[Newsbot]

Title: New Stanford/NYU study documents the civilian terror from Obama's drones | Glenn Greenwald | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk
Category: Uncle Sam
Posted By: DanSC
Date: 2012-09-25 10:09:10

[DanSC]

But hey, it's not like President Obama ever fired anyone.

[andyt]

Are you saying Romney would end the drone program? Has he said that? What would you have Obama do instead?

[DanSC]

andyt andyt:

Are you saying Romney would end the drone program? Has he said that? What would you have Obama do instead?

Mitt Romney has said he would continue the drone program as-is, so I won't be voting for him either.

As for what I would have Obama do instead? Not bombing every suspicious looking rock without something resembling intelligence just because drones are cheap and no American lives are at risk would be a good start. Not labeling civilians as enemy combatants would be another good thing.

[andyt]

In that case you'd basically be doing nothing, since those targets are not reachable by troops. I don't know if your characterization of what they're doing with the drones is fair, I doubt it. When the US invades a country there tends to be a good bit of collateral damage as well. Doubt if they could send Seal teams to do the job the drones are doing now, and then weren't there people crying that the bin Laden killing was also extra judicial.

[DanSC]

If only your "Well, what can you do?" attitude was around during the Iraq War andyt...

[andyt]

Not sure I follow. The Iraq war was pointless and just created Al Qaeda in Iraq. Took the focus off Afghanistan, to which initially there was a point. Were you fretting about women and children when NATO first invaded Astan?

If there's a good reason for war, you have to do it, and you're not going to come out clean, you will kill innocent people. No good reason for Iraq, but using drones to kill terror leaders seems like a good idea to me.

Is there anybody on the right who's speaking out against these drone strikes and offering a better alternative? For that matter, I'm sure there are plenty on the left who are speaking out against them, doubt if they have a better alternative to offer tho.

[Zipperfish]

DanSC DanSC:

If only your "Well, what can you do?" attitude was around during the Iraq War andyt...

Oh I think it was.

[BartSimpson]

It's just nice to see the anti-war crowd turning on Zero just in time for the election.