Meanwhile the President of the USA can still end all human civilization by pressing a button.

[originalpckelly]

It's nice how we forgot about that, isn't it?

Nukes make torture look like a vacation from the searing pain of being burned alive, if you live that long, by an H-Bomb exploding.

Is it really plausible to say we want or still have checks and balances on an office that can unleash such destruction on the world?

[Radical Activist]

1. Thanks for the reminder.

I almost felt good about things for a minute there. :spank:

[originalpckelly]

3. The nuclear sword of Damocles still hangs over us all, and they're moving it closer to our necks:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29691183

[Cirque du So-What]

2. Doesn't even make my Top-10 list of worrisome things

Not now, anyway. Couple months ago, different story.

[originalpckelly]

4. Really:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29691183

[BeFree]

5. Thank Gawd for GWB

He coulda done it, ya know? And you know he thought about it.

You know he sat there and looked at that red button thinking how easy it would be. Maybe Cheney stopped him?

Did ya ever think about that? Thank Gawd for Cheney, too?

[babylonsister]

6. And good morning to you, too. I really wouldn't worry that

the President is going to nuke everyone. If he had plans to do so, he wouldn't be working so hard. You'd be dead 1/21.

[originalpckelly]

7. That's not my point.

It is the ultimate form of dictatorship to even have the power to do that.

[babylonsister]

9. Well, thank goodness you think you had a point.

And now he's dictator. Gotcha.

[originalpckelly]

11. And the power to destroy the world isn't anything?

I shouldn't be offended by the fact that the President of the United States has a little suitcase follow him wherever he goes that could kill more people than Hitler or Stalin combined, right?

And I shouldn't worry about Russia?

Or maybe I should:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29691183

[babylonsister]

12. You're going to be offended regardless. I don't quite see a

solution, do you?

[originalpckelly]

14. Yes, I do see a solution, it's called ending the nuclear BS once and for all.

And not with a boom, but with a satellite flyover of the old rockets laid out in a bone yard for all of humanity to see just how incapable the world is of destroying itself.

[frogcycle]

32. ok, you go tackle that windmill. n/t

[originalpckelly]

37. Yes, as we all know an ICBM is really not at all capable of killing people...

it's really quite harmless.

[cali]

8. uh, so can a dozen other people on this planet- and frankly Pakistan's nukes

concern me far more.

[originalpckelly]

10. Pakistan doesn't bother me...

as I understand it, they don't have enough nukes at their disposal to destroy the world several times over. WE AND THE RUSSIANS DO:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29691183

[cali]

13. Pakistan's nukes are much more vulnerable to

falling in the hands of people who would use them than American nukes, and as I understand it they have more than enough nukes to destroy a honking big part of the world. They're are lots of things to worry about right now; Obama using nukes is not one of them.

[originalpckelly]

15. Obama using nukes is less of the problem...

the fact that he would have to if the Russians did would be the problem here. And the Russians are starting to act like they're interested in restarted that whole cold war thing:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29691183

Even if we can shoot down the Bears, we can't shoot down all their ICBMs. The Bears show that something is going on in that country, something terrifying.

[tekisui]

34. Pakistan has 60, and they run the risk

of becoming a failed state with theocrats in charge of the nukes. That is plenty of nukes to start a reaction that could end civilization.

[Silent3]

16. I know it's not the kind of check you're looking for...

...but there is one kind of check against a President starting an all-out nuclear war: The President himself could easily die in such a war, and if he survived, he would be very unlikely to find the aftermath very pleasant to live with. This doesn't protect us against a President who's truly gone insane, but even for a selfish and immoral President has at least a few marbles left, self-interest and desire for power recommend strongly against setting off the end of human civilization.

What makes the use of torture and secret prisons and unilaterally-decided indefinite detention powers which are more tempting for a President to abuse than nuclear launch codes is that the President can remain quite comfortable and safely distanced from the results of abusing these powers.

[originalpckelly]

18. True, and not true.

The fact that our President has all that power means that it's a hell of a lot easier to get the power to torture. The command/power structure that allows him to carry around a suitcase that can kill the whole world is the same command/power structure that allows a President to export people for torture.

[AllentownJake]

20. You do realize if Nukes disappeared tommorow

We still have a conventional Navy and airforce that can reduce any country in the world infrastructure back to the 1700s in a few days on the order of the President. Sending that country into chaos for decades.

Just saying.

[originalpckelly]

21. And we should destroy that bullshit too.

But the nukes make it thousands of times easier.

[AllentownJake]

23. Really?

Which one have we used for the past 60 years?

If nukes were really the "easier" solution you would think that we would project our power in the world more with them than the conventional forces.

Do me a favor, turn off the Imagine song. It's pretty and nice but it is Utopian and doesn't fit well to the nature of man.

