Dems Endanger Military Lives By Releasing "Torture Report"

[Gene Frenkle]

 

 

For #1,

Protecting Rights and Freedoms

Preventing the Spread and Use of Nuclear Weapons

Maintaining the Strongest Military in the World

 

For #2

Combating Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria

Prohibiting Human Trafficking by Government Contractors

The declaration of the use of chemical weapons by Syria as a "red line."

It certainly wasn't aimed at you, but thanks for playing!

 

However, I question whether 1.1 and 1.3 meet the criteria of "stances conservatives traditionally oppose".

 

 

 

This is the exercise? Where'd you come up with the number 3? Can I call you a liberal lemming if you don't support 3 conservative stances and 3 Bush policies?

 

This is the dumbest thing I've ever seen.

So literally ANY other number would have made it better than the dumbest thing you've ever seen? It's almost unbelievable. I really have to reflect on my obvious fixation on the number 3!

[FireChan]

 

It certainly wasn't aimed at you, but thanks for playing!

 

However, I question whether 1.1 and 1.3 meet the criteria of "stances conservatives traditionally oppose".

 

 

So literally ANY other number would have made it better than the dumbest thing you've ever seen? It's almost unbelievable. I really have to reflect on my obvious fixation on the number 3!

 

It was dumb regardless of the number. But I do want to know why 3 is necessary. If I have 2, am I still a lemming? What about one? Hell, having a single point that goes against the conservative grain would have to be proof someone doesn't blindly follow them, right?

 

In reality, it was dumb to paint someone politically as a Fox News lemming because of such an arbitrary and nonsensical standard.

 

So can you name 3 conservative stances and 3 Bush policies you agreed with? Before I write you off as a lemming?

Edited December 12, 2014 by FireChan

[dubs]

 

 

Not everyone who was "not tortured" were cold blooded murderers or even associated with terrorism. Do you not understand this? There were innocents caught up in this who were tortured as outlined by the Geneva Conventions or any semblance of general human decency. As I said, we either are a country that stands by its ideals or we're not.

 

And the program didn't lead us directly to OSB, despite what they depict in the movies. There's also no proof that the methods employed provided any actionable intel whatsoever -- if there were, someone would be out there shouting about the merits of torture. But they're not. Because there hasn't been any provided.

 

We've already surrendered our right to privacy out of fear, now you're advocating surrendering our concept of due process to wrath. Don't think for a moment that just because this was done to "terrorists" it can't be done to the next boogey-man... or whoever the state deems a worthy target.

 

So your standard is 100% accuracy? Fortunately we have a backup plan where we can use drones to kill someone without trials, questioning, and are guaranteed to only kill that person and not kill or injure anyone else.

 

And like I said earlier, how is enhanced interrogation 'torture' or even wrong? There is nothing about it that i have heard that I would be concerned about. It was approved by the Senate, president, and cabinet. The DoJ found no evidence to prosecute.

 

 

Edited December 12, 2014 by dubs

[DC Tom]

It certainly wasn't aimed at you, but thanks for playing!

 

However, I question whether 1.1 and 1.3 meet the criteria of "stances conservatives traditionally oppose".

 

I misread. I only pulled "traditionally liberal stances" from the Democratic Platform.

[LeviF]

Question for the group (especially those crying about the "rights" of foreign agitators):

 

Do non-residents of the U.S. who are accused of crimes committed abroad have the right (under the Constitution) to due process or equal protection? If not, should they? When are they (or, should they be) conferred these rights?

 

If they are conferred 14th Amendment rights, should they not be conferred 4th Amendment rights as well? 5th Amendment? 6th Amendment? Does it ever stop?

Edited December 12, 2014 by LeviF91

[Bronc24]

 

So literally ANY other number would have made it better than the dumbest thing you've ever seen? It's almost unbelievable. I really have to reflect on my obvious fixation on the number 3!

 

 

[B-Man]

Back to the report:

 

Democrats’ CIA gambit backfires.

