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Notes -
I see, well I certainly did not mean it that way in this case. I'm talking specifically about threats to a given established regime. What distinctions or origin we draw I don't really see as relevant. I'm talking about how power treats its challengers writ large.
Anyone who is a political enemy of the United States. In the Obama iteration that means mostly islamists, known or suspected, and their friends and family.
Certainly not friends of your average westerner, but they're not granted trial or human rights which they are entitled to according to the ideological principles of the American regime. Clearly demonstrating that power is ultimately unconstrained by ideology.
And it'd be foolish to think that this is exceptional, given the US has engaged, on its own civilian population, in arbitrary internment and mass immolation even in quite recent history.
At this point I want to stress that I'm not trying to tarnish the reputation of the US in particular, we all have skeletons in our closets, and it's a very nice country indeed. But it is still a country. And power works there the same way it does everywhere else in the world, however much we want to delude ourselves that magical dirt or pieces of paper make it otherwise.
Vae victis.
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