I'm not getting it. You seem to concede that Padilla was a danger and that it was right that he be detained, but where do you get the idea that he has been tortured into talking? Did someone say that? I haven't seen it. Is this just more reflexive anti-Bush criticism in which nothing this Administration or the military does is justified?

Jose Padilla is an al-Qaeda soldier and he has betrayed his country. I hope they get everything out of him he's got and then hang him.

Down with traitors!

So Toby, what makes you think he was NOT tortured? Why would you think the interrogators at Gitmo wouldn't be using the methods that the Bush regime advocated? And why do you think that the interrogators methods for extracting confessions (outside the Geneva convention) would not turn up false confessions? Even John McCain confessed to being a spy after being tortured in Vietnam.

Ashcroft and the DOJ decided they could use torture to get people to confess to their crimes - and you don't think this has anything to do with Padilla's confession? Perhaps he just spilled the beans the day he showed up and the last two years he was just held incognito?

The real problem with coerced confessions is that it taints the case and most people will discount a confession obtained under torture because it is so unreliable. The Bush regime is destroying their ability to prove their case in a court of law - which is frankly the one place they absolutely need to be able to prove their case. Otherwise they are just like the Chinese or the Soviets with their coerced confessions that prove nothing but the sickness of the society that accepts coerced (and false) confessions.

I also dislike traitors, but I want to have a level of proof that someone was a real traitor by working within the rule of law and having the proof fall within the bounds of the US constitution. Otherwise it is all a show trial and not worthy of America.

Mary:

So Toby, what makes you think he was NOT tortured?

I have no reason to believe that he was. But, if it turns out that they put him in solitary or dripped water on his head, it may have paid off.

Why would you think the interrogators at Gitmo wouldn't be using the methods that the Bush regime advocated?

Because you can get more out of a prisoner through mind games than by beating the stuffing out of him. That's a fact. That's not to say that Padilla wasn't given incentives to talk, but a skilled interrogator can get inside a guy's head by first listening to him. If Padilla was non-cooperative, they may have locked him away or starved him a little. Who knows? But, from what I've heard coming out of Gitmo, the prisoners there are treated pretty well. They get three hots and a cot and place to get down on their knees, so what the hell? It's a better life than tramping around Afghanistan with a bunch of repressed homosexuals with assault rifles.

And why do you think that the interrogators methods for extracting confessions (outside the Geneva convention) would not turn up false confessions?

I don't think that. It's a case-by-case basis. But you're more likely to find things out if you give a guy enough rope to hang himself with.

Even John McCain confessed to being a spy after being tortured in Vietnam.

There's your evidence.

Ashcroft and the DOJ decided they could use torture to get people to confess to their crimes - and you don't think this has anything to do with Padilla's confession?

Maybe. But, if we're dealing in facts here, then no one can say just yet, no matter how much they want to demonize our Government for their own partisan interests.

Perhaps he just spilled the beans the day he showed up and the last two years he was just held incognito?

I doubt it. I bet he started to lose all hope of ever seeing the light of day again and started ranting about how great Allah is and how evil Uncle Sam is ---and before long, his preachiness probably yielded up some good info. Remember: these turds are proud of their hatred of our way of life. Padilla probably wanted to go on record with his brave tales of resistance.

The real problem with coerced confessions is that it taints the case and most people will discount a confession obtained under torture because it is so unreliable.

That's probably true a lot of the time. But you can't know until you turn the screws. Even the shrieks of the damned can be parsed and cross-referenced.

The Bush regime is destroying their ability to prove their case in a court of law - which is frankly the one place they absolutely need to be able to prove their case.

That's why Padilla is an enemy combatant: the legal standards by which he will swing are different.

Otherwise they are just like the Chinese or the Soviets with their coerced confessions that prove nothing but the sickness of the society that accepts coerced (and false) confessions.

I think comparing totalitarian Communist regimes to our own democratic republic is invalid. That sort of thing was (and is) their usual M.O.; with us, it's an extraordinary departure, but not one we should shy away from if need be.

I also dislike traitors, but I want to have a level of proof that someone was a real traitor by working within the rule of law and having the proof fall within the bounds of the US constitution. Otherwise it is all a show trial and not worthy of America.

As I reminded you yesterday, even a law-abiding, Constitution-loving society must sometimes go outside of its norms to secure what will preserve it. Lincoln suspended many basic rights we take for granted today because he was faced with enormously difficult situations. You liberals need to remember that the very act in which we are now engaged (publicly debating and criticizing our Government) is something that would be unthinkable in virtually any other country involved in a war. Ths is why all the talk about the evil Patriot Act makes me ill. It is your cleverness that compels you to say that if we don't stand up for the Padillas of the world that we will be next. But this is horseshit. This is manufactured concern and 60s-era nostalgia as a pathology. People need to get a sense of proportion and remember their History.

What the hell is somebody like Toby doing on LeftCoaster anyway?

I'm a troll. Sister. It's the diversity program, see. I got in here on the affirmative action plan.

"It's a better life than tramping around Afghanistan with a bunch of repressed homosexuals with assault rifles."

If you are trying to demonstrate here that some Right-wingers are idiots who are completely ignorant of basic facts, then you should be very proud of this particular sentence. I am certainly convinced.

>Lincoln suspended many basic rights we take for granted today because he was faced with enormously difficult situations

Not a one of which actions can be shown to have made a whit of difference in the Civil War. Remember history? I've seen no evidence that you do.

Padilla seems very likely to be another in a long line of breathlessly reported "threats" that later turn out to be nothing at all.

Fuck, he's probably an Iranian plant. (that's a joke. I hope).