Bushco's desired torture language doesn't create "clarity"; it just creates a new "defense" to allegations of torture.
As though some barbaric interrogation "method" suddenly isn't torture if the torturers have concluded there is an "urgent need" to extract some information they imagine some detainee has in his head.
Manufacturing some "urgent need" is going to be pretty easy, considering the ease with which our authoritarian government throws around fears of WMD! WMD! WMD! at every turn.
Americans better stick to travelling exclusively to the Western EU for the rest of their lives. Anywhere else and you may be finding yourself in a room with an "interrogator" whose government has decided that you have some information for which there is a real "urgent need".
Posted by euzoius at September 16, 2006 06:12 AMI keep waiting for someone in the MSM to pick up on this wordsmithing that Bush is using. Rove and Cheney have obviously crafted this argument.
of course, torture is bad. but behavior that "shocks the conscience"? this country has become so polarized and so adrift of our moral center vis a vis Islam and brown people that it's a slippery slope to what shocks the conscience. the predictable end product of Bush's rhetoric is to make people see "those people" as less than human, and therefore torturing them is acceptable if it furthers Bush's plan.
this is exactly the Hitler playbook, make no mistake. and somebody needs to start speaking up about it.
Posted by susan at September 16, 2006 06:45 AMWhat else can you expect from the Mofo from Midland?
He enjoyed torturing small animals as a child and aides say that as governor of Taliban Tejas, he treasured Friday nights - the day and time the Huntsville death chamber puts the convicted to death.
He's a KOOK.
Posted by Christopher at September 16, 2006 07:06 AMbut behavior that "shocks the conscience"?
Why are these backward clown fucks even attempting to codify the Geneva Conventions through our legal processes if it isn't to cover their own asses for the torture they have already committed? I say we waterboard them for a while --or in Cheneys case insert him upside down into a mummy sleeping bag and sit on him-- to get at the truth of what they are doing. I want to know if it has anything to do with space aliens. So we will continue the torture...uh, interrogation...until we get the answer we want...uh, truth.
If there is a problem with the interpretation of Common Article 3 it is easily addressed by going to the Hague and asking for an interpretation. They won't like what they'll hear, which would be along the lines of, "Please stand behind the line and empty-out your pockets."
Fucking war criminals every last once of them. Thank you for making America a bastion of brutality and a laughing stock in the world, you neo-con and republi-con clown-tards. Except for the fact that our nukes make us so very dangerous, the clown-tards have proven our military is not to be feared if you can withstand the first wave of GBUs. After that, these fucking republi-cons and clown-fuck neo-cons have no game plan.
Republi-cons! Proof we should investigate eugenics once again. Please have your republi-con pet spayed or neutered. Save the world from this insanity!
He's a KOOK.
No he is not. He is stupid. He is certainly ignorant. He can barely read. You ever hear him phrase an argument within any historical context? no. He can't. He knows nothing. He is a product of being white trash nouveau riche. Educated at good schools where he never had to study as long as the tuition was paid and his pops had power and authority. People like this are easy to find in the midwest. Self-entitled, smug, with absolutely no sense of social justice.
Posted by phidipides at September 16, 2006 07:21 AMHe is evil, as was Hitler. Add that to the list of what he is.
Posted by Judith at September 16, 2006 08:06 AMWhen this Country argues about what is and what is not torture, we have lost our morale compass.
Posted by Judith at September 16, 2006 08:10 AMWhat bothers me, extremely, and I have heard no one pick up on this. This monster continiously talks about his torture as "this program".
Torture is a specific program that they have designed.
How twisted is this? And why hasn't anyone called them on this bullshit?
The only urgency in getting these fucking laws passed is to try to protect themselves from being convicted as the war criminals that they are.
Legal question...what about ip post facto? If the law was not in place during the acts how can it imunize them?
Posted by Anjha at September 16, 2006 08:12 AM"Americans better stick to travelling exclusively to the Western EU for the rest of their lives."
Euzoius, the thought has occurred to me that Americans cannot travel safely anymore, anywhere in the world.
Posted by Judith at September 16, 2006 08:17 AMHe is a product of being white trash nouveau riche.
Hahahahahahaha!
Posted by Christopher at September 16, 2006 08:20 AMShocking the conscience continues to get harder and harder, especially in some cases. My conscience is going to be shocked long before that of a professional interrogator (and probably most teenagers used to playing video games.)
