Posted by Tina
In case there is still doubt about the mindset that manufactured a false narrative in order to undermine or “transform” America, Breitbart Peace offers a clear illustration:
Convicted terrorist and retired professor Bill Ayers sat down with Fars News, a state-controlled media outlet that serves the Islamic Republic of Iran, where he proclaimed that the United States is a “terrorist nation” that is the “greatest purveyor of violence on earth… and the foremost threat to world peace.”
The same mindset that accepted Bill Ayers to the bossom of American education constructed the narrative that America uses “torture.” They are themselves willing to do anything and say anything to bring America to her knees. they are Marxists at heart who believe they have some sort of divine right to rule the world.
Those interested in the cause of freedom and the unalienable rights that prevent tyrannical rule by zealots and dictators should know, if we do not stand in opposition to these back stabbing, extremist voices we will lose the United States of America.
We should have squashed these bugs when they first showed up in the sixties!
18 U.S. Code § 2340 – Definitions
As used in this chapter—
(1) “torture” means an act committed by a person acting under the color of law specifically intended to inflict severe physical or mental pain or suffering (other than pain or suffering incidental to lawful sanctions) upon another person within his custody or physical control;
(2) “severe mental pain or suffering” means the prolonged mental harm caused by or resulting from—
(A) the intentional infliction or threatened infliction of severe physical pain or suffering;
(B) the administration or application, or threatened administration or application, of mind-altering substances or other procedures calculated to disrupt profoundly the senses or the personality;
(C) the threat of imminent death; or
(D) the threat that another person will imminently be subjected to death, severe physical pain or suffering, or the administration or application of mind-altering substances or other procedures calculated to disrupt profoundly the senses or personality; and
(3) “United States” means the several States of the United States, the District of Columbia, and the commonwealths, territories, and possessions of the United States.
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2340
Please explain, in your own words, how waterboarding and the other tactics revealed in the Senate report fail to meet this legal definition. (For the record, “Bush’s lawyers said it wasn’t” is not an explanation.)
John McCain lays down the law:
Mr. President, I rise in support of the release – the long-delayed release – of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s summarized, unclassified review of the so-called ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ that were employed by the previous administration to extract information from captured terrorists. It is a thorough and thoughtful study of practices that I believe not only failed their purpose – to secure actionable intelligence to prevent further attacks on the U.S. and our allies – but actually damaged our security interests, as well as our reputation as a force for good in the world.
“I believe the American people have a right – indeed, a responsibility – to know what was done in their name; how these practices did or did not serve our interests; and how they comported with our most important values.
“I commend Chairman Feinstein and her staff for their diligence in seeking a truthful accounting of policies I hope we will never resort to again. I thank them for persevering against persistent opposition from many members of the intelligence community, from officials in two administrations, and from some of our colleagues.
“The truth is sometimes a hard pill to swallow. It sometimes causes us difficulties at home and abroad. It is sometimes used by our enemies in attempts to hurt us. But the American people are entitled to it, nonetheless.
“They must know when the values that define our nation are intentionally disregarded by our security policies, even those policies that are conducted in secret. They must be able to make informed judgments about whether those policies and the personnel who supported them were justified in compromising our values; whether they served a greater good; or whether, as I believe, they stained our national honor, did much harm and little practical good.
“What were the policies? What was their purpose? Did they achieve it? Did they make us safer? Less safe? Or did they make no difference? What did they gain us? What did they cost us? The American people need the answers to these questions. Yes, some things must be kept from public disclosure to protect clandestine operations, sources and methods, but not the answers to these questions.
“By providing them, the Committee has empowered the American people to come to their own decisions about whether we should have employed such practices in the past and whether we should consider permitting them in the future. This report strengthens self-government and, ultimately, I believe, America’s security and stature in the world. I thank the Committee for that valuable public service.
“I have long believed some of these practices amounted to torture, as a reasonable person would define it, especially, but not only the practice of waterboarding, which is a mock execution and an exquisite form of torture. Its use was shameful and unnecessary; and, contrary to assertions made by some of its defenders and as the Committee’s report makes clear, it produced little useful intelligence to help us track down the perpetrators of 9/11 or prevent new attacks and atrocities.
“I know from personal experience that the abuse of prisoners will produce more bad than good intelligence. I know that victims of torture will offer intentionally misleading information if they think their captors will believe it. I know they will say whatever they think their torturers want them to say if they believe it will stop their suffering. Most of all, I know the use of torture compromises that which most distinguishes us from our enemies, our belief that all people, even captured enemies, possess basic human rights, which are protected by international conventions the U.S. not only joined, but for the most part authored.
“I know, too, that bad things happen in war. I know in war good people can feel obliged for good reasons to do things they would normally object to and recoil from.
“I understand the reasons that governed the decision to resort to these interrogation methods, and I know that those who approved them and those who used them were dedicated to securing justice for the victims of terrorist attacks and to protecting Americans from further harm. I know their responsibilities were grave and urgent, and the strain of their duty was onerous.
“I respect their dedication and appreciate their dilemma. But I dispute wholeheartedly that it was right for them to use these methods, which this report makes clear were neither in the best interests of justice nor our security nor the ideals we have sacrificed so much blood and treasure to defend.
“The knowledge of torture’s dubious efficacy and my moral objections to the abuse of prisoners motivated my sponsorship of the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005, which prohibits ‘cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment’ of captured combatants, whether they wear a nation’s uniform or not, and which passed the Senate by a vote of 90-9.
“Subsequently, I successfully offered amendments to the Military Commissions Act of 2006, which, among other things, prevented the attempt to weaken Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions, and broadened definitions in the War Crimes Act to make the future use of waterboarding and other ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ punishable as war crimes.
“There was considerable misinformation disseminated then about what was and wasn’t achieved using these methods in an effort to discourage support for the legislation. There was a good amount of misinformation used in 2011 to credit the use of these methods with the death of Osama bin Laden. And there is, I fear, misinformation being used today to prevent the release of this report, disputing its findings and warning about the security consequences of their public disclosure.
“Will the report’s release cause outrage that leads to violence in some parts of the Muslim world? Yes, I suppose that’s possible, perhaps likely. Sadly, violence needs little incentive in some quarters of the world today. But that doesn’t mean we will be telling the world something it will be shocked to learn. The entire world already knows that we water-boarded prisoners. It knows we subjected prisoners to various other types of degrading treatment. It knows we used black sites, secret prisons. Those practices haven’t been a secret for a decade.
“Terrorists might use the report’s re-identification of the practices as an excuse to attack Americans, but they hardly need an excuse for that. That has been their life’s calling for a while now.
“What might come as a surprise, not just to our enemies, but to many Americans, is how little these practices did to aid our efforts to bring 9/11 culprits to justice and to find and prevent terrorist attacks today and tomorrow. That could be a real surprise, since it contradicts the many assurances provided by intelligence officials on the record and in private that enhanced interrogation techniques were indispensable in the war against terrorism. And I suspect the objection of those same officials to the release of this report is really focused on that disclosure – torture’s ineffectiveness – because we gave up much in the expectation that torture would make us safer. Too much.
“Obviously, we need intelligence to defeat our enemies, but we need reliable intelligence. Torture produces more misleading information than actionable intelligence. And what the advocates of harsh and cruel interrogation methods have never established is that we couldn’t have gathered as good or more reliable intelligence from using humane methods.
“The most important lead we got in the search for bin Laden came from using conventional interrogation methods. I think it is an insult to the many intelligence officers who have acquired good intelligence without hurting or degrading prisoners to assert we can’t win this war without such methods. Yes, we can and we will.