 

“I strongly suspect Senate Democrats did not anticipate the events that played out after the release of their much-criticized report on CIA interrogation tactics. Sure, the gory details dominated headlines and delighted the antiwar left,

 

but then conservatives and some Democrats — and most telling, current and former CIA officials — struck back. . . .

 

Even worse, the president won’t say (!) whether he agrees with his own handpicked CIA director, John Brennan, that the information gained through enhanced interrogation techniques was useful, and he won’t criticize or endorse the Senate Democrats.

 

Now, there’s a resounding vote of no support for Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.).”

 

 

.

[DC Tom]

Question for the group (especially those crying about the "rights" of foreign agitators):

 

Do non-residents of the U.S. who are accused of crimes committed abroad have the right (under the Constitution) to due process or equal protection? If not, should they? When are they (or, should they be) conferred these rights?

 

If they are conferred 14th Amendment rights, should they not be conferred 4th Amendment rights as well? 5th Amendment? 6th Amendment? Does it ever stop?

 

I'd say it really depends. Generally, I think anyone accused of a crime in the US, regardless of citizenship, deserves constitutional protections. Additionally, anyone arrested overseas by a country with which we have an extradition treaty is also entitled.

 

Conversely, anyone captured in military action is not (though I do think they should be entitled to protection under the Geneva Convention - which is actually why I think they shouldn't be entitled to constitutional protections.)

 

The grey area is where you're executing a military action to serve a requirement of justice requirement (invading Panama to arrest Noriega springs most immediately to mind.) I'm not sure what I think there...but then, that's less a problem with the law than it is a problem with the bad idea of military action in lieu of law enforcement.

[Doc]

Not everyone who was "not tortured" were cold blooded murderers or even associated with terrorism. Do you not understand this? There were innocents caught up in this who were tortured as outlined by the Geneva Conventions or any semblance of general human decency. As I said, we either are a country that stands by its ideals or we're not.

 

And the program didn't lead us directly to OSB, despite what they depict in the movies. There's also no proof that the methods employed provided any actionable intel whatsoever -- if there were, someone would be out there shouting about the merits of torture. But they're not. Because there hasn't been any provided.

 

We've already surrendered our right to privacy out of fear, now you're advocating surrendering our concept of due process to wrath. Don't think for a moment that just because this was done to "terrorists" it can't be done to the next boogey-man... or whoever the state deems a worthy target.

And what about the innocent people who are killed by drones? When does that report come out?

[B-Man]

A Travesty of a Report :Senate Democrats’ denunciation of the CIA interrogation program is both hypocritical and ahistorical.

By Dr. Charles Krauthammer

 

The report by Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee regarding CIA interrogation essentially accuses the agency under George W. Bush of war criminality. Committee chair Dianne Feinstein appears to offer some extenuation when she reminds us in the report’s preamble of the shock and “pervasive fear” felt after 9/11.

 

It’s a common theme (often echoed by President Obama): Amid panic and disorientation, we lost our moral compass and made awful judgments. The results are documented in the committee report. They must never happen again.

 

It’s a kind of temporary-insanity defense for the Bush administration. And it is not just unctuous condescension but hypocritical nonsense. In the aftermath of 9/11, there was nothing irrational about believing that a second attack was a serious possibility and therefore everything should be done to prevent it. Indeed, this was the considered opinion of the CIA, the administration, the congressional leadership, and the American people.

 

Al-Qaeda had successfully mounted four major attacks on American targets in the previous three years. The pace was accelerating and the scale vastly increasing. The country then suffered a deadly anthrax attack of unknown origin. Al-Qaeda was known to be seeking weapons of mass destruction.

We were so blindsided that we established a 9/11 commission to find out why. And we knew next to nothing about the enemy: its methods, structure, intentions, plans. There was nothing morally deranged about deciding as a nation to do everything necessary to find out what we needed to prevent a repetition, or worse. As Feinstein said at the time, “We have to do some things that historically we have not wanted to do to protect ourselves.”

