BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)

Subject: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Musket
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 03:55 AM

Go on then, I'll start it.

I'm just waiting for someone to find out how much our people here in The UK knew about it and to what level.

You see, I doubt the state sponsored terrorists with CIA ranks will be brought to justice yet get the feeling if one agent here knew about one prisoner on one flight crossing UK air space, our prison population will increase by one, such is the outrage against a country we see as allies. Tory Bliar will be wearing a prickly shirt (again.)

How many in The USA? Bush has already dismissed the findings. Will he be held in a federal or Texas prison?

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 05:39 AM

What I think when I hear of these things is "do as we say, not as we do".

Not much room left for noble speeches at the UN condeming others for the inhumane treatment of those detained in conflict. There is little "high ground" left.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 06:00 AM

The historians all agree that the torture was fair, justified and well led. Besides other people did worse things so it is OK and I bet you cannot find one person alive who disagrees with me.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 06:21 AM

So, if torture is ok, why complain if the enemy does the same thing to your folks? Why sign onto agreements banning such acts?

If you ask folks if they agree that their countries solders should be subjected to torture, if captured, it is also likely that they would say, no.

In these cases McCain, who was subjected to torture, stated no valuable information was gained. Nothing gained.

Additionally, It also seems that it was done without letting the top governing folks know. Significant, when your country has signed onto international agreements for the humane treatment of those detained in conflict. At a minimum, one would expect top approval where important international protocols were involved.

Considering everything associated, I suspect there are worse things done to those detained that did not get into the report.

A first step towards "no holds barred, I suspect.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 06:21 AM

No we didn't...
More to the point, if the torture was a quation of individual initiative/excess of zeal/homicidal mania and nobody in command outside of the CIA was reasponsible, even then the question arises why nobody in the US is doing anything about it.
Because the most crying justification for every extremist one might dread is the "Oh, is that it? Knew it all the time. Next." coming from Capitol Hill.   It's as if the US is not responsible or accountable to anyone - but as it is a War Crime and the US has recognised the fact, even if it has not ssigned up to the ICJ, from what is coming out of the UN it may be referred there anyway, and if it is, then it will either have to recognise the Court or absent itself and find itself sent down by default in absentia.
The ICJ tends to take the viewpoint that it's only criminals who have an interest in disrespecting it. The same is effectively true of the Republicans for absenting themselves from the enquiry. So, if you're on the pitch but not in the game, you'll be taken out. Or in real-world terms, I thnks we may have just seen the end of the US as a Superpower.
The UK tends to dispose of its problems "with extreme prejudice", cf David Kelly, also a section head of the NAO some ten years back and one or two others. Which is better, I don't know, but to imagine that we have moved on from Tudors days is a fiction of the imagination.
All you have to do is recast the CIA as the Inquisition and you're right back into the same domain of a fanatically-inspired bunch of sadistic murderers, not easily distinguishable from their opponents. Roll in the mud, get dirt in your knicker, they say, but even so...

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Some bloke in Scotland
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 08:25 AM

This is about reality in The USA Rahere, not fantasy about conspiracy theories over here. David Kelly's suicide and the awful way in which he was treated is bad enough without fairy stories about real James Fucking Bond..

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Greg F.
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 08:43 AM

Knowing the history of the C.I.A. and its past lies and illegal shenanigans, why anyone should be suprised at these findings is completely beyond me.

As for Dumbya dismissing the findings, he was probably too stupid to realize what was actually going on, but Dick Cheney knew full well, and approved of it.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,#
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 09:08 AM

Interesting that when the allegations came out about Guantanamo about a dozen years ago they were called conspiracy theories. Maybe not, huh?

Subject: RE: BS: CIA SHIT torturers
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 09:14 AM

Sophistication
Hubris
Intelligence
Thought

These factors may be called S.H.I.T. for short

The combination and degree of these S. H. I. T. factors in our Supreme Court appointed President all added up to decisions from a desperate and an inferiority laden mind to revenge, to make suffer and ultimately, to torture.

If you educate yourself to the most common modes of the latest forms of CIA torture, they overwhelmingly involve shit and rectal fixations;
Covering with shit, diapered with shit, cells full of shit with no bucket, rectal feeding and shitting back undigested food , even the ever popular eating of shit all expose the personal repugnant feelings regarding shit by the CIA psychologists who invented this 'stuff' and the leader who approved of it.

Relative to lethal Nazi torture techniques the American methods tend to stress cruelty over death as their goal.

If you look at the people who devised and advised modern AMERICAN TORTURERS and the fearful leader who requested it, you too may conclude that while the procedures where full of shit the decision to do so was severely lacking in Sophistication, Hubris, Intelligence and Thought.

Every torture devised, betrays the mindset of those who ordered and carried out their wishes. It sure the hell did not come from God. Actually, biblical descriptions of torture are far more bloody and "cutting edge".

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 09:25 AM

Now I'm back to the sauces dips and sausage thread.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: BrendanB
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 09:33 AM

I cannot accept any argument that defends torture as legitimate. However, I do believe that when a person finds themselves up close and personal with those they perceive to be evil doers, whether that be terrorists, rapists, paedophiles or whatever and that same person is tasked with stopping them it must be a temptation to overstep the mark in the belief that the ends will justify the means.
It is easy to sit back in one's armchair and say that they should have been professional enough to resist that temptation but when one is in the thick of it I suspect that things do not seem so black and white.
Were I ever in that position I hope that I would have the moral courage to resist - but I cannot be certain.

The USA has faced this sorry business even though some of the participants refuse to acknowledge their involvement. I wonder if the UK government will show the same moral fibre?

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Greg F.
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 09:40 AM

professional enough to resist that temptation

This wasn't a one-on-one moral choice for participants, Brendan - these atrocities were part of a codified & established program.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,John P
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 09:43 AM

Why so many of us in America don't trust our government:

The Catholic Church conducts a wide-spread conspiracy to commit child rape and isn't investigated.

The CIA places illegal wiretaps on Congress and no one is indicted.

The CIA, condoned by very high-ranking officials, conducts illegal torture and no one is indicted.

The NSA conducts billions of illegal wiretaps and no one is indicted.

The President of the United States tells outright lies in order to justify invading another country and kill tens of thousand of people and is still walking around free.

The list goes on and on.

I voted for Obama and, given the nature of any Republican, would do so again. But his administration has failed to demand that our government act within the law and within common decency. It has failed to make any individual take responsibility for wildly illegal and unconstitutional actions. This makes it a failed presidency in my book. Anyone with the right kind of power can apparently get away with anything.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Greg F.
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 09:49 AM

a failed presidency in my book.

Sorry, John, but the Prez can't do much without Congress, which has been obstructed and paralized by the Repugnicans since day 1 of Obama's presidency. I'm not saying Obama is blameless, but do put the vast majority of the blame where it actually belongs.

Also,its silly to blame Obama for things that happened under Dumbya's watch.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: BrendanB
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 10:32 AM

'These atrocities were part of a codified and established programme'

I accept that stricture Greg but I understood from a news report on UK TV last night that some CIA operatives requested reassignment, so perhaps there was room for a moral choice to be made at an individual level.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,#
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 10:38 AM

ACLU about Guantanamo for those who didn't know a thing.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 10:42 AM

Yet the debate from the Americans is entirely introspective and utterly fails to take into account that this is being watched across the world. The BBC got bored and went elsewhere, so I watched it to the end on al-Jazeera, to see what kind of reception it might get the other side of the fence.
The people that were tortured are not Americans and so America affected other countries, regardless of the justification or not. These acts may have let the perpetrators of 9/11 off the hook: happy? 'd think not, so why my sainted mother's aunt did they do it?
The failure of the Republicans to have an input may impact internally as a "not in my name" argument, but has absolutely no effect internationally, not least because most of this seems to have occurred under them. The Report is now cast in stone, and the demands in the UN are unlikely to go away: once such a demand is formalised, it cannot be disregarded but must be processed. The response to that may affect how the UN treats the US henceforth: if it is ignored, it could be termed a pariah State. The charges here are on the same scale as Milosevic and company, and they thought they weren't signatories to the appropriate Conventions either. There's such a thing as learning the hard way.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,under the bar-guest
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 10:50 AM

The same thing was going on the north of Ireland in the early 1970,s, read the book by 'The Guineapigs' by John McGuffin (1974).