“But in the end, torture’s failure to serve its intended purpose isn’t the main reason to oppose its use. I have often said, and will always maintain, that this question isn’t about our enemies; it’s about us. It’s about who we were, who we are and who we aspire to be. It’s about how we represent ourselves to the world.
“We have made our way in this often dangerous and cruel world, not by just strictly pursuing our geopolitical interests, but by exemplifying our political values, and influencing other nations to embrace them. When we fight to defend our security we fight also for an idea, not for a tribe or a twisted interpretation of an ancient religion or for a king, but for an idea that all men are endowed by the Creator with inalienable rights. How much safer the world would be if all nations believed the same. How much more dangerous it can become when we forget it ourselves even momentarily.
“Our enemies act without conscience. We must not. This executive summary of the Committee’s report makes clear that acting without conscience isn’t necessary, it isn’t even helpful, in winning this strange and long war we’re fighting. We should be grateful to have that truth affirmed.
“Now, let us reassert the contrary proposition: that is it essential to our success in this war that we ask those who fight it for us to remember at all times that they are defending a sacred ideal of how nations should be governed and conduct their relations with others – even our enemies.
“Those of us who give them this duty are obliged by history, by our nation’s highest ideals and the many terrible sacrifices made to protect them, by our respect for human dignity to make clear we need not risk our national honor to prevail in this or any war. We need only remember in the worst of times, through the chaos and terror of war, when facing cruelty, suffering and loss, that we are always Americans, and different, stronger, and better than those who would destroy us.
Some days I wish McCain had won in 2008, if only so the torture enthusiasts would have SOME political incentives to change their positions–or at least have enough partisan loyalty to keep their bloodthirsty mouths shut.
Here are some of the practices Tina is defending:
“The interrogators didn’t know the languages that would have been useful for real intelligence, but they did come up with a lexicon of their own: “walling,” which meant slamming a person against a wall; “rough takedown,” in which a group would rush into a cell yelling, then drag a detainee down the hall while punching him, perhaps after having “cut off his clothes and secured him with Mylar tape”; “confinement box,” an instrument to make a prisoner feel he was closed in a coffin (the box came in large or small sizes); “sleep deprivation,” which might mean being kept awake for a hundred and eighty hours before succumbing to “disturbing hallucinations”; the ability to, as the report put it, “earn a bucket,” the bucket being what a prisoner might get to relieve himself in, rather than having to soil himself or being chained to a wall with a diaper (an “image” that President Bush was said to have found disturbing); “waterboarding,” which often itself seems to have been a euphemism for near, rather than simulated, drowning; “rectal rehydration as a means of behavioral control”; “lunch tray,” the assembly of foods that were puréed and used to rectally force-feed prisoners.
This is what the talk of family could look like: “CIA officers also threatened at least three detainees with harm to their families—to include threats to harm the children of a detainee, threats to sexually abuse the mother of a detainee, and a threat to ‘cut [a detainee’s] mother’s throat.’ ” The interrogation of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri included “implying that his mother would be brought before him and sexually abused.””
And, because this cannot be stressed enough, none of these methods had their intended effect of foiling terrorist attacks or protecting Americans.
Chris there’s about a 2% chance you will believe this, but I will give it a try, but according to very, very credible, insiders in the CIA, our tactics wiped out Tier Two leaders in Al Qaeda and as a result they were unable to mount a follow up attack after 9/11. They did a heck of a job and it could not have been done any other way, according to the people involved.
The message sent by releasing the information is: (1 ) The United States can’t be trusted to keep anything confidential ( 2 ) It undermines the moral of our covert agents. ( 3 ) It allows our enemies to cut and splice what they need to make a sales pitch to recruit jihadis ( 4 ) It has destroyed our confidential relationship with a number allies. ( 5 ) It denies us a viable option to gather intel when its absolutely critical that we know. Those in the business who say the enhanced interrogation techniques never worked and never helped us win against terrorists are lying to protect their own butts. ( 6 ) This will place a number of operatives at high risk ( 7 ) There is valid reason for releasing the information, it was done for political advantage. We will be forever weaker as a result and our enemies will be empowered and motivated even more. Nothing good will come from this, unless you are on the side of Islamic terrorists, then you were just handed a gift.
Source: http://www.newyorker.com/news/amy-davidson/inhumane-scenes-cia-prisons
Also keep in mind that these are just the abuses that we have documented proof of. Since the CIA destroyed a whole lot of evidence about what they did, we may never know the full extent of the depravity that was done in our names.
Oh my, how you are determined to paint the men and women of the CIA as exactly the same as those we’ve seen lopping off the heads of journalists! How eager you are to smear the name of our former President to aid Americas enemies. You are a complete dupe and a fool!
You’re incapable of making a sane determination! You’ve completely bought into the radical left’s anti-American agenda. These people have never been loyal to America or valued freedom and the Constitution. They serve at the foot of Marx!
The words severe, prolonged, intent, death don’t carry the same emotional drama for you that “torture” has unless they are used to further the radical narrative that GWB, his administration, and the CIA operatives intended to inflict lasting bodily or mental harm that would ultimately lead to death or crippling harm. The narrative of a maniacal, out of control bunch of brutes who took no precautions and have no integrity. You make me sick!
McCain is, as far as I’m concerned, also unqualified to determine if what we did was torture since his own experiences would naturally color his perceptions. No reputable lawyer would choose to place him on a jury.
President Obama has chosen to bomb our enemies, including traitorous Americans, women and children rather than dirty his hands and fall under the same harsh criticism being leveled at Bush and the CIA. Of course we also gather almost zero intelligence AND terrorists have spread across the globe and become stronger since then. and Iran is allowed to take a Sunday stroll toward developing and using nuclear weapons.
You’ve included yourself with the jerks who paint targets on America and her allies for politics. There is no person lower in a time of war. War, you nimrod, is not a game of patty cake. If you think we can defeat terrorists and their idiot ideology with kindness you are a complete fool!
Peddle your crybaby crap somewhere else; I’m not interested!
Our troops, our CIA, and our President, past and present NEED the American people behind them. to quote the man who kept Americans safe for all of the years on his watch following 911…THIS IS NOT HELPFUL!
In case you missed it, this is what Obama policies have wrought. He abandoned Iraq and this is the result.
“ISIS turned up and said to the children, ‘You say the words that you will follow Mohammed,’ ” White said in video posted on the Christian Broadcasting Network website.
“The children, all under 15, four of them, they said, ‘No, we love Yeshua [Jesus], we have always loved Yeshua.’
“They chopped all their heads off.
“How do you respond to that? You just cry.”
http://nypost.com/2014/12/12/christian-leader-isis-savages-behead-four-children/
From one terrorist bomb-maker to another . . . . .
It appears the left was accusing Diane Feinstein and Chuck Schumer of waterboarding back in 2007.
“During the Vietnam War, anti-war protesters used to shout, “Hey hey, LBJ, how many kids did you kill today?” Will anti-war and anti-torture protesters soon be yelling at Lady DiFi, “Hey DiFi, Di Fi, how many will be waterboarded because of your lie?”
http://valtinsblog.blogspot.com/2007/11/will-feinstein-and-schumer-be.html#.VIy_xOl0w5s
Also, there is this interesting article about Pelosi lying.
Confirmed: Pelosi Lied About CIA Briefing on Waterboarding:
“Three years ago, I wrote a satirical column “defending” Nancy Pelosi against accusations that she had lied publicly about being briefed by the CIA about the use of Enhanced Interrogation Techniques (EITs) — including waterboarding — on enemy detainees as far back as 2002.