 

Nancy Pelosi, then ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, was briefed about the interrogation program, including the so-called torture techniques. As were the other intelligence-committee leaders. “We understood what the CIA was doing,” wrote Porter Goss, Pelosi’s chairman on the House committee. “We gave the CIA our bipartisan support; we gave the CIA funding to carry out its activities.”

 

Democrat Jay Rockefeller, while the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, was asked in 2003 about turning over Khalid Sheik Mohammed to countries known to torture. He replied: “I wouldn’t take anything off the table where he is concerned.”

 

There was no uproar about this open countenancing of torture-by-proxy. Which demonstrates not just the shamelessness of Democrats today denouncing practices to which, at the time and at the very least, they made no objection. It demonstrates also how near-consensual was the idea that our national emergency might require extraordinary measures.

 

More at the link:

 

 

 

The Feinstein Report did not declassify & releases records of congressional briefings on interrogation. Ask yourself why not?

 

 

 

 

 

.

Edited December 12, 2014 by B-Man

[DC Tom]

who were tortured as outlined by the Geneva Conventions

 

Therein lies the rub: the Geneva Conventions merey proscribe torture; they don't specify what that is beyond a general description of "causing pain and suffering." And some of the techniques specified in the Senate Report have been widely accepted as not torture but valid interrogation techniques for quite sometime - defining sleep deprivation or "playing Metallica" or "mind games" as torture is very much changing the definition of "torture" after the fact, which is practically the definition of a political hack job. What's more, techniques designed to cause confusion, such as "mind games" or sleep deprevation, are useful and often-used interrogation tools (confused people don't keep track of their lies very well), and classifying them as "torture" goes a fairly long way towards classifying interrogation itself as torture.

[blzrul]

And what about the innocent people who are killed by drones? When does that report come out?

It will come out along with the report on the tens of thousands of innocent civilians dead, along with 5k US soldiers (not to mention the maimed and post-service suicides) related to the invasion of Iraq - a sovereign nation that had, at the time, done nothing to us and had nothing to do with 9/11. That will report will also include the juicy details around ISIS, which is lovingly equipped thanks to America and staffed by former Iraqi soldiers disenfranchised after said invasion. Maybe they'll bury the location of the WMDs in there too.

[Deranged Rhino]

 

And what about the innocent people who are killed by drones? When does that report come out?

 

Separate but equally important issue. One I'm a fan of seeing.

 

 

 

So your standard is 100% accuracy? Fortunately we have a backup plan where we can use drones to kill someone without trials, questioning, and are guaranteed to only kill that person and not kill or injure anyone else.

 

And like I said earlier, how is enhanced interrogation 'torture' or even wrong? There is nothing about it that i have heard that I would be concerned about. It was approved by the Senate, president, and cabinet. The DoJ found no evidence to prosecute.

 

It's not my standard, it's the standard of the American legal system. Again, it's far better for 100 guilty men to walk free than it is for even one innocent man to be jailed (or in this case tortured). It's a bedrock principle of our country's ethos.

 

Tell me how purée ing food and feeding it to a prisoner anally is not something you'd be concerned about. You're full of ****.

 

 

 

Therein lies the rub: the Geneva Conventions merey proscribe torture; they don't specify what that is beyond a general description of "causing pain and suffering." And some of the techniques specified in the Senate Report have been widely accepted as not torture but valid interrogation techniques for quite sometime - defining sleep deprivation or "playing Metallica" or "mind games" as torture is very much changing the definition of "torture" after the fact, which is practically the definition of a political hack job. What's more, techniques designed to cause confusion, such as "mind games" or sleep deprevation, are useful and often-used interrogation tools (confused people don't keep track of their lies very well), and classifying them as "torture" goes a fairly long way towards classifying interrogation itself as torture.

