A great Day in US History 19 June, 1953

[Devastatin Dave]

http://www.history.com/tdih.do?actio...tegory&id=2703
Man, I wish we still had the sperm holders that the Greatest generation had. I only wish we'd do the same to the multitude of TRAITORS that walk amongst us. So I think this day should be a holiday. The Reds can go to the coffee shop on their day off from the bookstore or hemp shop and read poetry and smell each other's BO. Whats your opinion?

[Reverend Joe]

Thank you, and a good idea, but I think I would take the opportunity to throw a few pipe bombs into government offices when there's noone around to stop me or get injured. That would send a message to the TRAITORS who hold office these days.

Call it "Revolutionary day."

Is that sufficiently extremist for you, Dave?

[Husar]

Whats your opinion?

Dave for president?


Well, it all depends on who you think are traitors of course. Maybe you should team up with Gonzo.

[Spino]

http://www.history.com/tdih.do?actio...tegory&id=2703
Man, I wish we still had the sperm holders that the Greatest generation had. I only wish we'd do the same to the multitude of TRAITORS that walk amongst us. So I think this day should be a holiday. The Reds can go to the coffee shop on their day off from the bookstore or hemp shop and read poetry and smell each other's BO. Whats your opinion?

It always bothers me when I see documentaries about the creation of the atom bomb or the Rosenbergs that casts them in a sympathetic light. Handing over the secret to the most great and terrible invention mankind has ever conceived to a tyrannical regime founded on an ideology that believes human nature can be coerced into a hive mind, insect-like existence offends me to my very core. The Rosenbergs were living proof that intelligence and idiocy are not mutually exclusive.

I do take point to your comment regarding the 'Greatest generation'. The 'Greatest generation' is an impressive generation but certainly not the greatest. If the fruit of the loins of the Greatest generation is the Baby Boomers I'd hate to see what the progeny of the 'Worst generation' will be like.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

... I'd hate to see what the progeny of the 'Worst generation' will be like.

Deifinitionally, they'd have to be an improvement, no?

[CrossLOPER]

It always bothers me when I see documentaries about the creation of the atom bomb or the Rosenbergs that casts them in a sympathetic light. Handing over the secret to the most great and terrible invention mankind has ever conceived to a tyrannical regime founded on an ideology that believes human nature can be coerced into a hive mind, insect-like existence offends me to my very core. The Rosenbergs were living proof that intelligence and idiocy are not mutually exclusive.

So, allowing the US to have exclusive access to such a weapon would have been just fine? Right.

[Proletariat]

Spino can speak for himself, but he's not saying anything about American exclusive access. He doesn't seem to be advocating that anyone who got information to the French, British or Israeli gov'ts regarding nuclear technology should be executed with little or no sympathy. Just the ones that helped 'a tyrannical regime founded on an ideology that believes human nature can be coerced into a hive mind, insect-like existence'

[Marshal Murat]

Exactly.
Wait, what?


The two mentioned were war-time allies, and happened to be democratic in some fashion.

Israel's possession of the nuclear weapon was the Frenchies doing wasn't it.

[Proletariat]

The two mentioned were war-time allies, and happened to be democratic in some fashion.

Israel's possession of the nuclear weapon was the Frenchies doing wasn't it.

Right. None of the three were 'a tyrannical regime founded on an ideology that believes human nature can be coerced into a hive mind, insect-like existence,' unlike Russia at the time, so CrossLOPER was putting kind of a strawman out there, imho. Anyway, I like Spino and LOPER's posts are both generally alot funnier and insightful than what I have to add here, so I'll butt out. Sorry if I was confusing, MM.

[Tribesman]

woohoo Dave lets celebrate executing a woman who didn't pass on atomic secrets and was falsely grassed up by her own brother , who was a spy , so he could protects himself his wife and kids .

what a bunch of bollox , but hey if you think its worth celebrating then fair play to ya Dave...wear that shirt with pride

methinks someone doesn't know their history

I only wish we'd do the same to the multitude of TRAITORS that walk amongst us.

would those be the traitors who sent young people to go off and die in an unwinnable war based on a bunch of lies.....AGAIN...or would those be different traitors you do be thinking about ?

[Xiahou]

woohoo Dave lets celebrate executing a woman who didn't pass on atomic secrets and was falsely grassed up by her own brother , who was a spy , so he could protects himself his wife and kids .:

Wouldn't it be easier just to quote Wikipedia instead of paraphrasing the entry yourself?

[Gregoshi]

Its a beautiful day in the neighborhood...

[Louis VI the Fat]

I would like to say how much it all smells like nineteen-fifties anti-communist paranoia, with a dash of anti-semitism thrown in for good measure, but I won't. Wiki says that declassified US and USSR records revealed that Julius really was involved in atomic espionage. It remains a bit inconclusive, especially the usefulness of his espionage activities, but the consensus seems to be that he simply was a Soviet spy. So shame about the wife, but other than that...

As for making the execution a public holiday, I can see some buts:
-The death penalty, whether you're pro or con, is no reason for celebration.
-I think that the SU bomb was really just a matter of time anyway. It is not hard at all to make a nuclear bomb. With the right equipment, any half-decent physics student could do it. The Rosenberg case is not important in this respect.
-As for spying: does the Rosenberg-variant even exist anymore? America is an open society and communication and globalisation have created a world entirely different from the 1950's. Just about any new technology will find it's way to the web instantly, for ready viewing in caves everywhere. Not to mention, there's no telling what those hundreds of thousands of foreign students are up to. Lord only knows how much technology is unwillingly transferred to China from the US.
But even so: is your Chinese exchange Ph.D. student a spy, a scientific asset, a potential business partner - or simply all three at the same time? Do the benefits of a free academic environment outweigh unvoluntary transfer of technology?

