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Senate panel releases scathing report on CIA interrogation...

Yeah, right. Who in the international community would that be? Don't forget to exclude all the countries that do real torture, everyday, to prisoners, just for the fun of it, including their own citizens. The left has this fictional dreamy thought of an elite, above all "international community" that will finally put the big bad USA in it's place. Get real. We are the greatest force for good that this planet has ever known. At least when we don't have cowards like Obama at the helm.

Why do you assume that just because I suggested what may happen as a result of this information going public that I support such action? Reading comprehension...

If the Obama Administration won't do anything about it, it's highly unlikely any other nation would. Hence, the reason I prefaced my response with "worse case". Frankly, I highly doubt any other nation would dare touch this issue for two reasons:

1) Such information was already made public years ago. The only difference here is the details as to how helpful torture was to intelligence gather. From the looks of it, not very.

2) Most nations would consider beheadings to be far worse than any act of torture (mainly because it's their people - Europeans as well as Americans - who are being beheaded).

The only nations that might get in an uproar over this are the Saudis and the UAE and their hands are so clean here either. Nonetheless, if people across the world start complaining loud enough condemning America for our torturous deeds especially if world leaders take this up to the U.N., we might see some pressure to do something about this besides publishing a torture report.
 
Calling what the US does "torture" is like calling your walk to your front porch a marathon.

I don't know if you're being cute with the use of "does" (as in currently) but people died during interrogation either by U.S. personnel or under their direct supervision. Not sure what definition of 'torture' you're using, but interrogation techniques that were harsh enough to kill people should probably be included in it.

We tortured people directly, and facilitated the torture of many others by 'third parties' through rendition etc. The question is whether we should continue to do that, and if not, what to do about the torture programs of the past. At a minimum, we should face what we did and learn from it, and either expand the use of torture because it works so awesomely and is a morally acceptable way to get information, or not.
 
I think the majority of us expect our government to lie to us. We even support them in all the lies they tell by making excuses for them. We only become mad at all the lies if it is the other party, the one we do not support is doing the lying. Our party, we are fine with it and even get a good laugh out of it at times.

I had a poll in which stated only 6% of all Americans expect a candidate to keep their campaign promises. That is how low a bar we hold our government and elected officials too. Trust in government is around 25% today. I have that poll. We consider lying just part of our political systems and something the government does. No big thing.

Tomorrow this report will mean nothing unless something happens overseas and it will be replaced with another hot issue.

There are several posts in this very thread that prove that first paragraph correct.

I think the rest of it is on target as well.
 
What has always baffled me is that the US, rightfully at times, has used its military muscle to advance "freedom and democracy", but has in recent times has shown nothing but authoritarianism in that goal.

Sociologists and historians agree that the shift from being determined enemies by Japan and Germany, to good friends and allies was largely steeped in how America conquered. I had a great friend, a Japanese born gardener who was a child when McArthur's troops rolled through his suburb of Tokyo. They had lined the streets with make shift American flags in the hopes the conquerors would not behead the adults and eat their children as they had been taught. Instead, and he had tears in his eyes when he told me this, they stopped the trucks and began handing out rice! His family had been subsisting on rats.

Compare that to Abu-Graib, how the US 'conquered' Iraq and imposed an unwanted government.

Is it any wonder that those deserving of "freedom and democracy" are resisting it's implementation as presented by the current and previous administration?

Not having figured out who are the bad guys doesn't help. I suspect there are Afghans who might be wary since Al-Qaeda was killing them with American weapons.

Well said.

Not only that, but we're dealing with a culture that considers freedom and democracy evil, as it allows people to disobey Allah.
 
Ooops caught me :roll:
But lets move past the right wing talking points shall we?
You have claimed this report is specifically political, you upheld a neo-cons talking points. Then when asked to provide evidence/proof or anything to back up his claims that this report is misleading, politically opportunistic, and used misquotes, you couldnt find anything, jsut said "we gotta wait". So you are already holding up a conclusion without any evidence to back up said conlusion. Essentially you upheld one mans talking points to try to discredit a whole report that took 4 years to prepare and went through 6 million pages of documents. Now you are going with yet another talking point..