Subject: CIA torturers WHO KNEW ?
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 11:14 AM

I knew. You knew. We all knew.

On a cold April day Frau Dieseldorf decided not to hang the laundry out to dry. In the bucket the clothes pins floated in cold rain water with a layer of grime on top. Most of all there was a putrid smell of burning meat in the air. It was better than before when the smell of hair was unbearable but that had been gone since winter.

Just like us the German people knew. Like us they did not know all the names and addresses but there were plenty of people who spoke their conscience of what they saw as well as those who bragged.

As long as it didn't spoil the sheets or foul up our commute we did nothing about it.

The torture belongs to you as much as me. I didn't know or I was just following orders doesn't wash. It won't wash away the stain on your hands. It is on you as much as it is on me.

Just like any bigotry even if you don't act out an act of hate you at least took advantage of white privilege without a thought to those who have no such privilege.

Like it or not, defend it or not, it is your torture no matter how removed you insist you are. It is in your nations name,. It is in your name.

With the release of the 6 million page report all that has changed is the who, how you and why you deserve to be treated in kind without care or concern from your torturer. Or perhaps you have no soul.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 11:32 AM

A CIA field office cannot do this no cia agent would do this not because of morality but because they can be charged. What happened was a very high level guy like the director under bush hired some contractors and said get us the information. Torture doesn't work agents use money which does work. The contractors are ex special forces that are not trained for anything but killing. Black Ops contractors get away with anything because they are private. I blame Cheney and the bush administration. It was a disgrace to America.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 11:43 AM

What was it 300 million for useless info. Agency knows Torture doesn't work but bush wanted revenge at any cost and no agent would do this. Hire some mercenaries instead and the agency gets reports only. A disgrace to America

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: akenaton
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 12:20 PM

Think yourselves luck that you have someone to blame.

We in the UK were taken to war by a "Labour" administration, which condoned and assisted in the "rendition" of Al Qaeda suspects.

Which means the transportation of "suspects" to countries willing to torture un-convicted prisoners. We have supported and armed Islamists all over the middle East, for half baked ideological reasons.
All who voted and continued to vote for Mr Blair have no right to any "high ground".

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Greg F.
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 12:25 PM

A CIA field office cannot do this no cia agent would do this

Dan, you don't know how much I would like to believe this, but if so, why is the entire CIA establishment denying that it was torture and claiming that it produced marvellous results?

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 12:39 PM

You are correct Greg. It is like the military. Political people say go here and fight and soldiers do. Then the administration hires merks to fight also. Then the next administration says oops. The cia directors come and go but the guys in the trenches shake their heads. Cia directors were never good at admitting cluster fucks even if it was another administration. Any field agent would say it was wrong and doomed to fail and against the law but admission has to come from a director and that won't happen for political reasons not for common decency or illegal acts. They don't ever apologize even for past sins
Sad for sure

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Acorn4
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 12:44 PM

It wasn't torture, it was "enhanced interrogation techniques" - and that makes it OK!!

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 12:49 PM

Yeah Torture by any other term is Torture. Cia directors are appointed by an administration and if the administration is corrupt revenge directed people. Then they will say it's legal and when the field agents say no way they hire merks. It was doomed to fail. I only thank those with the guts to release the full report so it doesn't repeat

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 01:06 PM

""Now I'm back to the sauces dips and sausage thread.""

They even used those to torture folks! Even a Shah (or, was it Shaw) would be above that type of torture.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 02:07 PM

I am surprised at Ake. There is not someone else to blame if you are American.


Depending upon who you ask, the Holocaust was technically legal.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 02:16 PM

Blended to a picante Puree.

what drug led to that kind of imagination?

I have had the experience of saying no to the CIA recruitment officers as a young man. My experience as a full time hypnotist dovetailed with the CIA'a long standing use of hypnosis for murder and torture. The last of their infamous hypnotists had died of old age. I saw what kind of future would be in store for me and said no and hell no. They were even cruel and inhuman to me for saying no. long story...

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: akenaton
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 02:26 PM

Well Don, many Americans here are blaming their political opponents,
George Bush and the Repubs.

As I have said, a supposedly left of centre regime in the UK dragged the British people into Iraq on the coattails of Mr Bush.
We cannot blame the Conservatives for Iraq as the "liberals" here blame the Republicans.

Correct me if I am wrong but did the Democrats not support the Iraq war almost to a man?

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Musket
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 02:29 PM

Takes a lot for him to surprise me though. When your whole life is someone else's fault, your mindset is disturbed to say the least.

I find it difficult to see what a third world government with bad human rights record or a freelance set of what they see themselves as freedom fighters will make of this.

If the country that goes further than any other in exporting its values is seen as immoral, what should people aspire to? (That's irony in case you.., never mind.)

Just think, your ex President worked on the idea American people would see this as necessary. For me, this is a good day. It shows the calibre of those not prepared to go along with such crimes and the outrage from good honest people in The USA is the start of the solution not the problem.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: akenaton
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 02:34 PM

Hmm I was voting SNP and protesting the war while YOU say you were voting for Blair.....no high ground for you boy!

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Ed T
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 02:38 PM

"Torture and other forms of abusive or coercive techniques often serve to strengthen an individual's resolve to resist, deepen his commitment to a cause, serve as a foundational theme for recruiting campaigns designed to attract others to violent extremism, and generate a lingering division among allies and international partners," wrote the signatories of today'sstatement. "In sum, it not only undermines an interrogator's ability to elicit useful information, it also undermines our nation's ability to counter threats to its security. Torture makes our nation less secure."
Source- News release from seventeen of US of As most respected interrogation and intelligence professionals -Oct. 1, 2014:




Intelligence Professionals Take Stand against Torture  

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Ebbie
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 02:44 PM

This story is not over.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 03:32 PM

Like it don't believe it or not it is an administration problem. The next director can get an order from the next Cheney that it is legal to use poison gas and some merks will be hired to do it cause field agents won't knowing it would be jail time for them
Merks nope they already have a get out of jail free card before they agree

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 03:39 PM

I said before a cia field agent that is not a hired merks then has to try an clean up the shit of bad political leaders who ever they be. They will get an order to try and mend fences. Which will be next to impossible in our arab allies

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 03:46 PM

And if you're looking for justice forget it before blackwater took the first dime of the millions of dollars they wanted a get out of jail free letter from the oval Office and you can take that to the bank they got it. Thank god we have people that will release the report.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 03:54 PM

Think of that prison abuse who did they go after, a couple of low rank uniformed soldiers but who ran the prison.. Blackwater any of them in jail?

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 04:03 PM

Last thing you want free reign, get a letter from the oval Office saying all actions are necessary for national security and immune to procecution and you can do anything you want

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 04:05 PM

Bush and his ilk got away with a lot of crap under the guise of "patriotism" - to the extent that many voted with him in the early days because to not do so would mean an outcry about various elected officials not being patriotic. There was a herd mentality in place.

Those who didn't like Bush already still didn't trust him but were outnumbered, and with Cheney by his side, the two got away with murder in so many ways. The spying, torture, rendition, and monitoring of Americans on American soil are the legacy of the Baby Bush administration.

The Diane Rehm Show (WAMU-FM in Washington, D.C.) discussed this 6700 page report today.