Spino [...] doesn't seem to be advocating that anyone who got information to the French, British or Israeli gov'ts regarding nuclear technology should be executed with little or no sympathy.

The French bomb was an independently developed product. As far as I know, there was no spying involved.
The US openly and voluntarily shared nuclear technology with the UK, France covertly, but voluntarily again, shared technology with Israel.
I don't think there was any spying involved in each of these cases. I do not know about China, South Africa, India. Pakistan's bomb was a clear result of spying, and I wouldn't take kindly on anybody involved.

[Papewaio]

Well there is precendence for having a death sentence as a holiday.

[Proletariat]

The French bomb was an independently developed product. As far as I know, there was no spying involved.
The US openly and voluntarily shared nuclear technology with the UK, France covertly, but voluntarily again, shared technology with Israel.
I don't think there was any spying involved in each of these cases. I do not know about China, South Africa, India. Pakistan's bomb was a clear result of spying, and I wouldn't take kindly on anybody involved.

Right, and I should've been more clear that I wasn't saying that they all obtained nuclear capability through espionage. Spino was saying that it sucked that this couple often gets a sympathetic take, but if you think about who they were helping, it's appalling. He wasn't saying at all that only America has a right to nuclear technology.

[Reverend Joe]

Well there is precendence for having a death sentence as a holiday.

Who exactly? I'm not saying you're wrong, because I have no idea; in fact, I am quite interested in finding out whom. And is it an American holiday, or a British one?

[Papewaio]

UK, US, Aus, NZ, EU...

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Good Friday

[Pannonian]

Who exactly? I'm not saying you're wrong, because I have no idea; in fact, I am quite interested in finding out whom. And is it an American holiday, or a British one?

They even commemorate the death sentence by having replica dead bodies, still hung up on their proto-gibbets, displayed everywhere. Some sickos even hang replicas of these proto-gibbets around their necks, in their unsavoury obesession with death. Absolutely disgusting death-cult that has followers on both sides of the Atlantic.

[Reverend Joe]

Oh, right. My family didn't celebrate it; honestly, I had no idea what Good Friday was until about six years ago. I always thought we just got a Friday off in the middle of April just for the hell of it.

[Gawain of Orkeny]

And all this time I thought KLAUS FUCHS and Theodore Hall. were the men who stole the Atom Bomb.

Besides the case against the Rosenbergs has a fishy smell about it. The Ruskies had spies in the project from the start.

[KukriKhan]

Well, ya gotta give props to the fact that over 200K Japanese civilians and two American maybe-spies, died, and yet no one has, in 60+ years, popped another 'big one' that hurt/killed a bunch of people all at once, despite the sabre-rattling and proliferation of a generation-and-a-half.

I'll join D.Dave in using this day to commemorate that fact. And wish upon the next generation-and-a-half the same result. May you next guys in charge find a better way.

That said, I'm somber when any human dies. And edgy when they die prematurely, especially when 'we teh people' cause it. Let's not break out the Champagne; rather, I think, let's drink a beer to human experience, and shake our heads at the marvel of it all.

[doc_bean]

And all this time I thought KLAUS FUCHS and Theodore Hall. were the men who stole the Atom Bomb.

Besides the case against the Rosenbergs has a fishy smell about it. The Ruskies had spies in the project from the start.

Some of the original developers of the A bomb really believed in MAD and would be all to willing to share the information. I don't knwo the whole case, they might have done 'something', but they're probably scapegoats none the less.

[Kralizec]

Some of the original developers of the A bomb really believed in MAD and would be all to willing to share the information. I don't knwo the whole case, they might have done 'something', but they're probably scapegoats none the less.

I don't think "MAD" was common jargon until the sixties, when anybody who worked on the Manhattan project would be either geriatric or dead.
I remember Oppenheimer (a crucial figure in the project) later argued against the development of the hydrogen bomb because he believed that the targets they would be deployed against would be almost always civilian in nature (since dozens of megatons is overkill against military installations)

Anyway I agree that what the Rosenbergs did was treasonous and a harsh punishment would be in order for that. I have some problems with the death penalty in general though, but that's a different discussion.

[Papewaio]

Most scientists are like athletes... they do most of their great work when they are young... mathematicians and physicists original work typically peaks before 30.

Most of them were alive and well in the 60's. Feynman was probably the youngest of the great scientists in the group and enjoyed himself immensely in the '60s and '70s... pity he died relatively young.

[HoreTore]

I support anyone who betrays their government.

I see it as my right to do so.

[Devastatin Dave]

I support anyone who betrays their government.

I see it as my right to do so.

And I see it as a right for the respective government to kill pieces of #### that risk thier fellow citizens because their brains lack the brain cells to understand the difference between "rights" and "treason".

[HoreTore]

And I see it as a right for the respective government to kill pieces of #### that risk thier fellow citizens because their brains lack the brain cells to understand the difference between "rights" and "treason".

Of course, and I also see it as a right for us to put said presidents brain outside his skull with a rifle.

[Banquo's Ghost]

Of course, and I also see it as a right for us to put said presidents brain outside his skull with a rifle.

I thought you were a pacifist? You do realise that political violence is not an option for proponents of non-violence?

[HoreTore]

I thought you were a pacifist? You do realise that political violence is not an option for proponents of non-violence?

Ah, but if you read the corporal punishment thread, you'll see that I've turned to the biblethumping side!

[Gawain of Orkeny]

I support anyone who betrays their government.

I see it as my right to do so.

One mans traitor is another mans patriot I guess Heck the founding fathers sure betrayed their government and if caught would have been executed just like these people.