The evidence against Pelosi was so strong that her tale could only be explained one of two ways: Either (a) she was lying, or (b) a vast conspiracy had constructed a web of deceit to ensnare her. Occam’s Razor revealed the truth, of course, but my column was premised on describing just how implausible the ‘anti-Pelosi witch hunt’ theory really was. As of that writing, we knew that two separate members of the House Intelligence Committee had personally attested to her presence at a private 2002 briefing, at which EITs were thoroughly described. A contemporaneous CIA report also confirmed Pelosi’s presence at the briefing, specifying that members were informed about the existence and use of these EITs. A 2007 Washington Post account corroborated these facts. And yet, Pelosi stuck to her story. She claimed that she was not — repeat: was not — told about any of this, further asserting that the CIA had lied by explicitly assuring her that waterboarding had not been used. In case any shadow of doubt remained, a final piece of this puzzle has fallen into place. The former CIA counterterrorism chief who conducted the briefing in question has at last spoken out:”
Continued..
http://townhall.com/tipsheet/guybenson/2012/05/01/confirmed_pelosi_lied_about_cia_briefing_on_waterboarding
There is a very good chance Feinstein’s release of this report will harm us as a nation and individuals serving to protect us.
I does appear, in my opinion, she did this as a retaliation against the CIA for its accessing her committee’s staff’s computers.
Dianne Feinstein: CIA May Have Broken The Law To Spy On Senate Staff: 3/11/14
“WASHINGTON — Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) delivered a devastating broadside against the CIA Tuesday, alleging that the agency was trying to intimidate Congress and may have broken the law in spying on Senate staffers.
Feinstein, head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, was responding to CIA charges that Senate staffers had hacked CIA computers to learn that the spy agency was in fact spying on the people charged with overseeing its activities. Those revelations surfaced last week, prompting the countercharge against the CIA and a CIA complaint to the Justice Department.
But Feinstein, who is often a strong defender of the intelligence community, hammered the agency in a morning Senate floor speech, saying that the CIA knew of every step the Intelligence Committee staffers took and that the CIA provided all the documents that the agency later questioned.
To allege that staffers may have broken the law was dishonest, she said, and smacked of an attempt to bully civilians responsible for checking agency abuses.
“Our staff involved in this matter have the appropriate clearances, handled the sensitive material according to established procedures and practice to protect classified information, and were provided access to the [documents] by the CIA itself,” Feinstein said. “As a result, there is no legitimate reason to allege to the Justice Department that Senate staff may have committed a crime. I view the [CIA’s] acting general counsel’s referral [to the Justice Department] as a potential effort to intimidate this staff, and I am not taking it lightly.”
Continued..
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/11/dianne-feinstein-cia_n_4941352.html
Which led to this.
EXCLUSIVE: CIA Spent $40 million, Hacked Senate Computers to Surpress Torture Report:
“Things got even hotter this afternoon in Washington in the wake of today’s release of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s now infamous Torture Report.
Struggling to control the CIA’s crumbling torture narrative, CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, attempted to derail US Senator Diane Feinstein today live on CNN, by interrupting the Senator repeatedly, insinuating that the report was wrong, almost acting as an apologist for Washington’s 13 year-long torture boondoggle. What followed in their exchange is some of the most explosive revelations yet…”
Continued..
http://beforeitsnews.com/alternative/2014/12/exclusive-cia-spent-40-million-hacked-senate-computers-to-surpress-torture-report-3074946.html
Off topic but important in MHO.
Attention: Trying to Get a Small Bit of Freedom Back
Jack and Tina and anyone else, there is a chance to take back a small bit of freedom the nanny state tyrants of California are about to take away.
As you probably know there is a ballot initiative effort to repeal the law that bans plastic grocery bags and forces retailers to charge ten cents each for a paper bags.
Tomorrow at Food Max in Chico (2051 Doctor Martin Luther King Junior Parkway) signature gathers will be present and you can sign the petition to get the measure on the next ballot.
Tonight they were there and I signed.
As I was signing I noticed most people refused to sign. One guy said, “F it” when asked. (And he used the full F word.)
I found this astonishing as these people were walking out of the store with the very plastic bags that would be outlawed.
As I was driving away I was wondering why the signature gathers were not asking people if they understood that they will have to pay 10 cents for each paper bag and have no option for a plastic bag if this measure does not make it on the ballot and does not pass.
Jack, maybe you can ask the signature gathers that question tomorrow when you go to sign the petition.
One of the signature gathers said he would be there at 2pm. I’m not sure if someone else will be there earlier. There were two signature gatherers when I was there.
Why hasn’t anyone considered this! Waterboarding does no physical harm. You can’t drowned while being waterboarded! There are no lasting physical effects. Now, lets address psycological effects. The discomfort is so great that most people give in well before there are any lasting psychological effects. This is not day after day torture that leaves people mentally crippled for life. This is something that can cause a subject to cooperate in a very short time. This is also something that every Navy seal experiences as part of their training. I don’t believe it is torture. It is physical coercion. There is a difference. There are no lasting effects. And, it is affective. Typically when used as an interrogation tool the integrator starts with information that is already know that the subject does not know is known. When false information is provided the subject is waterboarded again. The result is the subject has no idea what is known and what isn’t so they end up giving up information that is not known.
I do not support any interrogation technique that results in actual physical harm to a subject. However, since this one does not I accept its use in terrorist situations. There is always the argument that if we support this our enemies will use this against our people. The enemy in this case is not squeamish about using actual physical and psycological torture that leaves lasting scars. The end to almost all of their interrogations is beheading.
Lets get OUR heads out of the sand!
Huffington Post:
I look at the intent behind the interrogations and I find people doing difficult work to try to keep Americans safe and win a war against a enemy.
I look at the possible intentions for, a) Writing the report without key interviews or republican involvement, and b) Releasing it while we are still fighting this enemy and conclude that whatever the intent, the outcome’s negative impact far outweighs anything positive Feinstein hoped to accomplish…and I’m being generous.
Washington Free Beacon:
Chris, one of the worst problems I see is this: The Bush Administration used their legal counsel to advise them what was legally defined as torture. They did and then we stayed within the legal bounds and definition at that time.
Years later someone else comes up with a stricter definition of what is torture, so we backdate our moral sensibilities and cry foul and beat ourselves up over it. To what end?
That’s not right Chris. The President used his legal staff and they provided the guidelines that were followed…so if you feel obliged to do something, why not sue them? Sue the legal advisors Chris! But don’t destroy the CIA. Don’t damage our national security because 10 years later you have “evolved” and you change the rules and say, oh, bad, bad, bad, you shouldn’t have done that years back and now we’re going to punish you for following the rules from 10 years ago.
Does that really makes sense to you? I makes absolutely no sense to me. It’s stupid… only a moron could think that’s right.
Look, I’m not advocating we torture anyone, not at all. But, if we got a little rough right after 3000 innocent people were murdered on 9/11…I can understand. The motives were to protect the American people. If they were operating within the declared rules of the time, how can we go back and cry foul?!!!!
Terrorism has damaged us enough Chris! We’ve made so many concessions to limit our military response and minimize collateral damage, often at the sacrifice of our own sons and daughters. And considering what Al Qaeda did to us and what other Muslim terrorists did to us before that fateful day, they got what was coming to them. We owe barbarians nothing – they are an enemy with no rules that kill women and children. They kidnap, torture and behead people for things we wouldn’t even consider a criminal offense.
Why do you and DiFi want us to punish ourselves and beat ourselves down??
