What Is Worth Saying About the Killing of Bin Laden?
May 2nd, 2011 | 17 responses
This, for one:
I’d have strongly preferred that Osama bin Laden be captured rather than killed so that he could be tried for his crimes and punished in accordance with due process (and to obtain presumably ample intelligence). But if he in fact used force to resist capture, then the U.S. military was entitled to use force against him, the way American police routinely do against suspects who use violence to resist capture. But those are legalities and they will be ignored even more so than usual. The 9/11 attack was a heinous and wanton slaughter of thousands of innocent civilians, and it’s understandable that people are reacting with glee over the death of the person responsible for it. I personally don’t derive joy or an impulse to chant boastfully at the news that someone just got two bullets put in their skull — no matter who that someone is — but that reaction is inevitable: it’s the classic case of raucously cheering in a movie theater when the dastardly villain finally gets his due.
But beyond the emotional fulfillment that comes from vengeance and retributive justice, there are two points worth considering. The first is the question of what, if anything, is going to change as a result of the two bullets in Osama bin Laden’s head? Are we going to fight fewer wars or end the ones we’ve started? Are we going to see a restoration of some of the civil liberties which have been eroded at the alter of this scary Villain Mastermind? Is the War on Terror over? Are we Safer now?
It’s almost unfair to quote from this piece, because it’s all so important and so exceptional among the reams of reaction we’re seeing to bin Laden’s killing — most of it essentially variations on the same theme. If you want to know what that theme is, read Glenn’s article.
17 Responses to “What Is Worth Saying About the Killing of Bin Laden?”
I agree with his assessment.
BTW: “it’s going to be a huge boost to Obama’s re-election prospects and will be exploited for that end — than anything else.
I too favored capturing Osama alive, and that he should have faced trial, for purposes of extracting intelligence from him.
I’m surprised that Trump didn’t pick up on this (unless he is suddenly rational), OBL could very well be alive; where is the long-form death certificate? Secreted away in an undisclosed interrogation center deep in the Carpathian Mountains, he will give us the other higher ups in his network.
Quick, Donald send your divers to verify that there was no burial at sea.
[...] What Is Worth Saying About the Killing of Bin Laden? (themoderatevoice.com) [...]
To those who wanted OBL captured, I think you are forgetting that there was nowhere to take him and nowhere to try him. Gitmo is closed to new guests and, according to the majority of our elected representatives, there isn’t a prison in the US that can hold a terrorist. And our puny justice system is incapable of trying one.
I like our new digs, the new commenting system. Has anyone figured out where and how to log in? I am logged out in Google Chrome and couldn’t log back in. Fortunately I am still logged in in Firefox, but would prefer to use Google Chrome. If someone could tell me the file name of the cookie that would do.
We all wanted the guy captured, but presumed (at least those of us who are awake and aware have presumed) that he would be killed because he wouldn’t accept and would resist being taken alive.
“Deathers” a la D. Duck: “He wasn’t really killed. It’s a staged HOAX”
Kathy,
I respect Glenn’s concerns, but I also respect the joyous emotions that were expressed outside the White House and in other places. Everyone’s going to react differently to this. Personally, my feeling was not necessarily one of jubilation, but of relief. There is one less injustice that was unaccounted for in the world, and a big one. Justice is not an abstract concept, or a selfish one. It has real value. It is important that people around the world, both those who intend to do us harm and those who are our friends, know that we intend to stand on the side of justice, come what may.
That’s how I feel about it, but I can also understand how others would react with jubilation, and I would not tell them they should not have reacted in that way, as Glenn implies they shouldn’t have.
Glenn brings up the difficult questions concerning where we go from here. Those are valid questions, but they don’t negate the fact that this had to be done, as a matter of justice. Is anyone suggesting that we shouldn’t have taken him out when we had the chance, out of fear of a backlash or because it wouldn’t make us safer? I think even Glenn would not say that, and so a moment of satisfaction about this development is warranted, regardless of whatever concerns we might have about what could happen next.