 

As I've been saying, I'm not an idealist who doesn't think there is evil in the world or that this country doesn't have enemies. But we prosecuted folks for war crimes for things very similar to what was done. Were the cases of over reach a small percentage of the program? Absolutely. But no serious person who is upset about this is talking bout sleep deprivation or Metallica...

 

This is a far bigger issue as it speaks to what we are willing to sacrifice of ourselves in order to feel safer. It's all a game and dummies like dubs see no issue here because the folks it was being done to were Muslim. They're idiots.

Edited December 16, 2014 by GreggyT

[4merper4mer]

Tell me how purée ing food and feeding it to a prisoner anally is not something you'd be concerned about. You're full of ****.

 

 

It's better than not pureeing it first.

 

 

 

 

 

It's not my standard, it's the standard of the American legal system. Again, it's far better for 100 guilty men to walk free than it is for even one innocent man to be jailed (or in this case tortured). It's a bedrock principle of our country's ethos.

 

 

 

You know when you'll know that doesn't apply to foreigners caught on a battlefield?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When the 100 guilty ones conspire and your head is rolling down a flight of stairs. That's when.

Edited December 16, 2014 by 4merper4mer

[Deranged Rhino]

It's better than not pureeing it first.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You know when you'll know that doesn't apply to foreigners caught on a battlefield?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When the 100 guilty ones conspire and your head is rolling down a flight of stairs. That's when.

 

We are still in desperate need a head-rolling-down-a-flight-of-stairs-smiley for this.

[DC Tom]

As I've been saying, I'm not an idealist who doesn't think there is evil in the world or that this country doesn't have enemies. But we prosecuted folks for war crimes for things very similar to what was done. Were the cases of over reach a small percentage of the program? Absolutely. But no serious person who is upset about this is talking bout sleep deprivation or Metallica...

 

Except for the people that wrote the Senate report classifying sleep deprivation and Metallica as torture. (And omitted Rebecca Black? Idiots.)

[B-Man]

After a week of condemnations of the CIA interrogation program, and talk everywhere you turn of how it violated our values and weakened our standing in the world, the verdict of public opinion is in: People support it.

 

From Pew:

Following the Senate Intelligence Committee’s report on CIA interrogation practices in the period following the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, 51% of the public says they think the CIA methods were justified, compared with just 29% who say they were not justified; 20% do not express an opinion.

 

The new national survey by the Pew Research Center, conducted Dec. 11-14 among 1,001 adults, finds that amid competing claims over the effectiveness of CIA interrogation methods, 56% believe they provided intelligence that helped prevent terrorist attacks, while just half as many (28%) say they did not provide this type of intelligence. . .

 

Overall, the public expresses the most doubt not about the CIA methods and program itself, but about the Senate committee’s decision to release its report: as many call the decision to publicly release the findings the wrong decision (43%) as the right decision (42%).

 

 

 

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[Deranged Rhino]

Except for the people that wrote the Senate report classifying sleep deprivation and Metallica as torture. (And omitted Rebecca Black? Idiots.)

 

You're the only one classifying Senators as "serious".

 

After a week of condemnations of the CIA interrogation program, and talk everywhere you turn of how it violated our values and weakened our standing in the world, the verdict of public opinion is in: People support it.

 

People support it because it was sold as the one thing that kept them safe. Fear trumps intelligence, always and forever. It's why Cheney is still lauded when the guy should be a national embarrassment.

[B-Man]

You're the only one classifying Senators as "serious".

 

 

 

People support it because it was sold as the one thing that kept them safe. Fear trumps intelligence, always and forever. It's why Cheney is still lauded when the guy should be a national embarrassment.

 

Well,GT, you say fear, and I say common sense.

 

 

 

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[Deranged Rhino]

Well,GT, you say fear, and I say common sense.

 

If that makes you feel better as you willingly give up your right to privacy and due process because Cheney convinced you if you didn't, you'd die -- then that's all good I guess.

 

Me? I like to think for myself.