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Criminal investigation into CIA treatment of detainees expected [edited]

celticlord said:
My point is obvious and simple: Holder is investigating Bush while pointedly not investigating Dear Leader when both Administrations have the same policies and activities. The same "evidence" that presumably makes Bush's policies a crime makes Dear Leader's policies a continuation of that crime.

You claim this investigation is not political--until parts of Dear Leader's Administration are mentioned as targets of investigation, it is not and cannot be anything but political.
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Same policies? Torture has been stopped thus far. Executive order specifically states that they must follow the army field manual. Doesn't seem like the same policy. You had people on the top in the past administration ordering torture. Until such time that you can show that these torture practices have been carried on and people have been tortured I'd say you lack a point.

It's not political. This isn't a witch hunt over a policy or ideology as it was with your McCarthy witch hunt investigation. This is an investigation over a crime that was carried out willingly and knowingly in contravention of US and International Law.

Again why do you call him dear leader it just sounds ridiculous everytime you take the time to type it.
 
PogueMoran said:
Same policies? Torture has been stopped thus far.
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Oh? Really?

Do Gitmo Abuses Still Continue? - ABC News
In early February, a delegation from the Pentagon arrived to inspect detention conditions at the camp. The officials did not see Boumediene, the supposedly "free" detainee, because he had been placed in solitary confinement in Camp 3's so-called "Oscar Block" the day before. Of the acquitted detainees, he was the only one on a hunger strike.

"They put him in a terribly cold cell with 50 degrees Fahrenheit (10 degrees Celsius)," says Kirsch. "For the first days he had no running water, and he had to sleep on a pad less than one-centimeter thick visibly stained and smelling of food, vomit and feces." According to Kirsch, Boumediene was "kept isolated there" for 10 days, until Feb. 10, and was "not permitted to shower, pray or change his clothes. He was force fed using violent methods that were intended to and did injure him, and there was no medical treatment" for a foot injury.
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This was earlier this year...after the new "policies" were implemented.
 
celticlord said:
No obfuscation this time, just pointing out the politically convenient nature of Holder's "investigation".

If the Bush Administration's policies violated the law, then Dear Leader's current policies violate the same laws, because they are the same policies. That's the double standard Holder is applying here--investigating the Bush Administration for "crimes" while not also investigating the current Administration for the same "crimes".
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The investigation is into alleged CIA abuses committed during the interrogation of terrorism suspects. Not the policy, but the acts. There is no evidence that I know of that these acts are happening under President Obama. Therefore your whole argument is in fact obfuscation. You are drawing attention away from what is really happening with vague accusations.

If the interrogation methods used and approved by the Bush Administration were criminal, then why is Dear Leader promoting men like Stanley McChrystal? This is the officer who ran Camp Nama, which Human Rights Watch highlighted in their 2006 report "No Blood, No Foul". Dear Leader is the one who promoted him--rewarded him for his conduct in Iraq and Afghanistan. Congress, in his confirmation hearings, scrupulously avoided asking any questions about any of this, even though McChrystal's name has been linked in the media to both Camp Nama and Bagram Air Base:

Stanley McChrystal on Torture - New Afghanistan General Approves Torture? - Esquire
TASK FORCE 6-26: Inside Camp Nama; In Secret Unit's 'Black Room,' A Grim Portrait of U.S. Abuse - New York Times

Only Holder won't be examining any of this, will he? No, according to the article in the OP:
Holder plans to investigate Bush Administration "crimes", while carefully skirting around anything that might link Dear Leader and his Administration's involvement in acts identical to these "crimes" in every legal particular.
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You have not shown that any one in the Obama administration or the military under him have committed identical acts. You talk about the promotion of some one who was in charge of a unit where abuses are alleged to have taken place, but not during Obama's administration. See how you mislead people?

