Bombing in Boston

[vincent_richter]

Originally Posted by Drachen

It's also worth reminding people that whatever else he is, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is an American citizen.

Drastic oversimplification on my part, but when there's the possibility of more devices out there endangering more innocent lives, discovering that information has to be worth more than your right to invoke. That's not saying he should be waterboarded, merely that he needs to be held until it can be determined that he's not gonna phone a friend and blow up half of Times Square.

Originally Posted by Drachen

If I were to have made a list of probable organizations and ethnicities likely to have perpetrated the bombing, Chechens would have been down near the bottom along with the Tamil Tigers and the Real IRA.

I suppose it says something about the times that I first suspected white supremacists - if not a definite pattern. Think about it, though: what louder way to say "you're not paying attention" than by blowing up a few thousand civilians on one of the world's largest stages?

Originally Posted by Rachel_Bronwyn

He didn't offer himself up to die as his brother did. He wasn't the one with explosives strapped to his body. I don't doubt he would have proceeded to kill more people with additional ammunition.

I'm glad you left that last line intact.
Is he a stone-cold killer? He ran over his brother when fleeing campus.
Does he fully appreciate the gravity of his actions? That's significantly harder to gauge.
What concerns me is the possibility that he knew exactly what he was doing, and that people are willing to write off the wanton devastation he caused, simply because he got squeamish.