One wonders if anyone will manage to read the entire thing and report based upon that knowledge, vs those who will dip in and take things out of context.

Yesterday a conversation on NPR considered the possibility of Obama pardoning some of these folks - not because they don't deserve to be tried, but because trials would take a very long time and a lot of money, and IF THEY ARE PARDONED THEY ARE BRANDED AS CRIMINALS (who just happened to be pardoned). It might be the best we can hope for.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,achmelvich
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 04:06 PM

if decent blokes didn't sign up to do whatever evil bastards and corrupt governments tell them to do, then none of this shit would happen. it's easy - just say 'no'

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 04:50 PM

Amen ach so very true

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 05:13 PM

Sadly it isn't easy just to say no when the government has the press in it's pocket and the money men hold the government by the balls. Propaganda and campaigns to get people to hate whoever they deem to be the enemy, rather than see who the real criminals are, are very powerful tools to get people on your side. It happened not that many years ago in Germany. It is still happening today in the US, UK and all over Europe.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Ebbie
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 05:21 PM

Remember him?

"Alberto Gonzales is currently the Dean of Belmont University College of Law, in Nashville, Tennessee where he currently teaches Constitutional Law, Separation of Powers, National Security Law and First Amendment Law. He is also counsel at a Nashville-based law firm, Waller, where he advises clients on special matters, government investigations and regulatory matters."

To my mind, if anyone is indicted/prosecuted for this travesty, so should Gonzales be. He was the US Attorney General who assured the Bush administration that, hey, it is all legal.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 05:22 PM

No doubt Juan Peron had suitable training from the CIA!!!

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Greg F.
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 05:58 PM

Gonzales was just on the TV, Ebbie, saying that Dumbya new all about it & what's the problem? & that yes, they kept the facts from Colin Powell deliberately.

Also Michael Hayden, Dumbya's CIA director saying yeah, so what's the big deal? - Gonzales said it was OK! & trying to weasel-word his way out of the fact that it was torture.

Guess Hayden & the CIA "vass only following orders", ja?

What a bunch of scumbags, scuttling around like cockroaches when the light's turned on..

Can't wait for Cheney to be interviewed - THAT should be a REAL travesty.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 07:16 PM

Yeah listened to the son of a Bitch. Cheney would have done well in Nazi Germany would he not. Listen it doesn't work Torture never once worked never and we got jack shit from it but why would we suspect he wouldttell the truth.
At least it is all out maybe some good can come of it all

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 10 Dec 14 - 09:39 PM

Except that for those of us in the countries where our government collaborated in all this it's not "all out".

America needs to stop covering up that stuff. Covering up criminal activity just makes it certain it will happen again.

Americans shouldn't be the only ones in the dock over this. And that shouldn't be a merely metaphorical dock either - Tony Blair and Jack Straw should be up alongside Cheney and Bush in a real dock.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,ollaimh
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 12:15 AM

the American learned thr water boarding from the uk. the british perfected these techniques for the "special treatment" they gave a number of irish they thought on bad info, were ira. none were but most were destroyed for life. the great anglo empire goes on. they torture folks. face facts. they pretend to have moral high ground for internal political reasons, just like putin, but the wolr d knows they both torture.

the british used wide spread torture in Kenya, and in basra to a lesser extent more recently. and of course all over Africa and he new world. they introduced scalping, and did ethnic cleansing in the new world. oh yeah the quarter million irish taken as slaves and sold to carribean plantations.   

face it the americans and the british are part of the military capitalist , permant warfare state,(they call it laissez faire capitalism or free enterprize) that means torture and genocide if convient.
American and british voters have to stop voting for the jingoist parties who wave the flag if they want it to stop.   that probably means the green party in the us, unless the democrats change. and the peace and freedom party in the uk.   however the anglo saxon extreme nationalism makes this unlikely.

I think Obama would have done more without the extreme obstructionist congress, but the real problem is American flag waving stupid nationalists who just voted republican, thinking that will change something. they voted for the party that made the deficit mess and the Iraq and torture mess, with no memory at all.

of course, the cia still fans the war fare option. schuer was on television saying the problem is Obama won't use the military to solve problems, with no apparent awareness of the irony that without the invasion of Iraq there would be no isis and many fewer problems and a few trillion dollars less debt.

yaeh a lot of them should be prosecuted, but so should a lot of british torturers. and as john p says a lot of catholics(hopefully William lynn will lose his appeal) and a lot of people who tortured native children in residential schools. but the evil ones are in power and they know how to keep that power.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 02:39 AM

http://cms.fightforthefuture.org/pardonjohn/

http://cms.fightforthefuture.org/pardonjohn/

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 03:59 AM

Oh!..Pretend to be shocked and indignant...

Is there really anyone on here who DIDN'T know before, or even figure out that this stuff was going on?????

...and guess what??..the provisions of the NDAA gives them leeway to do it to anyone.....without even being charged, or allowed to see a lawyer.

'The Political Waltz'...and both parties are dancing partners.....


GfS

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Stu
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 04:03 AM

"A CIA field office cannot do this no cia agent would do this not because of morality but because they can be charged."

The idea that CIA agents simply outsourced all their torture requirements to third parties to avoid prosecution is dangerously naive. This organisation is unaccountable and operates beyond the law, and what counts for us simply doesn't count for them. CIA (and MI6) agents were directly involved in the torture and killing of people, some of them cases of mistaken identity who died lonely, terrifying deaths in squalid conditions (google the Salt Pit).

I could say more about the CIA from family experience, but in all honesty they scare the living fuck out of me.

By the way, the Gestapo perfected water boarding.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 10:05 AM

All the Slugger O,Toole webs, the US learned the tricks from the Brits.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 10:09 AM

Here is the thread Paper trail: from Northern Ireland's hooded men to CIA's global torture, Slugger O,Toole

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 10:15 AM

Waterboarding, including the nasty trick of using a hose-pipe to fill the victim's oesophagus and stomach with water, was a favourite torture method of the Japanese in WW2, a long time before the Irish 'troubles' of the '70s and beyond.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Ed T
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 10:19 AM

On CNN today Cheney stated something like, contrary to the report, then President Bush was regularily advised of all CIA operations, including interrogation, and that he would authorize the same actions again, if faced with the same situations.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 11:16 AM

Stu true prior to the 70's not true after that. They had a leash put on them

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 11:22 AM

Hence the outsource

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Greg F.
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 11:23 AM

Cheney said he had not read the 6,000-page classified document, drafted by Democrats and their staffs on the Senate Intelligence Committee, or the 500-page declassified and redacted executive summary. But he unequivocally said its findings were flawed and an affront to members of the CIA.

Classic Cheney, I ain't read it, but its "full of crap". Funny(?), coming from a real PIECE of crap.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Ed T
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 12:03 PM

In an hour and a half, the CIA Director is making a statement and will answer media questions-check CNN

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 12:15 PM

The origin of these abuses was NOT in the British Army, but in North Korea, and particularly among their Russian Advisers, during the Korean War. The discovery of the techniques came from the in-depth American study of brainwashing, and passed into all NATO to a various degree, including the British. Most nations trained in them fairly routinely during ths Cold War, using these techniques on themselves as a training tool to resist interogation if the Russians ever captured you - I don't know how much it went on in the line troops, I didn't spend much time in those circles, but I'm very familiar with stress positions, from the wrong side - as I think is Teribus. From there, it was probably second nature for the more brutal types to use them on the Irish, as they were at that time seen as an implacable enemy. That got out of control, however, and so with the arrival of the Red Fog of War doctrine (ie don't succumb to it) it was stopped. It's now seem as brutally stupid.