Kathy, correct me if I’m wrong but I believe in the past you have been a voice of the more emotional side of various debates, in the face of others who prefer to present data and strictly logic-based arguments. I don’t mean to misrepresent your view, but I believe there have been multiple instances where you have essentially admitted to dismissing data when it conflicts with your own experiences. I believe in a recent thread you told me that I should not apply a “mathematical facts” to a certain issue. In this case Glenn is holding up facts and logic to express his disapproval of the “emotional script” as he sees it. I’d suggest that perhaps there is some value in that emotion in this case. I believe the emotion in this case is a natural reaction to a large and long-standing injustice that has been accounted for. There will be plenty of room and time for the Glenn Greenwald’s of the world to look at things with a more critical and logical eye, without stepping on the immediate emotional reactions of others.
And, as a side note, I can’t take any argument very seriously when it asserts that “[killing people] is something the U.S. has always done well and is one of the few things it still does well.” I’m not an American exceptionalist, but I certainly think that the U.S. does more than a few things quite well, despite its problems.
DLS,
I admit, it would be unlikely that we would have taken OBL alive. That being said, the idea that he could have lived a few more years, being shaven each day, and being forced to live on pork and vodka, that’s where I was aiming at.
“But if he in fact used force to resist capture”
Lets not forget that Osama was a battle hardened terrorist. He spent most of his life fighting against empires in the most desolate mountain regions in the world. You would have to be half delusional to think he would ever be captured alive. He would swallow a grenade and take some people with him before allowing himself to be captured. The author is an @$$ for questioning the SEAL team that risked their lived going in to take Osama.
Next, I also did not feel the need to jump for joy or going running through the streets, but I didn’t live in NY or DC on 911. I love how liberals pick and choose when they want to be understanding. I guess the author thinks looking down on these people and their “emotional responses” is and appropriate liberal reaction to when we aren’t hugging trees and talking about butterflies.
In the author’s world, a therapy session with bin laden would have been ideal.
Liberalism… progressivism… is luxury provided by moments like this. Without an economy and security, it cannot exist in our world.
I don’t know how to answer your question, AD. In fact, I’m not sure I even understand it. I mean, I understand the individual words, but I don’t understand the logic behind them.
I *can* say assertively that I have never advocated emotion over facts and data. I know what you’re referring to in a general sense, but your interpretation here is a serious distortion of my rhetorical style, both substantively and as I view my own style.
Second,I don’t understand the connection you’re making between arguing from real, lived experience (of course, you didn’t say that, but that’s what you’re interpreting as “emotions rather than facts”). I don’t understand your criticism of Glenn’s point of view. You have the right to disagree with it, obviously, but I don’t see him saying what you say he’s saying. He acknowledged that people are going to have strong emotions upon the death of Osama bin Laden, and nowhere did he ever say people should not be relieved, even glad that he’s dead. What he’s talking about is the kind of open celebration that we’re seeing in some quarters. That tweet he included from Emily Miller, for example, was repulsive.
I think the best statement about this was made by a young boy, about nine or ten years old, who was interviewed on CBS News yesterday. The segment was about how to explain what happened (to OBL) to your children — in particular, how to explain to your children why people are celebrating someone’s death. This young man said — and of course it’s better if you heard him say it, because his tone of voice was emphatic and a bit shocked: “You should NEVER celebrate when someone dies, even if he did wrong things to you.” That boy had more wisdom and humanity than all too many of the adults I know. I pray he doesn’t lose it.
Kathy
I didn’t “celebrate’ the death. I was relieved, yes, and I was extremely glad that the operation went well. BUT, most of all, I am happy that they got files, disks, computers, papers, that is the real victory and hopefully will lead to further crippling of AQ.
Kathy,
I don’t think most people who were celebrating would have made that tweet. I can’t say for sure, but it seems to me the primary reason people are celebrating is because justice was served, not primarily because he is dead or because of the manner of his death. I think most of them would still be celebrating if he had been captured. I think you are drawing too fine a line by saying that people can be glad but should not celebrate. Who are we to say what level of gladness warrants a celebration for other people, particularly when those people may have experienced the events of 9/11 differently, and perhaps more personally, than ourselves? If they feel the desire to celebrate, I don’t have a problem with it.
As for the tweet itself, I also find it distasteful, but that’s hardly remarkable. There are plenty of things people say on the internet that I find distasteful or even repulsive.