Like Susan Colins? I already addressed that.



"exact same"? Never said that.


Mainly they didnt have access to the documents this Senate committee did. "While the task force did not have access to classified records, it is the most ambitious independent attempt to date to assess the detention and interrogation programs. A separate 6,000-page report on the Central Intelligence Agency’s record by the Senate Intelligence Committee, based exclusively on agency records, rather than interviews, remains classified."


How did they "come up with conclusions for the Republicans"?


Uhhh what are you even talking about now?



Well lets move past the left wing talking points.....Altogether.

Not one Democrat would say anything about Intel that came thru torture if it prevented a major attack and certainly not one that involved a nuke.

So how you looking now with all that preaching of morality.....while not giving a **** about how many lives you put in danger over a report that is old news and doesn't change any policy?
 
I don't know if you're being cute with the use of "does" (as in currently) but people died during interrogation either by U.S. personnel or under their direct supervision. Not sure what definition of 'torture' you're using, but interrogation techniques that were harsh enough to kill people should probably be included in it.

We tortured people directly, and facilitated the torture of many others by 'third parties' through rendition etc. The question is whether we should continue to do that, and if not, what to do about the torture programs of the past. At a minimum, we should face what we did and learn from it, and either expand the use of torture because it works so awesomely and is a morally acceptable way to get information, or not.

Just wondering if you think how we handled people in the past is worst than what WE ARE CURRENTLY DOING. That is using drones like they are video games and killing (rather than abusing) not only terrorists, but the people around them like their wives and kids. What should we do with the people from the President on down who are killing people without a trial more than a decade after we were bombed???
 
There are several posts in this very thread that prove that first paragraph correct.

I think the rest of it is on target as well.

The real sad part of all of this, we put up with it and accept it as the norm.
 
Oh, there is no question that the reporters and good people often mix up thing that are torture with things that are not. Waterboarding is a very good example. Three goes of it as it was allowed were unpleasant, but not torture by any stretch of the imagination. 184, on the other hand, would probably qualify, as would 700 hours of sleep deprivation.

It's a form of drowning that is repeatedly stopped before the person actually dies. If the person controlling the water flow doesn't stop, the person WILL die. It's torture. The entire purpose is to inflict enough pain/fear/both on a person to get them to tell you something - not different in substance than pulling out a fingernail, beating them, using cattle prods, etc.

It's pretty shocking that we'd try to redefine a type of torture as something else (getting someone to talk by infliction of immense pain and fear of death would be called what alternative term?) just because we did it and generally 'we' don't 'torture' so what we did must be something short of it. Think of it this way - if a domestic police officer interviewing your son waterboarded him and got a confession, what would you label what the police did to him? Torture! To call it any kind of "interrogation" is to prove Orwell correct.
 
Just wondering if you think how we handled people in the past is worst than what WE ARE CURRENTLY DOING. That is using drones like they are video games and killing (rather than abusing) not only terrorists, but the people around them like their wives and kids. What should we do with the people from the President on down who are killing people without a trial more than a decade after we were bombed???

Further, how many of us believe that the practice of torture is no longer happening because the government says so?
 
Just wondering if you think how we handled people in the past is worst than what WE ARE CURRENTLY DOING. That is using drones like they are video games and killing (rather than abusing) not only terrorists, but the people around them like their wives and kids. What should we do with the people from the President on down who are killing people without a trial more than a decade after we were bombed???

You're changing the subject, but I'll address the point.

1) Whether we should torture suspected terrorists or not is a valid question. As I said, if we decide as a country that we should officially sanction torture as a valid interrogation technique, then we should do that with open eyes, and admitting that's what we have decided to do. Denying we engaged in torture, to avoid making that decision, is just the coward's way of avoiding making that tough moral decision. My own view is torture is a counterproductive technique, and I believe that because the people who spend careers interrogating people have found that to be the case - that information derived from torture is unreliable - they tell you what they think might stop the torture, period. If that's a confession, you'll get a confession, no matter what they actually did. If they believe the torture will stop by implicating others, they'll implicate anyone they can think of if they believe it will stop the torture. It's also morally repugnant but frankly so is war and killing people so I can't with a good conscience object to torture but be OK with sending drones, etc.