What good will it do to put somebody on trial for torture or indict Bush for something or become defendants in a show trial in some liberal European country because of what DiFi released?
There’s just so much BAD that can happen and no good that I can see from this one.
And lastly, I believe it was done mostly to damage the republican party, sort of payback for winning this years election. The motives behind this are evil.
This political hatchet job makes the closing a lane on a bridge out of Chicago look pretty mild by comparison.
I think we would have been far served to throw Feinstein out of office than to release that torture report. In an earlier time such a vile act by a Senator would have led to a charge of treason.
Andrew McCarthy of Natioanl Review is, as always, brilliant when it comes to unpacking a legal issue. I urge you to read the entire piece but the following is important specifically with respect to the charge that the US engages in torture:
I did learn that two detainees died in detention, one in Iraq and another in Afghanistan. I don’t know what, if anything, was done about those incidents.
Another point worth mentioning:
Rich Lowry, also at National Review also has a few good points:
(Reuters) – One of the two psychologists who devised the CIA’s harsh Bush-era interrogation methods said on Wednesday that a scathing U.S. Senate report on the torture of foreign terrorism suspects “took things out of context” and made false accusations.
“It’s a bunch of hooey,” James Mitchell told Reuters from his home in Florida when asked for his response to the Senate Intelligence Committee’s findings released on Tuesday. “Some of the things are just plain not true.”
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A group of former top-ranking CIA officials disputed a U.S. Senate committee’s finding that the agency’s interrogation techniques produced no valuable intelligence, saying such work had saved thousands of lives.
Former CIA directors George Tenet, Porter Goss and Michael Hayden, along with three ex-deputy directors, wrote in an op-ed article published on Wednesday in the Wall Street Journal that the Senate Intelligence Committee report also was wrong in saying the agency had been deceptive about its work following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.
“The committee has given us … a one-sided study marred by errors of fact and interpretation – essentially a poorly done and partisan attack on the agency that has done the most to protect America after the 9/11 attacks,” they said.
The report concluded the CIA failed to disrupt any subsequent plots despite torturing captives during the presidency of George W. Bush.
But the former CIA officials said the United States never would have tracked down and killed al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in 2011 without information acquired in the interrogation program. Their methods also led to the capture of ranking al Qaeda operatives, provided valuable information about the organization and saved thousands of lives by disrupting al Qaeda plots, including one for an attack on the U.S. West Coast that could have been similar to the Sept. 11 attacks.
The former CIA officials defended the interrogation program by saying agents were in an unprecedented daily “‘ticking time bomb’ scenario” that required quick action.
That is the ominous statement an uncooperative Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM), mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, told his Central Intelligence Agency interrogators when they initially asked him, after he had been captured, about additional planned al-Qaida attacks on the United States.
In March 2003, KSM became the third and final terrorist ever waterboarded by the CIA. The other two were Abu Zubaydah and Rahim Al-Nashiri.
So few were waterboarded because the CIA was so strict in the criteria for deciding when the technique could be used.
As CIA Acting General Counsel John A. Rizzo explained in a 2004 letter to then-Acting Assistant Attorney General Daniel Levin of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, the CIA would only resort to waterboarding a top al-Qaida leader when the agency had “credible intelligence that a terrorist attack is imminent,” “substantial and credible indicators that the subject has actionable intelligence that can prevent, disrupt or deny this attack” and “(o)ther interrogation methods have failed to elicit the information within the perceived time limit for preventing the attack.”
Rizzo’s letter, as quoted here, was cited in a May 30, 2005, memo to Rizzo from then-Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Steven G. Bradbury, also of the Office of Legal Counsel.
On Tuesday, the CIA confirmed to me that it stands by assertions credited to the agency in this 2005 memo that subjecting KSM to “enhanced techniques” of interrogation — including waterboarding — caused him to reveal information that allowed the U.S. government to stop a planned 9/11-style attack on Los Angeles.
A pretty little girl named Suzy was
standing on the sidewalk in front of her home.
Next to her was a basket containing a number of tiny creatures; in her hand was a sign announcing
FREE KITTENS.
Suddenly a line of big black cars pulled up beside her. Out of the lead car stepped a tall, grinning man. “Hi there little girl, I’m President Obama.
What do you have in the basket?” he asked.
“Kittens,” little Suzy said. “How old are they?” asked Obama.
Suzy replied, “I’m not sure,they’re so young, their eyes aren’t even open yet.”
“And what kind of kittens are they?” Obama asked?
“Democrats,” answered Suzy with a smile.
Obama was delighted. As soon as he returned to his car, he called his PR chief and told him about the little girl and the kittens.
Recognizing the perfect photo op, the two men agreed that the president should return the next day; and in front of the assembled media, have the girl talk about her discerning kittens.
So the next day, Suzy was again standing on the sidewalk with her basket of “FREE KITTENS,” when another motorcade pulled up, this time followed by vans from ABC, NBC, CBS and CNN.
Cameras and audio equipment were quickly set up, then Obama got out of his limo and walked over to little Suzy. “Hello, again,” he said, “I’d love it if you would tell all my friends out there what kind of kittens you’re giving away.”
“Yes sir,” Suzy said. “They’re Republicans.”
Taken by surprise, the president stammered,
“But..but..yesterday, you told me they were
DEMOCRATS.”
Little Suzy smiled and said, “I know Sir, but today
,they have their eyes open.”
Jack at #15: Can you provide some evidence for your claim that the legal definition of torture has been changed since the Bush years? As I understand it, it has been the same for decades. I understand that the Bush administration had its lawyers, led by John Yoo, working overtime to justify how the practices used did not constitute torture. Given this blog’s usual skepticism of how government lawyers can justify absolutely anything, I am surprised that you find is argument convincing enough to offer. Remember that this was the same administration that argued Cheney did not have to divulge certain documents because he was not part of the executive branch, even though on other occasions before and after he had asserted executive privilege to get out of revealing other documents.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/cheney-the-fourth-branch/
As for the good the report could do, I believe when our government violates the constitution we should absolutely know about it. Indefinite detention is an unquestionable violation of the Constitution. The founders were wise enough to know that due process is necessary to prevent innocent people from being punished. We now know that 26 innocent people were subject to harsh interrogation due to this constitutional violation. How can anyone on the right be OK with that? And keep in mind that my intent here is not to damage Bush; Obama has legalized indefinite detention and thus bears as much guilt as Bush does.
We have the right and the responsibility to demand better of our government. This is one of the worst violations a government can be accused of, and you think we shouldn’t know because it might hurt our country? The actions taken hurt our country!
If you’re concerned about damage to the Republican Party, you should be denouncing the torture that was conducted and insisting that all your representatives do the same. What is hurting Republicans far more than the initial report is your defense of these disgusting practices. Your party continues to do nothing but confirm the most ugly stereotypes about itself, all while complaining about those same stereotypes. If you don’t want to be seen as defenders of torture, the simple solution is to stop defending torture. Democrats concerned with party over all couldn’t have asked for a better reaction. You’re giving them exactly what they want. But For those of us who actually want our country to be a better, more moral place, the Republican party’s reaction has been incredibly depressing.
Chris, no I can’t provide you with the definition at the moment. I might be able to provide you with the people who defined the first parameters. I’m not sure the original definition is out here. I will check around and see what I can find.
More Common Sense, your claims about waterboarding are completely false. It is possible to drown during waterboarding, and it does have long term psychological effects.
http://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1892721,00.html
http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post/does-waterboarding-have-long-term-p-2009-05-01/?id=does-waterboarding-have-long-term-p-2009-05-01
http://metinbasoglu.wordpress.com/2012/12/25/waterboarding-is-severe-torture-research-findings/
I’m curious as to why some people here seem to think that the statements of the people who devised the torture program are somehow more reliable than those of the people who exposed it. Are you saying the men responsible for this have no reason to lie?
