I am great fan of Jon Stewart and I feel that he is the voice of sanity among the TV talk show hosts (sorry Bill O'Reilly). He talks perfect sense and let me state upfront that I am both liberal and conservative. Well you should be getting that from blog name. I think I will need another post explaining the title of my blog.
Yesterday on Daily Show Jon Stewart interviewed George Bush's speech writer and author of the book "Courting Disaster- How Obama is making America unsafe " Marc Theissen. I have never heard of this guy and as soon as I saw the book title I realized he was some right wing propagandist. Jon Stewart clearly was in a mood to destroy this guy and also set his record straight. On Jan11th, Jon interviewed John Yoo on torture laws of US, what constitutes as torture and where to draw the line. (Video). This was the first time I saw Jon was very incoherent in his arguments and John Yoo literally pwned Stewart. At the end of the video even Jon acknowledges that the interview was "pretty unsatisfying" and he was under-prepared. Right wing bloggers had field day criticizing Jon, calling him the liberal buffoon and Jon had to apologize to his liberal supporters.
Lets look into the backdrop of the interview. Liz Cheney's (daughter of Dick Cheney) Keep America Safe new ad demands to make public the details of all the lawyers who represented Guantanamo detainees which was even criticized by the right wing. Marc Theissen has defended this ad in his Washington Post column. In the column he asks Should a lawyer who advocates setting terrorists(alleged, they may be innocent as well) free, knowing they may go on to kill Americans, have any role in setting U.S. detention policy? This point seems ridiculous to me. Pakistan for example, it has been alleged that ISI has been arresting individuals from tribal areas and having them extradited to US as Taliban terrorists. This was the focus of battle between Chief Justice Ifthikar and then dictator of Pakistan Parvez Musharaff. The CJ has asked the govt. to provide the list of all missing persons and also to investigate cash for arrests "scheme" of ISI.
Marc Theissen does not seem to be as intelligent as John Yoo or atleast he too thought he can win over Stewart the same way Yoo has done it. Only this time Jon Stewart was well prepared. You have to see the videos
David Frum in his blog writes that Jon Stewart was not graceful in his interview and that he just did not let Marc to speak. I have to say that I tend to agree with David Frum on this. There were instances in the interview when I felt Jon was not letting him speak but overall I think Marc had no right to say that he was not allowed to speak. Marc was not putting forth any valid points and he was making the same arguments that the terrorists are going to kill thousands of Americans and US needs to torture them to get information from them.
Here I will be treading the middle path. I do not think terrorists deserve Miranda rights and they need to be tortured to get the information. I do not have answers on what constitutes as torture. Well if only I had then I would be in law school.
PS: an interesting term I came to know from the interview was waterboarding. This is way of torture and people subjected this kind of torture cannot survive it for more than 15 seconds. You can watch a video of it over here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LPubUCJv58
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
USA and Guns (Ohio State campus shoot out)
Today at 3.30am there was a shooting incident in our university. (Ohio State). Withing 3 hours after the incident took place students received 3 mail notifications about the incident. You can look here for the CNN's report about the same http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/03/09/ohio.state.shooting/index.html?hpt=T2
The first one:
At approximately 3:30 a.m. today Ohio State's emergency dispatch received a 911 call indicating that a shooting had occurred at the OSU Maintenance Building, 2000 Tuttle Park Place.
Upon arrival, officers confirmed a shooting involving three University employees, none of which were students. One employee is dead. The other two have been transported to the hospital. The investigation is continuing and no names have been released pending notification of family.
The site location has been secured and there are some traffic restrictions around the building. The suspect is in custody.
The university continues normal operations. Classes will be held and normal work schedules are in effect.
The second one:
Update on Campus Shooting
The safety and well-being of our students, faculty and staff is our highest priority. University officials remain diligent in maintaining a secure environment for all campus visitors.
Today’s shooting on campus involved an employee in the Facilities, Operations, and Development department in a campus maintenance building. Campus police responded to the 911 call immediately and secured the area. At no time were any students in danger, and no students were involved in the incident.
The suspect and the two victims were all Ohio State employees. Counselors are available for the affected staff. The investigation is continuing and no names have been released pending notification of family.
The third one : (there were two other mails. One from Gordon Gee expressing his condolences to the families)
University police continue to investigate campus shooting
University Police continue to investigate this morning’s shooting and do not plan any further statements today. Public officials want to restate that the safety and well-being of students, faculty, and staff are their highest priorities, and ask for your continued support. Counselors are available to provide counseling and consultation to currently enrolled undergraduate and graduate students and those related to the incident. Contact 292-5766 or visit: http://www.ccs.ohio-state.edu/
If we put the incident aside for a moment, the above mail had me in splits. Having counselors for the affected employees and their families is perfectly understandable. But why would they have counselors for undergrad and grad students who in no way were affected. It made no sense to me. I am no expert at US laws but here I guess I can sue the university that this particular shooting incident induced fear in me which in turn affected my performance in finals (have finals from 15th Mar) due to which my GPA plummeted and because of which I could not get a job in US. (I know its crazy. Don't come to any conclusion about me reading this).
