BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed

Subject: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Peter T.
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 02:15 PM

An Inspector General's Report is expected to be released tomorrow in the U.S. (after a battle with the Obama Administration, taking up where George W. left off) outlining at least 100 deaths in custody of tortured prisoners, none of whom had faced trial, and some of whom were likely to be completely innocent. These murders -- that is what they are -- are so far going completely unpunished. We will see. As usual, peruse:

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/06/30/accountability/

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Peter T.
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 02:22 PM

Actually, it is not clear what the CIA report will disclose -- the ACLU is hoping that the fate of the documented deaths will be clarified.

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Rapparee
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 02:28 PM

Can't say nothin' until the facts are known.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: 3refs
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 02:31 PM

This is where I loose some I could be friends with.

"No one means all he says, and yet very few say all they mean, for words are slippery and thought is viscous"

I say this, with all the candor I have in my soul. Are there circumstances where I would condider torture as a last resort? Yes there are!

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: PoppaGator
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 02:35 PM

If anyone gets prosecuted for murder in any such instance, you can bet it'll be relatively low-ranking scapegoats, not the guys who sat back in their air-conditioned offices to plan and authorize this policy.

"Who, me? That's not what I meant to order, not at all."

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: number 6
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 02:45 PM

true PoppaGator .... especially when those low-ranking scapegoats belong to a "3rd party".

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Amos
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 04:12 PM

This is a deep and sorry disgrace. It is understandable that random accidental deaths occur in wartime. What is disgraceful, IMHO, is that was was adventured upon, when any student of history--even a "C" student--knows these are among the unwanted condequences of it.

PFui.



A

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 04:21 PM

If this is true, it puts the USA right in there with those who controlled the Gestapo.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: frogprince
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 04:27 PM

Once again, I'm saddened to nearly the point of literal sickness. How can this be ignored? How can it be prosecuted, without ripping the country apart at the seams? Nobody can "win".

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: ard mhacha
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 04:46 PM

Bush was manipulated by evil men, this form of punishment will always eventually be exposed.
Iraq and Afghanistan apart, the same US agents were operating for years throughout South America, the US can join with all of those countries that were constantly exposed as using torture, from quite a way back the US was no different.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Rapparee
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 05:14 PM

I still can't spoke on the report since it's not yet released. But from my study of torture (DON'T ask why!) what you usually get are whatever answers will stop it. That's why the witch persecution got so many "witches" and why the Inquisition found so many heretics.

Any "information" gained is suspect simply because people lie to get the torture to stop.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Bill D
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 05:16 PM

"If this is true, it puts the USA right in there with those who controlled the Gestapo."

That's a very inaccurate way to put it. Surely you don't equate Nazi Germany's attitude with the overall way the great majority of Americans view all this?
The Gestapo was pretty open & brazen in their operations...the stuff at Guantanamo was hidden to all but a few... and lied about

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Bobert
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 05:30 PM

Well, I hope they are released and I hope that they name names of those who died, those who performed the torture and those who ordered it up...

I disagree with Obama on this issue 100%... Hey, just how much more pissed off can the Isalmist radicals get??? After an invasion Iraq and the muder of upwards of a million Iraqis I don't think releasing this report is going to make anything worse... If anything, it will be proof positive that we are trying to correct some terrible actions...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Bill D
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 05:37 PM

Just remember...if we had elected another Republican, they would be admitting to NOTHING and releasing nothing.

This situation is like several others Obama was handed...(Like handing one a rope tied to 4-5 tigers tails)... there is NO easy way to untangle the mess, even when you want to.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Peace
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 06:07 PM

There was a thread on that topic about three years ago. Possibly some folks don't care to rehash it all.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Little Hawk
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 06:16 PM

There would have to be simply no other choice, lives at stake, and sheer desperation. Judgements like that are made by individual people on the spot, regardless of "the official rules", and they are entirely dependent on circumstances...and ANYONE might decide to use that kind of force under some hypothetical circumstance, but the vital thing is that no government should ever be allowed to make torture an officially acceptable and sanctioned policy, and that's what the Bush administration did.

It's not relevant to ask an individual "how far would YOU be prepared to go?", because individual choices are not the same as legally established policies put in place by governments.   What is relevant to ask is "Would you be willing to enshrine torture as a legitimate and legally protected procedure of YOUR government, were you in charge of that government?"

That is the crucial matter here.

Individual human circumstances vary far too much for any one set of "rules" to be adequate to meet all of them. Nevertheless, governments must be prevented from legitimizing policies such as torture, and they must be prevented at all cost. If not, you're heading straight for a dictatorship,

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Peace
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 06:32 PM

People who advocate torture as official policy should themselves be the first to be tortured under the new policy. I believe in the law--as in THE LAW: do unto others as they would do unto you, but do it first.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: 3refs
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 06:37 PM

"What is relevant to ask is "Would you be willing to enshrine torture as a legitimate and legally protected procedure of YOUR government, were you in charge of that government?"

I AM THE GOVERNMENT!

Is this not what is preached by all "us democratic practitioners" and "protectors of freedom? Freedom isn't free! There is a price to be paid and that cost can be doing things that hurt you in ways that are only shared between you and your beliefs.

I want to know why it's "OK" for me to get whatever information I feel is vital because of "some hypothetical circumstance" and it's not "OK" for me to do the same, for the country I love, and the citizens who live there?