“I’m curious as to why some people here seem to think that the statements of the people who devised the torture program are somehow more reliable than those of the people who exposed it.”
Chris that’s a very good question and you have to let your conscience be your guide, and of course your logic. First, who has a good motive for exposing it and stands to gain something? I also know one or two people involved and I have found them to be very honest and decent Americans. I don’t know DiFi.
A. At least some of the people who “exposed” it were fully informed from the start, in detail, and gave it their stamp of approval.
B. The people who “exposed” it, at least in this report, purposely avoided interviewing anyone who was involved allowing them the ability to decide the outcome and then choose the content that would support the premise. This is unethical and deceitful.
You assume those who wrote and released this report “have no reason to lie” which at this point in time especially is ridiculous. The party that is willing to put American soldiers, agents, allies, and their families at risk, undermine our war efforts, and give our enemies reasons to rejoice is the same party that lied to pass healthcare, secretly targeted journalists and conservative organizations prior to an election to affect the outcome, and has at its head a man that has repeatedly lied to the people.
The man that oversaw this program has been forthcoming about what was done. Today he was asked about the tapes that were destroyed. His response was that the tapes were transcribed so there is a record and that he order the tapes destroyed because his operatives faces were on them and he feared a leak would expose them, and their families, making them vulnerable.
Why would he fear leaks? If you don’t know the answer to that, you don’t know the radicals that run the party you support!
Tina, you still have not answered the question. Can you explain how the tactics disclosed in the report do not meet the legal definition of torture?
Or the other question: how do you square your stated distrust of the government we your absolute trust in the government’s ability to detain terror suspects without due process, especially since you now know for a fact that many innocent people were detained and subjected to harsh interrogation measures under this practice?
Chris: “Can you explain how the tactics disclosed in the report do not meet the legal definition of torture?”
easy!!! The tactics explained in the report, key word, “explained,” do not reflect what happened or the context in which it happened.
The partisan, reckless democrats that wrote this report started with the word torture and then set about demonstrating torture.
How can a report possibly reflect what happened when the panel didn’t bother to interview a single person involved?
Chris: “…how do you square your stated distrust of the government we your absolute trust in the government’s ability to detain terror suspects without due process…”
How did you get the idea that I absolutely distrust the government?
First of all the government is a large body of people some are better at what they do than others and some are more honest than others and some are just skunks. In most cases, I have a low expectation about what government can do.
The federal government is too big. Through the years our legislators have created too many expensive wasteful programs and created a huge bureaucratic behemoth, ripe for waste, fraud, and abuse, that doesn’t function well. I don’t think anything as big as our government can ever function well. (Big corporations don’t work as well for the same reasons)
I also have observed the two basic philosophies of the parties, watched them operate, and chosen the one that best matches my own. Neither functions perfectly; one I find a lot more underhanded and frankly America challenged, to put it nicely.
Our government does have one very important job. keeping the various states, united to form the nation, America, safe and to ensure that our freedom and rights are protected. I say it that way because people have forgotten that we are also a nation of states with their own constitutions, obligations and rights. The one very important job the states gave to the federal government requires adequate funding and people dedicated to take on the most difficult and demanding job imaginable. We train them, we swear them by oath to protect the Constitution and faithfully execute their duties. How many jobs have that requirement? We also have oversight and a system of checks and balances.
Finally, I think it’s incredibly important and incumbent upon every citizen to stand behind our government when we are involved in war. I cannot, in all good conscience, watch our kids, or the professionals that give them support, go into battle putting their lives on the line without giving them my full support. I also cannot stand by and watch as these people are ripped apart in the American media, by our own elected officials, as they work. I would expect that of our enemies but not Americans.
I believe President G. W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney are honest men of integrity who took the job because they wanted to serve the nation. I think they had people working under them who were similarly honest and dedicated. I trust them also because I watched them work. The only secrets they kept they kept to keep Americans safe. They have not run from these allegations; they don’t have to because they were not reckless when they determined what would be acceptable practice.
“…you now know for a fact that many innocent people were detained and subjected to harsh interrogation measures under this practice?”
I don’t know that at all.
We are involved in a war with brutal murderers lacking restrictive rules. Nothing we would do could ever match the things they do and have done to many innocent people. We have an obligation to stop them. there is no way to do that without some regrettable damage. You seem to want to believe the worst about your fellow Americans; I choose to believe our guys are doing the best they can in a very difficult situation.
None of us can be absolutely certain when we try to determine who is truthful, honest, or of good intention. I call em as I see em.
“easy!!! The tactics explained in the report, key word, “explained,” do not reflect what happened or the context in which it happened.
OK, so you’re saying that the accusations made in the report are completely false. That we never chained a prisoner naked to the floor and let him die of hypothermia, that we didn’t make people stand on broken ankles, that we didn’t threaten to kill and rape their family members (explicitly forbidden by the legal def. of torture).
So what about waterboarding? How does that not meet the legal definition of torture?
Tina, there is a difference between supporting our troops and blindly accepting anything the government tells you as long as they justify it under the term “national security.” You seem to be arguing that big government incompetence could not have possibly extended to the Bush administration’s handling of the war on terror–that position wouldn’t make sense in a vaccuum, and it certainly doesn’t make sense in a post-Iraq War world, when we know that the intelligence that lead to the war was faulty, and that the government had plenty of reason to doubt its accuracy.
I’m well aware that many Democrats bought into this evidence too, and I am not accusing the Bush administration of intentionally lying. I’m saying that this was a result of government incompetence. Curveball was not a reliable source, and there was plenty of evidence for that prior to the fact. To this day Dick Cheney asserts that the Iraq War was justified based on Saddam’s connection to Al Qaeda even though no such connection existed; how could you possibly trust such a man?
Your statements that the administration was not “reckless” and that they only used trained, dedicated operatives is also wrong. According to the report, 85% of the program’s staff were contractors, and some of the interrogators had no training in interrogation whatsoever. The same people who were devising the methods used were also in charge of overseeing their effectiveness and determining whether they would continue being used, for God’s sake. The contractors were not properly vetted and some had histories of anger management problems and even sexual offenses!
Furthermore, the CIA hid information from members of the Bush administration, including the president himself:
“–Bush was not briefed during the first four years of the program, but Vice President Dick Cheney was.
–A CIA email from 2003 said “the White House is extremely concerned [Secretary of State Colin] Powell would blow his stack if he were to be briefed” about the details of the program.
–The report says the CIA paid two psychologists more than $80 million to come up with torture methods. In the report’s executive summary, the programs developed by the CIA and these two contractors are described as “brutal” and “in violation of U.S. law, treaty obligations, and our values.”
–Additionally, the report found the agency paid millions of dollars, in cash, to foreign governments to get them to host “black sites” where interrogations were held (two of which were not used because of political concerns about the host countries). The report says one country paid by the CIA torture program was told that the black site was serving a different purpose entirely.
–Torture programs described in the report include “rectal feeding,” sleep deprivation, insects, use of diapers, and mock executions. According to the report, “rectal hydration” was used as a means of “behavior control.”
–The CIA accidentally tortured two of its informants.
CIA forced detainees to wear diapers “to cause humiliation” and “induce a sense of helplessness.” Learned helplessness is used to coerce the prisoner’s cooperation in terms of confessions, many of which later turn out to be false.
