OK, now the NYT doesn't look so bad. Remember my column about that paper's hyberbolic fulminations about a certain current president?
Well, they've been outdone by a letter writer on our very own page today, one Jack Heape of Ridgeway:
That has been the entire Bush administration’s creed. It has been one ongoing criminal enterprise since day one, a wrecking ball to the Constitution and rule of law, with torture, illegal surveillance and obstruction and perversion of justice in the firing of U.S. attorneys, not to mention national-level election fraud, the naked treason of outing Valerie Plame and on and on.
… thereby leaving the Gray Lady in the dust.
But you know, it occurs to me that we ought to have different categories for professional and amateur commentary. No serious editorial board would go that far. Yes, the NYT went overboard with their Conradesque use of "horror," but no professional would grasp at absolute terms to the extent of leaving himself no way out, such as with "the entire Bush administration's creed," or "one ongoing criminal enterprise since day one." Professionals hedge; they leave themselves room. Amateurs don't, so the comparison is unfair.
Moving on to the subject, however: I keep thinking these folks are going to calm down, now that Obama's been elected. Maybe the calming will begin after the inauguration. Let's certainly hope so.
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Given Bush’s lies about Iraq, wire tapping and the Valerie Plame incident Mr. Heape has it about right. Bush should have been impeached but of course that wasn’t going to happen with Republicans in charge or with the spineless wimpes in the conbress since 2006. But, it is time to move on. The good guys are in charge now.
Brad have you seen the latest attempt to discredit the election? Basically it’s based on a survey of Obama and McCain voters that asked them a series of questions about each candidate. For instance, one question: “Did Governor Palin say: ‘I can see Russia from my house’.” The upshot of this survey is that most Obama voters incorrectly said she did, in fact, say that, while McCain voters correctly attributed that statement to Tina Fey. The point of this excercise was to show how the media manipulated the election by furnishing biased information. Of course this is a bunch of nonsense. And it is an example of the “hyperbole” on the right.
What makes it nonsense, bud? Yesterday, you thought Sarah Palin said she could see Russia. And you voted for Obama. Case closed.
“But you know, it occurs to me that we ought to have different categories for professional and amateur commentary.”
So it begs the question, which category are you?
You seem to be singling out Mr. Heape for special consideration because you i) either disapprove of what he wrote and wish to make an example of his overly febrile writing (which is your implication, not mine); or ii) are trying to tell us that nuance and prudence is called for in dealing with an administration that has had damn little of either.
I’m also guessing that Mr. Heape may not know he’s the subject of this commentary, and that he wrote this letter under the assumption that it would be published on the editorial page as is his right, not the subject of a jibe on your blog.
…sounds kind of amateurish to me
It’s not “time to move on” as bud suggests, nor was there much hyperbole in the letter that “inspired” Warthime’s blog posting.
People across this world have suffered and died due to the willfulness, corruption and greed of this administration.
Real. People.
Your fellow men and women, the brothers and sisters you are supposed to keep…
Though, I guess the expectation of human decency is considered hyperbolic. One day, Bush et al will pay for their high crimes. American history is proof enough of that fact. Even Nixon didn’t escape the burden and blast of judgment, or the personal decay from guilt, even if he was legally pardoned.
Warthime, if I held to your viewpoint and displayed your skill set with prose, I’d bill myself as a professional cynic, amateur analyst.
From the U.S. Department of Labor we can determine that under the Clinton Administration the labor force grew from 109.7 million to 132.5 million (through Nov. 2000), an increase of 20.6%. During the Bush, Jr. Administration, January, 2001 to November 2008 the labor force grew from 132.5 million to 136.7 million, a scant 3.2%.
No matter how you spin this the Bush years have not been good for the economy. This is an appalling record. What makes this even more astounding is that typically wars create jobs. During WW II, Korea and Vietnam unemployment rates were exceptionally low. So how does he manage to wage 2 wars AND reek economic devastation on this country? It is simply a remarkable record of failure. And that’s no hyperbole.
The continuing problem is not the hyperbole being used to describe this 8 year “problem;” it’s the task of setting it aright. While the current administration’s attacks on the constitution and our legal system have been done on a limited retail basis, we must undo them or we leave room later for someone to go back and take up where the Bush White House left off. We need to put to rest forever the myth that torture gains a country anything but a bad reputation. We need to update our laws and methods of surveillance to ensure that they cover current means of communication, and that citizen’s rights are preserved. We need to make it clear that the President (or VP, for that matter) is not a law unto himself. I feel no need to prosecute Mr. Bush or Mr. Cheney, or any of their subordinates, but we must correct the mis-steps this administration has made, however painful that may be.
