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Amnesty International Wants Bush Prosecuted for Admitted Waterboarding

There was a court case. Clinton paid Paula Jones $850,000 to drop the charges . I guess he paid her all that phat cash because he did absolutely nothing to her. :shrug:

That IS 100% true. Just not sure if its extorsion. Probably not.
 
That's just the way it works out here in the real world.

So you're backing off your statement and accepting that you have a double standard. Americans can do things that they execute others for doing, and it's ok.

And you wonder why they hate us.
 
That is just plain factually wrong. The argument that the fact that we waterboard our troops in training and therefore waterboarding is not ever torture under any circumstances, is one of the most facile, incoherent arguments I've ever heard.

Please, just read the definition of torture. It's been posted several times. Torture only applies in limited instances, such as interrogation. Even assuming that waterboarding for military training isn't consented to (patently untrue, but let's just grant it for the sake of argument), training is not one of the ennumerated circumstances in which the war crime of torture can even occur. Read the definition of torture, please.

You need to recognize that water boarding for interrogation purposes is torture, water boarding for training purposes is not, period. It is not a matter of opinion, it is a matter of definition. Since you're deliberately ignoring the actual definition, I'm afraid I can no longer indulge you until you have done so.

Based on your definition of torture, waterboarding soldiers for training purposes inflicts severe pain and suffering, but it's ok to inflict severe pain and suffering on another individual if your purpose is something other than:
obtaining from him, or a third person, information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind

Further, according to your definition of torture, I can waterboard you since I'm not acting in an official capacity.

I can't tell you what I think of your argument right now without getting another infraction...:(
 
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Those Japanese soldiers we executed after WWII for waterboarding American soldiers?

They weren't. They were convicted of a whole basket of war crimes, most of which were much more serious. It's disingenuous to say they were executed for "waterboarding" when there was much, much more in the mix than only that.

And there was no specific charge of "waterboarding" in the first place; the charge was "inhumane treatment." No one was executed for that alone.
 
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Those Japanese soldiers we executed after WWII for waterboarding American soldiers?

Yes, I'm looking for a US law and/or court case that held waterboarding as torture and/or illegal. Any info?
 
That IS 100% true. Just not sure if its extorsion. Probably not.

Probably not?

Do you think the President of the United States, with all his high priced lawyers and advisors, would allow himself to be extorted by a young woman from small town Arkansas?

She must have been a great deal smarter than them to plan and get away with such a scheme!

Clinton's MO is Deny! Deny! Deny! and denigrate the claimant until the evidence is irrefutable, as in the Lewinsky case also. Then it's the 'Aw Shucks' and a big grin defense
 
Probably not?

Do you think the President of the United States, with all his high priced lawyers and advisors, would allow himself to be extorted by a young woman from small town Arkansas?

She must have been a great deal smarter than them to plan and get away with such a scheme!

Clinton's MO is Deny! Deny! Deny! and denigrate the claimant until the evidence is irrefutable, as in the Lewinsky case also. Then it's the 'Aw Shucks' and a big grin defense

That all that mch easier, when the press is out there lending a hand with the denigration.
 
Guy Incognito

Torture only applies in limited instances, such as interrogation.

It is either torture or it is not torture.

There were complaints at Gitmo that playing the radio too loudly was also "torture". Soon interrogation itself might be torture, if questions are asked without the terrorists consent.

No raised voices, no rude gestures, no harsh looks. Not until we gain the consent of terrorists first.
 
That all that mch easier, when the press is out there lending a hand with the denigration.

It was a disgrace, wasn't it Apdst?

At one time the media, or so goes the tale anyway, was suppose to expose government wrongdoing. Now they participate in it.

We should all be suspicious of government certainly but, over time, i've become far more suspicious of the media.
 
It was a disgrace, wasn't it Apdst?

At one time the media, or so goes the tale anyway, was suppose to expose government wrongdoing. Now they participate in it.

We should all be suspicious of government certainly but, over time, i've become far more suspicious of the media.

It has to be frustrating for the media to see GW Bush's popularity growing and in some cases higher than Obama's. how can this be? Anyone that has watched any of the Bush interviews promoting his book can see why. What a classy individual he really is, totally different than the public image created by the media. The continued hatred of individuals here who suffered nothing under GW Bush just goes to show how intellectually bankrupt those people are and how they have entirely too much invested in the destruction of a good man.
 
It has to be frustrating for the media to see GW Bush's popularity growing and in some cases higher than Obama's. how can this be? Anyone that has watched any of the Bush interviews promoting his book can see why. What a classy individual he really is, totally different than the public image created by the media. The continued hatred of individuals here who suffered nothing under GW Bush just goes to show how intellectually bankrupt those people are and how they have entirely too much invested in the destruction of a good man.

We hate the man for his actions, not his personality. I know this may be difficult for members of the Cult of Reagan...
 
It has to be frustrating for the media to see GW Bush's popularity growing and in some cases higher than Obama's. how can this be? Anyone that has watched any of the Bush interviews promoting his book can see why. What a classy individual he really is, totally different than the public image created by the media. The continued hatred of individuals here who suffered nothing under GW Bush just goes to show how intellectually bankrupt those people are and how they have entirely too much invested in the destruction of a good man.

