100 Homicides at Gitmo and Other Terrorist Prisons?

So claims not-quite-cute pundette Cece Connelly on the Brit Hume broadcast.

Not to get all legal here, but a "homicide" is any death at the hands of another human. It is not, in fact, synonymous with "murder." Murder is subcategory of homicide.

Numerous homicides are not illegal. Killing a prisoner as he riots or attempts to escape is technically a homicide, but it usually not a crime (assuming it was a justifiable homicide). Putting a prisoner in a hot-box, only to find later he had a weak heart and died within a couple of hours from the stress and heat, is also a "homicide," but it's an accidental homicide, and often not criminally chargeable unless there is a finding of willfully and knowingly putting the man's life in jeopardy.

For that matter, the US has in fact ordered thousands of homicides. Killing soldiers on the field of battle is, technically, categorized as "homicides." But obviously they are lawful homicides.

Are those on the left ignorant of these distinctions -- as they ignorant of the difference between what is colloquially called an "automatic pistol" but is in fact semi-automatic and not truly automatic like a machinegun? -- or do they deliberately use vague language in the hopes that the American public will equate "homicide" with "murder"?

I don't know. They're both ignorant and shamelessly manipulative and dishonest to advance the left's cause du jour. So it is, as they say, overdetermined. They have a lot of reasons to say thing like this; it's hard to narrow it down to one specific motive.

posted by Ace at 01:48 PM

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