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 07:07 PM

Basically because in doing that you degrade the country you claim to love, cause the citizens of that country to be despised, and encourage and assist its enemies.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: gnu
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 07:17 PM

Well, if it was life and death and I had to choose, fuck em, with extreme prejudice.

Anyone who would rather die is lying.... and dead.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: curmudgeon
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 07:21 PM

Truth under torture is as dependable as Bernard Madoff, Read what Rapaire said!

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: heric
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 07:25 PM

The hypothetical where it might matter and might work and might allow thousands of innocents to be saved is probably a once in a lifetime situation if that. The truth of the matter is you wouldn't trust the government to calculate your taxes for you, or deliver a parcel worth more than $300, or prosecute Ted Stevens, so how in the world can you trust them to torture "the right" person *when* it matters you sure has hell can't. You can't even control them from raping and killing children after all. Just look at the larger picture. And this on overseas adventures not in defense of the homeland.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: folk1e
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 07:33 PM

Perhaps the better question to ask is .......
" Is anybody suprised by this revelation that torture has been used by the USA?"
Most of the popular culture points to this being "normal" so why start crying now?
Perhaps the lesson to be learned is that torture does not produce good results!

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: heric
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 07:35 PM

By the way though wait and see on "100 deaths in custody of tortured prisoners" I rather doubt it.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: 3refs
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 07:47 PM

Exactly!
Once is "Murder". Twice is "Double Homicide". Three times is Serial Killing". Any more than that, call it what you will!
To feel that one heart beat stop because of your hand, is a fuck of a lot harder than the 10's 100's or 1000's that might perish because of the finger you press! Tell me a number where you say "NO MORE"!
Please, put up a list, of all of you who don't want me to do whatever it takes to save your life, and I won't ask you to do the same for me!
You ask me to look at the forrest, and I say to you, look at the trees!

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 10:09 PM

3refs - first tell us that you will consider it justified when you, personally, are tortured to death to provide information that you have not got and when you have done no wrong.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: 3refs
Date: 30 Jun 09 - 11:43 PM

My first response is "Shit Happens"! That's nothing but rude, and shows my ignorance!

People who are, or have been, tortured just to see what they know, are not the ones I speak of. I pray, to all the Gods, for them.

I'm sure/hoping that your not that naive, not to realize that there are/were people out there, who could have been stopped, or whatever they did, prevented!

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Jul 09 - 01:55 AM

You can't give a government official powers to do stuff like torture people, 3refs. If you do, one day they may come for you or someone you love who has done nothing wrong. Don't be surprised when they do. The worm just has to turn the wrong way, and that often happens.

I'm not saying there aren't situations where torture would be justified to save someone's life. Such situations can and sometimes do arise unexpectedly. And if they do, then individual people make those life and death decisions themselves...REGARDLESS of what ANY damned government has to say about it...and they sort out the legal repercussions later.

But DON'T EVER give your government free rein to torture whom it chooses. You will be very sorry one day if you do. Such governments are a curse upon humanity, and history is littered with the bodies of their innocent victims.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: gnu
Date: 01 Jul 09 - 02:03 PM

Well said, LH.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 01 Jul 09 - 05:38 PM

The mindset of the person who is willing to approve torture because they believe it is for the greater good is precisely the same as that of the terrorist who is willing to approve random killing for the same reason. They are the same people, basically, in slightly different situations.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 01 Jul 09 - 05:41 PM

"The mindset of the person who is willing to approve torture because they believe it is for the greater good is precisely the same as that of the terrorist who is willing to approve random killing for the same reason. They are the same people, basically, in slightly different situations."

Yes.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: pdq
Date: 01 Jul 09 - 06:37 PM

My opinion of the author who is sited in this thread's initial post...

Glenn Greenwald is more of a journalistic terrorist than a journalist.

He has written several books all trashing Republicans in the most vile slanted manor.

He has little interest in Truth unless he can forge it into a blunt instrument and beat his boogey men with it.

Glenn Greenwald probably makes millions of $$$ selling books and writing his articles of character assassination.

He does not even have to get his dirt under his pinkie little fingernails.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 01 Jul 09 - 06:58 PM

So does that mean he forged those autopsies?

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Rapparee
Date: 01 Jul 09 - 06:59 PM

I haven't seen the list yet.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: DougR
Date: 01 Jul 09 - 07:28 PM

When the list is available, will there be a new obit thread on the Mudcat?

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Bobert
Date: 01 Jul 09 - 07:32 PM

Well, Dougie, there should be and accompanying it there should be a list of those who commited the torture as well as a list of those who ordered them to do so...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 01 Jul 09 - 07:44 PM

The people who give the orders always make sure to avoid giving them in a way that can be traced back to them. And I don't think even those who think torture is justified in certain circumstances would deny that that is the height of cowardice, and despicable.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Rapparee
Date: 01 Jul 09 - 09:57 PM

If you're not willing to sign the orders, don't issue the orders.

At least that's what I was always told.

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: DougR
Date: 02 Jul 09 - 05:18 PM

Then we will count on you, Bobert, to start that thread.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Extensive Torture Deaths to be Revealed
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 02 Jul 09 - 05:30 PM

As usual McGrath puts it well.