Capital A, while I whole-heartidly agree that the Bush administration has lied to us in matters both large (threat from Iraq) and small (stated reason for landing plane on deck of the U.S.S. Lincoln) it would serve no purpose to belabor the point. His legacy is plenty well sullied as it is and history will not be kind to this failed president.
But the country faces enormous problems that will require a sort of healing process. It’s true that the Limbaugh faithful will continue to yap at the heals of the Obama administration with their idiocy about Blogo, birth certificates and other conspiracy theories. Yet they can be best marginilized by ignoring them. The vast majority of Americans are ready to quietly end the Bush years and move the country forward in a positive manner. Perhaps a few Republicans can be persuaded to pursue positive changes to our country in the vital foreign and domestic policy arena. With just a handful of moderate Republicans the pragmatic folks in Washington can pass just about anything they want to move us in a positive direction. I would suggest that dwelling on the failures of George W. Bush will only serve to undercut these efforts. I say it’s time to let this go and send Bush packing to the political oblivion of Texas.
To follow up on Marconi’s thoughts, Brad, does Jack Heape of Ridgeway know you’re on here dissing his effort? Is that the price for getting a letter in The State you disagree with — having the editor pick you apart on his blog? Or are you just trying to convince yourself you’re professional?
This joker used some really high falutin’ words there. Some of them might bring forty or fifty cents on the open market.
Move along folks, nothing to see here. Just another rant by a pseudo-sapient liberal hack.
And of course, this rant was dutifully published in The State Mullet Wrapper.
David
Iraq did have WMD.
We captured 650,000 tons of high explosives, biological weapons and chemical weapons.
Valerie Plame was exposed by Democrats, and her husband, not Rove, Libby, or any Republicans. She wasn’t a spy, anyway. Her husband ginned up the story to cover his lying about Iraq not trying to purchase uranium from Nigeria, in a NY Times article. His own report later said that Iraq DID try to purchase uranium.
There was no illegal wiretapping.
The only US citizens picked up in a warrantless wiretap were those talking overseas to terrorist suspects. The NSA and CIA have foiled 2,400 plots worldwide since Sept 11, 2001.
“But, it is time to move on.” – bud
You’re telling us?
You’ve done nothing but pile on Bush and McCain and Palin since Obama won. I think you’ve already dropped five piles today. It’s a pitiful sight.
bud, it does “serve a purpose” to “belabor” the points I made. The rule of law in this country is one of our most revered and guiding tenets. To turn our backs on that truth is to help engineer a reality that is corrupted and un-American.
If what you just expressed is your true viewpoint, then maybe your conservative critics on this blog are correct about you. Maybe you really don’t believe in the principles you often claim, but truly are just bashing Bush for the fun and ease of it. I don’t know. I’m not your judge, but that is how it seems based on your last posting.
My issue with Bush is not his party affiliation, though I agree that modern conservative ideals are twisted and mutated in comparison to those of their own party basis. My irritation with Bush and the gang is that they purposefully and repeatedly broke the law. My anger is that no one has made a motion to begin investigation of these actions. My shock and awe stem from the fact that, just like Nixon’s, Reagan’s and Clinton’s to a degree, this administration feels it is above the rule of law; in fact, they have worked hard to develop and legitimize their own shameful, corrupted version of ethics.
And before others start chirping about Clinton’s escape from legal recourse, blame the idiotic, short-sighted Republican leadership of the time for that mistake. In their zeal, they chose to charge and investigate Clinton for the crimes that would have brought him the least punishment, opting to hammer him for what they thought was the “sexier”, potentially most publicly damning charge. Clinton owes this country some prison time as well, I suspect.
By the standards posited by bud, Republican apologists and the blog owner, I guess I may seem like a self-righteous boor. Pardon me for taking to heart the ideals set forth by Jefferson and echoed in more recent media like Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. As a youth, I guess I got the wrong impression of how our president, public and elected officials should act so that we can remain a vibrant and successful society.