2) Our drone program and how it is sometimes used is as morally repugnant and, in my somewhat uninformed opinion, as self defeating as our torture program. I don't support it.
 
You're changing the subject, but I'll address the point.

1) Whether we should torture suspected terrorists or not is a valid question. As I said, if we decide as a country that we should officially sanction torture as a valid interrogation technique, then we should do that with open eyes, and admitting that's what we have decided to do. Denying we engaged in torture, to avoid making that decision, is just the coward's way of avoiding making that tough moral decision. My own view is torture is a counterproductive technique, and I believe that because the people who spend careers interrogating people have found that to be the case - that information derived from torture is unreliable - they tell you what they think might stop the torture, period. If that's a confession, you'll get a confession, no matter what they actually did. If they believe the torture will stop by implicating others, they'll implicate anyone they can think of if they believe it will stop the torture. It's also morally repugnant but frankly so is war and killing people so I can't with a good conscience object to torture but be OK with sending drones, etc.

2) Our drone program and how it is sometimes used is as morally repugnant and, in my somewhat uninformed opinion, as self defeating as our torture program. I don't support it.

Did not mean to change the subject.

Regarding torture, my feeling is that as a nation we should reject it. That being said, to another one of your points I would not go back and prosecute the folks who were told that what they were doing was legal and the country probably would have voted for torture in 2002.
 
Well lets move past the left wing talking points.....Altogether.

Not one Democrat would say anything about Intel that came thru torture if it prevented a major attack and certainly not one that involved a nuke.

So how you looking now with all that preaching of morality.....while not giving a **** about how many lives you put in danger over a report that is old news and doesn't change any policy?

You're right of course (it introduces two highly unlikely events as givens, 1) torture, that 2) led to information that prevented a catastrophic nuclear attack) but what's the point? That if some means MIGHT eventually at some point prevent some unknown number of deaths that we cannot object to that technique? If so you're just saying that there is no moral/ethical/practical line for state action - torture, murder, whatever, is fine so long as we think it MIGHT prevent some unknown event. I can't see how a society draws any bounds around behavior by the state in that case.

At home we accept that our justice system WILL allow murderers and rapists etc. to go free, but we do so because we respect human rights. If you're willing to disregard human rights if the ends justify those means, then what restraint is there on acceptable behavior by a state?
 
A brilliant essay on this despicable report ,done by despicable Democrats( and they wonder why America just threw them out out office?)
Torturing the Truth | National Review Online

An accounting of mistakes made during the CIA’s interrogation program is necessary and desirable — as are recommendations for how to improve the CIA’s programs and prevent mistakes in the future. The Senate Democrats’ report includes no such recommendations, as their former colleague Bob Kerrey of Nebraska has pointed out. That lacuna alone reveals the shallowness and bias of the Senate Democrats’ work. Those who want America to be defended responsibly and ethically should be ashamed of this report, not exulting in it.

Between this , and the amnesty thing, and all the Ferguson 'hands up ' stuff, most of America is just disgusted with liberals right now.
 
You're right of course (it introduces two highly unlikely events as givens, 1) torture, that 2) led to information that prevented a catastrophic nuclear attack) but what's the point? That if some means MIGHT eventually at some point prevent some unknown number of deaths that we cannot object to that technique? If so you're just saying that there is no moral/ethical/practical line for state action - torture, murder, whatever, is fine so long as we think it MIGHT prevent some unknown event. I can't see how a society draws any bounds around behavior by the state in that case.

At home we accept that our justice system WILL allow murderers and rapists etc. to go free, but we do so because we respect human rights. If you're willing to disregard human rights if the ends justify those means, then what restraint is there on acceptable behavior by a state?

