Non-Bloodthirsty Edition (John McWhorter & Glenn Loury)

[Abu Noor Al-Irlandee]

Originally Posted by popcorn_karate

I found this to be the worst DV by these two ever.

Definitely I agree with that. The whole torture discussion was bizarre. There are probably even elements of their seemingly shared point that I'd agree with -- e.g. that there are other important issues that should get attention and that one doesn't want to see hypocritical politicians wasting time and attention on something that really won't go anywhere -- but their tone for much of the discussion was really making me angry. Because some people might whisper about Gonzales or Yoo behind their backs at their fancy jobs or in their fancy country clubs this is supposed to be punishment enough? Just a note to Mr. Loury and Mr. McWhorter, being willing to forgive and move on is not magnanimous or virtuous when you were not the victim...it's just you disregarding the rights of the real human beings who were kidnapped, tortured and killed.

I definitely agree with the need to focus more attention on the horrific criminal injustice system in this country, but these two guys are too smart and have been through too much history to really think that somehow that issue would be dealt with if we only stopped focusing our attention on the torture debate.

Perhaps my difficulty in understanding where Mr. Loury and Mr. McWhorter were coming from in this portion of the diavlog was confusion on my part about to whom they are responding. Are there politicians or mainstream media figures who are jumping on this as a bandwagon issue? I really haven't noticed that, my perception is that the mainstream consensus is in agreement with the position Mr. Loury and Mr. McWhorter seem to be maintaining.

Are they upset with people like Andrew Sullivan or Glenn Greenwald (Both Bloggingheads)? If so, then I really don't get them because the efforts of these guys on this issue have been so important and have been obviously longstanding and they have really won eternal respect, admiration, and gratitude from this reader.