Cheney Calls for full Release of Memos

[Coyote]

You know........any of you assholes that think waterboarding is not torture.......I challenge all of you dumb motherfuckers to go and get strapped to a plank, have a washrag stuffed in your mouth, and then go through not less than 5 MINUTES of it.

Then come back and report. I'm betting you'll change your mind.

I challenge you to take yourself and all the people who are closest to you. To go in a large building, let a terrorist crash a plane in it, killing everyone inside. Knowing all along that it could be prevented by waterboarding the terrorist piloting the plane. Then come back and tell us how waterboarding is torture, oh wait you couldn't....

So basically, you are saying that we should adopt the same standards as our enemies? Because they behave horribly that justifies our doing the same? I always thought we SET the standards...not followed them.

(Never mind the fact that the terrorists actually responsible for 9/11 are all dead).

 

[jreeves]

All this business about doctors being present during torture negating it from being torture makes me wonder.

When the Nazi's were conducting their medical experiments on Jews....it was "doctors" not only there but participating. Does that mean all those people weren't being tortured? They weren't really in pain...? They weren't really....damaged?

Were the doctors there to prevent injury to the Jews? No, there that's called a false premise in the world of logical thinking. But it wouldn't shock me if you were unaware what logical thinking was.

 

[xotoxi]

All this business about doctors being present during torture negating it from being torture makes me wonder.

When the Nazi's were conducting their medical experiments on Jews....it was "doctors" not only there but participating. Does that mean all those people weren't being tortured? They weren't really in pain...? They weren't really....damaged?

The purpose of a doctor is to make sure the guy who is being tortured doesn't die, because then you can't get information. Not to make him feel more comfortable.

Yeah.....but if you torture them, all you get is unreliable information.

Case and point (see 5:23)

[youtube]<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/VK5sV5COcDk&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/VK5sV5COcDk&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>[/youtube]

"If Sean Hannity allows me to waterboard him based on the criteria and guidelines that have come out in these memos, I'm willing to bet that I will be able to coerce Sean Hannity. In fact, I am even willing to bet that I will be able to get Sean Hannity to say that Countdown with Keith Olbermann is his favorite show." - Mike Ritz, former Sere School instructor

 

[Coyote]

All this business about doctors being present during torture negating it from being torture makes me wonder.

When the Nazi's were conducting their medical experiments on Jews....it was "doctors" not only there but participating. Does that mean all those people weren't being tortured? They weren't really in pain...? They weren't really....damaged?

Were the doctors there to prevent injury to the Jews? No, there that's called a false premise in the world of logical thinking. But it wouldn't shock me if you were unaware what logical thinking was.

The real false premise is the assumption that the doctors were preventing anything except untimely death - they were violating their very oath by their presence in those proceedings. If they were willing to violate their medical oath then how can anything they do, say or observe be trusted?

 

[Ravi]

How so?

You seem to only consider physical pain to be torture. Even by the definition you posted anguish of the mind also is torture.

It's not extreme anguish...

Really?

 

[Ravi]

How so?

You seem to only consider physical pain to be torture. Even by the definition you posted anguish of the mind also is torture.

Then in that case, there needs to be a medical doctor and a psychiatrist on site.

The psychiatrist can ask them "How did the waterboarding make you feel?" and "Tell me about your childhood relationship with your mother."

I believe they did have psychiatrists present.

 

[jreeves]

You know........any of you assholes that think waterboarding is not torture.......I challenge all of you dumb motherfuckers to go and get strapped to a plank, have a washrag stuffed in your mouth, and then go through not less than 5 MINUTES of it.

Then come back and report. I'm betting you'll change your mind.

I challenge you to take yourself and all the people who are closest to you. To go in a large building, let a terrorist crash a plane in it, killing everyone inside. Knowing all along that it could be prevented by waterboarding the terrorist piloting the plane. Then come back and tell us how waterboarding is torture, oh wait you couldn't....

So basically, you are saying that we should adopt the same standards as our enemies? Because they behave horribly that justifies our doing the same? I always thought we SET the standards...not followed them.

(Never mind the fact that the terrorists actually responsible for 9/11 are all dead).