–The report repeatedly questions the quality of the information obtained through enhanced interrogation techniques. It found at least 26 people were wrongly detained as part of the program. One detainee was recommended for release because he was given to the CIA under false pretenses. Instead, the CIA transferred the detainee to US custody for another four years. The report noted detainees who were tortured “provided fabricated information on critical intelligence issues.”
–According to the report, CIA officials, including the agency’s former director, Michael Hayden, repeatedly lied about details of the program. The report describes instances of the CIA misleading the Department of Justice, a US Senate committee, and the media about the usage and effectiveness of enhanced interrogation techniques. It says that the CIA attempted to manipulate press coverage of the program. Hayden did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider about the report.”
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/the-senate-is-about-to-release-the-cia-torture-report-2014-12#ixzz3LwBfefi1
I continue to be baffled by your inability to believe the conclusions of the report and your insistence that government incompetence ends where the right of the government to imprison, brutalize and kill begins. The incompetence, negligence, dishonesty and influence of money here represents everything conservatives tell us is wrong with government…and yet somehow you can’t see it, because to acknowledge it would be to admit that you have sacrificed liberty for the sake of (false) security.
You speak of respecting those tasked with protecting our freedom but you can’t acknowledge that these programs did more damage to our freedoms than any terrorist attack ever could. If you really want to protect our freedom, you should be insisting that these unconstitutional abuses never happen again. You think your arguments are patriotic but they are really jingoistic in the truest possible sense; you think the government is justified in anything as long as they can pretend it keeps us safe, and you keep reminding me that “the enemy is worse” as if that makes a difference, which makes you a moral relativist.
You have become your own worst enemy.
Jack: “First, who has a good motive for exposing it and stands to gain something?”
People who care about the Constitution, the Geneva Conventions, the intent of the Founding Fathers in expressly condemning torture in their statements and founding documents, the rights of people to be considered innocent until proven guilty; non-sadists; libertarian-leaning people who think the government has way too much power to violate the rights of citizens as it is…shall I go on?
A NYT summary of CIA Directors sheds some light on the programs development and changes.
CNN’s interview with John Brennen adds context.
This 2011 Washington Post article provides an important question, why was it questioned only when Bush was President?
This little story also points to the other terrible outcome from the release of this report. Those nations of the free world, a world that recognizes human rights and fights for them…our allies, have now all similarly been exposed and made more vulnerable. The shred of remaining trust between the United states and these nations has withered significantly.
The radicals who pompously criticize the efforts of our CIA are of the same mindset as Bill Ayers who is perfectly comfortable sitting down with Iranian officials to make outrageously false statements about the US. They are easy to spot when you know what to look for and definitely not to be trusted.
Chris I have not “blindly accepted” anything. I just don’t see things as you do. I guess that drives you nuts.
Please stop defining my position as you see it; I have made my position clear. You clearly do not get it.
“To this day Dick Cheney asserts that the Iraq War was justified based on Saddam’s connection to Al Qaeda even though no such connection existed”
Please stop acting as if you are the final authority! All either of us knows is what we read. Each of us must rely on our senses and judgement to determine what we “believe” is the truth. You choose not to believe Cheney. Your loss in my estimation; Cheney is a fine man and dedicated servant of the American people.
April 2011, The Weekly Standard, “WikiLeaks: The Iraq-Al Qaeda Connection Confirmed, Again”
Townhall:
President Bush and to a lesser degree, Dick Cheney, did not push back hard against the radicals on the left bent on discrediting the war effort and the President and vice president. Many people believe that was a mistake. I imagine Bush felt that history would tell the final story and the gutter fight was something he would leave to others…and gutter fight it is!
“…these programs did more damage to our freedoms than any terrorist attack ever could.”
Absolutely absurd! Not to mention incredibly naive about the nature and determination of terrorist zealots making war on us, on your freedoms and indeed the freedoms of the entire free world.
So, following the “logic” of the “torture report,” 10 years from now there’ll be a “drone report” that accuses Obumble/Oblameo of murder since he’s selectively sending in drones that kill innocents – without due process – and Clowngress knew about that, too!
But it’s always different when a Demwit does it….
Tina: “Each of us must rely on our senses and judgement to determine what we “believe” is the truth.”
It’s really sad when conservatives feel the need to turn to the argument “truth is subjective” in order to salvage their side. You don’t actually believe this, but it’s all you have left.
OFF SUBJECT:
Hot damn! I am an alpha male!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/11293112/Men-who-like-spicier-food-are-alpha-males-with-higher-levels-of-testosterone-French-report-claims.html
Ronald Reagan signed U.S. ratification of the international Convention Against Torture, which he signed on April 18, 1988.
When a politician commits war crimes it is our duty to do something.
When we stoop down to their level we are no better.
In WW2 many surrendered to US to get a meal and bed because it was better than what the German Army gave us.
Torture is not Christian. Torture only works to make some one confess to untrue things.
We need to at the least pardon the Bush Admin to put on record the war crimes.
Tommy, welcome to our discussion, always nice to have new folks drop in and offer an opinion.
You seem like the voice of reason on so many issues near and dear, especially your thought on offering a pardon to those in the Bush Admin. to prevent the possibility of being tried for war crimes. See like if we are going to back date the rules, then absolutely, its only fair to do that.
Next, you said, “Torture is not Christian. Torture only works to make some one confess to untrue things.” Torture isn’t Christian, i.e. moral, and I agree. I disagree that torture only makes one confess to untrue things.
Anyone in the military who has ever had the experience of being in a SERE school or a POW will likely disagree. The SERE school is offered to people who will have classified information and be close to the front lines. Any SERE student will tell you, the human condition can only endure so much and then you break. It’s only a matter of when, not if.
This was true in WWII and it was true in wars throughout history. By the way, do you think we didn’t use torture during WWII? Well, nothing has changed since then, just because we live in so-called modern times. Today’s enemy is even more ruthless than the NAZI’s, they don’t respect any rules of war and illegally operated without a national flag as combatants. People like that are not subject to any rules of the Geneva Convention, but I digress.
This is why when people, mostly liberals, with no background or poor information on this subject of torture come up with the idea that torture doesn’t work…well, to those who know better, it sounds absurd. I’m not blaming you for your opinion, it’s just that I believe you’ve trusted the wrong sources to form it.
Sure, there are plenty of so-called experts to support what you said, but those who’re being honest and have real first-hand experience will tell you almost every single time it’s used, torture does work… like it or not.
Please bear with me, because this is an important subject to hash over. When time is of the essence, torture is the short cut to getting the information you need to know, and without any question in my mind, this is true.
Imagine you are the military operator of a crypo-machine and the passcode to enter the machine and make it operational is: 16A245B-!T. Unfortunately, you’re captured an the enemy takes you to dank, musty room deep in a concrete basement. There you are stripped naked and shoved inside what looks like a 3-X4- metal box inserted into the brick wall. The door closes on you. It’s pitch black and now you are laying on a metal grill kind of like you might find on a floor furnace. Below you, there is a light, it’s about 6 feet away and you can see what looks like two gas pilot-lights flickering in the darkness. They are reflecting on two large oven burners! You’re told by your captors that you have 30 seconds to give up the code or the burners will come on and you will die. If you lie they will put you back in and you will burn to death. The seconds tick by, you feel claustrophobic, panic sets, you resist every instinct to talk. Then the burners light up and flames slowly rise until your skin is starting to burn, the pain is excruciating… do you bravely burn slowly to your death or doing you break and scream out the secret code?
