In September 2002, senior leaders on the Senate and House intelligence committees  Democrats and Republicans  began receiving briefings on the CIA’s “enhanced interrogation program,†including the use of waterboarding on top al-Qaeda operatives. Among the leaders briefed was Nancy Pelosi, now speaker of the House.
The lawmakers raised no objections. According to Porter Goss, a congressman at that time and later head of the CIA, their chief concern was whether “the methods were tough enough.†But Carl Levin, the Democrat who runs the Senate Armed Services Committee, managed to suppress any mention of Speaker Pelosi and her congressional colleagues last week when his committee released its misleading and relentlessly partisan report, titled “Inquiry into the Treatment of Detainees in U.S. Custody.â€Â
This document is the latest chapter in the Democrats’ torture narrative  a warped tale that trivializes true torture by confounding it with less extreme forms of interrogation. The committee thoroughly misrepresents the legal standards that govern detainee treatment and ignores non-partisan investigations that have found no evidence of a systematic program of abuse. Perhaps most significant, the Democrats ignore the fact that those rare episodes of abuse that have been uncovered have resulted in prosecutions.
According to the Levin report, the Bush administration reacted to 9/11 by “redefining†the law to permit aggressive interrogation tactics. Thus, the fable goes, in early 2002 the president determined that neither al-Qaeda nor Taliban fighters were entitled to prisoner-of-war treatment, in effect blocking application of Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions and the “well established military doctrine†of “legal compliance with the Geneva Conventions.†The administration then covertly set about having its Justice Department alter the legal definition of torture, the story goes, while its interrogators were schooled in illegal tactics by experts at the Defense Department. These techniques were employed by the CIA on important captives and became elements of a new warfare culture that spread to military interrogators at Gitmo and led, eventually, to the Abu Ghraib scandal.
That narrative is flawed in its fundamental assumptions and fictional in its sweeping conclusions.
Flaws ignored such as that absolute compliance with CA3 is still taught and required by the services whether or not any given individual is entitled to that treatment.
That narrative is flawed in its fundamental assumptions and fictional in its sweeping conclusions.
Yeah, but if you tell a goddamn lie loud enough and long enough, it eventually becomes the truth. And the Nancyboys have learned this lesson well. Which may explain why thor & co don’t ever tire of posting here.
“… the Democrats’ torture narrative  a warped tale that trivializes true torture by confounding it with less extreme forms of interrogation…”
Much of what the left would like to call torture actually look like twisted fraternity hazings. Indeed, to many of these Arabs, simply having to submit to the authority of a woman is psychologically degrading. Imagine if that woman is making them assume some contorted positions, naked, such that Rashid’s appears to be teabagging Achmed..?
Is Achmed being tortured because he is forced to have Rashid’s balls in his face?
Puh-Leez…
Look, you want to talk about torture? Let’s bring in the Nazis and any of the southeast asian communist regimes? Or for that matter, Saddam…
‘Nuff said. Look, I appreciate that our military is treating these guys far better than they truly deserve or would be treated in their own country. The matters of fact are that these are mostly asymmetrical fighters, wearing no uniforms, and not part of any organized army of a nation state…
As such, the Geneva convention does not actually apply to them. And definitely neither does US law!
O!&Co. are gonna regret their preenong public palavering about the eeeeeevils of the torturing Booooosh! administration. Not only may it cause worse circumstances for any of our soldiers taken, they have used it as a pawn in the chessgame of electoral politics; as always, disregarding the possibility of any unintended consequences…
I imagine the trolls would be less pleased if 80% of the threads weren’t All About Them. ‘swhy I spend less time here. The articles are still fresh, but the commentary rarely grips past 10-20 posts because trolls are fed with steam shovels.
And without a lickspittle leftist press corps, this would be a moot point, but here we are.
I was listening to Randi Rhodes the other day (because I’m a moonbat, obviously) and she was slamming Dick Cheney for his interview with Rush.
She used this clip:
And went on to screech that “He hates the Constitution!” Because Cheney hates people having rights! But if you look at the transcript, you’ll see that she chopped “…that we extend only to American citizens. Remember, these are unlawful combatants. These are people who don’t belong to any recognized military force. They don’t obey the rules of warfare. They’re unlawful combatants. If you’re not going to have a place to locate ’em like Guantanamo, then you either have to bring them here to the continental United States — and I don’t know any member of Congress who’s volunteering to have Al-Qaeda terrorists deposited in his district — or you’ve gotta turn them over to some foreign government. And we found lots of times when you do that that a number of them have gone back onto the battlefield and tried to kill Americans again.” off the end of the statement.