Frankly, I don't see any of it as being a crime. Terrorists have no legal protections they may claim as their own, and I'm quite at ease with the idea of both the military and the CIA literally squeezing every last bit of useful intel out of captured terrorists before tossing the broken carcasses on the garbage heap. However, if folks are going to piss and moan about these things being crimes, then they had better get their brains around the reality that these policies have not been ended, have not been altered in any substantive way (excluding the CIA from their continuance is not a substantive change), and that these "crimes" are the policy and practice of the current Administration just as much as they were of the Bush Administration.

If Holder isn't going to investigate Dear Leader, then investigating Bush is a political persecution and a criminalization of policy that is absolutely not in the best interests of this country.
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Again, you confuse policy with acts. What Holder is investigating is things people have done. It's not his job to investigate policy I do not believe. Personally, I think any policy that allows for torture/EIT and indefinite holding of prisoners without trial is bad policy, and acting on them may be illegal. If so, I have no problem with any investigation, though as I have stated, I think any prosecutions are bad, except in the situation I outlined in an earlier post in this thread.

To repeat, and summarize: there is a difference between having a policy, and acting on a policy. This investigation is into acts, not the policy itself, though I hope this will spark action on any improper policy.
 
Redress said:
Not the policy, but the acts.
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Yeah, there's a small problem with that though.

The acts were illegal only if the policy was illegal. If the policy is not illegal than the acts cannot be criminal because the actors were operating under color of law.

As to the policy:

Court Of Appeals Rules Detainees are not ?Persons? in Guantánamo Torture Suit | Center for Constitutional Rights

Regardless of how you personally feel about the interrogation techniques (you and I are never going to agree on that point, so I'm not going to waste energy rehashing it), the unavoidable reality is that the current Administration publicly bashes Bush's policies while privately endorsing and continuing them. Those policies produced the actions that Holder now claims a desire to investigate. Those policies produced a presumption of legality on the part of the actors Holder now desires to investigate.

To prosecute the act and not the policy, because the policy is being continued and supported, is nothing more than a political persecution.
 
celticlord said:
Oh? Really?

Do Gitmo Abuses Still Continue? - ABC News


This was earlier this year...after the new "policies" were implemented.
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Let's take a closer look at this article:

Believing that nothing would change and that his acquittal had been false, he launched another hunger strike. And, once again, he was force-fed. This entailed having a nurse insert a pencil-thick tube into his nose and snaking feeding tubes down into his stomach. It was a painful procedure, and Boudediene claims that he complained about the nurse taking more than 15 minutes to perform it -- long enough to make his nose bleed. He believes that she deliberately took her time and claims that, despite the new president's claims in faraway Washington, such actions were par for the course in Guantanamo.
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So to keep him alive, he had a painful procedure inflicted upon him. This is somewhat different than torture for information.

The US Department of Defense denies all these accusations; it claims that they are unfounded and that procedures at Guantanamo have been reviewed. But Kirsch is convinced that the treatment of detainees like Boumediene violates the Geneva Conventions.
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Interesting, we have no corroboration of the claims of torture, just claims that have been denied. Enough to raise questions, but certainly far from a sure thing.

Ironically, the delegation that the Pentagon sent to Guantanamo came to similar conclusions about the conditions there, noting that abuse and mistreatment had, in fact, occurred. But the Pentagon officials insisted that the soldiers in question were disciplined, ordered to undergo special training or discharged. Otherwise, its report was positive.
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Oh wait, it looks like something may have actually happened, and those responsible punished. Yes, that certainly is just like the Bush policy. This adds a little more credibility to Boumediene's story, but still makes it far from credible, especially since part of his claim involved life saving procedures.

Other reports about the mistreatment of prisoners at Guantanamo have also emerged since Obama became president in January. Mohammed el Gharani, who was released and returned to his native Chad in April, claims that, until his last day at Guantanamo, soldiers beat him with sticks and used pepper spray on him whenever he refused to leave his cell. Another detainee has corroborated Gharani's claims.
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Now we have another claim that soldiers used force to make him leave his cell. Note again this is significantly different from systematic torture for information. Also note that this claim is made by one detainee, and corroborated only by another detainee...in other words, it's not fact yet, far from it.