The ones that were going to crash planes into buildings in LA aren't dead though. No we don't have the same standards as terrorist. Tell me the last time the CIA posted a video of a terrorist on the internet being beheaded? Or tell me the last time the US military intentionally killed a prisoner of war? As a matter of fact, I won't even hold AQ to the same standards, when was the last time AQ saved thousands of lives by cutting someones fingers off?

 

[xotoxi]

I challenge you to take yourself and all the people who are closest to you. To go in a large building, let a terrorist crash a plane in it, killing everyone inside. Knowing all along that it could be prevented by waterboarding the terrorist piloting the plane. Then come back and tell us how waterboarding is torture, oh wait you couldn't....

Why even waterboard them in the first place?

Lets just round them all up and execute all of them. Sure, we may kill a few innocents, but we'll most likely get all of the bad guys.

 

[jreeves]

You seem to only consider physical pain to be torture. Even by the definition you posted anguish of the mind also is torture.

It's not extreme anguish...

Really?

yes really

 

[jreeves]

I challenge you to take yourself and all the people who are closest to you. To go in a large building, let a terrorist crash a plane in it, killing everyone inside. Knowing all along that it could be prevented by waterboarding the terrorist piloting the plane. Then come back and tell us how waterboarding is torture, oh wait you couldn't....

Why even waterboard them in the first place?

Lets just round them all up and execute all of them. Sure, we may kill a few innocents, but we'll most likely get all of the bad guys.

Good point, our purpose is to extract information not to harm them.

 

[jreeves]

The purpose of a doctor is to make sure the guy who is being tortured doesn't die, because then you can't get information. Not to make him feel more comfortable.

Yeah.....but if you torture them, all you get is unreliable information.

Case and point (see 5:23)

[youtube]<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/VK5sV5COcDk&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/VK5sV5COcDk&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>[/youtube]

"If Sean Hannity allows me to waterboard him based on the criteria and guidelines that have come out in these memos, I'm willing to bet that I will be able to coerce Sean Hannity. In fact, I am even willing to bet that I will be able to get Sean Hannity to say that Countdown with Keith Olbermann is his favorite show." - Mike Ritz, former Sere School instructor

No one is arguing that waterboarding isn't effective but that waterboarding is somehow torture.

 

[ABikerSailor]

You know........any of you assholes that think waterboarding is not torture.......I challenge all of you dumb motherfuckers to go and get strapped to a plank, have a washrag stuffed in your mouth, and then go through not less than 5 MINUTES of it.

Then come back and report. I'm betting you'll change your mind.

I challenge you to take yourself and all the people who are closest to you. To go in a large building, let a terrorist crash a plane in it, killing everyone inside. Knowing all along that it could be prevented by waterboarding the terrorist piloting the plane. Then come back and tell us how waterboarding is torture, oh wait you couldn't....

We'd probably end up with a front row view to the destruction of the building down the street.......

Information from torture is notoriously unreliable. Ask any military person, they'll tell you all about it.

You fucking civvies don't know shit when it comes to crap like that, as you're all hyped up on Rambo movies and shit like that.

Try again douche.........fail.

 

[Coyote]

I challenge you to take yourself and all the people who are closest to you. To go in a large building, let a terrorist crash a plane in it, killing everyone inside. Knowing all along that it could be prevented by waterboarding the terrorist piloting the plane. Then come back and tell us how waterboarding is torture, oh wait you couldn't....

So basically, you are saying that we should adopt the same standards as our enemies? Because they behave horribly that justifies our doing the same? I always thought we SET the standards...not followed them.

(Never mind the fact that the terrorists actually responsible for 9/11 are all dead).

The ones that were going to crash planes into buildings in LA aren't dead though. No we don't have the same standards as terrorist. Tell me the last time the CIA posted a video of a terrorist on the internet being beheaded? Or tell me the last time the US military intentionally killed a prisoner of war? As a matter of fact, I won't even AQ to the same standards, when was the last time AQ saved thousands of lives by cutting someones fingers off?

