The NY Times did one of those things they’re so fond of: take an unscientific and inadequate sample of a subpopulation of voters, and ask them what they think of a recent policy decision. This time, they asked 6 Republicans what they think of bombing Venezualan boats. I’m not sure what the point is, except to let us know that Republicans are assholes.
Edward Padron, 67, thinks in principle that killing people in boats is OK, but killing survivors is wrong.
“I don’t agree with the second shot,” Mr. Padron said. “I do agree with them being stopped.”
Warning: Mr Padron holds the moral high ground in this group. It’s all downhill from there.
Erwin McKone, 55, has reservations about killing low-level guys in boats.
“If we were serious about the cartels, we would probably try to cut off the head of the snake,” he said, speculating that many of those who have been killed are “poor Venezuelans that see this as an opportunity to feed their families.”
I suspect he’d be fine if we just openly declared war on Venezuela.
Charles Vaughters, 25, favors killing alleged drug traffickers without much evidence.
“Drug traffickers are criminals who rape, murder and kill people, and they are dedicated to getting the product to Americans,” Mr. Vaughters said. “They don’t care if it harms Americans. I don’t think we should be feeling much sympathy.”
Rachel Uecker, 53, has a pragmatic perspective.
“If we take them to the courts, we’re going to have to pay for that and support them in prison,” she said. “If they’re bringing drugs into our country, I don’t care who gets rid of them.”
Brian Kozlowski, 41, wants more violence.
Brian D. Kozlowski, who is a strong Trump supporter, said the U.S. military should be used “more proactively to keep Americans safe.” He blamed the Biden administration for what he described as not doing enough to stop the flow of illegal drugs into the country.
He’s a lawyer. Let’s get rid of that troubling concept of presumed innocence.
But my very favorite example of twisted moral reasoning comes from Naomi Villalba (no age given), who cites the Bible as justification.
Ms. Villalba said the second strike was also justified, and she does not believe the United States is indiscriminately targeting boats.
“They should have done that strike regardless,” she said. “Every human being does have value, but if you’re caught up in something that’s very detrimental to society, I think that you should die.”
She compared these strikes to a story in the Bible, when Jesus healed someone on a Sunday, contradicting religious rules that forbid work on that day. Some laws are worth breaking for the betterment of mankind, she said, just like the biblical story was trying to show.
Well, yeah. If Jesus could break one of the ten commandments to heal someone, then Pete Hegseth can also break one of the commandments to murder two people clinging to wreckage in the ocean. Same thing. Every human being does have value, but….
Does being caught up in something detrimental to society also include evangelical Christianity and MAGA?
I take back my disparagement of the NY Times’ methods of taking the pulse of the country. I did learn something after all.
These are the same people who will be celebrating the Prince of Peace in a few weeks….
That’s what Ken Ham said so you’re in good company. Ha!
https://youtu.be/9bB0RCLsWhE
A minor quibble unrelated to the point being made here. I’m not a Christian or Jew, but even I know that this is wrong : Ms. Villalba said, “. . . when Jesus healed someone on a Sunday,, contradicting religious rules that forbid work on that day. . .”
That would’ve been the Jewish sabbath, Friday-Saturday, not the Christian Sunday, as Christianity did not yet exist. She probably would be shocked to learn that Jesus wasn’t a Christian and didn’t give a rat’s ass about the Gentiles, despite what the gospel writers claimed.
This NY Times article seems to be rage bait.
I’m sure if you interviewed a few MAGA Republicans, you could easily find some that think it is OK to kill me with a drone launched from a Navy ship.
Here is a recent poll of Americans that isn’t so narrowly based.
.1. It is 53% to 47% don’t approve of the boat attacks. 75% think the US should make sure the boats are carrying drugs before attacking them.
(If we stop them and search them and find drugs, then why bother attacking them? We could just arrest them like we do every day anyway.)
.2. A majority — 70 percent — of respondents said that they would oppose the U.S. taking military action against Venezuela.
Well, there is this at least.
A majority of people still remember Vietnam and Iraq.
So, yeah, a significant minority of US people support mindless cruelty, violence, and murder.
We already knew this long ago though.
Why is this news?
One of the themes and tools of the current MAGAs and Trump is performative cruelty.
They really like and get off on seeing cruelty.
This must be why the Gladiator games in ancient Rome were so popular.
.1. ICE/BP are just brutal thugs who go around using excessive force to arrest suspects, many of which are innocent legal residents or US citizens.
We don’t need this to enforce our immigration laws.
We’ve been enforcing our immigration laws for a century without this.
This isn’t immigration law enforcement and the real target is the American people. It’s right wingnut terror by terrorists.
.2. The murderous boat strikes in the Caribbean.
It’s not necessary either.
The US Coast Guard stops and searches dozens of boats every day without killing everyone on them first.
.3. Taking away the Food Stamps and medical care from the most vulnerable parts of the population.
Yeah, people will suffer and die.
They don’t care.
.4. The antivaxxers have already killed more than a few children with measles and whooping cough. They will kill more.
They don’t care if kids die.
.5. Calling out the National Guard and the US Army to occupy our cities. For no real reason.
They really want to just provoke some sort of incident and have the soldiers kill a few or a few dozen Americans.
They need an excuse to fire into a crowd of people and leave a pile of dead bodies.
If anyone does things that are “very detrimental to society” it’s certainly the POTUS. How much more healthcare is he going to take away from people? How many tens of millions are going to die because of his aid cuts? What about the wreckage his climate policy turns our planet into?