90% of us will confess, others make take two or three more attempts like this, but 99.9% crack. This was a tactic employed by the SAVAK, the Iranian Secret Police. I got to know these guys back in the early 70-s and this was one of their methods. If you would like to know a bit more about the SAVAK, let me quote from a book ROGUE STATE by William Blum ( http://williamblum.org/about )
“Physical abuse or other degrading treatment was rejected, not only because it is wrong, but because it has historically proven to be ineffective,” said Richard Stolz, Deputy Director of Operations of the Central Intelligence Agency in 1988. ( LIE )
The CIA likes to say things like this because they think it sounds like good plausible denial. But who can believe that torture does not loosen up tongues, that for such purpose it is not exceedingly effective? … Torture’s effectiveness extends yet further, for its purpose is frequently not so much to elicit information as it is to punish, to coerce the victims from any further dissident activity by gouging out the idealism from their very being, and as a warning to their comrades.
For these ends, the CIA has co-existed with torture for decades….” END
Blum is not a conservative voice, he’s often in the far left camp and in this respect he ought to carry some credibility with those are trying to decide if torture works based on their political perspective and who they want to trust as sources.
Of course torture works and of course torture is wrong!
Now lets take this to one more level and I will leave it alone: Imagine for the moment that you’re the President and you have authorized the killing of Kalid Sheik Mohammed, aka KSM, because he masterminded the 9/11 plot. But, he’s not killed, instead he is captured and credible sources now say he has in play a follow-on attack on the City of Los Angeles, a germ warfare attack! The deadly attack could come in a matter of days and thousands of American lives will be lost and it could be your own Mother and Father who also live there.
The guidance by your Dept. of Justice says enhanced interrogation techniques such as waterboarding or sleep depravation do not “technically” rise to the level of torture. They assure you they could be used to extract information to stop this new terrorist attack. Some in your cabinet disagree, they say this is wrong and that any pain inflicted on another human being is torture. They warn, its illegal and its not the American way.
It’s your call, stand on your principles or let your parents and thousands of others die for those principles?
Time is limited, and you wrestle with the decision knowing that either way you will be held accountable. One one hand you have already issued a warrant to kill this man, and logically speaking death is a lot more severe than any temporary pain from “enhanced interrogation.” Heck, even the Bible says you can exact torturous punishment for transgressions against others. Hammurabi’s Law, an eye for an eye. But, there’s also more, “And it shall be, if the wicked man be worthy to be beaten, that the judge shall cause him to lie down, and to be beaten. Deuteronomy 25:2 “A fool’s lips enter into contention, and his mouth calleth for strokes. Proverbs 18:6 Judgments are prepared for scorners, and stripes for the back of fools. Proverbs 19:29 A whip for the horse, a bridle for the ass, and a rod for the fool’s back. Proverbs 26:3 If a man beats his male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies as a direct result, he must be punished, but he is not to be punished if the slave gets up after a day or two, since the slave is his property. Exodus 21:20-21 (I am not a Bible expert, I just discovered how helpful the internet can be for clever quotes! )
Your Justice Dept. admits they are making a very fine distinction on what is, and is not torture, but they believe you would be acting within legal parameters if you did, A, B and C, but not D.
What do you do? I know what I would do and I wouldn’t lose any sleep over it. By the way, my own Grandson went through similar “enhanced interrogation” tactics aka torture in his SERE school, as do all front line government employees with a top secret clearance must. Hey, if it was good enough for him, it’s good enough for KSM. My instructions would be, start filling the buckets and get the towel ready. I’ll take the blame and if my country wants to try me for a war crime later then I’ll take that risk too, if it will save American lives verses risking one terrorist life. To me that guy was as good as dead anyway from the first time he signed on to kill women and children. And until you can show me a better way… this would be my final decision. I’m fairly convinced that most all of us would rather have that kind of President than one willing err on the side caution and personal sensibilities.
I wonder how we can justify a drone strike if we are so willing restrict injury upon a captive terrorist?
Chris: “It’s really sad when conservatives feel the need to turn to the argument “truth is subjective” in order to salvage their side.”
What a bunch a crap. You assume “truth” was established in this report. But it’s simply what you believe to be the truth. You have accepted a partisan report and the opinions of radical left lawyers as the last word and claimed it represents the truth. Man, you are so full of yourself!
I never said truth is subjective. I said neither you or I can ever have the first hand knowledge that those who were in the room have and I accept that lawyers disagree about what is Constitutional and what is not.
“…it’s all you have left.”
More crap. And you don’t think this crap makes you sound desperate?
Clueless as well as arrogant! Celebrate Chris, you could easily claim membership in the radical Bill Ayers wing of the anti-American nutbag faction.
See I can be nasty and dismissive too. Isn’t it a bit stupid?
TommyW39 thank you for expressing your opinion.
America does not torture but we are willing to make people who have murdered thousands of Americans and have threatened to kill thousands more extremely uncomfortable and fearful to get information from them.
Our government is not a religious body. It is charged in the Constitution to defend the nation from those who seek to do us harm. Our government took care to determine the parameters for interrogation following 911. The information gleaned from these techniques yielded results…one example is an attack on Los Angeles that was stopped, according to those who actually were present during the interrogations.
Anyone captured during war who is subjected to harsh interrogation gives up misinformation. Soldiers are trained and continue to fight the enemy even after capture. It is up to interrogators, who are also well trained, to test information against information they already have. They give up information without meaning or wanting to which is why these methods work.
I wish the world could live in peace as you do. As a Christian I am also certain it will not ever happen without divine intervention. Mankind is fallen in nature. I believe it is Christian to do everything possible to stop these murderous zealots and I do not believe that Americans working in the CIA as a whole have engaged in what is being called torture. I believe they are using very harsh techniques for good cause. The sooner we put an end to the terrorists with evil intent the better…more innocent lives will be saved and that is a good thing.
Excellent Jack! I hope at least some of this content is included in your new post to the front page.
Your description of the torture Iran inflicted speaks to my complaint about those who accuse the CIA of torture FOR POLITICAL PURPOSES. They use the word without consideration for intent or purpose, care taken, legal advice, or restraints…or the contrast you have made.
The Washington Post has looked into the claims made by Tina and Dick Cheney about Iraq’s relationship with Al Qaeda and found them very tenuous.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/wp/2014/07/17/the-cheneys-claims-of-a-deep-longstanding-far-reaching-relationship-between-al-qaeda-and-saddam/
I continue to be baffled by conservatives’ continued attempts to defend the incompetence of the Bush administration with regards to not only the revelations in the torture report (all of which are backed up by primary sources), but also the Iraq War itself. Almost no one from the Bush administration other than Cheney continues to assert that there were WMDs or a significant relationship with Al Qaeda to justify the war. Most of them have conceded that the intel was faulty but we still see a few extreme partisans desperate to rehabilitate their images by cherry-picking evidence–exactly the lazy type of confirmation bias that got us into that pointless war in the first place.
So let’s sum up:
1) The government starts a program of harsh interrogation methods against terror suspects.
2) These methods clearly constitute torture under the legal definition, but government lawyers ludicrously argue that they don’t.
3) The operators of the program implement practices even more extreme than those officially authorized by the government, without the permission or knowledge of the government.
4) The operators of the program lie to and withhold information from key officials in the Bush administration, and fail to report accurate info to the Secretary of State and the President himself.
5) The operators of the program are also put in charge of assessing the efficacy of their own methods, creating a clear conflict of interest and an environment of zero accountability.
6) The program does not just use trained interrogators who have sworn loyalty to the United States, but subcontracters who have no interrogation training. Some of them have anger management problems and histories of sexual offenses.