You then forget that the Demos report is based on 20 cases out of hundreds and hundreds, where they say these techniques provided no intel that would have changed anything. Their reasoning for the report, remember? That torture does not work.
 
Did not mean to change the subject.

Regarding torture, my feeling is that as a nation we should reject it. That being said, to another one of your points I would not go back and prosecute the folks who were told that what they were doing was legal and the country probably would have voted for torture in 2002.

I agree with that, but not because the "country probably would have voted for torture in 2002." The South "voted for" slavery and lynchings, etc. for a long time, but those acts remain morally repugnant and are a stain on our national history.

But you're right about the prosecutions - the guys following orders should IMO not have careers any longer in government, but I also wouldn't support their prosecution. They were pawns and a decision to prosecute them unless you prosecute everyone up to the very top of the chain of command who signed off on what they did - which would likely include going all the way to the WH - is just letting the little people be the fall guys for the people responsible.

You mentioned the drone program - the guys with the joy sticks in Nevada aren't the problems. It's Obama and his key deputies.
 
It's a form of drowning that is repeatedly stopped before the person actually dies. If the person controlling the water flow doesn't stop, the person WILL die. It's torture. The entire purpose is to inflict enough pain/fear/both on a person to get them to tell you something - not different in substance than pulling out a fingernail, beating them, using cattle prods, etc.

It's pretty shocking that we'd try to redefine a type of torture as something else (getting someone to talk by infliction of immense pain and fear of death would be called what alternative term?) just because we did it and generally 'we' don't 'torture' so what we did must be something short of it. Think of it this way - if a domestic police officer interviewing your son waterboarded him and got a confession, what would you label what the police did to him? Torture! To call it any kind of "interrogation" is to prove Orwell correct.

Actually, I know rather exactly how waterboarding works, why it feels as it does and how it feels. Have you ever tried it?
I am quite sure it might be categorized as torture,if carried to extremes. As it was legally analyzed and permitted it is unpleasant enough, but it is not torture.
 
You then forget that the Demos report is based on 20 cases out of hundreds and hundreds, where they say these techniques provided no intel that would have changed anything. Their reasoning for the report, remember? That torture does not work.

First of all, you ignored the main point - just because it works or might work means it's OK for us to do? There is no line at all? Should we extend that philosophy to dealing with suspected criminals at home? You OK giving the Obama administration the power to torture militia members they suspect MIGHT BE domestic terrorists because some day one of them might in fact blow up the WH?

The CIA has been asked to provide examples where the torture program did get actionable intel and have basically come up empty. So it's not that the report examined only 20, it's that the top guys have been asked to provide the intelligence committees with examples of it working and can't or won't do so, and when they do provide examples, they are found to be at best doubtful, and in many ways fabricated, with key information coming in fact from sessions or sources that did NOT involve torture.

Furthermore, if we are to objectively evaluate the torture program, you cannot cherry pick one or a handful out of the "hundreds and hundreds" where some worthwhile information was obtained and ignore 1) the MANY times we got better information through traditional interrogation and 2) got crap intel from tortured prisoners, or got false confessions etc. And you also can't ignore what the torture program does do our overall national security picture - does being a country that openly tortures suspects increase our national security, all things considered? I can't see how that's the case.
 
Actually, I know rather exactly how waterboarding works, why it feels as it does and how it feels. Have you ever tried it?
I am quite sure it might be categorized as torture,if carried to extremes. As it was legally analyzed and permitted it is unpleasant enough, but it is not torture.

First of all, I assume you were or are a member of the military who was subjected to it as part of training? If so, surely you recognize the difference in a case where you KNOW the person doing it wishes you no harm, WILL stop well before you are at risk, definitely HAS a medical team on hand should anything go wrong versus if you were in a cell in Iraq and the waterboarding was being done by Iraqi forces with no such guarantees? That you were pretty sure you'd be almost killed, over and over, until you said what they wanted to hear? And that if you did die, they'd shed no tears for you?

