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[smeeprocket]

The point is, it was an attack on a military base, and we responded by nuking a civilian city.

edit: two, actually.

Japan would have fought to the last. They were preparing for just that when the bombings happened.

And as Bohandas pointed out, yes, other bombings were equal or worse. The firebombing campaign on Japan had average kill numbers above that of the nukes, not that anybody ever talks about that. The main value of the nukes was shock and awe.

Yea their soldiers would have fought our soldiers. Nothing justifies what we did. You can't make dropping nukes on civilians acceptable.

[smeeprocket]

So, to make things better we should gang up on the conservatives, neoconservtives in particular? That sounds like what you're saying rolan7.

More like we need to vote them out. We need to refuse to deal with intimidation and abhorrent behavior on there part. Neo-cons are a blight. This racism they have been perpetuating, and the anti-woman sentiment, is so very dangerous.

[Baffler]

The point is, it was an attack on a military base, and we responded by nuking a civilian city.

edit: two, actually.

Japan would have fought to the last. They were preparing for just that when the bombings happened.

And as Bohandas pointed out, yes, other bombings were equal or worse. The firebombing campaign on Japan had average kill numbers above that of the nukes, not that anybody ever talks about that. The main value of the nukes was shock and awe.

Yea their soldiers would have fought our soldiers. Nothing justifies what we did. You can't make dropping nukes on civilians acceptable.

I'm sure you're aware then of what happened to POW's and civilians in the Philippines? Or what absolutely deserves the moniker "Rape of Nanking?" Japan was just as ambitious and almost as brutal as their allies in Nazi Germany. They weren't going to surrender. The other option was to invade Japan and kill even more civilians, or starve them out with the same effects.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

The point is, it was an attack on a military base, and we responded by nuking a civilian city.

edit: two, actually.

Japan would have fought to the last. They were preparing for just that when the bombings happened.

And as Bohandas pointed out, yes, other bombings were equal or worse. The firebombing campaign on Japan had average kill numbers above that of the nukes, not that anybody ever talks about that. The main value of the nukes was shock and awe.

Yea their soldiers would have fought our soldiers. Nothing justifies what we did. You can't make dropping nukes on civilians acceptable.

Firstly, Japan was attempting to mass arm their civilians for a ceaseless conflict, but that's an aside. There is no difference between killing a person by destroying all their society's mechanisms and blowing them up. War will always kill civilians. That is its nature. There is no moral war. You can pretend to respect your enemy, give them rights and privileges, and just go on and on trying to fight them forever because you handed them the tools to their own persistence. Or you can crush them completely, mercilessly, and reshape them in your own image. It doesn't really matter which. They are ethically equivalent.

[smeeprocket]

The point is, it was an attack on a military base, and we responded by nuking a civilian city.

edit: two, actually.

Japan would have fought to the last. They were preparing for just that when the bombings happened.

And as Bohandas pointed out, yes, other bombings were equal or worse. The firebombing campaign on Japan had average kill numbers above that of the nukes, not that anybody ever talks about that. The main value of the nukes was shock and awe.

Yea their soldiers would have fought our soldiers. Nothing justifies what we did. You can't make dropping nukes on civilians acceptable.

I'm sure you're aware then of what happened to POW's and civilians in the Philippines? Or what absolutely deserves the moniker "Rape of Nanking?" Japan was just as ambitious and almost as brutal as their allies in Nazi Germany. They weren't going to surrender. The other option was to invade Japan and kill even more civilians, or starve them out with the same effects.

The Rape of Nan-King was horrific. But that doesn't justify US horrors. There just isn't any justification you can make for dropping a nuke on innocent people. It is fundamentally wrong in the same way torture is. EVEN if it achieves your goal, you have failed.

I advise watching white light, black rain to really see what happened.

[Baffler]

Alright. This is a bit far removed from the problems of the American justice system anyway.

[smeeprocket]

The point is, it was an attack on a military base, and we responded by nuking a civilian city.

edit: two, actually.

Japan would have fought to the last. They were preparing for just that when the bombings happened.

And as Bohandas pointed out, yes, other bombings were equal or worse. The firebombing campaign on Japan had average kill numbers above that of the nukes, not that anybody ever talks about that. The main value of the nukes was shock and awe.

Yea their soldiers would have fought our soldiers. Nothing justifies what we did. You can't make dropping nukes on civilians acceptable.

Firstly, Japan was attempting to mass arm their civilians for a ceaseless conflict, but that's an aside. There is no difference between killing a person by destroying all their society's mechanisms and blowing them up. War will always kill civilians. That is its nature. There is no moral war. You can pretend to respect your enemy, give them rights and privileges, and just go on and on trying to fight them forever because you handed them the tools to their own persistence. Or you can crush them completely, mercilessly, and reshape them in your own image. It doesn't really matter which. They are ethically equivalent.

I disagree with this on all levels. "collateral damage" is never an acceptable option.

Then we had our scientist go over there and observe the effects. Not treat them, just watch and see what happened to all of them.

[SalmonGod]

Going to echo the sentiment that shit needs to hit the fan and fall to pieces one way or another before anything will get better.  I don't think it has to be losing a war on home turf.  But it needs to be something that feels catastrophic and effects everybody.

I've had the sense for many years that America just became mentally ill after WW2.  The "Greatest Generation" that fought the war went on to create a political atmosphere that was obsessed with control and global military/economic dominance.  Then they spawned the baby boomers, who can really just be characterized as obnoxious spoiled reactionary brats.  If the Greatest are the people who turned America into the world police, then the boomers are your stereotypical cop's kid.