Sour grapes are of no concern to me; the grapes of wrath would be closer to my intention, but a good drink and dose of legal punishment and public shaming for those found deseving would be best served.
OK, y’all tell me which you think is better — that I point out an example of hyperbole that illustrates further a point I’ve made, but NOT mention where I saw it, or that I’m straight-up about it? I debate about that, but it just seems silly not to use his name when you can go find it so easily. Besides, am I BLAMING Mr. Heape, or giving him CREDIT? Depends on your point of view, I guess.
Anyway, the professionals are back on the scoreboard! Check this out from Joe Galloway today:
The president journeyed to the Army War College in Carlisle, Pa., to try to polish his legacy with a rambling 15-minute speech that laid out his many glorious achievements of the last eight years for a captive military audience. <
Standing amid the splendid ruins of what once was a proud nation, Bush celebrated keeping America safe from terrorist attacks; transforming our military; reorganizing and repairing our broken national intelligence agencies; creating the mighty Department of Homeland Security; and making the world safe for freedom and democracy.
I’d like to see one of those amateurs out there try to touch “Standing amid the splendid ruins of what once was a proud nation…” For sheer pompous, rolling grandeur, you can’t beat it. I’m picturing the veteran war correspondent who wrote that standing amid the smoking rubble of the U.S. Capitol in a Mad Max costume, lording over the post-apocalyptic world — and that just emphasizes what a cartoonishly exaggerated viewpoint that is. I just looked out the window — State House is still there. No half-human mutant marauders rolling down Shop Road. (Oh, and more to the point, I’ve visited the Army War College in Carlisle a number of times recently, and it’s holding up pretty well, too.)
The thing that surprises me about Joe Galloway using such language (or WOULD surprise me, if I weren’t used to Joe Galloway) is that he is a guy who has see REAL devastation. He has seen combat; I have not. In fact, to really give credit where it’s due, the McClatchy Washington Bureau today announced that his We Were Soldiers Once — And Young has been named one of the Top Ten war books of all time! And we’re talking ALL time. Here’s the rest of the list, according to Military History magazine:
Other books in the top 10 are “The Iliad” (Homer, 8th Century B.C.), “History of the Peloponnesian War” (Thucydides, 423-411 B.C.), “On War” (Carl von Clausewitz, 1832), “War and Peace” (Leo Tolstoy, 1868), “The Red Badge of Courage” (Stephen Crane, 1895), “The Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant” (U.S. Grant, 1895), “The Face of Battle” (John Keegan, 1976), “With the Old Breed” (Eugene Sledge, 1981), and “Battle Cry of Freedom” (James Munro McPherson, 1988)
I guess Caesar’s Commentaries just didn’t make the cut. Maybe he should have tried for a more memorable opening sentence or something.
Seriously, this makes me determined to go back and read Galloway’s book. I gave it to my Dad several years ago, and meant to “borrow” it when he was finished, but didn’t. I’ve been meaning to read The Face of Battle, too. But I’ll pass on War and Peace. Dostoevsky, yes; Tolstoy, no.
Maybe after I read it, I’ll see things Joe’s way. Maybe.
Yep. That’s pretty hyperbolic ok. I have to wonder who’s providing us with the bigger pile of bull-er-feathers: the over inflated rhetoric of some of the press about the failure of the Bush administration, or the over inflated rhetoric of Mr. Bush’s claims of glorious achievement. My guess is that it would be a lot more sensible to stop attending to both and to move on to more constructive tasks.
Brad, you’re absolutely right, these examples you have cited are rhetorical overkill. Still, since they are not uttered by those who have wielded the power these past 8 years, they must take a back seat to the fundamental, most obscene exaggeration of the same time period…the absurd notion that Al-Qaeda represented a fundamental existential threat to the United States at the level of a state power with across-the-board functioning military capability, a la the Third Reich.
Now, see, that would be an interesting thing to have a rational discussion about, Phillip — if such is possible at the end of this MOST HORRIBLE ERA IN HISTORY!
Let’s try, though.
“Existential threat” is a high standard. So high that I don’t think even Hitler meets the test. If you were a Jew in Eastern Europe, he was an immediate threat to your existence. If you were in New York, not so much. In fact, if you take the broad view of the war, the Third Reich peaked just before we actually got into the war — it had already reached its high water mark in Russia, and was about to start rolling backward. It never posed a threat to the existence of the U.S., not in a direct, physical way. Hitler just sort of wanted us and the Brits to leave him alone so he could kill Jews and Russians and everybody else he really hated. But we wouldn’t quit fighting, thank God — even after he pulled out his last-ditch persuader in the Ardennes, which was intended to get us to agree to an armistice on the Western front without actually winning.