7) Two of our own informants are subject to the harsh interrogation measures by mistake.
8) 26 innocent people are subject to the harsh interrogation measures by mistake.
9) One detainee dies after of hypothermia after being chained to the floor.
10) Some detainees are forced to stand on broken ankles, their loved ones are threatened with death and sexual abuse, and are forcibly sodomized through a practice called “rectal feeding” for no medical reason.
11) No evidence that any of these methods produced actionable intelligence can be found.
12) All of these allegations are backed up with documented proof such as internal e-mails, documents, and testimony from CIA agents who witnessed these practices and said they were uncomfortable with what transpired.
13) Instead of wailing about government incompetence and abuse of power as they are wont to do every time a few investments in solar energy don’t pan out, most conservatives waffle between denying the evidence in the report and claiming that even if everything in it really did happen, it’s totally justified. Then, they accuse the other side of being unfair partisans, even though they themselves are in the process of defending something that goes against every single principle they claim to stand for. Possibly the worst case of government incompetence, immorality, and lack of accountability seen in decades has just been uncovered, and conservatives look the other way because it was their guy at the top when it happened.
“2) These methods clearly constitute torture under the legal definition, but government lawyers ludicrously argue that they don’t. ”
Perhaps our torture tactics ought to be compared to their torture tactics, then we grade ourselves on a curve? Just a thought.
Chris, one thing we should agree on is, there’s nothing ludicrous about it, this is a deadly serious matter. It should never be entertained lightly by either side of this argument, pro or con. And there is right on both sides, so its not nearly as clear as you would have us believe.
On one side of this current war are the lives of jihadists, religious fanatics, with no rules, no flag and operating covertly. They are bent on killing women and children and anyone else in their way. On our side and in our defense, we have the brave young men and women from America serving in our military. They are taking extreme risks to defend us while we restrict them with questionable rules of engagement. If we have erred here, then our motives were founded in saving lives, not taking them. The covert forces (CIA) and our military were both dedicated to saving American lives and preventing another 9/11. So if we behaved too aggressively, i.e, waterboarding (not beheading) then its a forgivable sin. We should strive to set the highest possible example as a civilized country, but lofty idealism means all things have their limits and we ought not be stupid about it.
History is written by victors…and we need to be around to do that.
Note: the bolded portions below are my own elaborations upon Tina’s comments.
Tina: “America does not torture [by my definition of torture which in no way matches the legal definition. But hey, government lawyers said that the methods aren’t legally torture, and government lawyers are never wrong unless they are representing Democrats].
“but we are willing to make people who have murdered thousands of Americans and have threatened to kill thousands more [and at least 26 falsely accused people, and who knows how many more, and who cares, because due process is for weaker nations who aren’t willing to do what it takes to win] extremely uncomfortable and fearful to get information from them.”
“Our government is not a religious body, [Unless it’s trying to stop gay people from getting married, in which case, praise the Lord and pass the ammunition!]
“It is charged in the Constitution to defend the nation from those who seek to do us harm. [It is also charged to uphold the eighth amendment, but the only amendment that actually matters is the second, so who cares.] Our government took care to determine the parameters for interrogation following 911. [Those parameters clearly fell within the bounds of the legal definition of torture, and even those parameters weren’t followed by the operators of the program, but who cares.]. The information gleaned from these techniques yielded results…one example is an attack on Los Angeles that was stopped, according to those who actually were present during the interrogations. [Of course, while enhanced interrogation techniques are owed some credit for foiling this plot, we’d be remiss not to also hail the Bush administration’s lesser-known time travel program, which allowed the adminisration to go back to 2002 after extracting information from KSM via waterboarding in 2003 in order to foil the LA attack. Science!
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/chatterbox/2009/04/waterbored.html ]
“Perhaps our torture tactics ought to be compared to their torture tactics, then we grade ourselves on a curve? Just a thought.”
It’s a terrible thought. There’s a reason that “Hey, at least we’re not as bad as the guys who cut off apostates’ heads” is not part of our national anthem. Moral relativism is not what America is about. I didn’t think it was what conservatism was about.
“On one side of this current war are the lives of jihadists, religious fanatics, with no rules, no flag and operating covertly. They are bent on killing women and children and anyone else in their way. On our side and in our defense, we have the brave young men and women from America serving in our military.”
Yes, and between them stood greedy subcontracters who were assigned to assess the effectiveness of their own recommendations, who lied to their superiors about the effectiveness of their own work, and who tortured 26 innocent people.
Why aren’t you outraged by this? The people who were most responsible for these atrocities were NOT the patriots you’re talking about. Some of them weren’t even Americans. They certainly weren’t doing this out of loyalty or freedom.
I believe the Bush administration and the CIA genuinely wanted to protect Americans, but that makes their decision to outsource the job to a bunch of mercs with anger management and sex problems all the more baffling.
“America does not torture but we are willing to make people who have murdered thousands of Americans and have threatened to kill thousands more extremely uncomfortable and fearful to get information from them.”
I attracted attention in public … I laughed so loud.
“We don’t torture people … we just … torture people.”
Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha
Still no comments on the government incompetence that lead to 26 innocent people being tortured, including two of our own informants, sex offenders being hired as interrogators, interrogators lying to the Bush administration about what went on and the effectiveness of their work…?
Figures. Government incompetence is only bad when a Democrat does it.
Jack at #45 Excellent…again!!!
Our resident lefties refuse to make adult distinctions based in reality. The fantasy is that we can defeat murderous terrorists with kindness. KSM and other like him don’t give a rip about their empathetic posturing and would not be deterred to a hand reached out in kindness.
WSJ/NBC Poll, “Most Americans Say CIA ‘Harsh Interrogation’ Acceptable ”
Jewish press reports on Rasmussen poll, headline: “Despite ‘Torture Report’ Efforts, Americans Still Support Interrogation Tactics”
Chris, there is no moral equivalency between what Muslim fanatics do to people in their custody and what America does. Why would you even say that? When was the last time we beheaded a terrorist to make a point that the next one better cooperate?
Situational ethics…hardly, but to all things are the rare exceptions. To box yourself in so rigidly that you would sooner allow the annihilation of thousands of innocent people rather than to breach a fine line in the rules of engagement is not only monstrous…its just plain stupid. Nobody in their right mind would do that, yet you act so damn holier than thou about this point, it creeps me out. I hope you are never in a position to make such a call because your common sense sucks! It’s deadly too! You would be the kind of commander that gets his troops killed.
Jack: “Chris, there is no moral equivalency between what Muslim fanatics do to people in their custody and what America does. Why would you even say that?”
I never did. You are the one who suggested that we should “grade on a curve” by comparing our tactics to the enemy’s. That’s not the American way. The reason for our country’s greatness is not because we’re not as bad as actual terrorists. We need to aspire to far better than that.
The fact is that our country has prosecuted others in the past for using tactics like waterboarding and the others described in the report. By tolerating it now we are turning our back on our values.
It would be one thing if you could show that these tactics did anything to keep us safe, but you haven’t. You brought up one instance that I showed could not have possibly been averted by torture; the attack was foiled in 2002 and the man the administration claimed gave up the info wasn’t even captured until 2003! So I reject your false dichotomy when you say that I “would sooner allow the annihilation of thousands of innocent people rather than to breach a fine line in the rules of engagement…” There is no evidence that these tactics saved any innocent people. There is only evidence that at least 26 innocent people were unjustly punished. None of the conservatives seem to care about them, nor are they in any way curious about the likelihood that more innocent people could have been tortured under this gross violation of due process.