Yes, I do own The Guineapigs, having bought it before it was squashed - it was a Penguin Special and was on sale for a very short time before the Government had it delisted. It was a propaganda tool, so I'd be careful about using it as a historical document about what actually happened: I don't think you'd have found waterboarding on the scale of intensity more recently known, for example - and I say that in full knowledge of what the Army did use at the time. Another thing you must be careful about is legal anachronism, the Law by which this is being pursued now did not exist then and so the troops cannot be criticised for acting illegally, or even immorally in the context of the time. We've grown up a bit, and softened a bit, and that's not necessarily a good thing in the long term, but is in the short term. I don't call my training torture, for example, but character building - as you know I'm no pushover.

Anyway, the point is not the UK then, but the US now. In my first reply, I pointed out the hypothetical situation of the US refuting action - but it's now happened. That has just given al-Qaida and IS a big boost, I fear: they can now turn around and say this is what their enemy is like in its own words. And that's a disaster, given it was certain to fail.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 02:10 PM

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/1470200/waterboarding

Waterboarding did not start in the Korean War, it's documented as far back as the Spanish Inquisition, and has been used during various conflicts since. It certainly was not invented by the British during the Irish 'troubles' as Olive claimed.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Musket
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 02:26 PM

Keel hauling goes back at least to Henry VIII. It is down as a naval punishment from 1531.

Water boarding is little different.

Looking at the history of state crime and where methods started doesn't have any bearing on this, either from embarrassed Americans or romanticising Fenians.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Ed T
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 03:30 PM

From the report:

'Rectal feeding'

CIA operatives subjected at least five detainees to what they called "rectal rehydration and feeding".

One CIA cable released in the report reveals that detainee Majid Khan was administered by enema his "'lunch tray' consisting of hummus, pasta with sauce, nuts and raisins was 'pureed and rectally infused'". One CIA officer's email was in the report quoted as saying "we used the largest Ewal [sic] tube we had".

Rectal feeding is of limited application in actually keeping a person alive or administering nutrients, since the colon and rectum cannot absorb much besides salt, glucose and a few minerals and vitamins. The CIA administered rectal rehydration to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed"without a determination of medical need" and justified "rectal fluid resuscitation" of Abu Zubaydah because he "partially refus[ed] liquids". Al-Nashiri was given an enema after a brief hunger strike.

Risks of rectal feeding and rehydration include damage to the rectum and colon, triggering bowels to empty, food rotting inside the recipient's digestive tract, and an inflamed or prolapsed rectum from carless insertion of the feeding tube. The report found that CIA leadership was notified that rectal exams may have been conducted with "Excessive force", and that one of the detainees, Mustafa al-Hawsawi, suffered from an anal fissure, chronic hemorrhoids and symptomatic rectal prolapse.

The CIA's chief of interrogations characterized rectal rehydration as a method of "total control" over detainees, and an unnamed person said the procedure helped to "clear a person's head""

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Bill D
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 03:37 PM

If you want to see how those ultimate arbiters of correctness, the political cartoonists, view the whole thing, look here. It goes on for pages... and they are not kind.

John Brennen of the CIA was on all the networks this afternoon, 'enduring' questions and doing some dodging.... but also some admitting.

I am beyond aghast that ANYONE from my country went down that path.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Greg F.
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 04:06 PM

and doing some dodging

Dodging be damned. He refused to acknowledge that it was, indeed, torture. Another weasel.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,#
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 04:47 PM

We of the tinfoil hat brigade knew this shit was happening a decade ago. People who didn't want to know didn't bother to find out.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Bill D
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 05:55 PM

"He refused to acknowledge that it was, indeed, torture.."

Of course not.

He did acknowledge that some had "gone beyond what was approved".... and then just 'noted' that everyone will call the result what they choose.

There is some slight, sadistic pleasure in watching him squirm.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 08:15 PM

The claim that things had "gone beyond what was approved" is an effort to pass the blame down to the lowest possible level, as was done in the case of Abu Ghraib.

It always happens like that - "a few bad apples", don't blame us.

"We were just obeying orders" is no kind of excuse for the people lower down. But it's a true enough claim, and is an indictment of the people who give the orders and authorised them.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Janie
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 09:44 PM

I am puzzled by the dialog and debate about whether torturing detainees produced information/intelligence that was useful. Not puzzled. Horrified. As if that would justify torturing people.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Ebbie
Date: 11 Dec 14 - 11:06 PM

The other day I got to thinking about 'truth serum'. If it were predictably accurate - which it is NOT - would using it be banned because of being forced to testify against oneself?

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: LadyJean
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 12:12 AM

My friend Nils who worked as an army interrogator during the Cold War, says, "Torture is what you use to make the person you're interrogating confess that he's the Queen of England."

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 12:16 AM

McGrath of Harlow has it clocked....most sane people knew this, or a variation has been going on for years....and this administration, has also known about it(for years).. The 'releasing' of the documents at this time, with all the renewed media coverage, should have your flags up, as to motive, not just for doing it, in the first place, but as to the timing....and what this is getting us ready for.


GfS

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Under the bar-guest
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 05:20 AM

Read this Why it's so rare to hear an apology for torture and be informed why US learnt from the Brits, Why it's so rare to hear an apology for torture on the BBC News MAGAZINE.,

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 08:19 AM

A key sentence from that article by Frank Foley in the BBC News Mafazine:

"A fundamental underpinning of the post-9/11 interrogations was a belief among security officials that their brutal treatment of detainees would remain largely secret."

And that is why openness is so important at this stage. "Everyone already knows about it, so why drag it up now" misses the point. The perpetrators at all levels are still protected, the lower level ones by continuing secrecy, the higher up ones by the untouchability that clings to those who are seen as important. And in the case of foreign leaders such as Tony Blair and Jack Straw ( among many others), by both secrecy and status.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Stu
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 08:21 AM

"Hence the outsource"

None of this evidence is about outsourcing. It's about US officials from the CIA being directly involved in torture. Any legal issues were circumvented by the renditioning of prisoners to countries where they had no rights at all and could be tortured by anyone with impunity. The CIA created the programme and implemented it. They are responsible, not some war hungry mercenary.

Of course, the sad fact is the US were aided and abetted by lots of other countries that allowed rendition flights to land at their airports; the UK and Ireland included. No fucker comes out of this smelling of anything but shit and gore, and to think otherwise is an act of self-delusion.

These people are a different breed, believe me.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 09:59 AM

Seems the whatsit's about to hit the fan here in "neutral" Ireland,
Our local airport, Shannon, has been allowing U.S. military planes carrying potential torture victims through on their way to their torture sessions without bothering to check who was on board, while at the same time locking up the protesters.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,achmelvich
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 11:23 AM

if ordinary people did not agree to do these barbaric acts, they just wouldn't happen. dick cheney or whoever wouldn't do it on his own.some people continue to agree to perform whatever inhumane acts of torture they are told to. (leaving aside the milgram stuff) seriously - who are the people who would do that, nobody is forced to join these 'special forces' or the CIA. presumably they get some enjoyment out of the job - is it the case that the more extreme is your sadism the better you are at the work? such criminal tendency should be enough of a character flaw to disqualify them from any respectable employment.
'it's a dirty job but someone has to do it' - no, they don't

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Greg F.
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 12:24 PM

dick cheney ... wouldn't do it on his own.

Sure he would - in a New York minute.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 04:31 PM

You're still not addressing the point about the US thinking it's a purely internal affair, though. WHY do they even begin to think that, WHERE are they coming from? A Nation which can be so ignorant of anything outside of its borders must be a menace to us all.
Given we've had more than a bit from over there about how wonderful they are, I think we are entitled to an explanation!

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 06:03 PM

More to the point, we're entitled to information about what our people did to assist in all this.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 06:14 PM

The torture itself may have ceased, at least for now, but the mindset that engaged in it hasn't gone.