I saw a couple of those interviews and was struck not only buy his sincere geniality, which was well known, but by the strength behind it. In this he was reminiscent of Reagan. These are the only two Presidents I've seen who seem able to meld the two so effortlessly.
 
We hate the man for his actions, not his personality. I know this may be difficult for members of the Cult of Reagan...

That you "hate" the man says a great deal about the Left today.
 
We hate the man for his actions, not his personality. I know this may be difficult for members of the Cult of Reagan...

You hate his actions because you base your opinions out of ignorance, not facts which of course you want to ignore. I learned a long time ago to trust but verify and that is good advice for liberals. It is ok to buy the rhetoric but then verify that rhetoric for if you did you wouldn't buy the media spin again. GW Bush did nothing more than do his job which was to protect and defend this country. That was his number one priority and he did it well.
 
That you "hate" the man says a great deal about the Left today.
Wow Deuce, you speak for the entirety of the American Left now. Cool.

Is that an elected or appointed position?
 
You hate his actions because you base your opinions out of ignorance, not facts which of course you want to ignore. I learned a long time ago to trust but verify and that is good advice for liberals. It is ok to buy the rhetoric but then verify that rhetoric for if you did you wouldn't buy the media spin again. GW Bush did nothing more than do his job which was to protect and defend this country. That was his number one priority and he did it well.

As far as rhetorec is concerned, what has been purchased wholesale by far too many people is that "you are either with us or against us". Between the jingoists who vote "with" and the reactionaries voting "against", there is little room for those who reject the torture, but also realize that Amnesty International has quite the agenda of their own.
 
Wow Deuce, you speak for the entirety of the American Left now. Cool.

Is that an elected or appointed position?

It may be hereditary, Coronado.

At some point he may have children of his own, and so can pass the mantle on to Trey just as Ace passed it on to him.
 
As far as rhetorec is concerned, what has been purchased wholesale by far too many people is that "you are either with us or against us". Between the jingoists who vote "with" and the reactionaries voting "against", there is little room for those who reject the torture, but also realize that Amnesty International has quite the agenda of their own.

There is no question that Amnesia International has an agenda just like the American left. All will ignore the atrocities going on around the world to try and prosecute a President who broke no laws. It serves no purpose to relive this other than to divert from what is going on right now and to divert from the human rights abuses of nations all over the world many of whom are represented in Amnesia International.
 
It is either torture or it is not torture.

You're right, an action either meets the definition of torture or it doesn't. But when you say "it is either torture or it isn't," if by "it" you mean "water-boarding" you are fantastically incorrect. An action must meet the definition of torture to be considered the war crime of torture.

An act being severely painful isn't enough to make it torture. Is a dentist appointment torture? Of course not, because you go to the dentist and give your consent, and moreover it isn't for interrogation purposes.

An act has to occur under certain circumstances, such as with lack of consent and for interrogation purposes. Water-boarding performed on detainees for interrogation purposes without consent is torture, and water-boarding performed on consenting trainees for training purposes is not torture.


I don't really see what's so hard about this to understand. We've been over this same point many, many times already.
 
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Wow Deuce, you speak for the entirety of the American Left now. Cool.

Is that an elected or appointed position?

You feel Deuce is speaking for the entire Left?? I certainly hope thats not the case.
 
You feel Deuce is speaking for the entire Left?? I certainly hope thats not the case.
I don't "feel" anything. I'm just responding to your implication that he is. :shrug:
 
Done to Americans? Crime worthy of death!
Done to suspected terrorists? Oh, no biggy.


Congrats! You finally get it! :)

Seriously though, we waterboard our own troops in SERE training. The war-crimes executions were never exclusively about waterboarding either, that was just one item on a long laundry list.

Yes, it is perfectly ok for us to waterboard non-American unlawful combatants if we have reasonable evidence they pose a threat to us and won't give up the info. Waterboarding is rough, but calling it "torture" puts it on the level of hot irons and racks, and it isn't.

But even more importantly, I don't accept that we have to give them moral equivalency and say "if it's wrong for them to do it, it is wrong for us to do it."


Why? Because there is no moral equivalency between America and Al-Queda. Our end purposes are very different, our modes of operation are very different: they saw the heads off of civilian journalists. THAT is torture.

Even if there were some moral equivalency, I wouldn't care, because we're us and they are "them" and we're at war with each other.




We should never let Amnesty International or any other international "authority" try any American President for anything, nor even any American soldier. To do so is a surrender of our sovereignty. (That's what happens to you when you LOSE the war, btw.)

As long as we have the power, we make the rules. When we no longer have the power or the will to do so, someone else will make the rules and we'll have to suck it up and deal with it. That's reality.


On the whole, I'd say we exercise our power with far greater restraint than many historical empires have: Persia, Rome, the Caliphate, colonial Spain. Only the colonial British Empire held power with anything like the restraint which we employ.

If Al-Q and company succeeded in restoring the Caliphate and achieving global dominance for their extreme version of Islam, you can rest assured they would not be so gentle and reasonable.
 
You feel Deuce is speaking for the entire Left?? I certainly hope thats not the case.

I don't feel that Coronado feels that Deuce is speaking for the entire left so much as I feel that Coronodo feels that Deuce feels he is doing so.

At least that's what I feel.
 
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