CIA and torture
 

The Senate report says that torture produced no actionable intelligence. Several former CIA heads, #^&#^&#^&#^& Cheney, as well as one guy interviewed on Foxnews who says he took part in the waterboarding, disagree. Can't we find out the truth for once? I want to know who's lying.

As to the use of torture, this is one of those times where I just don't see where the liberals are coming from...

(1) I hear that it's ilegal - not if the Justice Department says it's not. The Bush Justice Department determined that waterboarding was legal, which necessarily means that the guys who did it, broke no laws.

(2) I hear liberals claiming that since most people will say anything to stop the torture, it will lead to false leads. That is absurd, because any form of interrogation can lead to false leads. Police interviews lead to false leads. Tip lines lead to false leads. Are liberals arguing we do away with those? For God's sake, no one is saying that torture produces perfect information 100% of the time, so stop rejecting its use by saying it isn't perfect.

(3) I hear liberals saying it makes us no better than the terrorists. A child sees the absurdity of that argument. Terrorists kill innocent civilians out of pure evil. The goal of terrorism is to cause the death sof innocent civilians. The CIA tortured people to try and prevent the loss of innocent lives. Not only are those 2 things not morally equivalent, they're almost the exact opposite of one another.

It's common sense that some individuals will be less reluctant to divulge information if you ask "pretty please", than they will be if they are tortured. In very limited circumstances (American civilian lives are at imminent risk, we have someone who can help us prevent those deaths), it would be immoral not to do whatever it takes, and I mean whatever it takes (I'd go way past waterboarding).

We need very careful oversight to prevent abuse. The use of torture needs to be very, very limited. But I see no value, none whatsoever, of sacrificing innocent American lives upon the altar of "the moral high ground".

We didn't create this scenario. The barbarians did, by their own free will.

I don't get it. I just don't get it.

the "timed" release of this report is Laughable
the methods described remind one of cavemen making wheels
out of stone...

the technology that we now possess combined with designer drugs
that are so perfected they can read their minds
like it was a playboy magazine.

this is bait car tactics

(1) In 2002 Bush's legal council wrote a letter stating why they believed EIT's under a certain definition wouldn't be considered torture. This was the justification I believe for all further orders.

This doesn't make the actions legal. It simply gives a reasoning for the decision to not follow the Geneva Convention and a line of defense if the actions were prosecuted under US or International law.

(2) That doesn't make a lot of sense. I don't think there's any real evidence that torture does work and most experts seem to believe there are better methods. If it's not likely to work and likely illegal why would you do it?

(3) I've never heard people say we're no better but it certainly does undermine our high-ground and our identity.

I would have liked the report to be more complete and ideally bi-partisan but it doesn't sound like the key findings are that far off. Brennan's conference yesterday was pretty balanced.

As for who's lying, I wouldn't put any chips on Cheney. Here's a nice little tidbit that was just made public.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/12/12/world/...html?hpt=hp_t2

They cut the heads off of their prisoners, they love videoing themselves cutting the heads off of sometimes innocent Americans...I personally don't care if they are captured and (water boarded, sleep deprived or tortured or what over you want to call it) to get intelligence. I'd rather be water boarded than get my head hacked off with a Rambo knife and we sure aren't doing that to those animals....I'm getting sick of the whole thing really...maybe i'm feeling a little grumpy today but there are many levels of torture from solitary to water board to head chopping...
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I'm perplexed by this reasoning.

Do we judge the merit of our behavior based on our standards or theirs?

"I don't think there's any real evidence that torture does work"

How about this for evidence? Spence, if I asked you for your bank account id and password, you would say "no". If I asked you that same question while holding a chainsaw to your genitals, you would give me what I was looking for. Yes or no?

It goes against everything we know about human beings, to believe that torture cannot (in some cases) produce intelligence that can't be produced using other methods.

Also, several CIA directors say there is hard evidence that it does, and did, work, and so does #^&#^&#^&#^& Cheney. So why can't we lay all the cards on the table and see who is lying?

"I've never heard people say we're no better "

Than you aren't paying close attention.

"it certainly does undermine our high-ground and our identity."

No, it doesn't. Spence, i don't believe for a second you'd advise not to waterboard a terrorist who knew where your kids were. You can say whatever you want, but I refuse to believe you'd refuse to play that card, if that's all that was left.

The terrorists are the ones who have no right to claim the moral high ground.