Even the Japanese weren’t going to wipe out the United States. Pearl Harbor was just a particularly nasty, savage attempt to seize strategic leverage in the Pacific, but it was not an immediate threat to Peoria.
The U.S. would not be the one that I grew up in had we not achieved unconditional victory in WWII. I’m grateful I didn’t have to experience that. But it still would have existed in some form.
I think what most people saw al Qaeda as — and still see them as — is the outfit that killed more Americans (most of them civilians this time) than died at Pearl Harbor, in two of our greatest cities, and in the peaceful skies over Pennsylvania, on 9/11.
More than that, I see them as the group that would love to do it again. And if they could kill more of us, they would.
I look out and I see lots of other groups that envy al Qaeda for its “achievement” in killing so many Americans. Pakistan is just choked with such people. Similar people hold political power in Iran, and are seeking the bomb that Pakistan already has. And I see all of those groups, and the cultural, economic, political and ideological roots from which they arise, are part of one gigantic, complex problem for this country and the rest of the developed world.
And I don’t think it’s wise to belittle that problem.
To return to where we started — “existential threat” is a high standard, but as long as you propose it, which is more of an existential threat: A nation-state that can hit at your forward military bases, or a viral movement that can blow you out of the air on your way to see Aunt Gladys in Pittsburg?
No, they are not the same kinds of threats. But that’s no reason to belittle the problem al Qaeda poses.
Just remember – better locks on four airplane cockpit doors would have changed the last seven years completely.
There would be no “war” on terror.
Folks, I am not asking for anyone to change their mind about Bush. All I ask is to consider where he was and has been coming from since 9/11. Bush has made a lot of mistakes while in office and I have my problems with him as well but in the context of history, we need to remember that he is only the second president in modern history to be occupying the Oval Office when we were attacked by an enemy whose intention was to destroy us. FDR was the first and he had a visible enemy to combat, not one lurking in the shadows and possessing the ability to secure weapons of any nature up to and including nuclear weapons if the money is there and finding a willing supplier. Just because the terrorists do not represent a powerful nation is no reason to downplay their potential to reap havoc and mass destruction on America.
When we start to believe that a small group of terrorists are no more than a nuisance, we need to remember our forefathers who resorted to guerilla warfare against a very powerful British army. Ultimately we were able to muster enough manpower to form an army and the end result was a free America. So, when you use language that describes Al-Qaeda as an asburd notion, your understanding of history is very limited and short-sighted. There are close to one billion Muslims on this planet. By conservative estimates, nearly 15% fully support terrorism methods. With the near fanatical devotion to their religion, this makes up an impressive “army of religious soldiers” for the Islamic cause. We can try to cloak it in political correctness by changing the tone of discussions but that is denying the truth of the matter.
The rhetorical overkill and it is overkill has become a standard instead of the exception in modern journalism. The eviceral hatred of Bush has prompted otherwise decent or at least I like to think so, journalists to engage in personal attacks for the sake of sensationalism and to put their politics on the news instead of just reporting it.
I am posting a column from the WSJ for all to read if you will. Out of respect, I would ask that you read it with an open mind and at least try to put yourself in GWB’s shoes on 9/11 and how you would have reacted. If this is not a fair and reasonable request, then all who post here who won’t try to have an open mind will never be able to reconcile or accept any opinion other than their own. That would be a shame and tragedy when all we keep hearing is how we should come together. I suspect that the coming together is feasible only if the other side totally accepts the left’s point of view. If we cannot at least entertain the idea that Bush was and still is genuine in his efforts to keep America safe, then we will suffer the same sort of attack in the near future because we will treat the genuine threat of future terrorist attacks as nothing more than a nuisance or something to be relegated to the Bomb Squad in the local police department.
I will apologize in advance to the length of this post but I think it is well worth the read.
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The Real ‘Torture’ Disgrace
The left gears up to prosecute Bush officials for protecting the country.