First - your own argument is a bit of a strawman. On the one side you have outlaws practicing beheadings. On the other, you have an attempt to justify a legally sanctioned government program of torture. No one is arguing that what the outlaws do is horrible and wrong - but you are attempting to use that to justify an acceptance of anything up to that point. As long as "we aren't quite as bad as they are it's ok". But it's not. Torture degrades both the dispenser and the recipient and worse, it eats away at the moral fiber of the entire society that condones it out of fear or retribution.


Torture is a slippery slope. Once you start justifying it by putting it within a legal framework - where do you stop?

 

[Coyote]

Yeah.....but if you torture them, all you get is unreliable information.

Case and point (see 5:23)

[youtube]<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/VK5sV5COcDk&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/VK5sV5COcDk&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>[/youtube]

"If Sean Hannity allows me to waterboard him based on the criteria and guidelines that have come out in these memos, I'm willing to bet that I will be able to coerce Sean Hannity. In fact, I am even willing to bet that I will be able to get Sean Hannity to say that Countdown with Keith Olbermann is his favorite show." - Mike Ritz, former Sere School instructor

No one is arguing that waterboarding isn't effective but that waterboarding is somehow torture.

If waterboarding is so effective then why didn't Khalid Sheikh Mohammed lead us to bin Laden despite 183 drownings?

 

[jreeves]

You know........any of you assholes that think waterboarding is not torture.......I challenge all of you dumb motherfuckers to go and get strapped to a plank, have a washrag stuffed in your mouth, and then go through not less than 5 MINUTES of it.

Then come back and report. I'm betting you'll change your mind.

I challenge you to take yourself and all the people who are closest to you. To go in a large building, let a terrorist crash a plane in it, killing everyone inside. Knowing all along that it could be prevented by waterboarding the terrorist piloting the plane. Then come back and tell us how waterboarding is torture, oh wait you couldn't....

We'd probably end up with a front row view to the destruction of the building down the street.......

Information from torture is notoriously unreliable. Ask any military person, they'll tell you all about it.

You fucking civvies don't know shit when it comes to crap like that, as you're all hyped up on Rambo movies and shit like that.

Try again douche.........fail.

Of course its unreliable...
JEFFREY: Waterboarding saved L.A. - Washington Times
Before they were waterboarded, neither KSM nor Abu Zubaydah thought Americans had the will to stop al Qaeda, the 2005 Justice Department memo says, citing information from the CIA.

"Both KSM and Zubaydah had 'expressed their belief that the general U.S. population was "weak," lacked resilience and would be unable to "do what was necessary" to prevent the terrorists from succeeding in their goals,' " the memo says. "Indeed, before the CIA used enhanced techniques in its interrogation of KSM, he resisted giving any answers to questions about future attacks, simply noting, 'Soon, you will know.' "

After he was waterboarded, KSM provided the CIA with information that enabled the U.S. government to close down a terror cell already "tasked" with flying a jet into a building in Los Angeles.

"You have informed us that the interrogation of KSM - once enhanced techniques were employed - led to the discovery of a KSM plot, the 'Second Wave,' 'to use East Asian operatives to crash a hijacked airliner into' a building in Los Angeles," the memo says, referring to information the CIA provided to the Justice Department.

"You have informed us that information obtained from KSM also led to the capture of Riduan bin Isomuddin, better known as Hambali, and the discovery of the Guraba Cell, a 17-member Jemaah Islamiyah cell tasked with executing the 'Second Wave,' " the memo says.

"More specifically, we understand that KSM admitted that he had [redaction] large sum of money to an al Qaeda associate [redaction] ... . Khan subsequently identified the associate [Zubair], who was then captured," the memo says. "Zubair, in turn, provided information that led to the arrest of Hambali. The information acquired from these captures allowed CIA interrogators to pose more specific questions to KSM, which led the CIA [to] Hambali's brother, al-Hadi. Using information obtained from multiple sources, al-Hadi was captured, and he subsequently identified the Garuba cell. With the aid of this additional information, interrogations of Hambali confirmed much of what was learned from KSM."

 

[jreeves]

So basically, you are saying that we should adopt the same standards as our enemies? Because they behave horribly that justifies our doing the same? I always thought we SET the standards...not followed them.

(Never mind the fact that the terrorists actually responsible for 9/11 are all dead).