Second, so what is torture? A cattle prod is unpleasant, but not generally deadly, so that's OK and not-torture I guess? Hooking a battery up to your genitals OK and not-torture? How about pulling out fingernails. I'm not aware of anyone dying from it, so is that not-torture?

Edit to add that the entire PURPOSE is to make it "rather unpleasant" enough that a hardened killer (allegedly) who wants death to America overcomes that desire to harm us and in fact gives us valuable information to prevent some attack. It's just laughable that we expect a technique that is merely "unpleasant" to work on such a person. If we don't in fact inflict SEVERE pain AND discomfort AND fear of dying, which is after all what torture is all about, then why would we expect it to actually work? We wouldn't, which is why we in fact waterboarded the key guys not three times but roughly 100 and 200 times for each of the two most notorious suspects we waterboarded.

One more point - sure, the legal restraints were on "3 times" or some such BS, but a country that justifies 3 times doesn't even have to take a step, just a slight shuffle is all, to justify 100 times or 200 times or 300 times (if they thought it might work) or causing hypothermia or beatings or any number of techniques because you've obliterated the moral line against torture with the first time you waterboard someone. After that it's nothing but effectiveness which is at question.
 
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I agree with that, but not because the "country probably would have voted for torture in 2002." The South "voted for" slavery and lynchings, etc. for a long time, but those acts remain morally repugnant and are a stain on our national history.

But you're right about the prosecutions - the guys following orders should IMO not have careers any longer in government, but I also wouldn't support their prosecution. They were pawns and a decision to prosecute them unless you prosecute everyone up to the very top of the chain of command who signed off on what they did - which would likely include going all the way to the WH - is just letting the little people be the fall guys for the people responsible.

You mentioned the drone program - the guys with the joy sticks in Nevada aren't the problems. It's Obama and his key deputies.

Poor use of words on my part. For the record, I have always hated the idea of torture. Feeling we should never cross that line. That being said, I think it would be hypocritical to go after the folks who actually did this stuff, versus the folks in the past and the current who order them to do it.
 
First of all, I assume you were or are a member of the military who was subjected to it as part of training? If so, surely you recognize the difference in a case where you KNOW the person doing it wishes you no harm, WILL stop well before you are at risk, definitely HAS a medical team on hand should anything go wrong versus if you were in a cell in Iraq and the waterboarding was being done by Iraqi forces with no such guarantees? That you were pretty sure you'd be almost killed, over and over, until you said what they wanted to hear? And that if you did die, they'd shed no tears for you?

Second, so what is torture? A cattle prod is unpleasant, but not generally deadly, so that's OK and not-torture I guess? Hooking a battery up to your genitals OK and not-torture? How about pulling out fingernails. I'm not aware of anyone dying from it, so is that not-torture?

No I am not military, but wanted to know, what I was talking about.

Yes, I have thought about the difference between knowing and not knowing, if you are to die. Without wanting to go into it, I do not think that it makes the difference. In the case of the prisoners of whom we know, we are talking of ones that were well briefed on American methods. They would very probably have known the going would be very bad but not deadly.

As far as I presently know, the CIA had medical teams on hand.

We are not talking about Iraqi interrogation. That is a discussion we can have, but it is one that needs to be separated.

Yes, you are quite right. We as a nation and as a community of nations need to talk about what torture is. We got it wrong in the UN Charter and have demeaned the term. Take your cattle prod. Using it on a person can be torture, but it need not be. This has been long overdue and
is why I thought it so good a step, when the Bush White House asked it to be looked at, analyzed and defined. It was only a first step, but more than most countries have had the sense and courage to do. It is very unpleasant a topic. Politically a nightmare. But we should demand the discussion.
 
Poor use of words on my part. For the record, I have always hated the idea of torture. Feeling we should never cross that line. That being said, I think it would be hypocritical to go after the folks who actually did this stuff, versus the folks in the past and the current who order them to do it.

The way I see it, if a country sanctions torture, then others have the right to torture back. If you are for this torture, then you would be a big fat hypocrite if you had a problem with your own soldiers being tortured back.
 
