double standards

[waider]

So there's a talking head (Nile Gardner, of, I think, the Washington Heritage Foundation or something) on TV right now saying that any move by the Irish government to search the CIA planes that pass through Shannon would be an insult to the US and so on. But if those CIA planes are, in fact, carrying "terrorists" to places outside enforceable legal jurisdiction, is that not an insult to Ireland? I mean, aside from the unprovable suggestion that it might cause us to be targetted for retaliation (oh great, just what we need: more people blowing up bits of Ireland), it seems that it puts us in direct contravention of the UN Charter on Human Rights if there is more than idle speculation as to the nature of these flights and yet the relevant Irish authorities continue to do nothing about them.

So, you know, if the planes are clean we can search them, right? If you're not guilty, there's nothing to be afraid of, right?

Amnesty's press release on the flights, Strong words, no actions from Bertie Ahern, under the dubious headline, "Taoiseach refuses to facilitate torture"

Comments

[dr-strych9.livejournal.com]

The open question remains whether the Americans would notice if Ireland "insulted" the United States by inspecting the aircraft that land at their airports.

I mean, what are we going to do? "Retaliate" by inspecting Irish airplanes for all the prisoners that your government renders into the American prison gulag archipelago for us to torture because you Irish don't have the stomach for it? I'm trying to see the downside here... help me out.

[waider.livejournal.com]

Well, yeah. The traditional bugbear here is that America will stop investing in Ireland, which I think is unlikely since companies like KBR have shown that they're quite happy to invest in places that contradict the politics of the day as long as there's money flowing back to them.

Maybe the US could, I dunno, photograph and fingerprint every Irish person who flies into the US on the Visa Waiver programme. That'd show us!

[eejitalmuppet.livejournal.com]

Funny you should mention that. Last week, the EU ruled that the information the US demands from European airlines flying to the US was in breach of European privacy laws. I'm too lazy to search for the details, so you can do that for yourself...