Here's an extract from a story about the six Guantanamo prisoners who, after years in captivity without at any time even being charged with a crime, let alone convicted were this week sent to freedom in Uruguay.

"The harsh treatment lasted up to the moment the prisoners descended from the US military plane in Montevideo early on Sunday.
The men spent their entire nine-hour flight to freedom in handcuffs, shackles, blindfolds and "ear defenders", their lawyers said.

"When they arrived, the Uruguayans refused to let them walk off the plane in shackles, they insisted that they be allowed to take their first step on Uruguayan soil as free men," said Mone.

That wasn't some effort to extract information. It was plain and simply arbitrary and pointless cruelty. Recreational cruelty on behalf of the American state. And of President Obama we sadly have to assume.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,John P
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 06:53 PM

You're still not addressing the point about the US thinking it's a purely internal affair, though.

I'm an American and I certainly don't think this is purely an internal affair. We are very upset right now because a congressional report just came out that details our government's actions, but no one I know thinks it only happens in the US or that it only affects the US. We all knew it was going on at the time and was being done by multiple countries and we all hated it. We all know it's still going on and we still hate it.

Many people seem to think that we're all responsible because it was done in our name. I reject that notion -- torture has never been done in MY name, and I hate the fact that I can't trust the leaders of my country. I hate the fact that everyone I know finds the CIA and all their works abhorrent and that there's nothing we can do about it. Our country, like most countries, is controlled by power-mad greedy killers, and I include many Democrats in that assessment along with, apparently, all but one Republican. And I don't trust John McCain because of most of his other positions.

Anyone who achieves high power or great wealth is not to be trusted because, almost always, in order to achieve those things they have to do things that are reprehensible.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 07:32 PM

Ake, I would have hoped you noticed I accept responsibility as an individual, as a liberal and as a nation for allowing torture as an official policy. In short everyone who claims American citizenship or civic duty, by silence or non action are responsible for American torture in our name. Even you have no waiver to claim yourself innocent unless you are honest in declaring yourself devoid of integrity or ultimate morality.

Other than creating editorial political cartons against torture I did virtually nothing.

Old Dude you never fail to fill the gaps in my similar thoughts.
In other words, Yeah that's right!

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: wysiwyg
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 09:57 PM

I don't have time to read the whole thread and I'm not sure I have the stomach for it anyway. So this is my one and only post on the subject FWIW:

Q: WHAT color would the torturees have been, preponderantly?

A: I bet not white/pink.

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Don Firth
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 11:46 PM

I strongly agree with the comments of John P., just above.

And—I take strong exception to those across the pond and/or north or south of the borders who look down their noses at "Americans" for allegedly condoning atrocities such as torture perpetrated by agencies of the government. There is damned little that I, as a private citizen, can do about it other than speak out in protest, express my anger and disapproval—and vote.

"Not in MY name!"

In times past, how many devout Christians who took their religion from what Jesus taught in the Gospels, were outraged at the actions of that agency of the Church, the Inquistion? Quite a few, I suspect.   

There is was word for those who condemn everyone of a particular group for the actions of a few members of that group.   I'll leave it to others to work it out.

Particularly ironic when one's own country is more than a bit "iffy" in that regard….

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,#
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 01:17 AM

"Although the committee identified the contractors via pseudonyms, NBC News has previously identified them as Mitchell, Jessen & Associates, a Spokane, Washington, company run by two psychologists, Dr. John "Bruce" Jessen and Dr. James Mitchell, who had both previously worked with the U.S. Air Force."

from the below link, second article down

http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/cia-torture-report/cia-paid-torture-teachers-more-80-million-n264756




Maybe they could go to jail instead of their employers.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Musket
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 03:47 AM

Must be difficult for Ireland to wake up and realise they are not innocent virgins either.

The outrage for us all, and bearing in mind that most Western countries either supported or acknowledged US search for those who would harm democracies, is that by trying to do so, the values we all hold were put aside.

Torturing, holding without trial and profile prejudice are precisely what we all wished to overcome. But the CIA led the way in joining in the fun. We all knew, and it isn't the first time Shannon (or Prestwick etc) have been named in regard to extraordinary rendition.

But to hear it through a report commissioned by The US government, shocking as the contents are, is a positive thing because hitherto, governments try to play down past misdemeanours, even if it were "the other lot" lest their own murky side gets publicised later.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 10:30 AM

So why is nobody marching into their office and nicking them for war crimes?

This is utterly irrational, that psychologists should resort to torture to garner information. What kind of shrinks are they not to know that their victims are certain to fugue under those circumstances? It'll give you the answers you want, but not the information you need, it's as reliable as a chocolate teapot. Why f'ing bother, if all you want is to go ahead anyway? Cut the cackle and keep it simple, if you're going to rule autocratically, then rule autocratically. What kind of conscience have these people got, willing to salve their consciences in a little lie by creating a bigger one like this? Or is their hypocrisy such that they're willing to torture and abuse just for the fun of it? And if so, then what kind of behaviour is going on in the current bunch to find that tolerable in their predecessors? They obviously have no moral norms, any of them, and are unfit for office en masse. And the same can be said of the UK for not holding them to a standard. What a bunch of utter shits - and to say not in my name misses the point, it was done in our name and we're entitled to hold them to account as a result.
We should be more than just shocked, we should repudiate the lot of them. A democracy which accepts such things is not worthy of the name, because they do act in our name, like it or not, they are entrusted to represent us and must be held accountable for how they do so. At least in the UK we have a plurality of parties: is there nothing to be done in the US to alter matters? If it comes out that the UK was positively implicated, then I shall most certainly be visiting my MP's surgery to make the point in person. The UK has no jurisdiction in the US, but we are signatories of the ICJ and if Blair is implicated, then we know what to do, I trust. Neither fear nor favour.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 11:13 AM

It has been said, (repeatedly, and on the 'news'), that Americans are 'more' at risk now, as a result of the 'release of the information' about the methods that were used to interrogate the prisoners ..... What is so much bull-crap about that is, does ANYONE think that when Obama released the five terrorists, in exchange for deserter Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, that those same five terrorists didn't inform their buddies, of what was going on???????????

Naw, this is another 'publicity stunt', targeting the consensus of the public, which has the attention span of a mayfly!!

What is really happening is that the mask is coming off...and the public is being DE-sensitized....for what reason awaits implementing provisions of NDAA, on our own citizens.......we'll be 'used to it' by then!


GfS

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Some bloke in Scotland (Occasionally a Muske
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 11:48 AM

presumably you'll be first against the wall then Goofus?

Look on the bright side, if the tea party get in next, you'll probably get a congressional medal for the shite you peddle on Mudcat.



Oy, Musket Original! Cookie crumbled, email me the password, duck!

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 01:04 PM

Americans might be more at risk now because people who do not have buddies who are terrorists may start supporting terrorists or even become trainee terrorists themseleves. Especially if perhaps their family has been killed in a drone strike.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 06:50 PM

Your buddies are outraged: the UK Parliament is now shifting, as MPs see they will not get away with shovelling this one under the carpet in the way the US might wish.
Malcolm Rifkind, Chair of the Parliamentary Intelligence and Security Select Committee, has asked the Senate to see the unredacted text. Keith Vaz, Chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee, has called the current Home Secretary Theresa May to explain on Monday.
Jack Straw, the Foreign Minister (Secretary of State) at the time has already been interviewed by Scotland Yard, the Police National HQ(albeit on a neutral basis).
The points being made are exactly those I just made: we are better than that, even if you in the States are not. We may not be able to bring you to Justice, but the UK has no choice, must act, and is acting. Some of the UK's top politicians, with a status close to Statesman, are onto this one and will not let it go.

