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Obama Rules Out Charging C.I.A. Agents in Interrogations

RightinNYC

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/17/us/politics/17detain.html?hp=&pagewanted=print

The Justice Department made public on Friday detailed memos describing harsh interrogation techniques used by the Central Intelligence Agency, as President Obama said that C.I.A. operatives who carried out the techniques would not be prosecuted.

....

But Mr. Obama used a written statement to reiterate his opposition to a extensive investigation of the program, saying it was “time for reflection, not retribution.”

Interesting to see his response.

This is a sketchy part:

One technique authorized for use by the C.I.A. beginning in August 2002 was the use of “insects placed in a confinement box,” presumably to induce fear on the part of a terror suspect

But there's no indication that this was actually used, and it sounds more like the NYT is just going through a list of all approved techniques and picking out ones that sound scary rather than reflecting the techniques that were actually used.
 
No one will ever be brought to justice for the tortures that went on in Gitmo because the administration doesn't care. All that matters to me is that it happened, and the details are now public. The U.S. no longer has the right to cry out against other nations that employ torture.
 
No one will ever be brought to justice for the tortures that went on in Gitmo because the administration doesn't care. All that matters to me is that it happened, and the details are now public. The U.S. no longer has the right to cry out against other nations that employ torture.

Do you see any distinctions between countries depending on their policies, or do you just lump everyone who has committed what you consider torture in the same boat?

In your eyes, is a country that takes a few individuals suspected of having information of imminent terrorist attacks and waterboards them, all while carefully monitoring their vital signs, effectively the same as a country that arrests thousands of dissidents, castrates them, rapes their families, etc.?
 
Do you see any distinctions between countries depending on their policies, or do you just lump everyone who has committed what you consider torture in the same boat?

In your eyes, is a country that takes a few individuals suspected of having information of imminent terrorist attacks and waterboards them, all while carefully monitoring their vital signs, effectively the same as a country that arrests thousands of dissidents, castrates them, rapes their families, etc.?

To be fair he didn't exactly say that and he is right to the degree that no one should be torturing. I would not want the UN poking its nose in but I wouldn't want my nation torturing anyone including Chinese water torture.
 
To be fair he didn't exactly say that and he is right to the degree that no one should be torturing. I would not want the UN poking its nose in but I wouldn't want my nation torturing anyone including Chinese water torture.

I didn't mean to imply that he said that, I'm actually genuinely asking. There are completely reasonable arguments for both sides, and I can see how someone would make that statement.
 
I didn't mean to imply that he said that, I'm actually genuinely asking. There are completely reasonable arguments for both sides, and I can see how someone would make that statement.

Obviously one cannot compare the US and say China, ignoring the US and other nations willingness to get paly with China, but I don't think that completely gets them off the hook.

I'm somewhat of a Stoic but even so I still would not want my nation to tarnish its victories by sinking to its enemies levels and to embark upon a course that, you never know, might see the use of such methods widened.

Now the likes of the UN and Spain sticking their noses in on such relatively minor transgressions is a different matter. I have little time for such transnationalism and it seems like pathetic, PC stunts to me. Again one is forced to remind the left(and others.) that a diminished respect for national sovereignty is likely to undermine any progres that aggressive interventionism, whether it is through invasions or extra-governmental institutions, may devliver.
 
..... It's almost as if all of Bush's destiny was to start Obama...
 
Obama is behaving like an enema to the state.

Attacking it from within and from all quarters.

Obama consulted widely on memos - Mike Allen - POLITICO.com
“It was a weighty decision,” Axelrod said.

... former top official in the administration of President George W. Bush called the publication of the memos “unbelievable.”

“It's damaging because these are techniques that work, and by Obama's action today, we are telling the terrorists what they are,” the official said. “We have laid it all out for our enemies.

.
 
I agree that the line officers who were commanded to use torture should not be prosecuted at this time. To choose them first would make them scapegoats, and the wrath of the nation would focus on them rather than those who are truly to blame.
 
Do you see any distinctions between countries depending on their policies, or do you just lump everyone who has committed what you consider torture in the same boat?

In your eyes, is a country that takes a few individuals suspected of having information of imminent terrorist attacks and waterboards them, all while carefully monitoring their vital signs, effectively the same as a country that arrests thousands of dissidents, castrates them, rapes their families, etc.?

I actually wasn't comparing the U.S. to other nations when I said what I said. I'm comparing the U.S. to its own standard of "fairness and liberty" that it attempts to project to the world's nations. I have always found it ironic that such notions fly out the window when it suits the powers that be.

If you were to compare the U.S. to China, then no I would not say that the U.S. is as severe... but torture is torture and the justifications don't really matter to me.

What I basically meant was that the next time I hear the words "freedom, justice, and liberty" come out of the mouths of your political leaders, I will know to take it with a grain of salt. They are just talking words that don't represent any sort of reality in U.S. foreign policy.

The U.S. is NOT a peacekeeping nation. It is a warring nation.
 
The U.S. is NOT a peacekeeping nation. It is a warring nation.