So, because leftoid freaks have no conception of what the Constitution is and does, Cheney hates it. It’s too bad we have such freaks in Congress.
As Billy Joel said, you should never argue with a crazy mind.
I’m sorry, Merovign. My hands are kind of tied. Jeff’ll be back soon, and he can put the hammer down, then.
“As Billy Joel said, you should never argue with a crazy mind.”
Then, as Merovign points out, why does everyone engage the various trolls, much to their egos’ satisfaction?
Because apparently, we’re gluttons for punishment. I’ll resolve to disengage.
As I’m sure you know, MJ, engagement isn’t necessarily argument.
Barack Obama is a scholar of Constitutional law. I bet he even knows more than Rush Limbaugh.
Spook: And?
Congressional Democrats have instead found it expedient to smear the administration, the military, and the intelligence community for political purposes.
Our dirty socialist media is the catalyst though. They’re a fertile little petri dish what Democrats can spooge their anti-American propaganda into and get a nice little anti-American culture growing in no time flat. The New York Times and NPR seem to take point position on this sort of thing, cause their audiences are very receptive to anti-American propaganda. It’s very sick.
I apologize for my State forcing this asshole, Levin, onto the national scene. I myself have never voted for him but he is, along with that idiot “Stab-u-now” my Senator. Detroit and the UAW carry much of the blame and will receive billions in return now that the “pay for play” Party is in power nationwide.
Stabenow is really uncommonly stupid. Granholm makes them look smart though.
I was born in Michigan.
I’m curious as to when they’re going to drop the tired old tag “Wolverine State” and go with something a little more now like “The Failure State” or “Gateway to Socialism” or “Michigan: A Big Urban Shitlog in the Middle of a Hunter’s Pardise”
That last one would be one long-ass license plate.
I think something neutral, like “Shaped Like a Mitten!”
You’re a true Diplomat Dan.
“Michigan: The Hand that Wipes the Country’s Ass”
How about “the Bifurc-State”? Just to take a swipe at the “other” parts.
“Michigan: Thumb-wear Out There”
“Michigan: A Big Urban Shitlog in the Middle of a Hunter’s Pardiseâ€Â
Well, that’s really more fitting for Detroit. And Flint.
Absent it’s urban areas and it’s politicians and it’s voters, Michigan is a wonderful state.
Absent it’s urban areas and it’s politicians and it’s voters, Michigan is a wonderful state.
I agree Carin. But even if you have the most expensive carpeting in your parlor, when Kwame takes a big duke in the middle of it, it kind of ruins the whole room.
“Much of what the left would like to call torture actually look like twisted fraternity hazings.”
thor pays $350 an hour to have it done to him.
Yea, but if I can RIP out that carpeting …
Michigan has some fundamentals that no politician can ruin. Just imagine you’re Madonna or Michael Moore. You don’t actually LIVE here, but you own a huge, secluded Mansion among the lake. You aren’t beholden to Michigan politics, but you can still enjoy it’s beauty.
There is a reason a lot of rich folks have places in Michigan. You can really get away from it ALL here.
And if you head up into the UP, you really are getting away from it all.
Even us poorer middle class folks can “get away from it all”in Michigan. For all of the 90’s I lived in a small 2 bedroom place on a dead end road with 120 feet of frontage on a 60 acre lake. Only 20 miles from work. Out away from Detroit there are many, many lakes to be on. Circumstances necessitated my moving in 2001, but that’s life.
We had a cottage in Lexington near Port Huron. Grew up swimming in Huron.
All America sees is what Granholm, Levin and Kilpatrick have brought to the fore. Incompetence.
Buncha redneck inbred hillbillies you neocons are …
“Michigan: Thumb-wear Out Thereâ€Â
-Barney Frank
Major John, I just use Trollhammer. A lot. Blessings upon the forger of the Trollhammer!!!!!
Barack Obama is a scholar of Constitutional law.
Really?
Can you cite some of his publications?
IIRC, I saw a column by a Freep writer, Susan Ager, who got into one of those very exclusive cottage parks in the UP that only the very rich and well-connected can get in. It is very ancien-riche, electricity being sparse, television and radio and internet discouraged, meals taken in the main building, etc.
I wish I could find the article, because it was so early-twentieth century, that place.
Would that be like the Huron Mountain Club?
And if you head up into the UP, you really are getting away from it all.
Amen, speaking as a guest to the UP. Many thanks to the “forward looking” Michigani “racists” for establishing veritable Concentration Camps for criminals and Communists elsewhere within their own State! Awesome.