Back to main topic, I do not understand the gun culture of USA. I like this country, well as a matter of fact I love this country. This country values human life. We can see that everywhere. They don't let buses overcrowd, buildings will have to adhere to strict regulations, police and para medics are very swift in their response. Everything is so good but this country lets every tom dick and harry carry a gun. Today OSU would not have lost two of its employees if only procuring a gun would not have been that easy for the shooter. Last month in a similar incident at U of Alabama, 3 faculty paid the price. There the suspect was denied tenure. (worse she was Harvard graduate). Here the shooter had poor performance evaluation.
There have been string of shooting incidents across US universities over the last two years. Virginia Tech, LSU where couple of Indian students died. Another incident in New York where one south east Asian started firing at people in immigration office, last week one at Pentagon, Fort Hood shootout (atleast here the shooter was in army, so nothing can be done there).
People talk of second amendment and about rights to carry a gun. But who has given them the right to take a life. During the 2008 presidential election, I saw ads by National Rifle Association of America that Obama would be banning the guns once he becomes the President. There was this site called GunBanObama where people can vote against it. I thought atleast there is one reason to vote Obama to presidency. Even after one year of his presidency he hasn't taken any steps or it doesn't look like there would be any bill soon in US congress. Well even with majority in Congress he could not pass the health care reform bill. Now that democrats are no longer in majority I doubt either of the bills getting passed.
The first one:
At approximately 3:30 a.m. today Ohio State's emergency dispatch received a 911 call indicating that a shooting had occurred at the OSU Maintenance Building, 2000 Tuttle Park Place.
Upon arrival, officers confirmed a shooting involving three University employees, none of which were students. One employee is dead. The other two have been transported to the hospital. The investigation is continuing and no names have been released pending notification of family.
The site location has been secured and there are some traffic restrictions around the building. The suspect is in custody.
The university continues normal operations. Classes will be held and normal work schedules are in effect.
The second one:
Update on Campus Shooting
The safety and well-being of our students, faculty and staff is our highest priority. University officials remain diligent in maintaining a secure environment for all campus visitors.
Today’s shooting on campus involved an employee in the Facilities, Operations, and Development department in a campus maintenance building. Campus police responded to the 911 call immediately and secured the area. At no time were any students in danger, and no students were involved in the incident.
The suspect and the two victims were all Ohio State employees. Counselors are available for the affected staff. The investigation is continuing and no names have been released pending notification of family.
The third one : (there were two other mails. One from Gordon Gee expressing his condolences to the families)
University police continue to investigate campus shooting
University Police continue to investigate this morning’s shooting and do not plan any further statements today. Public officials want to restate that the safety and well-being of students, faculty, and staff are their highest priorities, and ask for your continued support. Counselors are available to provide counseling and consultation to currently enrolled undergraduate and graduate students and those related to the incident. Contact 292-5766 or visit: http://www.ccs.ohio-state.edu/
If we put the incident aside for a moment, the above mail had me in splits. Having counselors for the affected employees and their families is perfectly understandable. But why would they have counselors for undergrad and grad students who in no way were affected. It made no sense to me. I am no expert at US laws but here I guess I can sue the university that this particular shooting incident induced fear in me which in turn affected my performance in finals (have finals from 15th Mar) due to which my GPA plummeted and because of which I could not get a job in US. (I know its crazy. Don't come to any conclusion about me reading this).
Back to main topic, I do not understand the gun culture of USA. I like this country, well as a matter of fact I love this country. This country values human life. We can see that everywhere. They don't let buses overcrowd, buildings will have to adhere to strict regulations, police and para medics are very swift in their response. Everything is so good but this country lets every tom dick and harry carry a gun. Today OSU would not have lost two of its employees if only procuring a gun would not have been that easy for the shooter. Last month in a similar incident at U of Alabama, 3 faculty paid the price. There the suspect was denied tenure. (worse she was Harvard graduate). Here the shooter had poor performance evaluation.
There have been string of shooting incidents across US universities over the last two years. Virginia Tech, LSU where couple of Indian students died. Another incident in New York where one south east Asian started firing at people in immigration office, last week one at Pentagon, Fort Hood shootout (atleast here the shooter was in army, so nothing can be done there).
People talk of second amendment and about rights to carry a gun. But who has given them the right to take a life. During the 2008 presidential election, I saw ads by National Rifle Association of America that Obama would be banning the guns once he becomes the President. There was this site called GunBanObama where people can vote against it. I thought atleast there is one reason to vote Obama to presidency. Even after one year of his presidency he hasn't taken any steps or it doesn't look like there would be any bill soon in US congress. Well even with majority in Congress he could not pass the health care reform bill. Now that democrats are no longer in majority I doubt either of the bills getting passed.
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