I didn’t mean to misrepresent your view regarding facts vs. emotion. I was not precise in my wording, but I meant data vs. experience. However, I’d say that one’s personal experience is linked with the emotions of those experiences, so the two are closely related. In this case, the people are reacting emotionally due to their experience on and after 9/11. Glenn’s point that there is still plenty to be concerned about misses that point.
PJB Fan, acknowledged and understood.
I had wondered if he actually might have given us intelligence had he been taken alive.
Well, that’s nice, AD. I do have a problem with it. And I have a right to say so here. I am getting the sense from what you have written that you think if I say here that I am repelled by the scenes of flag-waving, USA cheers, and celebration in the streets, that means I would walk up to a 9/11 survivor and scold them if they were celebrating or expressing joy. I understand the response, but that doesn’t mean I can’t also believe that expressions of joy and merry-making are inappropriate and even wrong, from my moral standpoint. I don’t think it has anything to do with OBL specifically. For me, it’s about death itself, about human mortality, and I don’t think it’s something to cheer. Again, quoting someone I heard on television who said it much more concisely than I have been able to, celebrating OBL’s death is akin to mocking mortality. That’s wrong. And I have just as much right to say so as others have a right to think I don’t have a right to say so.
As for people more directly affected by 9/11, their views and feelings are not monolithic, either. CBS News found plenty who, when asked, gave a more muted response. Not that they were sorry he had been killed, but I heard many say his death wouldn’t bring their loved ones back. I’m betting that a lot of 9/11 families feel similarly. It’s closure, but it doesn’t really change anything, and it doesn’t ease their pain.
As it happens, I do know someone who died in 9/11. He was a member of my synagogue, and although I was not particularly close to him, I attended his memorial service and I have spoken to his wife several times. She has always opposed the wars that began after 9/11 and continue unabated. I don’t know how she reacted to OBL’s death, but from what I know of her, I doubt she views it as an occasion for celebration.
ETA: I want to respond to this, too:
Well, I don’t think he missed that point at all. He simply expressed another way of looking at it. Here is something for you to think about, if you so choose: Both views can exist simultaneously, even for the same person. It is possible — easily possible — for Glenn, for me, and for others to understand on an emotional level why people who lost close family members in 9/11 might express open joy at OBL’s death; and at the same time to recognize that partying in the streets, or saying you want to see OBL’s bloody corpse, is inappropriate. Just because we *didn’t* lose someone close to us in 9/11 doesn’t mean our more dispassionate response is incorrect. And it also doesn’t mean that we do not have a mature, adult sense of what is right and compassionate and kind to say to the face of a specific individual who lost family in 9/11, and what is okay and even important to say in the comments thread of a political blog.
Kathy
Of course. When did I say you didn’t have the right to express your view? I’m simply disagreeing with you and we’re having a debate. That’s what this forum is for.
Understood. (One of things that irked me about the initial coverage is how the news anchors speculated on how the 9/11 families would feel, which was annoying both because they didn’t bother to ask them first, and also because it was assumed they would all feel the same). I didn’t say that there are only two buckets: 9/11 families and everyone else. Everyone, individually, experienced 9/11 differently, emotionally speaking. That means people are going to react differently now, and just because someone is reacting to it differently than I would, given my emotional reaction to 9/11, doesn’t make it wrong. I don’t agree with your premise that celebrating after someone dies (not directly because they are dead, but because the death was a means of serving justice) is necessarily “mocking mortality”. That is a moral question, so we can’t prove it either way. I’m just expressing my disagreement.
That was exactly my point when I said: “There will be plenty of room and time for the Glenn Greenwald’s of the world to look at things with a more critical and logical eye, without stepping on the immediate emotional reactions of others.”
(ETA: I can see how my comment I quoted could have been interpreted as “he shouldn’t be bring that up right now.” That was not my intent. I was trying to say that he can express his view without criticizing the celebrations.)
Like I said, Glenn’s concerns are valid and worth addressing. My objection is that he raises the issues in a manner that belittles and disapproves of the valid emotional response from others.
I guess we will have to agree to disagree on that interpretation.