Spence, are you OK with Obama's drone strikes, which we absolutely know for a fact, occasionally result in the death of innocent bystanders? According to Obama, it's OK for us to incinerate innocent bystanders, but not OK to sleep deprive a known terrorist, guilty of mass murder? We can blow up an innocent baby, but not keep Usama Bin Laden awake for a few days?

You go ahead and defend that.

Ive never heard anything factual from #^&#^&#^&#^& Cheney and he's been waterboarded like 300 times

We base it on our standards...that's why we don't hack their heads off with a Rambo knife...just toss a little water on them and ask some questions... :)
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And don't let them sleep.

Tragic way of interrogating

[QUOTE=Piscator;1058831]They cut the heads off of their prisoners, they love videoing themselves cutting the heads off of sometimes innocent Americans..

Why doesn't the UN council expend some of the energy they want to use to prosecute US operatives that utilized EITs to stopping the thugs that cut the heads off of captured soldiers and bystanders? I believe that treating POWs in that manner would violate the Geneva convention, wouldn't it? Analysis of the film of the 22 beheaded prisoners suggest that the filming took place over a 4 to 6 hour period. I can't imagine the torture of being dragged around for hours to star in a film featuring your own beheading.

Yeah, I watched the video of the beheadings. I will never wipe the memory of those poor, defeated souls that had resigned themselves to what was coming without a struggle. Had they not been tortured (or drugged) into their dazed state, you would think that one of them would have put up enough resistance to get himself shot rather than waiting passively for the inevitable.

It makes me want to puke that the world now wants to prosecute American operatives.

Our high ground in accord with rule of law has been undermined by progressive ad hoc rule of whim in opposition to the law of our land for a long time. Leftist progressives have no moral ground to stand on in that respect. And with that lawless transformation, our "identity" is no longer recognizable. In every respect, we not only contradict ourselves, but we look like fools, not worthy of respect, to the rest of the world, when we appear to have a fungible identity which changes from one day to the next. And when we can one day lie and rail about and accuse some obscure anti-Islamic video being the cause of bloody riots and death of our own consulate members, then mea culpa expose what we had actually done to Islamists even though even many more of our people would be at risk because of it--when we can do that about face, from falsely condemning a video, to praising a supposedly "high ground" truth which would cause the mayhem and bloodshed that we accused the video of fomenting, the height of the ground is leveled to the pit of hypocrisy . . . and stupidity.

spence - pls, pls. don't respond to that. Enough band width has been wasted.

:wave::wave: I have to admit, I had a chuckle with that. You got me.

m Polska 24.pl

I just watched a show last night regarding this matter. It was informative. Much of the specific info gathered apparently was due to EIT's. According to former CIA chief Morell. He was very detailed. Provided context timing etc.

I am more than certain had another major attack occurred on US soil. Those who are villainizing the techniques would not be.
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For what it's worth.

1. Given enough momentum and funding I am more than certain ISIS/ISIL Al Qaeda Taliban would be happy to construct a world de void of western philosophy by any means necessary. Including Nazi Germany levels of ethnic cleansing.

2. If Bin Laden were able to get a dirty bomb or nuclear device on US soil as he was apparently trying to do. ("Was info provided by Khaleed Sheikh Mohammed". Info obtained via his interrogation also got us the Courier which led to us eventually killing Bin Laden.) How many of these Individuals would be in line to water board any one of these Gitmo cretins.

I could give a damn about Geneva Convention BS when it comes to individuals who stand for what these terrorists do. The rest of the world should stop caring as well IMHO. It's so easy to sit here today and say we were wrong. Too many forget what happened and how that felt in 2001. So willing to villainize
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Totally agree . It's amazing how many people live in their own little happy world and have no idea what it takes to protect them. We aren't dealing with rational people .
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The sheep, the sheepdogs, and the wolves.

If you persist in an environment such as academia and don't venture out into the real world, your view will be skewed such a way in that you confuse the sheepdog with the wolf..

The truth has been spoken. :hihi:

Very nice twist on a speech by William J Bennet given to the Naval Academy in 1997:

http://www.combat.ws/S4/LIBRARY/SHEEPDOG.HTM

You've gone farther than his view of the sheep toward the sheepdogs. He says even though the sheep consider the sheepdogs heroes when they're saved by them, they, generally, being in denial about the real danger of wolves, have an innate distrust of the sheepdogs because they look a lot like the wolves.