The release of Carl Levin’s report on the Bush Administration’s alleged “torture” policies was a formality: The Senator’s conclusions were politically predetermined long ago. Still, the credulity and acclaim that has greeted this agitprop is embarrassing, even by Washington standards.
AP
Sen. Carl Levin.
According to the familiar “torture narrative” that Mr. Levin sanctifies, President Bush and senior officials sanctioned detainee abuse, first by refusing to accord al Qaeda members Geneva Convention rights, and second by conspiring to rewrite the legal definition of torture. The new practices were then imposed on military leaders and spread through the chain of command. Therefore, Mr. Bush, former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and their deputies are morally — and legally — responsible for all prisoner abuse since 9/11, not least Abu Ghraib.
Nearly every element of this narrative is dishonest. As officials testified during Mr. Levin’s hearings and according to documents in his possession, senior officials were responding to requests from the CIA and other commanders in the field. The flow was bottom up, not top down. Those commanders were seeking guidance on what kind of interrogation was permissible as they tried to elicit information from enemies who want to murder civilians. At the time, no less than Barack Obama’s Attorney General nominee, Eric Holder, was saying that terrorists didn’t qualify for Geneva protections.
This was the context in which the Justice Department wrote the so-called “torture memos” of 2002 and 2003. You’d never know from the Levin jeremiad that these are legal — not policy — documents. They are attempts not to dictate interrogation guidelines but to explore the legal limits of what the CIA might be able to do.
It would have been irresponsible for those charged with antiterror policy to do anything less. In a 2007 interview former CIA director George Tenet described the urgency of that post-9/11 period: “I’ve got reports of nuclear weapons in New York City, apartment buildings that are going to be blown up, planes that are going to fly into airports all over again . . . Plot lines that I don’t know — I don’t know what’s going on inside the United States.” Actionable intelligence is the most effective weapon in the war on terror, which can potentially save thousands of lives.
We know that the most aggressive tactic ever authorized was waterboarding, which was used in only three cases against hardened, high-ranking al Qaeda operatives, including Abu Zubaydah after he was picked up in Pakistan in 2002. U.S. officials say the information he gave up foiled multiple terror plots and led to the capture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the architect of 9/11. As Dick Cheney told ABC this week, “There was a time there, three or four years ago, when about half of everything we knew about al Qaeda came from one source” — KSM.
Starting in 2002, key Congressional leaders, including Democrats, were fully briefed by the CIA about its activities, amounting to some 30 sessions before “torture” became a public issue. None of them saw fit to object. In fact, Congress has always defined torture so vaguely as to ban only the most extreme acts and preserve legal loopholes. At least twice it has had opportunity to specifically ban waterboarding and be accountable after some future attack. Members declined.
As for “stress positions” allowed for a time by the Pentagon, such as hooding, sleep deprivation or exposure to heat and cold, they are psychological techniques designed to break a detainee, but light years away from actual torture. Perhaps the reason Mr. Levin released only an executive summary with its unsubstantiated charges of criminal behavior — instead of the hundreds of pages of a full declassified version — is that the evidence doesn’t fit the story. If it did, Mr. Levin or his staff would surely have leaked the details.
Not one of the 12 nonpartisan investigations in recent years concluded that the Administration condoned or tolerated detainee abuse, while multiple courts martial have punished real offenders. None of the dozen or so Abu Ghraib trials and investigations have implicated higher ups; the most senior officer charged, a lieutenant colonel, was acquitted in 2006. Former Defense Secretary Jim Schlesinger’s panel concluded that the abuses were sadistic behavior by the “night shift.”
Now that Mr. Obama is on his way to the White House, even some Democrats are acknowledging the complicated security realities. Dianne Feinstein, a Bush critic who will chair the Senate Intelligence Committee in January, recently told the New York Times that extreme cases might call for flexibility. “I think that you have to use the noncoercive standard to the greatest extent possible,” she said (our emphasis). Ms. Feinstein later put out a statement that all interrogations should be conducted within the more specific limits of the U.S. Army Field Manual but said she will “consider” other views. But that is already the law for most of the government. What the Bush Administration has insisted on is an exception for the CIA to use other techniques (not waterboarding) in extreme cases.
As for Mr. Levin, his real purpose is to lay the groundwork for war-crimes prosecutions of Bush officials like John Yoo, Jay Bybee and Jim Haynes who acted in good faith to keep the country safe within the confines of the law. Messrs. Obama and Holder would be foolish to spend their political capital on revenge, but Mr. Levin is demanding an “independent” commission to further politicize the issue and smear decent public servants.