Let's keep this breaking up to a minimum as i don't want you to get lost and start misrepresenting something.

Oh hey look - passive aggressive snidery from Boo! What an astonishment!

...... no coffeepap emoticon?

And over the years, I have looked up every claim. I've followed every link. And read the what Demsoc posted. You'll see a different explanation.

No you haven't. You denied that the data presented proved beyond all doubt that we couldn't have stopped the attacks using other methods.

You got lsot already. This doesn't speak to anything I said, at least not as written.

That's because it wasn't directed at you - it was quoting and responding to someone else. Perhaps you should check out that "originally posted by" before you go around accusing others of being lost in the conversation?

No we did engage in torture. The effort to redefine torture was in itself evil.

The answer to specifically and carefully define torture so as to ensure that we maintained the ability to save lives without crossing that line is hardly evil

And while there are no good guys in war, it is still different than torture which requires a much more personal and sadistic act.

A) There are "no good guys in war" to the extent that "there are no good people". Warfare features lots of acts of cruelty (which isn't necessarily bad) and acts of evil, as well as acts of supreme sacrifice and goodness.
B) Torture doesn't have to be personal or sadistic - if anything, for those who actually torture, becoming personal and sadistic will probably make them less effective.
C) Interrogation such as we performed was neither personal nor sadistic, but rather professionally and deliberately crafted.

One of the fellows I talked to at first said it didn't bother him. His wife gave an odd look. I questioned the look. She talked about how he didn't sleep at night. He began talking about the things he had done, and largely the redefined things you speak of, and finally admitted it was why he couldn't sleep. I only listened.

Huh. And this guy committed torture?

I can't speak for you and won't, but what we did is and always has been torture.

I was placed in stress conditions and made to expose myself for prolonged, sleep deprived periods in the military. Was I tortured? We've got guys on this forum who have been waterboarded - they'll tell you it is n't torture.

When we first started talking about this, there was a post with the CIA handbook on this. I can't find it now, but hopefully you'll remember it
.

Yeah - and I gave you a rundown of multiple attacks stopped with the detainee reporting, and described to you how deeply our understanding of al-Qa'ida on that program, and even quoted KSM saying that we should waterboard all the detainees because it would make life easier on them... and you gave me in response the FBI guy who claimed that if only he'd gotten more time his nice-guy approach would have eventually worked, he pretty promises.
 
First of all, you ignored the main point - just because it works or might work means it's OK for us to do? There is no line at all? Should we extend that philosophy to dealing with suspected criminals at home? You OK giving the Obama administration the power to torture militia members they suspect MIGHT BE domestic terrorists because some day one of them might in fact blow up the WH?

The CIA has been asked to provide examples where the torture program did get actionable intel and have basically come up empty. So it's not that the report examined only 20, it's that the top guys have been asked to provide the intelligence committees with examples of it working and can't or won't do so, and when they do provide examples, they are found to be at best doubtful, and in many ways fabricated, with key information coming in fact from sessions or sources that did NOT involve torture.

Furthermore, if we are to objectively evaluate the torture program, you cannot cherry pick one or a handful out of the "hundreds and hundreds" where some worthwhile information was obtained and ignore 1) the MANY times we got better information through traditional interrogation and 2) got crap intel from tortured prisoners, or got false confessions etc. And you also can't ignore what the torture program does do our overall national security picture - does being a country that openly tortures suspects increase our national security, all things considered? I can't see how that's the case.



No the CIA didn't come up empty.....they have cited cases and there is a lot that is still classified.

The point is.....we don't have an Open Policy to torture.


A group of former top-ranking CIA officials disputed a U.S. Senate committee's finding that the agency's interrogation techniques produced no valuable intelligence, saying such work had saved thousands of lives. Former CIA directors George Tenet, Porter Goss and Michael Hayden, along with three ex-deputy directors, wrote in an op-ed article published on Wednesday in the Wall Street Journal that the Senate Intelligence Committee report also was wrong in saying the agency had been deceptive about its work following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.