In point of fact, there is no evidence that the systematic use of EIT's is continuing, and evidence that those who have abused prisoners are being punished for it. This is a change in policy.
 
celticlord said:
Yeah, there's a small problem with that though.

The acts were illegal only if the policy was illegal. If the policy is not illegal than the acts cannot be criminal because the actors were operating under color of law.

As to the policy:

Court Of Appeals Rules Detainees are not ?Persons? in Guantánamo Torture Suit | Center for Constitutional Rights

Regardless of how you personally feel about the interrogation techniques (you and I are never going to agree on that point, so I'm not going to waste energy rehashing it), the unavoidable reality is that the current Administration publicly bashes Bush's policies while privately endorsing and continuing them. Those policies produced the actions that Holder now claims a desire to investigate. Those policies produced a presumption of legality on the part of the actors Holder now desires to investigate.

To prosecute the act and not the policy, because the policy is being continued and supported, is nothing more than a political persecution.
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Wrong, and you know it. Let's go back to the original article that started all this, and quote something you know as well as I.

A senior Justice Department official said that Holder envisioned an inquiry that would be narrow in scope, focusing on "whether people went beyond the techniques that were authorized" in Bush administration memos that liberally interpreted anti-torture laws.
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In other words, the investigation is into whether people exceeded the policy. Again, the policy itself is not part of the investigation, and is and should be a separate matter. Let's try for just a bit of honesty, shall we?
 
celticlord said:
Oh? Really?

Do Gitmo Abuses Still Continue? - ABC News


This was earlier this year...after the new "policies" were implemented.
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You seem to be missing the point. If people go against the new policies then that is on them. The old policies of the Bush Administration called for illegal techniques. Obama called for people to follow the army field manual. So now you have people directly disobeying orders. How is this the same as what happened under the Bush Administration?
 
goldendog said:
This is not political...this is about our restoring country's integrity. Our country's ability to look beyond politics and DO THE RIGHT THING. These investigations are needed to heal the country...It is not about covering up people's lies and deceit...it is not about politicians using good troops to carry out evil unlawful acts and then cowar behind those very troops who were following the orders of those very politicians who are doing the cowaring.

This process might just hurt alittle but in the end we will all be better off for it.
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What an incredible pile of Liberal bile. But then, spewing bile is a Liberal trait.

Your first incredibly dumb remark is your claim that anyone committed unlawful acts; this is another because Liberals say so. Yet every investigation to date has uncovered NOTHING that can be concluded to be "unlawful".

But the Taliban and Al Qaieda are happy to see the Obama administration desperately trying to carry out his wishes and divine war crimes for bringing these people to justice and liberating two Muslim nations from despots.

You have to be living in an Alice in Wonderland world to watch the efforts of Liberal Democrats to divine war crimes and prosecute previous administrations because they disagree with their policies.

But hey, bring on the prosecutions and retributions and set another new LOW standard for politics in the US. Leave it to the Democrats to continue to drag this nation down to the lowest common denominator.

Yes folks, lets start a new lower standard where the winning party carries our witch hunts for perceived crimes and punish their political opponents by impugning them in the court of public opinion.

Yes, you just have to love this new change Obama spoke of with this new bi-partisan joining together. Democrats will continue driving a wedge between the parties with such asinine nonsense and further drag down the opinion polls the citizens of this nation have about how they do their jobs.

This administration has become the most divisive in recent memory. There is no bi-partisanship or efforts to be inclusive. Their idea of inclusion is that you just agree with their idiotic nonsense and roll over for them.

Yes, Liberals lap up this swill with glee in a vacuum of any hint of thoughtful debate and instead run off the cliff like a bunch of lemmings following their leaders.

This doesn't do anything for integrity; it makes us look like a bunch of petty dumbasses who even when we WIN, must play partisan politics in an attempt to impugn our political opponents for political gain. It’s asinine and petty; bet hey, this pretty much defines Democrats these days.