Posted by CG at September 16, 2006 08:29 AMIt's very strange, really: the "shocks the conscience" standard is itself highly contested, with the "originalists" arguing that any brutality that was OK in 1792 (and that covers a lot of ground) should be just fine today, and other judges looking to the modern "conscience."
It's not clear that moving to a "shocks the conscience" standard necessarily gets the torturers off the hook. After all, I would guess that the Founding Fathers would have been scandalized by some of the procedures in question, and the modern worldwide conscience likewise finds a lot of this stuff shocking.
Posted by dj moonbat at September 16, 2006 08:30 AMWhat kind of stupid question is this......
Of course they are sheeple! Dont question it...accept it!.
Posted by Parallax at September 16, 2006 08:41 AMHe is evil, as was Hitler.
And like Germany, his supporters are complicit!
Posted by Seven of Six at September 16, 2006 09:07 AMAt least we can take comfort knowing there are only 857 more days of this nightmare and then finally, Bush will be swept into the trash bin of history.
Posted by Christopher at September 16, 2006 09:10 AM"At least we can take comfort knowing there are only 857 more days of this nightmare and then finally, Bush will be swept into the trash bin of history."
I don't think the nightmare ends in 857 days ...
Posted by gail at September 16, 2006 09:13 AM...nor do I gail
Posted by herbal tee at September 16, 2006 09:14 AM"Legal question...what about ip post facto? If the law was not in place during the acts how can it imunize them?"
Anjha, I have the same question. Seems to me that regardless of what law is inacted now, it was not present when we violated it. Laws generally are not retroactive. Furthermore, Hitler could have passed a law that said it was okay to kill Jews, but that doesn't make it so in the world court.
Posted by Judith at September 16, 2006 09:19 AMNor do I. I think we have no idea what is in store for us in those 857 days.
Posted by Judith at September 16, 2006 09:23 AMThat is long enough to install Dictator Bush permanently.
Posted by Judith at September 16, 2006 09:24 AMI guess I should have added that we all become complicit, as long as We The People allow for this to continue.
Posted by Seven of Six at September 16, 2006 09:30 AM"Legal question...what about [ex] post facto? If the law was not in place during the acts how can it imunize them?"
It offends the prohibition on ex post facto laws to prosecute somebody for something that was legal when s/he did it. It does not offend the prohibition not to prosecute somebody for something that was illegal when s/he did it.
Posted by dj moonbat at September 16, 2006 09:46 AMThe latest turn in Bush's War for the Salvation of Civilization, Iraq section, is building a earthen and barbwire barrier around Baghdad, to either keep people in or out, depending on the time of day. Saddam didn't even have to resort to this. Finally, after years of wondering, we see Bush indeed does have a plan for Iraq......imprison all the inhabitants. Some democracy, you might say. Just wait, he probably has they same plan for you and I.......When you see Frist introduce a bill banning the possession of wire cutters, you'll know its time to buy a coat and head to Canada.
Posted by T2 at September 16, 2006 10:02 AM''Ten years from now, when we have the whole story, we are going to be ashamed,'' he said. ''This is not us. This is not the way we do business. I don’t think in our history we’ve ever had a presidential involvement, a secretarial involvement, a vice-presidential involvement, an attorney-general’s involvement in telling our troops essentially, Carte blanche is the way you should feel. You should not have any qualms because this is a different kind of conflict.''~ Lawrence Wilkerson, in his "cabal" speech
If congress does indeed "legalize" torture -- ["If congress doesn't legalize this illegal Program, it will end." ~ the Preznet] -- would it get past the Supremes? And if congress does not legalize torture, will this "Program" -- ala presidential signing statements -- truly end?
Presidentally authorized horror shops -- Abu Ghraib just one example of this entire obsenity.
Recall that the Pentagon is "investigating" more than (admittedly) 100 detainee deaths -- "Oops! Must have shoved the baton a little too far up Haji's a**!"
Note, too, that "Worried CIA Officers Buy Legal Insurance."
Staggeringly stunning that this even remains "debatable" -- that Bush & Co's advocacy of torture is buttressed by a significant measure of popular, political support!
["At first, we denied our culpability in the abominations of Abu Ghraib and elsewhere. But it polled well among a certain segment of voters! So now we're openly pitching our blood lust in prime time speeches to the nation, and viciously castigating those who 'don't have the stomach for it!'"]
Utterly obscene.
SEC. 6. SATISFACTION OF TREATY OBLIGATIONS…
(b) RIGHTS NOT JUDICIALLY ENFORCEABLE.—
(1) IN GENERAL.—No person in any habeas action or any other action may invoke the Geneva Conventions or any protocols thereto as a source of rights, whether directly or indirectly, for any purpose in any court of the United States or its States or territories.