As Mr. Levin put it in laying on his innuendo this week, a commission “may or may not lead to indictments or civil action.” It will also encourage some grandstanding foreign prosecutor to arrest Mr. Rumsfeld and other Bush officials like Pinochet if they ever dare to leave the U.S. Why John McCain endorsed this Levin gambit is the kind of mystery that has defined, and damaged, his career. We hope other Republicans push back.
Mr. Levin claims that Bush interrogation programs “damaged our ability to collect accurate intelligence that could save lives.” The truth is closer to the opposite. The second-guessing of Democrats is likely to lead to a risk-averse mindset at the CIA and elsewhere that compromises the ability of terror fighters to break the next KSM. The political winds always shift, but terrorists are as dangerous as ever……”
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It’s not that I don’t think Al Quesadilla provides a great threat…
…It’s that we are giving another generation of people in that region a reason to hate us. Instead of promoting pro-Americanism, we are fostering resentment. We are undermining the region’s own resistance against terrorism by pitting it against something just as bad — a foreign occupying force.
…It’s that more Americans have been killed since 9/11 than on 9/11.
…It’s that we simply cannot afford this effort, especially considering our growing deficit and economic woes at home.
…It’s that we are not even addressing the issue of why they would seek to kill us in the first place.
It’s not that I necessarily want the bomb in the hands of an Iranian leader…
…It’s that I don’t think it’s right for a country with nuclear weapons to forcibly keep others from having them. If my two biggest enemies (the US and Israel) had nuclear weapons and demonstrated a willingness to invade a sovereign country (Iraq) because they didn’t like what that country’s leader was doing, you’re damn right I’d be a little nervous and be doing my best to even the playing field.
Brad, in no way does my position “belittle” the Al Qaeda threat. It is a serious challenge. But it was blown out of proportion deliberately, fear was engendered deliberately, so that certain policies could be pursued.
By the same token, even though some editorial writers may employ hyperbole to describe the serious wounds George W. Bush and Dick Cheney have inflicted on this country, I hope that you also do not belittle the very real damage that has been done.
Hmm,’exposure to heat and cold…miles away from torture’–someone should explain this to Crammer and Ridley, or Jeanne d’Arc for that matter. “Actionable intelligence is the most effective weapon in the war on terror.” But why do people keep on thinking that information gained from someone tortured is ‘actionable’? As the Maid of Orleans made clear, someone tortured will say whatever he/she thinks will make the torturer stop. This may or may not have any relationship at all to the truth. It’s not “actionable” until one checks its veracity. I know we train our people to resist torture techniques. Do we really think our enemies send their agents into action innocent and unprepared? If their knowledge is of any urgency, then any false information they may yield under torture, just might cause the delay and distraction necessary to allow the actual plot to succeed. We need to make it clear to all that we do not torture, because we do not use cruel and unusual punishment, and because we are smart enough to know it does not work effectively as an information gathering tool.
More than 100 of the irregular prisoners of war and terrorists released from GITMO have been killed in combat, suicide kamikaze bombings, or recaptured.
Going way out on a limb, and assuming that’s true, so what?
So maybe Gitmo isn’t the lost cause you presume it to be.
Really, you don’t know who’s been tortured and who hasn’t, and what actually constitutes torture, so you should probably restrict yourself to your sphere of expertise, limited though it may be.
Merry Christmas.
So these prisoners at GITMO are obviously not innocent, Karen.
They were captured in the act of trying to commit murder. Many of them admit it. Over 100 of them who were released went back to the Mideast and were killed or captured while again committing murder.
Democrats disarmed the commercial pilots, which took effect in August 2001. President Bush and the GOP should have overturned this the day they took office in January 2001, along with 1,000 other EXOs and laws, but they wanted to play nice and “get along” with the enemy.
Prior to that, many flight crews armed themselves with handguns, and all flights carrying U.S. Mail REQUIRED the pilots to be armed, usually with a USGI .45 ACP Colt 1911A1 pistol.
Today, we are back to having the airlines issue SIG and HK autopistols chambered in .40 S&W, to pilots and navigators.
Finestkind. So try ’em for murder and put ’em in jail according to the rule of law.