Who may you ask? Who do you think?
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A debate over how to investigate Bush-era officials who authorized harsh interrogation tactics of terrorism suspects split Washington on Thursday, and Democrats squabbled over how to proceed.
The top Democrats in Congress differed over the creation of a special “truth commission” to investigate whether laws were violated by Bush administration officials whose legal analysis sanctioned waterboarding, a form of simulated drowning, and other methods such as sleep deprivation and forced nudity.
While House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called for creation of such a commission, her Senate counterpart, Majority Leader Harry Reid, declined to endorse it.
Reid said the Senate intelligence committee should complete its own closed-door inquiry, which could take up to a year. “I believe what we have to do is wait until the intelligence committee finishes its work,” Reid told the Las Vegas Sun.
And whose to blame for all this chaos? Who do you think?
Democrats are being driven by pressure from their left wing to take action against Bush administration officials, saying Bush allowed interrogation techniques that amounted to torture and someone should be held responsible.
Good evening Shepard Smith. Welcome to the Left Wing of the Democratic Party.
Ps. When are we going to stop reading these euphemisms for torture? Just today I’ve read “interrogation techniques”, “aggressive interrogation techniques”, “harsh interrogation techniques” and “intelligence techniques” (which has to be the most laughable one yet). If the news media can’t bring themselves to call it what it really is “torture techniques” let’s at least call them something a little less oxymoronic. How about we start calling them “False Confession Techniques”? At least that one has the benefit of being more truthful regarding the reason torture has historically been employed than the rest do. It certainly explains why Bush and Cheney authorized torture.
The euphemisms are infuriating me. My husband, the ex-Marine, doesn’t read blogs so today I asked him, casually, “Honey, when you went thru SERE, did the instructors call it TORTURE? You know, when they were introducing the program, did they say, we’re preparing you for the types of TORTURE that might be used on you if you’re captured by the VietCong?”
“Well, duh, yeah,” he replied.
“And, was it? Was it TORTURE?”
“Hell, yeah!”
“I mean, even knowing that they weren’t going to accidentally kill you, did it feel like TORTURE?”
Now I had his full attention and he turned to look me in the eye, “Sweetheart, people get accidentally killed in the military all the damned time. It was real TORTURE.”
Liz Cheney speaks shit. Every single use of a euphemism for TORTURE is shit.
you know anything thing that the apologists are missing is that there is a good reason to define cruel and inhumane treatment in a very broad and unforgiving way. Set aside waterboarding for a moment. Attaching a collar and ropes to someone’s neck and then slamming them into a loud, tin wall? Is it torture? Who knows? But it’s illegal. And the reason it’s illegal is because once you start allowing for physical coercion of any kind it quickly gets out of hand.
People punch each other in the face all the time. It’s not torture. But it’s illegal nonetheless to punch someone in the face. Slapping around some pedophile who knows where the kidnapped child is chained up is not torture and it’s not unjustified, but we don’t allow it. Because if we allowed it, they’d move on to putting pliers to the guy. You draw a line well short of torture for a good reason.
And now, if we look at waterboarding, I think it is clearly torture, but even with guidelines they abused the process that was laid out for them.
Bravo to Shepard Smith. I don’t always agree with him, but in this case, he’s 100% absolutely spot on. This is America, we do not torture.
Why is it that conservatives think that the Geneva convention applies to everyone else but them?? Notice how they don’t call it torture. They call it “Enhanced Interrogation Techniques” The right doesn’t want to use the word torture because the word undermines their arguments.
By the way, Sean Hannity says he’s willing to be waterboarded. Keith Olbermann will put up 1000 dollars for every second Hannity can take it. My guess is Hannity wouldn’t last 5 seconds.
But again, bravo to Smith!!!!
“Harsh interrogation techniques” are when you start going all nutso and yell “Answer me, asshole”. That’s harsh. Waterboarding is not harsh, it’s torture and it’s a crime. Or maybe I’m wrong. Maybe September 11 was injudicious piloting.
gee Harry Reid opposing an investigation into Bush era crimes. Gee, who woulda thunk it?????
add that to steaming pile of Reid’s record: Military Commissions of 2006, FISA, Alito, Roberts…
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Ron Suskind’s story is mind boggling: the timeline for the Bush administration shows they were searching for a link between Saddam Hussein and 911 (Al Qaeda). They ordered torture on human beings to make them confess there was a link. These are high crimes as grave as treason. Throw the bums in jail, we don’t want that kind even in The Hague. We have barely recovered from the Nazi and Japanese era of torture and war crimes. The ICC jail in The Hague was used during World War II by the Germans to jail resistance fighters, torture them and execute our heroes by firing squad in the dunes nearby.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."