11:55 am ET May 29, 2004 NYTIMES DISCUSSION AFTER MAX PUNKT POSTED HIS RESPONSE TO PRISON TACTICS AT GITMO AND BEYOND. 30 MINUTE INTERVALS NOTED:

Yokel (11:55 am ET May 29) - Max Punkt, It is painfully obvious that the left simply doesn't understand how de-sensitizing the continuing repititon of the prison abuse stories is becoming. For me, since the Nick Berg incident, it's too bad they simply didn't slit a few (say 5 to 6 thousand) throats, then the comparative criticisms would be properly scaled.

dd - Any suggestions on who they should start with?

jidan - I'm for the sniper-squad:cheap and effective...

Yokel - Go to the first cell in the first cell-block. See I believe the Nick Berg murder was indiscriminate in the choice of victim. I think we should be similarly unconcerned.

The muslims respect little, but they at least give pause when faced with over-whelming responses.

paul - Since what happened to Mr. Berg was because of our prisoner abuse, I would say the abuse seems pretty important to some. If you think it’s relatively unimportant, that’s fine…

maclab - 12:26 PM - Angel according to your logic we should thank CHENEY/bush for wasting 20000 Iraqis and 900 Americans to keep the little green men out of the US.

paul- Why just the cell blocks? Aren’t 70 – 92% of those we are holding innocent of any wrongdoing? Why not just do it to everyone in Iraq?

beauseant - People who obey gun laws are not the problem. People who don't obey gun laws are not stopped by gun laws.

devius - Max, The jihadees should be thankful for the tropical resort at Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib Sheraton . They should have been locked up in regular all-American prisons.

dio - 12:58 PM George Bush has committed war crimes and should, by the standards of Nuremberg, be put to death.

Max Punkt - 1:24 PM - Devius, How much are we complicit in what has occured? Do you believe that torture is justifiable. This is organized aggression; reason serving hatred… It is hard to see what seperates us from what we seek to punish, when we allow such sadistic behavior to occur. Of course, it is rather extreme to distribute such guilt to people who are not directly involved, but my question is where does that guilt supposedly stop?

dio - The situational ethics of the wingnuts: wrong for them, right for us If we torture, it's right. If we invade, it's right. If we defend against invaders, it's right. If we exact retribution, it's right. If we stockpile WMD's, it's right.

snow - 2:03 PM - Fear is the basis of religious dogma. --- Bertrand Russell Double double Standards Does Al Qaeda bother about International Law ?

Max Punkt - Who in this chat understands Arabic? Who has been to any of these countries we speak of?… How many civilian deaths are enough to redress the wounds of 9/11?

Beauseant - Having lived and worked in that land for a number of years, most of that time with the locals I can vouch that they are not all fanatics.

tom- Reality on the ground ...Max, And how many wasted billions and American lives? I don't have any answer to the Iraq problem. We are there. We ought to do whatever good we can. And for whatever short length of time we stay, we need an orderly exit.

snow- So being comfortable on your various high horses sitting on your arses behind your computer screens yelling about the 'neoclowns'

Max Punkt- Tom, The approach you suggest ignores how we got to Iraq and why we are there. You claim that since we are there we should just do "good". How do you propose to do this? … Rummy and Reagan helped Saddam as much as they could in the eighties to destabalize the region. Are we doing any differently now?

chad- Who should be more powerful?

It does no good to get emotional about the effects of war… who exactly would we prefer to have more power than us?. If the answer is some sort of collective (UN?) I could discuss it. But, what other country?

jeff- chad -- Only a fool would want anyone to be more powerful than himself. That is true of individuals, and it is true of nations. Has something to do with the human survival instinct, which is predicated on competition as the norm, I believe? Eat or be eaten.

tom - 2:54 PM - Max, Yes, the US has toppled a domino in the vain hopes of unleashing a cascade of regional freedom. Didn't work. Can't work, in our lifetime, or with all the remaining credit in our over-extended budget. But we are there and we cannot precipitously leave as that would be even more irresponsible than Bush's bait-and-switch pretexts for getting the US in there in the first place.

Max Punkt- A bigger problem is this assumption that our forces will do good. After Abu, how much more optimisitc can you be? After all the civilians we've killed? Should we keep on "helping"?

Tom - I do think some good is being done. Much more needs to be done.

Jeff - NO! Al-Sadr and his followers should be hunted down and killed. They will continue to kill U.S. troops as long as they are allowed to keep weapons. My observation is that they are probably a front for Iran.

Max Punkt - jeff, You charge that we must kill Al-Sadr! Your mindset typifies what got us into this mess. Have connections in Iran do you? My bet is that you don't know anyone in Iran, or Iranian for that matter. Sounds like you're still afraid of the boogey man.

Jeff - 3:32 PM- maxipunk -- If you read my post with any degree of competence in the English language, you would have seen that I said al Sadr is a fron for the Iranians. I certainly didn't say that I was! Hell, I hate those slime-buckets! You really should learn to read better.