5 ms·

The charges are propped up to make the sentence seem soft. 35 is still a lifetime. He may not live long enough to be free.

• sp332 13y ago
  35 isn't even half a lifetime. He was born in 1987 (geez, he's younger than I am) so with "time served" he'll be about 60 when he gets out.
  • clarky07 13y ago
    right. missing out on 25-60 is totally reasonable. nothing important happens during those years anyways.
    • sp332 13y ago
      Stop putting words in my mouth.
      • aclevernickname 13y ago
        I've found that people use the "stop putting words in my mouth" line when someone follows their words to a logical conclusion. This leads me to believe that the sentence really means "quit pointing out flaws in my reasoning."
        • sp332 13y ago
          I guess you could read the conversation before commenting. Here, I'll make it easy for you: I said "35 isn't even half a lifetime... he'll be about 60 when he gets out." and clarky07 said "missing out on 25-60 is totally reasonable. nothing important happens during those years anyways." which is not the same thing as what I said. See? clarky07 tried to make it sound like I said that 35 years was no big deal, but I didn't say that.
          • aclevernickname 13y ago
            I bet your use of passive-aggressive condescension wins all your arguments for you, and wins you the respect of all your peers. Now, if you said that 35 isn't half a lifetime, and that he'll be about 60 when he gets out, how doesn't that minimize the focus on the effect those 35 years of incarceration actually have on Manning? Were you just so insensitive an engineer that you felt the cold, literal correction was somehow benefiting the conversation?
            • sp332 13y ago
              Your other comment said I wasn't being logical enough. Now I'm being too logical? I didn't think it was very passive either. That leaves... respect of my peers. OK, I have a lot of time on my hands so I'm game: I think that exaggeration of the effect of Manning's leaks is what led to the overly harsh sentence in the first place. The least we could do in discussing it is not make the same mistake. I think Manning's sentence is much too long. But at the same time, I don't think misrepresenting how harsh it is does any side of the argument any good. I'm sensitive enough to realize that if we want reasonable sentences, we will have to be honest about how harsh a sentence really is. I can also predict that critics will write us off as irrational or whiny if we make a habit of overreacting every time something happens we don't like. I'm not insensitive. On the contrary, I can imagine much worse sentences that could have been handed down, up to and including capital punishment for treason. As crushing as the final sentence must be to Manning and those near him, I can also understand the coping mechanisms they will resort to to deal with it. One of those is that the sentence is not as bad as it could have been.
          • clarky07 13y ago
            >clarky07 tried to make it sound like I said that 35 years was no big deal, but I didn't say that. >35 isn't even half a lifetime. He was born in 1987 (geez, he's younger than I am) How is this not minimizing the severity again? At the very least it's more than half his remaining lifetime, and possibly all of his remaining lifetime. He also gets to miss out on pretty much any chance at having a family. His only friends will be other convicts. I hope he at least manages to get out on parole, but there is certainly a chance he doesn't.
  • 6d0debc071 13y ago
    It's five years off the average lifespan in terms of it being half a lifetime. And you spend your first 16 odd years under with relatively little autonomy anyway. In terms of usable adult life, he's had around a decade at most. And the last 15 years are kinda crappy anyway. If you look at things that way, then it's questionable whether this is any kinder than just putting him up against a wall and getting it over with.
• hullo 13y ago
  The article points out he is eligible for parole after a third of the sentence, and that he'll receive credit for time already served. They even do the math for us - he'll be eligible for release in 8 years.
  • rooshdi 13y ago
    Keyword: eligible. Nothing's guaranteed.
  • jellicle 13y ago
    Leonard Peltier is still in prison. It's extraordinarily unlikely that Manning will ever be paroled; the U.S. Government holds grudges, as Greenwald's spouse has so recently seen.
    • nthj 13y ago
      uhm, the UK government is the government that detained Greenwald's partner, not the Feds