iamcal.com Since May 2000

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• Hello!

Does anyone else think that putting a head of state on trial is fuck stupid?

He's not on trial for personally killing anybody, he's on trial for ordering peoples executions. Is Bush going to be trialled because of people on death row in America, or is he fine because he's not a, erm, dictateur (not sure of the English - dictatar?)?

Is Tony on trial for the invasion of Iraq and the death of many, many innocent people? Or maybe for the death of England's troops?

While I do think Sadaam was a bad man, I don't think he can be put on trial. What has happened to the immunity for head of states?

*Ducks and waits for the shit to hit the fan*

Illegal crimes. Acts of war don't count. People sentenced to death under the legal process don't count.

Wow. Are all french people so spectacularly uninformed? He gassed an entire village of people just because they were kurds and he wanted to test his chemical weapons. Do you think he shouldn't be tried for that?

*Dons his Devil's Advocate coat.*

But if he was head of state couldn't he argue that any executions he ordered were under legal process?

Not under international law, they aren't.

And he is using that exact argument to refuse to recognise the court he is being tried in.

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/m...

But he was a Dick Tater. He made up his own laws as he went along. What's wrong with that?

Brock you monkey - he's on trial for the execution of 143 Shia men, not the gassing of the Kurds.

Are all English people so spectacularly uninformed?

In that BBC thing, isn't he saying that the court isn't a court because he (as rular of Iraq) didn't say it was? Or am I reading it wrong?

I didn't say he was being tried for the Kurds, I said he did it. I was asking if you though that 143 killed wasn't enough, and did you think that if we added the additional hundreds of Kurds he has killed, then it is ok then to try him then?

You already stated that you don't think he should be tried for killing 143 people.

He has also done a huge amount of other things, which are all being lined up to try him for.

As for the court thing, then yes, that is exactly what he is saying.

I think they should stop screwing around and just top the bastard. We know what he's been responsible for, so does everyone else, he's as mad as a thing that's very mad and unlikely to ever accept that anything he did was wrong, so why waste time and resources on a long trial?

Going to top Blair while you're at it?
Acts of war may not count, but the Gulf war wasn't a war, it was an invasion.

Although Blair could blame Bush, I suppose - we all know who runs this country.

Er, don't a lot of wars start with invasions?

He gassed an entire village of people just because they were kurds and he wanted to test his chemical weapons. Do you think he shouldn't be tried for that?

No more than Tony and George should be tried for invading Iraq in the first place.

WH: Sorry, wrong words - What I'm trying to say is that the war was illegal, and not recognised by the UN. So the gassing of the curds and the invasion of Iraq are, from a legal point of view, surely the same thing?

The idea of assaulting a country because of disagree with them and want to promote there own politics and business is absolute bullshit.

Absolute bullshit.

SFG: technically, you are right. it is a prime example of why it is bad practice to allow a human with executive authority to be Head of State. you'll note most "modern" republics such as france and america have the same problem. while it's a legal nicety that a state can't be sued for its crimes against its own laws (by definition), the practicality of then anointing with Immunity any current incumbent in the top office is that it can then cover ALL actions. e.g. corruption.

i prefer the aussie approach, where our head of state is a legal fiction, and all govt etc members are merely agents thereof. so the Agent can be held responsible for breach of the State's laws.

I don't understand some of that: 'while it's a legal nicety that a state can't be sued for its crimes against its own laws' and 'our head of state is a legal fiction' - what does that mean?

oh, and i agree with you re bush's invasion. altho it wasn't business related: simple at-home political reputation protection.

Well, they made a mistake in not removing Saddam after the first Gulf War, which you may remember followed on from Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. I'm not saying two wrongs make a right ....

I think they'd have been criticised whether they invaded or not. If they hadn't they'd have been criticised for not doing enough to relieve the humanitarian suffering of the Iraqi people under the Ba'ath Party rule. The WMD argument was largely irrelevant. The fact is they'd gassed many people in the past and it was reasonable to think thay had WMDs ready for use. And it suited Saddam for his enemies to think that. But he's mad enough to launch attacks on others as well as his own people.

UN sanctions were only making things worse for ordinary Iraqis, and removing them would probably not have improved their situation, as Saddam would just use any revenue for his own purposes, as before.

well, the first is what you just said.

"He's not on trial for personally killing anybody, he's on trial for ordering peoples executions. Is Bush going to be trialled because of people on death row in America, or is he fine because he's not a, erm, dictateur (not sure of the English - dictatar?)?

Is Tony on trial for the invasion of Iraq and the death of many, many innocent people? Or maybe for the death of England's troops?

