So I wandered over, as I occasionally do, to Red State. Among the conservative blogs, it alone (a) allows diaries and comments, and (b) generally has a pretty good level of discourse -- at least for Republicans.
But the current discourse over there is repulsive. It's so bad that a common theme is that we have no MORAL responsibility to provide any humane treatment to detainees, and in fact, to treat them humanely is an affront to our "honor and national dignity." Think I'm kidding? Read on.
From a comment by someone known as Centerfire at
Red State:
Treating the detainees with the kid gloves reserved for legitimate POWs, who abide by the recognized rules of warfare, in spite of the fact that these people have openly violated those rules as a matter of course, would constitute an affront to our honor and national dignity. It would be a moral catastrophe.
These individuals have through their own choices placed themselves completely outside the norms of civilization. We owe them nothing. Nothing. The fact that we treat them with even a bare modicum of human dignity, to which they are in no way entitled, is to our everlasting credit.
We have no moral obligation to provide them with central air. We have no moral obligation to refrain from chaining them to the floor. We have no moral obligation to keep them from peeing themselves. All of that went out the window when they adopted the tactics of pirates and assassins, and they knew it when they made that choice.
So the next time you read about torture and mistreatment of detainees at Gitmo, understand that they're doing it for YOU. Your honor and dignity as an American. Don't whine and complain, you pitiful liberal, they're doing it for YOU.
I think I'm losing my mind.