SEC. 9. RETROACTIVE APPLICATION.
This Act shall take effect on the date of the enactment of this Act and shall apply retroactively, including to any aspect of the detention, treatment, or trial of any person detained at any time since September 11, 2001, and to any claim or cause of action pending on or after the date of the enactment of this Act.
~ http://balkin.blogspot.com/Bush.Military.Commissions.Bill.pdf
Posted by manonfyre at September 16, 2006 10:09 AMTreason on 9-11 did "change everything" for the traitors...
Cheers.
It's not just the torture, it's the insistence that it be publicly affirmed. States have always beat on people in private and informally; it's a very hard habit to break. The flasher-style f-the-world publicity is what creeps me out the most.
There's got to be some sort of twisted sexual pathology there, a rapist mindset at the very least. I wish the bastard hadn't done so much booze and coke when he was younger. If he could still get it up, we might not have these problems.
Posted by sagesource at September 16, 2006 10:28 AMThe Geneva conventions were approved in 1949. Now Bush wants us to believe they are vague, need "clarification." Just look at Bush, his record of superior intellectual abilities on complex issues, and anyone can see he is the guy to "perfect" the time tested Geneva Conventions! ELECT DEMOCRATS TO CONGRESS!
Posted by CLK at September 16, 2006 10:54 AMThere's got to be some sort of twisted sexual pathology there, a rapist mindset at the very least.
Sagesource, the dirty truth is that there exists a startling amount of abuse, sadism, mental illness, violence, and pathology in this country.
Torture can be added to the list. I'm sure Bush is sadistic, and probably gets a hard-on watching snuff films.
Any American who does not stand up against this sick and immoral government is guilty by association. As far as having only 857 days, we will be paying a brutal price in the world community for the next decade (justifiably so...). I only hope that the next president has the wisdom to begin to heal the damage done over the past 6 years.
Posted by Dave at September 16, 2006 05:54 PMIf bush gets his way he may pardon BTK. In bush-think anyone whose middle name is "torture" should get to head up the GOP inquisition.
Posted by TIKI AL at September 16, 2006 06:35 PMBush's reply:
"You can't have a Crusade without torture."
Assimilated Press
Read White House OK's Use Of Torture In Public Schools
Why is this allowed by the media?
"A senior administration official, authorized to speak with reporters about the legal issues behind the administration's strategy yesterday on the condition that he not be named."
If the government is afraid to identify this person, the official himself may well be more controversial than the propaganda he or she is spreading. My guess is that it is an attempt by the WH to have a person outside of the administration's legal community spread pseudo-legal arguments that he or she is not qualified to make and that lawyers in the administration will not back up.
Posted by Tim at September 17, 2006 02:35 AMTim, I saw that too and thought it was absurd. If he's authorized to speak with the press, why isn't he identified?? Might have to write to the Post about that one (it was the Post, wasn't it?)
Posted by CG at September 17, 2006 05:45 AMI want the world to know that this is not being done in my name.
Heres something I am trying to do - I want to put newspaper ads in daily papers around the country that will help shape the debate about torture and secret prisons. Please check out my site jeffcraft.us and let me know what you think, and if you think its a good idea, add your name to the ad.
I know I'm not alone, Help me remind America what it means to be American.
Lets be a shining hope to mankind again
Posted by Jeff Craft at September 17, 2006 08:49 PMI believe that the people who are standing behind Bush's/Gonzales' reinterpretation of the Geneva Conventions over what "torture" is and what is "humiliating" should be given a chance to judge for themselves.
First, let's try waterboarding them. Afterward, they will be handed a questionnaire asking if the experience was "torture" and/or "humiliating." Hey, if they can't stand the head, they should get out of the kitchen, and leave the Bush administration to burn in the fires of hell for eternity...or something.
Then, we'll move onto stripping all the people defending Bush administration "torture" policies, putting them in a room that alternates been extremely warm and extremely cold, sometimes splashing water on them, letting them lie in their own excrement, and then after a few days of this, hand them a questionnaire asking them to describe whether their first-hand experience was "torture" and/or "humiliating."
Oh, wait, many of these wingnuts standing rock-solid blindly behind BushCo's trashing of the Geneva Conventions have never served in the U.S. military, so they don't have a clue about how BushCo's evil actions will harm U.S. soldiers.
Posted by The Oracle at September 18, 2006 01:02 AM