"The committee has given us ... a one-sided study marred by errors of fact and interpretation - essentially a poorly done and partisan attack on the agency that has done the most to protect America after the 9/11 attacks," they said. The report concluded the CIA failed to disrupt any subsequent plots despite torturing captives during the presidency of George W. Bush. But the former CIA officials said the United States never would have tracked down and killed al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in 2011 without information acquired in the interrogation program. Their methods also led to the capture of ranking al Qaeda operatives, provided valuable information about the organization and saved thousands of lives by disrupting al Qaeda plots, including one for an attack on the U.S. West Coast that could have been similar to the Sept. 11 attacks.

The intelligence officials criticized the committee staff for not interviewing any of them and said the staff had already concluded the interrogation methods gave no useful intelligence before conducting their investigation......snip~

Ex-CIA officials say torture report is one-sided, flawed


Hope that sheds some light on what you didn't think the CIA had. ;)
 
No I am not military, but wanted to know, what I was talking about.

It's not clear what the circumstances of you being waterboarded were? And if you can't speak to it personally, then all you have is the accounts of others, same as me.

Yes, I have thought about the difference between knowing and not knowing, if you are to die. Without wanting to go into it, I do not think that it makes the difference. In the case of the prisoners of whom we know, we are talking of ones that were well briefed on American methods. They would very probably have known the going would be very bad but not deadly.

Not persuasive. Our 'standards' were thrown out the window when we didn't get what we wanted, (see, KSM) so depending on the U.S. adhering to standards would have proved foolish. People died in our custody, and I'm sure more died in the black sites, but we'll never know about those because we handed them off to 'third parties.'

Yes, you are quite right. We as a nation and as a community of nations need to talk about what torture is. We got it wrong in the UN Charter and have demeaned the term. Take your cattle prod. Using it on a person can be torture, but it need not be. This has been long overdue and
is why I thought it so good a step, when the Bush White House asked it to be looked at, analyzed and defined. It was only a first step, but more than most countries have had the sense and courage to do. It is very unpleasant a topic. Politically a nightmare. But we should demand the discussion.

When can using a cattle prod on someone during an interrogation be NOT-torture?

And IMO the memos justifying torture were a huge step down a path we do not want to be on. There's a good reason why "just a little bit of torture" was paired with rendition, black sites, etc. If something that didn't fit in the narrow confines of ridiculous rules justifying torture so long as it wasn't TOO bad was necessary, we just arranged for someone else to do it, or threw out our own standards. Once you obliterate a moral line, then you should expect people to behave as if the moral line was obliterated.

And, heck, it's now confirmed that there are no consequences to stepping over the already obliterated lines. The people involved have been promoted, certainly haven't faced any legal difficulties, and the only ones in jail related to our torture program are the whistleblowers. And a good part of the public denies that torture is torture. See this thread.
 
It's not clear what the circumstances of you being waterboarded were? And if you can't speak to it personally, then all you have is the accounts of others, same as me.

Not persuasive. Our 'standards' were thrown out the window when we didn't get what we wanted, (see, KSM) so depending on the U.S. adhering to standards would have proved foolish. People died in our custody, and I'm sure more died in the black sites, but we'll never know about those because we handed them off to 'third parties.'

When can using a cattle prod on someone during an interrogation be NOT-torture?

And IMO the memos justifying torture were a huge step down a path we do not want to be on. There's a good reason why "just a little bit of torture" was paired with rendition, black sites, etc. If something that didn't fit in the narrow confines of ridiculous rules justifying torture so long as it wasn't TOO bad was necessary, we just arranged for someone else to do it, or threw out our own standards. Once you obliterate a moral line, then you should expect people to behave as if the moral line was obliterated.

And, heck, it's now confirmed that there are no consequences to stepping over the already obliterated lines. The people involved have been promoted, certainly haven't faced any legal difficulties, and the only ones in jail related to our torture program are the whistleblowers. And a good part of the public denies that torture is torture. See this thread.

In other words, you do not know, what you are talking about, but have strong opinions in spite of the fact. This is not quite untypical of the people that condemn so easily.
 
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