But you've clarified a more influential subset of sheep--academia, which molds its view through its influence on the schools and the various print and visual media. And a subset which is even farther removed from reality than most of the sheep. It believes it has a morally superior view than the rest of the sheep of how life works, even though they are sheltered from most of the evil aspects the rest are heir to. So it goes beyond merely distrusting the sheepdogs, it actually equates the sheepdogs with the wolves.

So our sheepdogs, to them, are just as much wolves as wolves are. And to be vilified, even punished as much as the wolves should be. In their view, if their must be sheepdogs, they are expected not to bite the wolves. Rather, they should protect the sheep by the superior example of respect for life. This would teach, by moral example, that it is better for the wolves to respect the sheep, and to live by the sheep's example. Perhaps, to eat grass rather than sheep meat. A sort of turning of the other cheek. Not that the sheep should turn a cheek, as they tremble with fear, but that the sheepdogs, standing between them and the wolves, should represent such a gesture by treating the wolves with kindness, generosity. The sheepdogs should display the values of all the world's sheep by gesturing towards the wolves with the various treaties and conventions on the proper treatment that wolves, or at least other sheep gone astray, should be accorded.

Unfortunately, in the real world, the vast majority of wolves don't care about the treaties that various sheep have agreed to. Like all smart wolves, if they learn to game the sheep system, and they know that the sheepdogs won't bite, they can wave a friendly tail, move along, and come back later with the knowledge they have gained, and feast on more sheep.

And sheepdogs, indeed, are like, in many ways, the wolves, with a major exception, as noted by Bennet--they will bite the wolves but never harm the sheep. It is that distinction which not only separates them from the wolves, but which makes them such an effective protection for the sheep against the wolves.

I suppose, others with a more progressive nature than I, would say that such parables don't really apply to humans. We are not really sheep or wolves. We have a "higher" status on the evolutionary scale.

But we have not yet evolved to the higher state of existence that our superiors demand. For instance, they depend so much on genetics to equalize cultural disputes. Our genetics, to them, basically makes us who we are. There are genes that dispose some to this or that. To a particular sexuality. Or to love or criminality. To dominance or subordination. But is there an acknowledgment that some are genetically inclined to be warriors--the warriors Bennet speaks of in his speech? And that, as the genetic makeup supposedly cannot be overridden in sexuality, that neither can the warrior makeup. Throughout history, warriors have been brutal in war, and they must because they face each other with their inherent will to win, to defeat an enemy and protect their homes. Some warriors, as Bennet points out, are more or less so in the continuum of war behavior. It takes the consummate warrior to face the enemy in the most extreme circumstances. Asking the warrior to play nice in the face of intractable enemies, enemies who have no agreement nor inclination to play by the rules of sheep, is asking for defeat.

Are interrogators warriors? Who would have the genetic makeup to be an interrogator? Have we isolated such a gene? Until we do, who do we depend on to interrogate? Aren't the CIA a branch of the warrior class? And when they go into the interrogative battle with an enemy, do they act as the sheepdogs they are, or should they act like a university professor?

That was a great speech on a subject that has gone on for centuries and has spun off many interesting bits of thought.

I see it frequently with people that have lived most of their life in their thought silos & circles.

You really teased my thoughts out past where I was going with it but there is much truth in that.

Great read and comment on Bennett's speech, Detbuch.
Last night Dr. Mitchell said the reason he took the job with the CIA and it's interrogation program was after seeing people falling from the trade center and the "sheepdog's" from Flight 93 heroism. He was willing to give up his life for his country. Now without even being interviewed by the Dem sheep in their report tey are on their high and mighty Political "morality condemning him.
I wonder what these sheep would be saying if we had had another 9/11 hit?

Meantime the sheep are out protesting against the very "sheep dogs" that put their lives on the line for the protection of all our lives.

It is something that a petty, vindictive elitist like Diane Feinstein can release that report without bothering to ask the folks at the CIAs clandestine srvice, for their side of the story.

The interviews with Megyn kelly were fantastic.

She also had Marc Thiessen on (he's a frequent guest, was a speechwriter/policy advisor to Bush, a brilliant young conservative, thoughtful and respectful). When talking about whether or not we actually got any actionable intelligence from torture, Thiessen said that one of the guys recently killed by an Obama drone attack, was only made known to us by the enhanced interrogation of the terrorists.