But I’m still against killing Donald Trump (and against the death penalty in general). I’m sorry, dear Republicans, if that, coming from an atheist, sounds too “Christian” to you, and I know you’ll never forgive it…
John Watts @ #3 — “Jesus…didn’t give a rat’s ass about the Gentiles, despite what the gospel writers claimed.” Evidence? I’m not sure what the basis for your claim is. Biases about the parochial nature of Judean culture at the time? That may not be well founded because, as I have read, one of the larger conflicts going on in Judea from at least the 3rd century BCE on was between traditional Judaists and Hellenized Judaists. Not all people living in Judea during the time were opposed to Hellenization, and later Romanization. Herod and his clan had no problem with Gentiles, and probably made a tidy sum off of pilgrims to his temple.
PZ: From what you cited here, the guy saying we should go after the leaders rather than the grunts is the one with any moral ground.
The guy you quote as having misgivings about the second strike is OK with the idea of a military solution that will of course have high civilian casualties.
I dunno, it feels like the nominal opposition to this invasion of Venezuela hinges on a technicality. Hegseth is out, empty suit who does the same shit Hegseth would have done is in. I don’t expect to see any more than a fig leaf of opposition in the halls of power, but I am uncomfortable with the fact that there isn’t fiercer opposition to this war among ordinary Americans.
Maybe the propaganda works? Even on this site’s comment section it seems to be taken as a given that Americans will be greeted as liberators (I see no reason to think so — rather the opposite seems likely). The media is practically salivating over the prospect of finally getting rid of these pesky leftist governments, but they’ve always been saying that. It’s their job to say so.
Anti-war sentiment still seems to be in the doldrums. 70% opposition according to raven sounds nice, but it’s not the record-breaking protests we saw against Dubya’s Iraq 2.0, nor against Israel’s genocide in Gaza.
Sorry, but “Republican Jesus” lines up perfectly with they way Christians have behaved for two millennia. .
Stop pretending that there was this age of altruistic and nonviolent Christians that was only usurped by Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson in the 70s. They’ve ALWAYS been like this.
Oh, and before you bring up the Gospels or Acts and the supposedly hippie-dippy nature of Jesus and his posse, remember the fucking source! Of course their cult manual would paint early Christians in a benevolent light.
These xtian terrorist magats believe malicious, unproven, rumors from the murderous, lying, magat war fighter ahole without any proof or due process. In the past, IF the boat was proven to carry drugs they would be seized, the people arrested. They have made this country one of war crimes, just like putin and netanyahoo.
This dishonest propaganda is why young people hate and distrust the mainstream media, as do I.
And they wonder why people are ditching Christianity now more than ever.
Celebrating Charlie Kirk getting killed — woe to anyone who celebrates his death
Celebrating Kashoggi and the fishermen getting killed — silence.
The hypocrisy is strong here.
To what alleged invasion do you intend to refer, beholderr?
(Best if you anchored your beliefs in reality)
Not even slightly.
Making up shit to sustain your fantasies is kinda pathetic.
“Making up s*** to sustain your fantasies is kinda pathetic.”
Just like creationists.
Matthew’s Jesus spent a chapter in that book saying ya gotta be even more hardcore at law-abiding than the Pharisees: just looking at someone wrong is a death penalty offense + Hell (Mt5:27-28, Lev20:10). You better hack off body parts just to be safe…
Buuut John’s Jesus wasn’t interested in enforcing the stoning (Jn8:8-11), no matter how blatant the offense, ignoring accusers until they leave. Oh wait, hey, that passage, “Let he who is without sin”, was a forgery inserted in later centuries.
Dan McClellan – One of the most quoted Bible verses is a forgery (1:46)
Dan McClellan – How Christians determine what OT laws remain in force (11:03)
John Watts@3
Actually, the gospel writers made quite clear what Jesus thought of the Gentiles (Matthew 15):
This ain’t a survey:
Can we fire missiles at people tax dodgers, or predatory health insurance schemes? I think a lot of people would support that.
Missiles are kinda pricey, gijoel.
Not like they generate value or income, no?
Their very purpose is to blow up.
Made expressly to be destroy and damage the adjacent area.
(You imagine you are being sarcastic, but you are swimming in it thereby. Repudiate, don’t concede!_
@17.ahcuah : OTOH, there’s the parable of the Samaritan – and as Asimov pointed out in an essay ‘Lost in Non-Translation’ – we miss the whole point of that parable by not knowing that the Samaritans were absolutely hated by the Judeans and are in fact a separate ethnic group of people they saw as heretical not like we see them as a word for exemplars of charirty and kindness.
The whole point was that loathed outsiders could be good people whereas those from within the in-group in this case the ancient Judaeans, people in high authority and respect can be hypocritical and, well, useless and unhelpful towards those who are suffering and in great need. Oh and Jesus never called the Samaritan good apparently simply the Samaritan in that parable.
Asimov also noted simlarly that the term Moabite in the story of Ruth and Boaz :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_(biblical_figure) )
We miss the entire point of the story by not understanding how much the Israelites hated the Moabites** and that Ruth belonged to a despised group that was seen as a threat and inferiror to them. For modern Israelis think of Ruth and the Samaritan as Palestinians.
Source : page 270,“Lost in Non-Translation” essay, Magic’ anthology, Isaac Asimov, Voyager,1997.
So the bibnlcal Jesus did see even demonised minoritity groups of his time as equal “neighbours” in atleats that account of the mythology.
.* See : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samaritans
.** See : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moab