[originalpckelly]

25. Actually, I tend to think it's human nature to be greedy and self-interested...

and it's in everyone's self-interest to destroy this weapons once and for all, or at least reduce them to the point where they could only take out part of the world.

[AllentownJake]

28. Not often people give up power voluntarily

and like I said in the other post thread...President Obama is doing the slow process thing you are calling for. He told Gates no to modernizing the Nuclear Arsenal and he's looking to engage the Russians when trust is re-established on more arms reduction talks.

[originalpckelly]

29. It's what should be done...

and we all have to hold his feet to the fire. He's got two little girls, does he want to those girls grow up in a world that can still blow itself up so easily? I doubt it.

[AllentownJake]

31. Well he told Gates

No on a new modern Nuclear Arsenal and he's engaging the Russians behind the scenes. Is there any more he should be doing?

[Silent3]

35. Military response often has to be fast response...

...so it's much harder to implement strong checks on power there. The details of how a prisoner is handled, how he's treated, when he gets to have a trial, etc., can and should be handled with greater deliberation because there's no reasonable excuse for hurried unilateral action for these things.

[AllentownJake]

17. and I'm sure you have a simple black and white solution for the nuclear arms problem in the world

If you do, spare me. Simple black and white solutions is what I heard for 8 years.

President Obama is working on new arms control treaties...right now he's kind of tied up with the economic end of the world.

[originalpckelly]

19. I do: destroy the nukes.

When the USA signed and complied with its last arms reduction treaty, it laid the destroyed B-52s out in an airplane boneyard with their wings severed so that the Russian satellites could fly overhead to be sure that the planes were gone.

We can do the same thing with ICBMs, beyond the ones that have been taken out already.

And we can exchange inspectors to ensure each side has destroyed its nukes.

[AllentownJake]

22. Not going to work

First of all you don't have the political support to do that.

Second of all, despite what you may believe about human nature, the fact that we can destroy each other at any given moment is a huge incentive for our leaders to talk to each other.

Thirdly, if your solution to a problem that has been around for 60 years can be explained easily to a third grader...its probably not a good solution.

[originalpckelly]

24. What? Do you not remember the '80s?

What about all the arm reduction treaties and stuff where the eliminated some of the weapons?

It's not impossible, it's been done before, and it can be done again.

[AllentownJake]

26. You will be able to reduce arsenals

We really don't have the need to blow up the world 7 times.

Just so you know President Obama has rejected Gate's plan of modernizing our nuclear arsenal.

However, call me crazy I'd like to keep a few ICBMs and our aircraft carriers and airforce in case Russia or China go imperialist so we have a stick to shake at them.

I also would like to keep the rest of our navy to protect the shipping lanes from piracy.

[originalpckelly]

27. Why do we have the shipping lanes that must be protected?

[AllentownJake]

30. We are protecting world trade

Sorry, right now I need to drive to work and until this alternative energy is developed and produced I need gas for my car.

I also like to eat banannas and other fruits.

On can argue about Tarifs and whether trade should be "free" between nations who don't respect workers rights however, I like the ability to get and ship products around the world.

[frogcycle]

33. because otherwise all we'd have is bowling lanes

stupid answer to ...

[originalpckelly]

36. The shipping lanes enable the empire to let the spice flow.

The spice must flow.

[frogcycle]

38. so must the mindless drivel

[originalpckelly]

39. I see that you fail to understand what's going on.

They are buying us all off with cheap shit manufactured in foreign countries so we won't get uppity and realize how much we're all getting fucked.

"They" are the rich people who hold major stakes in corporations, own the land/rentals, and own mortgages and other debt obligations. America is a giant company town. 70% of America works paycheck to paycheck with no hope of escaping that system.

They get us coming and going. At work they take all the profits first then decide how much to pay the people. The homes of many people are either rental units, or mortgaged houses. Even the poor little old ladies who've managed to get their hands on an un-mortgaged house are now having that taken away with these goddamn reverse mortgages.

Most everything that everyone buys comes from one of these corporations, so they get you there too. All the other bills you pay each month are usually to corporations, with the exception of water and power for a few us with co-ops.

It is propped up by moving resources from foreign countries to our own, through those very shipping lanes.

[frogcycle]

40. get off your superior high horse n/t

[originalpckelly]

41. And the people who own us aren't on an even higher horse?

[cbc5g]

42. Heh if you think that would work

Then you really haven't been thinking about it much. Do you really, REALLY think that we, or them, would just get rid of all of them without stashing a few somewhere else, hidden? Theres no way any country with nukes now will EVER give them up completely. Unless our species evolves into a truthful peace loving non violent species, it's just not gonna happen. And we are far, far from being peaceful and nonviolent.

[Lost in CT]

43. America Fuck Yeah....

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3692333705196414991