The greatest hypocrites of them all: The British

[Renew Deal]

"I welcome the fact that Saddam Hussein has been tried by an Iraqi court for at least some of the appalling crimes he committed against the Iraqi people. He has now been held to account <...> The British government does not support the use of the death penalty, in Iraq or anywhere else <...> We have made our position very clear to the Iraqi authorities, but we respect their decision as that of a sovereign nation."<43> — Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Execution_of_Saddam_Hussein#Europe

:wtf:

[Maiden England]

1. Why is that hypocritical?

They don't have nor support a death penalty. :shrug:

[malaise]

2. Then how do they support the lynching? n/t

[k_jerome]

8. why not go all out and call it the crucifxion of Hussein? nt

[dailykoff]

11. You can leave that to history.

And don't worry, it will.

[Renew Deal]

3. How can someone be held to account with a procedure that they themselves

don't support.

[Maiden England]

6. Maybe because I'm British I understand the point made

"has been held to account" as a term really applies to Saddam being found guilty rather than the fact he was sentenced to a punishment. You assume that if you find someone guilty - or accountable for their crimes (hence held to account) that they should be receiving some sort of punishment for that and you can acknowledge that fact without supporting the method of punishment itself. More of a - I'm glad you are holding him to account for what he did, but we would have rather seen him rot in jail as a punishment.

I'm sorry to be nitpicky, but as a British ex-pat, I'd rather people find my government hypocritical of things they are actually hypocritical about (of which there is much to choose from), than mere semantics.

[terrya]

5. I'm wondering about that myself.

Hey...Britain does not have the death penalty. She was stating a basic fact.

[LeftishBrit]

4. Please don't call Margaret Beckett "the British"!

Unless you want me to call Condi Rice "the Americans"!

Having said that, yes, it is very hypocritical under the circumstances. In general, there would be no contradiction in a country opposing the death penalty and yet accepting another country's right to follow its own laws; but with Iraq, the US and British governments have been intervening and interfering with everything, so it's interesting that it's suddenly a 'sovereign nation' when it comes to executing Saddam.

In any case, he should have been handed over to The Hague, and Blair should have pressed for that.

[dailykoff]

10. Tony Blair is still PM

and he's Britain's hypocrite-in-chief and honorary Texas Terror-fighter.

[LeftishBrit]

12. Yup (unfortunately)

And Bush is still president, and he is America's Mad King George.

Blair will be gone in a few months, thank God; but it's not clear how much better Brown will be.

Michael Howard would have been even worse.

[acmavm]

7. I am really confused. What does this twit think that Shock and

Awe was? That was an intended execution. Every attack by the US/British were attempted or actual executions of people who they thought it was clever to put their faces on playing cards so we'd know the order of importance of their execution.

Those frigging bombs that they dropped weren't meant to say I Love You. Out of 122 intial bombings (I think that's the number) of 'high value' targets, the miserable bastards didn't get one. They just executed Iraq civilians.

I don't want to hear any lying shit about not being in favor of the death penalty from any mouthpiece of either government.

[malaise]

9. 100% correct n/t

[moondust]

13. They also don't support torture.

But one wouldn't know it by their tacit approval of extraordinary renditions.

Nor have I heard of any EU policy changes toward the U.S. since the passage of the Military Commissions Act of 2006.


Disappointing to say the least.