocrite is not wrong, she's merely guilty as well. [1] let alone the union of US and Western democracies
specialist 9y ago
We didn't lose the argument. We didn't even forfeit. What GWB et al did was much, much worse. We said human rights didn't matter. Now that might makes right is our nation's policy, it appears that l/3rd of the voters are just fine with that.

mac01021 9y ago

You think the US was behaving morally through the 70s, 80s, and 90s?

dandare 9y ago
Of course not, there are several examples of democratically elected governments overthrown and replaced with brutal dictators, Tuskegee, MKUltra, COINTELPRO, Iran Contra, Dark Alliance. But most of these fuckups were illegal - or at least not officially sanctioned. That changed with 9/11 and Operation Iraqi Freedom. Until then the US never publicly sanctioned torture and kidnapping of individuals.
- bshepard 9y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Tribunal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Tribunal
- avar 9y ago
  > most of these fuckups were illegal > - or at least not officially > sanctioned. To people outside the US that are the subject of these campaigns this amounts to nothing more than obscure inside baseball. Unless something like war crime trials are held, or reparations are paid to the relevant countries it doesn't matter in the least for the end result, or for future such operations whether or not these operations were legal or sanctioned. Nobody involved of any significance ever got charged or convicted, and the US certainly didn't help reinstate the governments that had been overthrown. The only thing that happened post-9/11 was that the official narrative started more closely resembling the realities on the ground.
  - dandare 9y ago
    That is a good point.
ASalazarMX 9y ago
As native to one of the countries affected by Manifest destiny, I can assure USA's foreign policy never has had the moral high ground, but it just liked to say it did.
dlwdlw 9y ago
US cultural echo chamber :/
ignoramceisblis 9y ago
He's just giving you your daily dose of Republican bashing. Remember who the bad guys are.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

tziki 9y ago

>The US, and consequently the western democracies How is that? To me it seems Europe very much has the moral high ground.

wazoox 9y ago
Up until Sarkozy received several millions $ of illegal financing for the French presidential election from the hands of Gaddafi, and a little later decided to get rid of his former "friend", with his accomplices David Cameron and Barack Obama, and proceeded to destroy the country, assassinate Gaddafi and fuel Islamic chaos, wars, and migrations in the whole of Western and Central Africa. A hell of a moral high ground if you ask me...
- mlok 9y ago
  This topic is taken care of by the Justice System at the moment, so this actually counters your point. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/20/nicolas-sarkozy-police-custody-french-president-campaign-funding-libya https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/20/nicolas-sarkoz... Mediapart is the Independant media that broke the story back in 2012, and has been attacked by Sarkozy. https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/france/300412/sarkozy-attacks-mediapart-over-gaddafi-funding-revelations https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/france/300412/sarkozy-at...
  - wazoox 9y ago
    Historically, former members of the government in France haven't ever been jailed. Chirac, Pasqua and others simply received a slap on the wrist, and Sarkozy will probably end the same. I hope, though, that this time Guéant won't get through because the evidence is so overwhelming, but we'll see. All in all, this delineates a clear picture of an extremely corrupt government, but alas still very well protected by state officials and the following governments in the name of "raison d'État". Mediapart is one of the very few media who isn't owned by plutocrats, most of them happening to be, by no coincidence, Sarkozy's friends (Bolloré invited Sarkozy on his yacht after his election; Dassault is a senator from Sarkozy's party; Drahi is a staunch supporter of Sarkozy; Bouygues is father-in-law of one of Sarkozy's sons; etc). Sarkozy never actually sued Mediapart, because the dossier is absolutely rock-solid. He constantly complains about "undeserved attacks" and "smearing" in his friends' complacent media, but he never actually sued the website. You have no idea how totally corrupt the French state is nowadays. It's truly terrible. Macron plans are even worse and will make France a true authoritarian state (exactly along the lines of Putin's Russia), by depriving MPs of the minority of almost all of their (very few) legislative rights and powers, opening the possibility of a third mandate for the president, etc.

Bromskloss 9y ago

> The US, and consequently the western democracies, lost the ability to genuinely criticize the bad guys for doing bad things like torture or kidnapping. Would such criticism have had an effect otherwise?

kahnpro 9y ago
Yes, it's very useful for motivating and mobilising people and nations to our cause. A banner to rally under. Now we have nothing besides plain old nationalism.

teh_klev 9y ago

I apologise if this sounds a wee bit snippy but I think you need to read some history books to find out what the US and western friends were getting up to prior to Bush Jr's time in office. Here's a couple of suggestions: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Overthrow-Americas-Century-Regime-Change/dp/0805082409/ https://www.amazon.co.uk/Overthrow-Americas-Century-Regime-C... https://www.amazon.co.uk/All-Shahs-Men-American-Middle/dp/047018549X https://www.amazon.co.uk/All-Shahs-Men-American-Middle/dp/04... Have a look for books on the US's covert (and slightly less covert) activities in Central and South America.

dandare 9y ago
See my reply to mac01021.

Slansitartop 9y ago

> One of the most negative longterm consequence of the G. W. Bush era is the erosion of high moral ground in human rights. One of the most negative longterm consequences is also the fact that HN seems unable to discuss Chinese human rights violations, and instead must derail all such threads into discussions about the US. Almost none of the comments here actually discuss topic of the OP. > The US, and consequently the western democracies, lost the ability to genuinely criticize the bad guys for doing bad things like torture or kidnapping. Of course, the situation in China is not comparable to US, but we lost the argument. This is absolutely not true. The US and Western democracies very much have the ability to criticize human rights abuses just with the caveats that 1) one doesn't have to be guiltless to criticize or call out bad behavior, 2) the US is not a unitary political entity [1], and 3) a hypocrite is not wrong, she's merely guilty as well. [1] let alone the union of US and Western democracies

specialist 9y ago

We didn't lose the argument. We didn't even forfeit. What GWB et al did was much, much worse. We said human rights didn't matter. Now that might makes right is our nation's policy, it appears that l/3rd of the voters are just fine with that.