Yes lets waste millions upon millions having this partisan witch hunt while running up vast deficits for which this administration has not been honest how they are paying for it and watch the national debt exceed GDP for the first time in our history which will make our currency about as valuable as monopoly money.

You just cannot fabricate the level of ignorance it takes to be a Liberal Democrat these days; it is stunning and defies logic.
 
PogueMoran said:
The deed of torture was already criminal pre-2003. Nothing changes long standing US law
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Its stunning watching Liberals desperately re-define their version of what constitutes torture for purely political purposes.

But alas, water boarding is not torture as defined by the UN, the definition of torture and the Geneva Conventions.

What is equally stunning is that the efforts of good men and women to defend the very liberals attempting to impugn their actions for partisan political gain should be brought into question and divined as being illegal; you people just cannot help yourselves when it comes to disingenuous partisan hyperbolic bull****.
 
Truth Detector said:
But alas, water boarding is not torture as defined by the UN, the definition of torture and the Geneva Conventions.
.
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America has executed people for waterboarding its soldiers, since when did it cease to be considered torture?
 
WillRockwell said:
America has executed people for waterboarding its soldiers, since when did it cease to be considered torture?
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We didn't. We executed Japanese soldiers for losing the war. Same reason we hung the Nazis at Nuremburg.
 
WillRockwell said:
The truth in a nutshell, I think, is this. While the Bush laws remain on the books, no one is being tortured. As for the excuses Bush made to abrogate the Geneva Convention, they were never legal, are not being used, and are no longer honored.
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Another laughable assertion suggesting that unlawful enemy combatants dressed as civilians fighting in foreign lands have any application to Geneva Conventions.

It is about the same despicable contorted logic we see when Durbin compares American treatment of prisoners to Nazis.

Liberals just can't help themselves when it comes to the despicable divisive hyperbolic rhetoric that serves to drive a huge wedge between our political ideologies while blathering about the need to work together.
 
celticlord said:
We didn't. We executed Japanese soldiers for losing the war. Same reason we hung the Nazis at Nuremburg.
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Actually, you are wrong. Will you admit it?
Japanese soldiers were convicted of waterboarding at the Tokyo Trials, officially known as the International Military Tribunal for the Far East.
After World War II, an international coalition convened to prosecute Japanese soldiers charged with torture. At the top of the list of techniques was water-based interrogation, known variously then as 'water cure,' 'water torture' and 'waterboarding,' according to the charging documents. It simulates drowning." Politifact went on to report, "A number of the Japanese soldiers convicted by American judges were hanged, while others received lengthy prison sentences or time in labor camps."
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Correction: U.S. actually did execute Japanese soldiers for waterboarding | Crooks and Liars
 
Truth Detector said:
Its stunning watching Liberals desperately re-define their version of what constitutes torture for purely political purposes.

But alas, water boarding is not torture as defined by the UN, the definition of torture and the Geneva Conventions.

What is equally stunning is that the efforts of good men and women to defend the very liberals attempting to impugn their actions for partisan political gain should be brought into question and divined as being illegal; you people just cannot help yourselves when it comes to disingenuous partisan hyperbolic bull****.
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Ha getting a lecture from a birther is hillarious. There is no re-defining of torture here. It has been pretty damned clear for decades that waterboarding is torture as we've prosecuted it overseas and in this country. Waterboarding IS torture under the definition of Geneva and US Law. We prosecuted the japanese for waterboarding. We prosecuted it here in the US under Reagan's justice department. Reagan must be rolling in his grave as you continue to be a torture apologists. Once upon a time the right stood for the rule of law. I guess that time has passed.
 
Truth Detector said:
Another laughable assertion suggesting that unlawful enemy combatants dressed as civilians fighting in foreign lands have any application to Geneva Conventions.

It is about the same despicable contorted logic we see when Durbin compares American treatment of prisoners to Nazis.

Liberals just can't help themselves when it comes to the despicable divisive hyperbolic rhetoric that serves to drive a huge wedge between our political ideologies while blathering about the need to work together.
Click to expand...