Outside of the policies of Bush/Cheney, that is just not so. Most of the conflicts we have entered were for the purpose of ending genocide or terrorist sanctuaries.
 
Do you see any distinctions between countries depending on their policies, or do you just lump everyone who has committed what you consider torture in the same boat?

In your eyes, is a country that takes a few individuals suspected of having information of imminent terrorist attacks and waterboards them, all while carefully monitoring their vital signs, effectively the same as a country that arrests thousands of dissidents, castrates them, rapes their families, etc.?

You can just take Mexico for example, that you have an American arrested their suspected of selling guns to the drug cartel. If you American protest over that he is killed during torture. Then Mexicans can say hey we are just like you after 9/11 in a national emergency and thousands of people have been killed during the drug wars, we have to do what is neccissary. That we believed that the American guy had vital information and as a poor country we don't have the same fancy equpment to monitor vital signs.
 
I love the self righteous issues.

We make/use incredibly horrendous weapons to decimate other human beings with, then get all bent out of shape when someone puts a guy in a box with a catepillar in order to play on his fears and extract information.
 
I actually wasn't comparing the U.S. to other nations when I said what I said. I'm comparing the U.S. to its own standard of "fairness and liberty" that it attempts to project to the world's nations. I have always found it ironic that such notions fly out the window when it suits the powers that be.

If you were to compare the U.S. to China, then no I would not say that the U.S. is as severe... but torture is torture and the justifications don't really matter to me.

What I basically meant was that the next time I hear the words "freedom, justice, and liberty" come out of the mouths of your political leaders, I will know to take it with a grain of salt. They are just talking words that don't represent any sort of reality in U.S. foreign policy.

The U.S. is NOT a peacekeeping nation. It is a warring nation.

The world of intelligence gathering is not all roses you know. In Russia they'd shove a soldering iron up your butt and turn it on. In China they'd beat you with electric batons.

If you knew that a guy was a terrorist with information on an imminent terrorist attack and you only have 48 hours to get it out of him before the attack goes forward, what are you going to do? Give him a box of chocolates?

Waterboarding isn't exactly "humane" but neither is killing 3000 people. It could have been a lot worse. War is hell.
 
You can just take Mexico for example, that you have an American arrested their suspected of selling guns to the drug cartel. If you American protest over that he is killed during torture. Then Mexicans can say hey we are just like you after 9/11 in a national emergency and thousands of people have been killed during the drug wars, we have to do what is neccissary. That we believed that the American guy had vital information and as a poor country we don't have the same fancy equpment to monitor vital signs.

They can say whatever the hell they want but that wont stop us from severing diplomatic ties with them or worse. I don't know how you can compare "selling guns" to trying to kill thousands of civilians. 9/11 was interpreted as a declaration of war by Al-queda.

Repeat after me: "War is hell."
 
The world of intelligence gathering is not all roses you know. In Russia they'd shove a soldering iron up your butt and turn it on. In China they'd beat you with electric batons.

If you knew that a guy was a terrorist with information on an imminent terrorist attack and you only have 48 hours to get it out of him before the attack goes forward, what are you going to do? Give him a box of chocolates?

Waterboarding isn't exactly "humane" but neither is killing 3000 people. It could have been a lot worse. War is hell.

Torture doesn't work. It doesn't yield useful information. If you were torturing a terrorist about a ticking bomb, he wouldn't tell you squat.
 
Torture doesn't work. It doesn't yield useful information. If you were torturing a terrorist about a ticking bomb, he wouldn't tell you squat.

The CIA thinks it does work. Are you more qualified than the CIA to tell me what interrogation methods do or do not work? NOW it wont work because NOW everybody knows the CIA's methods are basically bluffs and they're not actually going to hurt you.
 
I actually wasn't comparing the U.S. to other nations when I said what I said. I'm comparing the U.S. to its own standard of "fairness and liberty" that it attempts to project to the world's nations. I have always found it ironic that such notions fly out the window when it suits the powers that be.

If you were to compare the U.S. to China, then no I would not say that the U.S. is as severe... but torture is torture and the justifications don't really matter to me.

What I basically meant was that the next time I hear the words "freedom, justice, and liberty" come out of the mouths of your political leaders, I will know to take it with a grain of salt. They are just talking words that don't represent any sort of reality in U.S. foreign policy.

The U.S. is NOT a peacekeeping nation. It is a warring nation.

Your comments border on hysterics and are beyond offensive; but I found the highlighted passage particularly offensive and illustrative of the historic ignorance of the "hate America" crowd.

Thanks for illustrating it so well.

It begs the question; who will liberate those nations and protect them from despots, dictators tyrants and terrorists if not America?
 
I love the self righteous issues.
We make/use incredibly horrendous weapons to decimate other human beings with, then get all bent out of shape when someone puts a guy in a box with a catepillar in order to play on his fears and extract information.

I know what you mean.