We've been spoiled and deluded by a long period of superpower status and material affluence, and the origin and nature of that status has been whitewashed by authorities for decades, while everyone else has been making honest efforts to mature.

Yeah no.  Most of our current political problems are due to poverty, and a shrinking middle class.  We aren't fat, we're starving.  What we need is better education and infrastructure, not more poverty or another enemy to blame everything on.  We've *had* war all this time, and it's just draining our resources and enriching profiteers.  The worse things get, the more desperate people throw their lot in with the conservatives.  Promise of riches for hard work, plenty of people to blame for everything, and old fashioned "safe" values like keeping women in kitchens.  These things appeal to people who have lost everything, ironically due to Neocon schemes.

There's nothing fundamentally wrong with America, or any of its ethnic or cultural groups.  It's the neo-conservative ideology.  They *love* it when poor whites and poor blacks blame each other for everything.  They're the ones who profit over illegal immigration, that's why they want to keep it illegal - meanwhile poor white workers blame the poor Mexican workers for stealing all the jobs.

See?  The 99% keep fighting *each other*, and the neo-cons win every time.

I wasn't saying anything counter to this, and further back I even said that our biggest obstacle to change is the way our politics and media successfully divide us.

The sentiment I think you were missing is that the downward spiral you are describing isn't going to alter course until it hits some bottom level that serves as a massive wake-up call.  You described this downward spiral yourself.  People are tricked into voting against their own interests by their own desperations, which increases their desperation and so on.  We can't count on better education and infrastructure to break the cycle, because those things can't be obtained without breaking the cycle.

[Helgoland]

I disagree with this on all levels. "collateral damage" is never an acceptable option.

Then we had our scientist go over there and observe the effects. Not treat them, just watch and see what happened to all of them.

Well, an invasion would've killed even more civilians, so the nukes were the arguably more ethical choice... Especially considering that the long-term effects of exposure to radiation were ill-understood at the time.

[Rolan7]

So, to make things better we should gang up on the conservatives, neoconservtives in particular? That sounds like what you're saying rolan7.

More like we need to vote them out. We need to refuse to deal with intimidation and abhorrent behavior on there part. Neo-cons are a blight. This racism they have been perpetuating, and the anti-woman sentiment, is so very dangerous.

Their pet politicians in most cases, but yeah.  It's not the hard-working Americans they swindled with promises of fair pay and victory over invented enemies.  It's the subset of the 1% who has been *really effectively* increasing the income gap and destroying the middle class.  For decades really, but most prominently since 9/11.

SalmonGod: Ah, fair enough.  I'm more optimistic, but I'm not sure I'm justified in that.

[Bohandas]

The point is, it was an attack on a military base, and we responded by nuking a civilian city.

edit: two, actually.

Japan would have fought to the last. They were preparing for just that when the bombings happened.

I think that's actually why a lot of people don't like the nukes, because they represent a clear victory of technology over the outmoded ideals of valor and honorable combat. The same goes for why so many people seem to dislike drones and missiles.

[smjjames]

The point is, it was an attack on a military base, and we responded by nuking a civilian city.

edit: two, actually.

Japan would have fought to the last. They were preparing for just that when the bombings happened.

And as Bohandas pointed out, yes, other bombings were equal or worse. The firebombing campaign on Japan had average kill numbers above that of the nukes, not that anybody ever talks about that. The main value of the nukes was shock and awe.

Yea their soldiers would have fought our soldiers. Nothing justifies what we did. You can't make dropping nukes on civilians acceptable.

Firstly, Japan was attempting to mass arm their civilians for a ceaseless conflict, but that's an aside. There is no difference between killing a person by destroying all their society's mechanisms and blowing them up. War will always kill civilians. That is its nature. There is no moral war. You can pretend to respect your enemy, give them rights and privileges, and just go on and on trying to fight them forever because you handed them the tools to their own persistence. Or you can crush them completely, mercilessly, and reshape them in your own image. It doesn't really matter which. They are ethically equivalent.

I disagree with this on all levels. "collateral damage" is never an acceptable option.

Then we had our scientist go over there and observe the effects. Not treat them, just watch and see what happened to all of them.

To be fair, the exact effects were unknown (or just not well understood) at the time and they had no time to do more tests.

[smeeprocket]

I disagree with this on all levels. "collateral damage" is never an acceptable option.

Then we had our scientist go over there and observe the effects. Not treat them, just watch and see what happened to all of them.

Well, an invasion would've killed even more civilians, so the nukes were the arguably more ethical choice... Especially considering that the long-term effects of exposure to radiation were ill-understood at the time.

That's an assumption we really can't prove because that is not the path the US took. But yea, this is far removed from the original topic.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

"collateral damage" is never an acceptable option.

Collateral damage is a smokescreen. The distinction between solider and civilian is essentially a lie, and all attempts at it have manged exactly nothing besides the sanctimonious delusion that some wars are a righteous endeavor.

Then we had our scientist go over there and observe the effects. Not treat them, just watch and see what happened to all of them.

The precise effects of nukes on human beings were not particularly known, but whatever. Their motives don't matter.

[Descan]

Honestly, if the point was psychological, the Amero's could have nuked a purely military area, or even an empty field of some kind. Didn't HAVE to nuke a city.

Might not have had the same emotional effect, but if it went "field" and then "military base" along with wording to the effect "We'll keep ramping up until you surrender," I doubt it'd have taken much more...