If the US is unable to explain, then the US had better prepare for some of its past Chiefs and tgheir subordinates to be hauled in front of the ICJ. What applies to Serbia can just as easily apply to GWBII

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 07:44 PM

We now have the possibility of David Miliband, brother of the Leadour Party leader, lined up to be interviewed by the Police. He was the last of the Labour Foreign Secretaries: one presumes Margaret Beckett, in between them, is also on the receiving end of a little chat.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Musket
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 07:59 PM

And yet none of this bullshit is relevant to the thread.

And some of it isn't true either, is it?

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 09:08 PM

Torture must work really well huh. I bet historically every person who went to a dungeon chamber confessed to the crime

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: olddude
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 09:16 PM

130 million to the untrained psychology guys company to do this. Why Cia Field agents are trained. They know it doesn't work. Money works offers of asylum works. Saying well if you won't help us we will give you to Israel as they requested works. Physical Tortureis a ccomplete failure and a crime against humanity

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 14 Dec 14 - 12:04 AM

The HYPOCRISY of it all.....

...another about face....when before................

..and how come Feinstien, who was in charge of CIA oversight, never said anything, BEFORE....till now????

Anyone else smell a rat????


GfS

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 14 Dec 14 - 12:13 AM

Oh...and 100....

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Bill D
Date: 14 Dec 14 - 02:18 PM

I also agree with John P and Don Firth above..... and though I 'agree' with Rahere's concerns, I have difficulty with his phrasing:

"You're still not addressing the point about the US thinking it's a purely internal affair, though. WHY do they even begin to think that, WHERE are they coming from? A Nation which can be so ignorant of anything outside of its borders must be a menace to us all."

This is a misleading and inaccurate characterization- **nations** do not 'think' and are not 'ignorant'. People- , that is, individuals are guilty of flaws in attitude & behavior. It is well documented that there were Germans who defied Hitler and the Nazis... and often suffered for it. When *individuals* who have power and status in a country abuse rationality, it is no wonder they often abuse other humans.... which leads to atrocities being attributed to entities which can be defined more simply. I can see the temptation to attribute actions to "a country", but doing so obscures the fact that many million in that country despise what has been done in their name. In the US, our political system and structure unfortunately does allow the possibility of the wrong **individuals** getting too much power... and correcting this is not a matter of just some national vote saying "hey, quit that!"... and correcting the entire system brings up metaphors of correcting course on a very large ship.

I DO wish 'we' could correct those problems which are so obvious to many of us... but I also wish there were more understanding shown regarding the situation we protesters are in as we try to deal with the stupidity up top.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 14 Dec 14 - 06:43 PM

OK, get precise - but the sense in the UK is that we're not only not accepting the crime, we're not accepting the cover-up, and we're not accepting anyone who goes along with it. That means the whole US political system from top to bloody bottom is seen as an utter and complete fuck-up, from GWBII who did it with the backing of his minions to Obama who's allowed him to get away with it with the backing of his minions. You have no end of International Treaties and on the strength of this not one of them is worth the paper they're written on. Tens of thousands just hit the street to protest, rightly, abuse of a racial minority, but there's narry a squeak from anyone about the world being led by a penny-ante bunch of shysters. It's that bad, a complete diplomatic disaster which will result in the Western world being held hostage for the next generation or longer.
The UK s starting to shift on this, and if the US wants to retain its "special relationship" with the country who gave it its military mojo back, then it has to get off its fat complatent arse and start to clean the shit out of a considerable number of bodies.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Bill D
Date: 14 Dec 14 - 09:06 PM

Oh, that's a very well-stated righteously indignant rant.... but it simply mixes some fact with your own opinion..." the whole US political system from top to bloody bottom" is NOT a complete fuck-up.
The basics of it served quite well for a couple of hundred years, and much of it still has many pluses. In order to respond to your broad brush, I have to 'get precise'. No one STILL gets it that Obama "and his 'minions'" are not letting anyone "get away with it" (And Obama would be bemused at the idea that he has 'minions')
   You don't specify exactly WHO are "a penny-ante bunch of shysters."... the bankers? The politicians? The military?... I'm sure there are some shysters in all those places. Don't you in the UK have your share? When you criticize YOUR country, you are usually specific.... Blair, Cameron...even Thatcher sometimes still. But let the US do something to upset or frustrate you and it's all rotten from top to bottom.

And just HOW do you propose we " start to clean the shit out of a considerable number of bodies."? WHICH bodies? Have I not detailed the complex political steps necessary to do that? Or do you relish seeing us in another form of Civil War?

I can deal with reasoned, analytical and **helpful** comments, but righteous,sarcastic finger-pointing gets old, dontcha know?

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Dec 14 - 09:28 PM

Verily!!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 14 Dec 14 - 10:53 PM

what the hell do you think goes on in a war?
of course there is torture - gaining intelligence of what the enemy is up to is of what both sides do. its the least your men in the field deserve.

'jihad' means holy war, doesn't it. it reminds me somewhat of what the Argentinians said after The Falklands - we were naive, we didn't know war was like that.

if you read Brian Keenans account of his captivity - it seems to that the Muslim world has a very firm grasp of the ethics - or rather the lack of them that govern the use of torture in war.

why the hell haven't you lot? and why would the shit hit the fan in Ireland, Jim. Both sides were using torture in the recent unpleasantness. God knows, they had time enough to get used to the idea.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 14 Dec 14 - 11:22 PM

Bill D: "You don't specify exactly WHO are "a penny-ante bunch of shysters."... the bankers? The politicians? The military?... I'm sure there are some shysters in all those places."

Yes!..absolutely....and when those groups have 'intercourse' with each other, instead of representing the will, for the good of the people..it usually comes about by corruption....both parties!......something our 'so-called liberal' buddies can't seem to grasp....In reality, the 'big divide' between 'conservatives and liberals' is nothing but theater, because the people who 'own' the party leaders, weren't so stupid, to only corrupt one of them!!...Nope, they need control of both, to set up their national dialogue, for their Machiavellian tactics, and neither party is 'making their constituents 'happy'.....they just talk them into believing that they are making 'progress'...but it's neither to the 'right' or the 'left'....they leave you to settle that, and settle for a thinly veiled 'compromise'....which it really isn't....it's REALLY moving in a direction that had the party MEMBERS(of both parties) were aware of, they would NEVER approve of any of it...nor the direction of where it's REALLY headed........BUT.....
Suckers will be suckers!......There's one born every minute.....the rest of them just join a 'party' and root for them that are doing their thinking, and talking for them......and talk you into any bullshit they push.....and of course, tell you 'it's their platform'...me?..I'm not with the party..I'm with the band.
Music is either good or bad...you either like it or you don't. Politicians aren't so 'transparent' to a lot of people...until you're able to see right through them!....but for that, you need 'eyes to see'.
The rest is just hogwash...here, go fight over the table scraps!!

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 15 Dec 14 - 08:06 AM

I would remind you I was a senior staffer of WEU, the European Defence HQ, so military intelligence of this time is not something I am utterly unaware of. My work included crisis management planning, so I was one of their customers.

Garbage In Garbage Out is particularly dangerous in Intelligence, as poor-quality data input produces output which is at best disinformation and at worst so deluded it gets people and Nations killed. The boundary between obtaining good-quality data through fear lies at the edge where respect is lost to desperation. It's the point at which fears become reality: "if what you tell us to save yourself from your fears is proved wrong, then you're not going to save yourself" is a very different thing from this, subjecting them to the reality of their own worst fears to the point of breaking the person so far apart that they no longer know what is truth and what is fiction and will tell you anything.

Therefore, as a customer, anything which perpetuates the error is to be utterly disparaged in action and intent: if what you do is dangerous to my planning, then if you won't stop it I can at least stop listening to it. But, this goes further, it undermines the US claim to act within a framework of law and opens its commitment to International Law to question - and as there's no such thing as a debateable commitment, you're either doing it or you aren't, then the question instantly becomes a critique that nobody can thereafter trust the US in its Treaty commitments.