The ones that were going to crash planes into buildings in LA aren't dead though. No we don't have the same standards as terrorist. Tell me the last time the CIA posted a video of a terrorist on the internet being beheaded? Or tell me the last time the US military intentionally killed a prisoner of war? As a matter of fact, I won't even AQ to the same standards, when was the last time AQ saved thousands of lives by cutting someones fingers off?

First - your own argument is a bit of a strawman. On the one side you have outlaws practicing beheadings. On the other, you have an attempt to justify a legally sanctioned government program of torture. No one is arguing that what the outlaws do is horrible and wrong - but you are attempting to use that to justify an acceptance of anything up to that point. As long as "we aren't quite as bad as they are it's ok". But it's not. Torture degrades both the dispenser and the recipient and worse, it eats away at the moral fiber of the entire society that condones it out of fear or retribution.


Torture is a slippery slope. Once you start justifying it by putting it within a legal framework - where do you stop?

It's not torture by definition....that's where your argument falls apart.

 

[jreeves]

Case and point (see 5:23)

[youtube]<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/VK5sV5COcDk&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/VK5sV5COcDk&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>[/youtube]

"If Sean Hannity allows me to waterboard him based on the criteria and guidelines that have come out in these memos, I'm willing to bet that I will be able to coerce Sean Hannity. In fact, I am even willing to bet that I will be able to get Sean Hannity to say that Countdown with Keith Olbermann is his favorite show." - Mike Ritz, former Sere School instructor

No one is arguing that waterboarding isn't effective but that waterboarding is somehow torture.

If waterboarding is so effective then why didn't Khalid Sheikh Mohammed lead us to bin Laden despite 183 drownings?

He probably didn't know where Bin Laden was.

 

[Coyote]

No one is arguing that waterboarding isn't effective but that waterboarding is somehow torture.

If waterboarding is so effective then why didn't Khalid Sheikh Mohammed lead us to bin Laden despite 183 drownings?

He probably didn't know where Bin Laden was.

Yet it took them 183 times to figure out they had the wrong guy?

That's the problem with torture.

 

[Coyote]

The ones that were going to crash planes into buildings in LA aren't dead though. No we don't have the same standards as terrorist. Tell me the last time the CIA posted a video of a terrorist on the internet being beheaded? Or tell me the last time the US military intentionally killed a prisoner of war? As a matter of fact, I won't even AQ to the same standards, when was the last time AQ saved thousands of lives by cutting someones fingers off?

First - your own argument is a bit of a strawman. On the one side you have outlaws practicing beheadings. On the other, you have an attempt to justify a legally sanctioned government program of torture. No one is arguing that what the outlaws do is horrible and wrong - but you are attempting to use that to justify an acceptance of anything up to that point. As long as "we aren't quite as bad as they are it's ok". But it's not. Torture degrades both the dispenser and the recipient and worse, it eats away at the moral fiber of the entire society that condones it out of fear or retribution.


Torture is a slippery slope. Once you start justifying it by putting it within a legal framework - where do you stop?

It's not torture by definition....that's where your argument falls apart.

Uh uh. Now you are playing games with semantics in an attempt to justify something that is normally reprehensible.

 

[xotoxi]

Yeah.....but if you torture them, all you get is unreliable information.

"If Sean Hannity allows me to waterboard him based on the criteria and guidelines that have come out in these memos, I'm willing to bet that I will be able to coerce Sean Hannity. In fact, I am even willing to bet that I will be able to get Sean Hannity to say that Countdown with Keith Olbermann is his favorite show." - Mike Ritz, former Sere School instructor

No one is arguing that waterboarding isn't effective but that waterboarding is somehow torture.

What?

No one is arguing that waterboarding isn't effective

Are you trying to say that we all agree that waterboarding is effective?

Or are you saying that "waterboarding isn't effective"?

Because if you are saying that waterboarding is effective at obtaining "information", even if that information is a blatant lie (Hannity saying that Countdown is his favorite show), then it is NOT effective at obtaining useful information.

And if you are admitting that "waterboarding isn't effective", then in essence, our government is just doing it for shits and giggles.

Either way, you've dug yourself a hole from which you will not be able to climb out.