Comment on: "Readers Answer Me Answering Them" Blog post by Nicholas D. Kristof, NYT Sept. 17, 2013

For original blog post see:
http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/09/14/readers-answer-me-answering-them/

Your arguments, as I understand them, still come down to "humanitarian" or "moral" imperatives to "intervene" in Syria because they allegedly used chemical weapons, which are "outlawed" by an international treaty, to which Syria is not a signatory.

The US is not a signatory (did not ratify) to the Kyoto Protocol and is still polluting the atmosphere at record levels. Does that give other countries the right to bomb US power plants?

Just for reference, the deaths caused by these chemical attacks are estimated to be about 2% of all casualties of the current civil war. Also, by the governments own account, the proposed strikes would NOT eliminate the chemical weapons, but would indeed have (unknown numbers) of "collateral casualties".

International law: seizing a slave ship for humanitarian reasons is a long way from dropping bombs! An equivalence in your "genocide" arguments would be to arbitrarily pick the "bad guy" and then bomb the heck out of them, rather than sending in a UN force to separate the warring parties.

Your cost estimates are way off. You make the typical cynical error of lowballing the numbers so as to fit your argument. Whatever the cost of air strikes, in humanitarian and ethical terms, that money would be much, much better spent helping with the refugee crisis to minimize the social and economic disruptions in Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey.

Your credibility continues to decline as you tenaciously hold on to your ridiculous arguments.