Amongst that list of things the US seems unwilling to stop is ignoring the accountability of the CIA to its commanders. It is an INTELLIGENCE Agency, not a combat unit in its own right, something the Agency appears to have forgotten several generations back. There can be a need for instant intervention, but only on the basis of a truthful judgement, as opposed to one warped by prejudice, dogma and wilful blind ignorance. This was a lesson learned from the Inquisition hundreds of years ago.

In terms of detail, In the UK, the Home Secretary Theresa May, to whom the Intelligence Services report, is being questioned by the Parliamentary Home Office Select Committee today. The Parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee is equally outraged, and are holding MI5 and MI6 to account. The Police are interviewing the Ministers who were responsible at the time, as the start of an enquiry which is aimed at arresting any criminals under our jurisdiction. WHO, by contrast, is being taken to account in the US, by WHOM and WHEN? IS the Head of the CIA changing their procedures to stop this happening ever again? ARE your Police actively interrogating those in command at the time to get to the bottom of who to charge for these criminal actions?

As it is, the apparent answer in the US is "None" to all of these, that report seems to have been filed vertically in the garbage bin. This means both those who committed what are crimes in high places and those who should hold them to account, in the words of Sir Malcolm Rifkind, Chair of the Parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee doing the clean-up in the UK, "without fear or favour", all of those who should be doing something in the US - but are not - become just as unreliable as those who did it, both sides of the political spectrum, reducing your entire political system to "a penny-ante bunch of shysters" for taking authority but not using it. It's not pleasant, but it is real.

You may not like it, but that is what is real and whay is happening. Those who did it on the UK will certainly name names in the US, so it'll escape through the back door. Man up, US, come with us and clean up the bodies who did this. CIA for sure, probably parts of the NSA, State Department, some of the Senate Overview - which is probably why they are circling the wagons - but go where it goes.

It may hurt your sense of National self-identity, but do you really want to identify yourselves with such things? These replies smack of denial, "say it's not so". But it is so, and cannot be unsaid. The options are simple, take it seriously, act like an adult nation and clean up the mess, mostly by ensuring those who did it are taught a lesson they will never forget and will never again be in a position to repeat the offence, or continue as you are and be treated as yet another dictatorial hegemony unworthy of attention.

Not everything is well in the UK, but when things are bad, we do what's necessary to sort it. For a while, it started to look as though Labour's riding roughshod over any opposition might have displaced that, but now no more - this is simply a relic of the former period. Our cosy version of the two-party system has broken down, and that is to the good, both major parties are now facing accountability to the people.

It is said that for good to prevail, those charged with doing it must succeed every time: evil only has to happen once. Don't give it the chance.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 15 Dec 14 - 12:02 PM

Rahere: "I would remind you I was a senior staffer of WEU, the European Defence HQ, so military intelligence of this time is not something I am utterly unaware of. My work included crisis management planning...."

Well, 'crisis management planning' sounds like what they do here...plan a crisis, then manage it!.....and to resolve it, we get shit that NOBODY wants...except to those who planned it originally, to promote the real hidden agenda....which placates the public, with lying rhetoric and replacing the 'disturbance' with less liberty and freedom.

Sound familiar?


GfS

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Dec 14 - 05:42 PM

Marry Gristmess
Police on Earth
God Wills through men.

Torture 101 lecture;

"Cheney will be the first to tell you that the techniques of the Spanish Inquisition shoulc be deeded classic torture, while any twist or enhancement of those core value Spanish tortures, if clever and sufficiently degradational and non lethal, can be considered American value enhancement interrogations."

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Bill D
Date: 15 Dec 14 - 11:57 PM

Rahere... I do not question your background and your basic knowledge of how intelligence is gathered and mistakes can be made in doing so.... and I even acknowledge your noting of the problem of "... the accountability of the CIA to its commanders.". These things are not in question, and have been noted in (some of) our media.
   I also note your account of various UK personnel being interviewed and taken to task for flaws.

As to: "IS the Head of the CIA changing their procedures to stop this happening ever again?" He indicated that he is... but without details, as one would expect.

My concern in your post is the change in tone/flavor/direction once you have explicated the obvious. You say: " Not everything is well in the UK, but when things are bad, we do what's necessary to sort it." This implicitly assumes that the US is not, and sidesteps the issue that I have noted before, that the steps "necessary to sort it" are intrinsically different than in the UK. It may be that yours are more efficient, or transparent, or even less political- I can't judge that. It is simply that ours seem to have a different and more complex set of constraints- including the makeup of various Congressional committees (which are about to get even more so as the #@*&%$ Republicans get control in January!)
There simply is not a comparable process here to 'to sort it out'. You may consider this to be a serious flaw, but it is what it is... and changing **that process**, like our frustrating process of choosing our political leaders, is subject to the same political awkwardness. It is when you make the shift from noting the problem to suggesting that 'we', as a nation, somehow fail to take relevant action, that I shake my head in frustration.
There ARE efforts to 'sort out' some of this nonsense, and no one is more concerned than I at the roadblocks...(well, no, I'm sure there are many just as concerned as I).

Some, like GfS just above, find refuge in the 'everyone is equally guilty' simplification, and 'Guest' just below that wants to suggest that *Obama* does everything. He does NOT.... it is NOT the case that all decisions flow over his desk for specific approval!

This summation ", both sides of the political spectrum, reducing your entire political system to "a penny-ante bunch of shysters" for taking authority but not using it. It's not pleasant, but it is real." just glosses over the true situation, but I can no more force YOU to see all the grays ...instead of blacks & whites... than I can remake out political system.
I have joked to friends for many years that "when I am made Emperor of the Universe" it will all be better....sadly, my nomination has been withheld.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 01:48 AM

Bill D: "Some, like GfS just above, find refuge in the 'everyone is equally guilty' simplification,..."

Not exactly, Bill...and it's not refuge...The multinational corporate heads, including the international bankers are the ones pulling the strings...Oh, we can bitch about either the Republicans or Democrats, 'liberal' or 'conservative', but in the final analysis, it's the aforementioned business globalists, who decide WHO we 'vote' for, and which party is going to take the ire of the public, because 'their party is, or isn't in office....but it's all smoke in mirrors....and BTW, nobody 'votes' for these guys, nobody can remove them from office, and much like the difference 'department czars', they are effectively free to do as they wish, without any recourse, oversight, or accountability....as long as they are portrayed to be pushing a political agenda, favoring one side or the other.
In reality, they're 'employed' by the same 'special interests'...and leading us down a path, which is portrayed as 'compromises', which both sides have to settle for.....because neither side would have gone for what they really are pushing for....Obamacare is one glaring example....by law, and extremely UN-affordable, the public is forced, by penalty of law, to purchase insurance from private companies.....not the same as government funded, universal coverage...AND, if it goes 'belly-up' the insurance companies get bailed out...but the people do not!
...or much like Jeff Immelt, head of GE, appointed as 'jobs czar, and given 500 billion dollars to start up jobs here...so what happens?...he starts up jobs in China making electric items, and now it's a law to buy his curly light bulbs.....the cover story is that they use a lot less electricity....the truth is, he, and GE, just made a bundle, under penalty of law, selling those crappy things...AND, not one job was created here, with that 500 billion...except his!!.....and that is just one example....or come to think of it, two.
If they didn't use the environmental EXCUSE, to pander to the 'left', they would have used a different EXCUSE, to pander to the 'right', if they were the ones 'holding office'.