They actually do according to the supreme court. This has nothing to do with Liberals in Hamdan V. Rumsfeld the supreme court determined that the Geneva conventions do apply to enemy combatants. So far you're the only one spewing divisive rhetoric
 
WillRockwell said:
Actually, you are wrong. Will you admit it?
Japanese soldiers were convicted of waterboarding at the Tokyo Trials, officially known as the International Military Tribunal for the Far East.
Correction: U.S. actually did execute Japanese soldiers for waterboarding | Crooks and Liars
Click to expand...

I see you have difficulty distinguishing the difference between our version of water boarding and Japanese Water torture; or perhaps it is willful; reality has never been your forte’.

In addition, the only reason Japanese were tried in war crimes was the FACT that they indeed violated Geneva Conventions they had signed onto, there actions were indeed the definition of torture and they were the vanquished. Had they won, they would have been the ones conducting trials.

What is despicable with yours and others desperate attempts is the desire to prosecute your own countrymen by fabricating this outrage at perceived and fabricated crimes for purely partisan political purposes.
 
Truth Detector said:
I see you have difficulty distinguishing the difference between our version of water boarding and Japanese Water torture; or perhaps it is willful; reality has never been your forte’.

In addition, the only reason Japanese were tried in war crimes was the FACT that they indeed violated Geneva Conventions they had signed onto, there actions were indeed the definition of torture and they were the vanquished. Had they won, they would have been the ones conducting trials.

What is despicable with yours and others desperate attempts is the desire to prosecute your own countrymen by fabricating this outrage at perceived and fabricated crimes for purely partisan political purposes.
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Waterboarding is waterboarding. We prosecuted it here in the united states in 1983. It is illegal under our laws. It is torture. Just because another country doesn't sign onto Geneva doesn't mean we get to break our obligation. We signed onto Geneva and international law that we ratify essentially becomes US Law. If our form of waterboarding was so effective and useful why did we need to waterboard someone 183 times?
 
Truth Detector said:
I see you have difficulty distinguishing the difference between our version of water boarding and Japanese Water torture; or perhaps it is willful; reality has never been your forte’.

In addition, the only reason Japanese were tried in war crimes was the FACT that they indeed violated Geneva Conventions they had signed onto, there actions were indeed the definition of torture and they were the vanquished. Had they won, they would have been the ones conducting trials.

What is despicable with yours and others desperate attempts is the desire to prosecute your own countrymen by fabricating this outrage at perceived and fabricated crimes for purely partisan political purposes.
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You don't seem to know your history. Geneva didn't take place until 1949. The tokyo trials took place in 1946. So no Japan didn't sign onto Geneva during the time we tried and executed Japanese war criminals
 
PogueMoran said:
Ha getting a lecture from a birther is hillarious.
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Another false and hyperbolic claim; but then, being a Liberal, this is usually all you have right?

PogueMoran said:
There is no re-defining of torture here. It has been pretty damned clear for decades that waterboarding is torture as we've prosecuted it overseas and in this country. Waterboarding IS torture under the definition of Geneva and US Law.
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This would be false. Of course you wish to define water boarding along with the types of water torture used by our enemies as one and the same; but alas, they are not.

Your claim as defined by the Geneva Convention is false and I challenge you to post the exact language from the Convention that supports your contention; I have read it closely throughout many debates, perhaps you should as well before making such farcical claims?

PogueMoran said:
We prosecuted the japanese for waterboarding.
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Once again, what the Japanese did was NOT water boarding as conducted by our people and your desperate highly emotional rants in a vacuum of the facts simply don't make it so.

PogueMoran said:
We prosecuted it here in the US under Reagan's justice department. Reagan must be rolling in his grave as you continue to be a torture apologists.
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Provide the exact facts and case that supports such desperate assertions and we can debate those as well.

The notion that I am a torture apologist is as hyperbolic and farcical as your desperate assertion that I am a "birther."

But it is a typical tactic used by Liberals who wallow in denial and fabricate versions of reality that support their failed partisan beliefs.