While I do think Sadaam was a bad man, I don't think he can be put on trial. What has happened to the immunity for head of states?"

your President is the actual head of state. ie, actually and legally embodies the State. same in america. same in most simple republics.

offering Legal Immunity is a bodge to allow for the legal paradox that other states shouldn't be able to sue a state for it's own self-declared-legal actions.



and re the second:
australia's head of state is a few lines in our constitution, and the Person incumbent merely acts as Representative of the State. and, incidentally, only has 2 real powers:
1/ delay Legislation (to a limited extent)
2/ force Democracy -- can sack the entire parliament and call an election, which with 100% voting turn-out guaranteed (it is a legal offence not to vote), tends to mean the next parliament will be a better representative of the people

eg the aussie house of representatives was sacked en masse in 1974 after the government screwed things up right royally. the opposition was voted in in the largest landslide result seen since WWII :)

I have to get back to work now, so I'll finish for now by saying that in this case I think he should stand trial and that although I don't think the invasion was a particularly good idea, I don't think that any other solution would have had a better result, seeing as Saddam IS as mad as a hatter and needed to be removed.

Unfortunately there are a lot of other nutters running around in Iraq whose viewpoint seems to be that they'd rather kill everyone in an attempt to restore the Ba'ath Party to power than let the Iraqi people determine their own future.

We don't seem to have learned any lessons from Korea or Vietnam, but perhaps there IS no solution to these problems.

:shrugs:

If it was such a huge problem, why didn't America invade in 1982 when this happened?

Probably because they were selling guns to them at the time

1) Nobody's perfect.

2) Maybe they were saving up for it?

3)Perhaps they needed the revenue from the arms sales to fund the invasion, but then, you know, it's like taking out a loan to pay off your credit cards, once you've paid them off you justify a tiny bit of spending on your card again, cos you really need a new wide screen TV, right, and/or a new PC ... and an iPod or something, and then you have to save up all over again before you can invade Poland. That's why Hitler didn't invade immediately when he came to power, he had to finish his payments on his new gas oven.

Eek:

As person of Kurdish nationality, I believe this trial is a farce, and will not bring anything to the people of Iraq. It will stir a long cycle of violence, of more blood, of more massacres. Who would believe the impartiality of that tribunal, presided over by a Kurd from Suleymaniya. What legal doctrine tells us the suspect should be tried by the relatives of the victim? This so-called trial is just to cover up the crimes committed by Anglo-Americans against the peoples of Iraq.
Anonymous

Hmmm, one Kurd (allegedly) thinks it's a farce. You should have said so before, obviously I got it all wrong.

i thought "one Kurd" was what a lot of people get on a Friday night.

*applauds*

Sheez, that took me a while to get. :S

I wish they would storm in and nab Robert Mugabe. He's also wreaking havoc on his people and nobody does anything about that. Wonder why?

We're saving our pocket money for that one.

"Sheez, that took me a while to get. :S "

Works best in a Scottish accent.

"We're saving our pocket money for that one."

-------well please hurry! ;)

does anyone mind explaining the one kurd thing to me? I've sat here saying it in a Scottish accent and everything. People think I'm nuts over here...

Christ, I'm French and I know he's saying 'wankered'...

£"$%&^&*()*^%$££$%^^&*

Shit, sorry. I do that with monotonous regularity. But what's wankered got to do with Friday night? Never mind, I never get jokes...

Wankered = drunk, right?
Or am I getting it wrong too? /:

you are correct SFG.

No, you're right.

/bows

Accents on English are as hell confusing (especially as I learnt English in Germany - go figure).
Cockneys: No problem
Scottish: Not sure
Jordy: WTF language are you speaking?

There is a lot of Norwegian in Geordie, that's why you can't understand it. Most of the slang isn't English based.
e.g:
Geordie "I'm Gan yem"

= "I'm going home".

Phonetically, "Gan Yem" is Norwegian for going home. All to do with the vikings apparently.

to be fair to Syl, that slang has not got out of england much. i'd never heard it till i got here.

in further news, saddam throws toys out of pram:

"OI! What the fuck?"



"They're MY fucking toys, innit! NOT YOURS! I'll do with them what I fucking WANT, knarrwo'imeen!"

Hmmmm, after the successful re-emergence of the Viking Kittens I think it's time to revive Rock, Paper, Saddam (now with a Flash option).

Can't we just skip the trial and execute the evil bastard?

i thought "one Kurd" was what a lot of people get on a Friday night.

Genius. :)

So you can mention Mariah Carey or Saddam Hussein and Gary shows up?

That boy has fucking weird sexual taste...

he misread it as "one Kibo!"