Right now, the political talk is projecting Hilary Clinton, running against Jeb Bush.....two peas in the same pod, and BOTH working for the same masters....but the electorate, will get whipped up, and arguments flaring(even on here, watch) about which of the two is going to be 'more desirable' depending on the 'party'....but in reality, it won't amount to a 'hill of beans' difference.... these two families go WAY back, in their dirty dealings, working together...back as far (at least) to Iran/Contra ... and Mena Arkansas, when George Sr. was in cahoots with Bill Clinton...and Jeb was PERSONALLY piloting loads of coke in, from Central America.(Source: 'Out of Control', a rather huge book that chronicles the whole affair...and used by the Christic Institute, in their lawsuit, in Federal Court, (in Florida), against the policies, of guns for drugs, in Central America, at the time) Daniel Sheehan was the attorney handling the case...and the stuff that came out, would stagger your imagination!....Look it up....and you will find that the Bushes and Clintons are hand in glove....and NOT concerned with the people who 'voted' for them, but rather their own agenda, in the pecking order of globalist bankers, and multinational corporation heads.....and that's just another example.
Think about it.

As for me, it's beyond my control.... I'm just composing music....'I'm not with the party...I'm with the band!'

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Musket
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 02:56 AM

Any chance of working out what key the band are playing in then?

"and when the band you're in starts playing different tunes
I'll see you on the dark side of the moon"

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 05:03 AM

'Not everything is well in the UK, but when things are bad, we do what's necessary to sort it.'

yeh note the alacrity we cracked down on Philby, Blunt, Burgess etc.

this is about intelligence gathering, and we are in position to give lectures to anyone.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Musket
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 05:37 AM

A bit odd saying "we" Al.

90% of the population, including just about all the cabinet weren't born when the UK intelligence services suddenly noticed Cambridge was a suburb of Moscow.

Still, I recall buying Spycatcher at Milan Airport and proudly smuggling it through customs at Heathrow.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Greg F.
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 09:35 AM

The Grand Inquisitor Speaks (piece of garbage that he is):

NewYork Times, DEC. 14, 2014

As vice president, Dick Cheney was the most enthusiastic sponsor for the brutal C.I.A. interrogation program used on Al Qaeda suspects, protesting when President George W. Bush scaled it back in his second term. Now that a Senate Intelligence Committee report has declared that the C.I.A.'s methods, later prohibited, violated American values and produced little or no useful intelligence, Mr. Cheney is fiercely defending not just the agency's record, but his own as well.

"I would do it again in a minute," Mr. Cheney said in a spirited, emotional appearance Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press." He denied that waterboarding and related interrogation tactics were torture.


Click Here

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Bill D
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 11:32 AM

GfS..."Hilary Clinton, running against Jeb Bush.....two peas in the same pod, and BOTH working for the same masters."

I see... you read it in a book, so it MUST be true. Especially when the book is from the 1980s... about CIA & the Sandinistas .... no, wait..you read OTHER stuff in that book that sorta 'suggests' that Jeb & Hilary are... ummmm...or is it that someone 'claims' that because stuff happened, certain people are obviously implicated...and it all connects with Obamacare being a disaster & unaffordable, even though all the news reporting says it is working well ...except for the shrill voices of conservatives who can't stand the idea of Obama doing anything good.

You, sir, WANT to believe this crap, and you will quote any source that supports your predigested opinions, no matter how weak their thesis...and you wonder why I accuse you of the "everyone is guilty" fallacy.

Oh well....

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Greg F.
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 01:03 PM

Pay no attention to the GofuS behing the curtain. That way lies madness.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 03:02 PM

one of the great disappointments of Blair was that he didn't clean the Augean stables that British security has always been. the USA is a paragon of virtue in this matter in comparison.

could Watergate have ever happened in England. A president - a right wing President - brought to justice for subverting democratic process!

take another look at that Spycatcher book. Thatcher had very good reason to want to ban it. she owed her election success to MI5 initially. and the security services were instrumental in breaking the power of the unions. ensuring that investment and modernisation were not needed in English industry, and we remained a low wage economy.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 05:51 PM

Bill D: "I see... you read it in a book, so it MUST be true."


Here, you uninformed illiterate...read it yourself....in many places! ...and BTW, not ALL the CIA(under G Bush Sr.) was in on it...some some 'rogue factions....but it was still a Bush operation.....along with Bill Clinton's help!

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Greg F.
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 06:19 PM

Pay no attention to the GofuS behing the curtain. That way lies madness.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 07:35 PM

Yup... all he does is prove it is possible to find ANY claims on the WWW.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Don Firth
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 08:51 PM

Goofus?   Calling Bill D. an "uninformed illiterate!?"

Amazing!!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 17 Dec 14 - 12:27 AM

Don, say what you will, but in an earlier post you claimed to know a lot about Iran/Contra (at least that's what you claimed)...if that's the case, and the senior Bush was in on it, being as he used to be the CIA chief, before being V.P., did they, or did they not, use the Mena airport, in Arkansas, while Clinton was governor?..and do you believe that Clinton knew about it?

Now come on, tell the truth(if possible)...

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 17 Dec 14 - 12:50 AM

Hey, you know what....to on about proving this, would be too much of a thread drift....What I posted earlier is absolutely true....even though, it does all tie in together....but why bother...blockheads will be blockheads, and if our 'astute party members' aren't able to learn anything new, don't even waste the time it takes to think.


GfS

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Don Firth
Date: 17 Dec 14 - 01:00 AM

Goofballupagus, I don't remember ever claiming that I was any kind of expert on the Iran-Contra situation. Find the post where I claimed that or admit that you consistently lie about what other people say.

I mean it, Goofball! Put up or shut up!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 17 Dec 14 - 12:20 PM

Find it yourself!...If you don't write stuff down, you'd never remember it....and in this case, when I brought up Iran/Contra, you deflected, saying you were well aware of it all...Now, IF I pull it up, and post it, are you finally going to admit that you're the liar???????

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Musket
Date: 17 Dec 14 - 12:29 PM

I reckon its 7.1 to Don at the moment, although Goofus's 1 is subject to stewards' enquiry for doping...

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Don Firth
Date: 17 Dec 14 - 12:36 PM

Goofup--I ran a search looking for it (search box at the top of the page and my list of posts), I found ALL of our exchanges, and there is nothing there where I say what you said I said.

I was well aware of the Iran/Contra affair because it was in the news--and I was working in a radio station news department at the time--but never, at any time, did I claim to be any kind of expert on the matter.

YOU, sir, are the liar here!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 17 Dec 14 - 12:50 PM

It wasn't on this thread...look in earlier threads.

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Don Firth
Date: 17 Dec 14 - 01:10 PM

I did! As I said, with the search box at the top of the page, which you obviously don't know how to use.

Through the search box, I can access ALL of ANYONE's posts--including mine--and YOURS!!

Think about it!!

Yes, you are the liar here (and I can document it with your own words).

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Dec 14 - 06:31 PM

It may not really be fair to condemn someone as a liar, if the individual is actually too mentally disorganized to know what he said a short time before. (Obviously, Gfs, you'll realize that I'm referring to Don).

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Dec 14 - 06:33 PM

And that was me, "frogprince"; not trying to snipe from hiding, my cookie is messing with me.

Subject: RE: BS: CIA torturers (God Bless America)
From: Don Firth
Date: 17 Dec 14 - 07:54 PM

For an expert Googler such as myself, it's easy enough to find stuff with the "Lyrics and Knowledge Search" feature in the upper left-hand corner of the Mudcat forum's "table of contents" page. I put "Iran/Contra" in the box, click on "Search," and up pops a list of threads in which the words appear. Then in the "Edit" menu on my toolbar (Windows 7), I can pull up "Find on This Page" and put in whatever word(s) or name I'm looking for.

With a little ingenuity and persistence, I think I could find the Holy Grail or Jimmie Hoffa's body using these handy search boxes.

So be careful, Goofball—or anyone, for that matter—if you wrote something and later deny it, the post in which you said what you later deny having said can come back and bite you on the ass!!

Don Firth