But you have to recognize that many people disapprove strongly of each. The creation of horrendous weapons, their use, and the caterpillars. Though I do think that most if not all humans have a fundamental impairment when it comes to ethics, as a result of survival instincts and reasoning:

horrendous torture and violence:

OK to do? No.
OK to do to your arch-enemy? Of course
OK to do to you by your arch-enemy? No!
OK for your gov. to do to you? No
OK for the gov. to do to people who want to rebel against the gov? Yes!
It's like anti-ethics.

-Mach
 
I know what you mean.

But you have to recognize that many people disapprove strongly of each. The creation of horrendous weapons, their use, and the caterpillars. Though I do think that most if not all humans have a fundamental impairment when it comes to ethics, as a result of survival instincts and reasoning:

horrendous torture and violence:

OK to do? No.
OK to do to your arch-enemy? Of course
OK to do to you by your arch-enemy? No!
OK for your gov. to do to you? No
OK for the gov. to do to people who want to rebel against the gov? Yes!
It's like anti-ethics.

-Mach

It's not "okay" but if it's necessary to prevent an imminent terrorist attack that could kill 1000's of innocent people of which the person has direct knowledge, so be it.

And I would hardly call these methods "torture." I found a message on another forum which mirrors my sentiment exactly.

But to get back to the subject at hand.. the whole torture thing seriously does come off as light weight and it almost insults the word torture to call it torture. You have to keep in mind that the audience on the right that is supposed to be appalled by all of this will kinda think its good riddance. Torture to us like what happened to Leon Klinghoffer.. shot a guy in a wheelchair and tossed him off of a boat. Torture is the US serviceman that was kicked to death by a bunch of hijackers in the 1980s. Torture is the CIA station chief in Lebanon getting beaten and whipped to death. Torture is all the crap the Vietnamese did to our vets. Torture is the Bataan Death March, or, on the German side, the sending of some of our Jewish airmen to Aushwitz and Dachau.

By contrast, you've got the Bush administration making sure that the guy's head is properly padded so he won't get hurt when he's thrown up against a wall, and, in the memos, a repeated emphasis on avoiding actually physically hurting some of the senior leaders of our current enemy. To us, compared to what our enemies treat the USA - hey do remember our servicemen getting dragged down the street in Somalia... or, hey, how about all the stories about American women getting stuck in Iran and having their husbands beat the crap out of them. Or, more to the point, the Taliban shooting women in a soccer stadium for mass entertainment, because, jeez, they learned how to read.

To us, these memos don't point to an administration torturing. If anything, it seems like they are acting justly, and far superior, as usual, to any enemy the USA not only has now, but has had since World War I.
 
Outside of the policies of Bush/Cheney, that is just not so. Most of the conflicts we have entered were for the purpose of ending genocide or terrorist sanctuaries.

lolwut

WWI?
Korea?
Vietnam?

So when you said "most," did you actually mean "One of the 4 major wars we've been involved in the past century"?

I am definitely interested in reading through these, so thank you for posting the link. What do you mean by your comment I highlighted above? I am very curious..... :2wave:

It all seems sort of surreal to me. In these memos, they reference pages and pages of case law, treaty language, studies, etc. in order to justify something so simple as grabbing a terrorist by the collar. It's impossible to read these memos and come away with the idea that the way these detainess were treated was anything less than perfectly scripted. That can be good or bad depending on your viewpoint, but the main thing I took away from it was the absurdity of all of it.

The fact that they feel the need to spend pages and pages discussing the possible long term mental effects of solitary confinement/fear of injury/public nudity when hundreds of thousands of Americans in prison suffer the same experiences every day without thought or concern is altogether astonishing.

Perhaps the most ironic thing at all is that a reason why the CIA was so cautious to cover absolutely everything that they might do to these people is probably because they were worried that those opposed to the prosecution of the war would eventually take control of government and punish them for their actions.

Torture doesn't work. It doesn't yield useful information. If you were torturing a terrorist about a ticking bomb, he wouldn't tell you squat.

Well, guess the debate's over. Thank god you were here to share that with us.
 
You can just take Mexico for example, that you have an American arrested their suspected of selling guns to the drug cartel. If you American protest over that he is killed during torture. Then Mexicans can say hey we are just like you after 9/11 in a national emergency and thousands of people have been killed during the drug wars, we have to do what is neccissary. That we believed that the American guy had vital information and as a poor country we don't have the same fancy equpment to monitor vital signs.

In order to profess this nonsense, one has to pretend or willingly ignore the acts of other nations and terrorists in the past. Are you people so poorly informed about history that you think America citizens and troops were not tortured by other countries or terrorist interests before 9-11?

What naive denial does it take for Liberals to make such inane arguments presuming that the USA has now set a new standard for torture by these few justified actions when that low standard had been set by others for centuries?

Do the "hate America" first crowds actually believe that making such preposterous claims and idiotic assertions about the United States makes us better and safer and will prevent future atrocities?

:roll:
 
I love the self righteous issues.

We make/use incredibly horrendous weapons to decimate other human beings with, then get all bent out of shape when someone puts a guy in a box with a catepillar in order to play on his fears and extract information.

They never did this; it was one of the suggested methods in the memos.
 
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