PogueMoran said:
Once upon a time the right stood for the rule of law. I guess that time has passed.
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The notion that we don't stand for the rule of law is once more the realm of hysterical emotional hyperbole expressed by Liberals like you for purely partisan political purposes.

But then, since when did you ever concern yourself with facts and honesty based on the false claims you made in your rebuttal above. Your more adept at emotional hysterics than dealing in honesty facts and historical realities; but this is to be expected from Liberals.
 
Truth Detector said:
Another false and hyperbolic claim; but then, being a Liberal, this is usually all you have right?
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I see so anyone you disagree with must automatically make them a liberal right? So that would make you what? An extremist right? You are a birther nothing to complain about there.
Truth Detector said:
This would be false. Of course you wish to define water boarding along with the types of water torture used by our enemies as one and the same; but alas, they are not.
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Waterboarding as we have defined it. Once again we have prosecuted Waterboarding here in the US when a texas sheriff and 3 of his deputies used it on prisoners to elicit false confessions. Waterboarding is torture plain and simple.

Truth Detector said:
Your claim as defined by the Geneva Convention is false and I challenge you to post the exact language from the Convention that supports your contention; I have read it closely throughout many debates, perhaps you should as well before making such farcical claims?
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You do know that when we sign treaties we are obligated to follow them right? Regardless of if a country has signed onto it or not.

Truth Detector said:
Once again, what the Japanese did was NOT water boarding as conducted by our people and your desperate highly emotional rants in a vacuum of the facts simply don't make it so.
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What you seem not to understand is we have prosecuted Waterboarding here in this country. Regardless of the japanese we still have prosecuted it. So yes waterboarding is against the law no matter how much you pretend it isn't

Truth Detector said:
Provide the exact facts and case that supports such desperate assertions and we can debate those as well.
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James parker and 3 of his sheriffs were convicted in 1983 of waterboarding prisoners to force confessions for crimes.
Waterboarding: A Tortured History : NPR

Waterboarding Used to Be a Crime - washingtonpost.com


Truth Detector said:
The notion that I am a torture apologist is as hyperbolic and farcical as your desperate assertion that I am a "birther."

But it is a typical tactic used by Liberals who wallow in denial and fabricate versions of reality that support their failed partisan beliefs.



The notion that we don't stand for the rule of law is once more the realm of hysterical emotional hyperbole expressed by Liberals like you for purely partisan political purposes.

But then, since when did you ever concern yourself with facts and honesty based on the false claims you made in your rebuttal above. Your more adept at emotional hysterics than dealing in honesty facts and historical realities; but this is to be expected from Liberals.
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Really? You seem pretty emotional here with some vile invective not based on any facts but rather your own personal feelings. Everyone who seems to disagree with you is a liberal and then you throw up strawmen to describe what you think a liberal is. I'm dealing with the facts you're spinning on emotion
 
Truth Detector said:
I see you have difficulty distinguishing the difference between our version of water boarding and Japanese Water torture; or perhaps it is willful; reality has never been your forte’.

In addition, the only reason Japanese were tried in war crimes was the FACT that they indeed violated Geneva Conventions they had signed onto, there actions were indeed the definition of torture and they were the vanquished. Had they won, they would have been the ones conducting trials.

What is despicable with yours and others desperate attempts is the desire to prosecute your own countrymen by fabricating this outrage at perceived and fabricated crimes for purely partisan political purposes.
Click to expand...

The only partisan at work here is you, now trying to draw some fine distintion with the difference between Japanese waterboarding and American waterboarding. Your hypocrisy is obvious to everyone, your feeble attempts to excuse the criminal behaviour of your Beloved Bush is transparent and pathetic. You wail about prosecuting my "countrymen". The Unibomber, Eric Rudolph, Charles Manson and Timothy McVeigh were also my "countrymen", should I defend them? I'll wager my ancestors have defended this land a hell of a lot longer than yours, and we have learned when to excuse a "countryman" and when to prosecute him. Obviously you have not been around long enough to figure that out.
 
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