Can't we just find out the truth? If Thiessen is lying, I genuinely want to know, so that i don't listen to him anymore. If he i stelling th etruth, then a lot of liberals who claim it didn't work, will have egg on their faces.

I have to believe that if th eliberals could prove that Thiessen and #^&#^&#^&#^& Cheney are lying that it worked, they's present the evidence to show the world that #^&#^&#^&#^& Cheney is a flat-out liar. That they haven't done that, tells me that they know that Cheney and Thiessen are telling th etruth.

It's putrid. One side is lying, and the documentation exists for us to know who the liars are.

I apologize for misattributing the speech to Bennet. It was actually a speech by LTC(RET) Dave Grossman, RANGER, Ph.D., author of “On Killing.” He quoted part of Bennet's 1997 speech in the introduction to his. Both the Bennet quote and Grossman's speech were inspiring. The kind of words that speak of high things, duties, and honor which evoke tears of pride and feelings that transcend the ad hoc functionalism of our present governmental regulatory state. They're the kind of speeches that are lacking in current political addresses. If one wonders why the political division of our time expresses so much confusion and distrust of government by the people, I would say that much of our rejection of politicians, no matter how much good they intend to do for us, is that they don't inspire us beyond grubbing for handouts.

It is no inspiration to be told we need because we are not capable. It is no inspiration to be told, in effect, that we are the servants of beneficent masters who will see to our every need. And it is no inspiration toward charity by those who have if the warm personal feelings of giving are no longer needed. Those feelings are dampened by a confiscatory state which transforms "charity" into routine and compulsory transfers to those who expect them not as gifts, but as government granted "rights".

It is no inspiration to realize that we don't have inalienable rights to our life, our liberty, our property, and not even to our pursuit of happiness. These, we are told, are not granted by some higher power, not even by dint of our own efforts. These are granted and administered by government. In a collective hive ruled from the top down by surrogate queen bees morphed into politicians and their corporate cronies.

Our "modern" collectivized, planned, administrated life is intentionally made soulless. Inspiration is a problem to those who govern us. It creates too much feeling of pesky individualism. We are charmed, instead, into brief stimulations of pleasure by a varied and massive entertainment industry (most of which cow tows, like the rest of industry, to the State's desires), and are comforted with the notion that we will be protected from the desolations of want and hunger. We must not even be too concerned with providing for our own safety. The state will protect us . . . in all things. At least, we are promised all of this. Embedded in this cocoon of comfort and safety spun around us by our superior intellectual experts, the sheep's warm and fuzzy is not only made uncomfortable by hostilities or violence of any kind, the sheep see the warrior class propensity as an unnecessary danger to their tidy order.

So the notion of a warrior class, inspired by high ideals of honor and sacrifice, wanes and rises in direct relation to present danger. Right after 9/11 the sheepdogs were given high praise and honored as heroes. But later, after the danger had ebbed, and things seemed under control, so too did ebb respect for the sheepdogs. When the wolf was at the door, the sheepdogs' fangs were welcome. After the sheepdogs had sufficiently shooed away the wolves, their fangs seemed too brutal, not nice enough for our more "civilized" and comfortable dispositions.

The sheepdogs had to be defanged . . . at least until the wolves were at the door again.

But what many of the sheep don't realize or perhaps least refuse to realize is that the wolves are always just past the door. Across the street, maybe in the shadow. Some wolves lash out because simply it is their nature. Some plan and scheme while waiting for increasingly favorable conditions.

As an history, we have seen this ebb and flow, time and time again. Like the tides we so desperately plan ourselves around, the wax and wane of the Sheepdog is watched by the wolves.

Yes, and Feinstein's report of what she judges is higher ground did nothing but show weakness on our part. Was she expecting repentance from our enemies and hope they lay down their weapons because we are the good guys? She got her answer to that with the killing of the 132 innocent children in Pakistan. She has no clue as to the vision and evil of terrorism.

Never forget a wolf will always take it's time and track it's prey for miles to find it in a weakened conditioned before it attacks. Our enemies have endless time on their hands and will wait for just the right time to strike. The more weakness we show will only hasten that time. Wake up sheeple we are in a deadly war.

If polls are correct, the majority of sheep are still in the flow of 9/11 mentality and in favor of EIT:

http://www.redstate.com/2014/12/16/t...ltural-divide/

Hard to imagine where the elites are coming from. They're saying, Spence is saying...that if we had some fat pig terrorist in custody who we were as sure as possible, had info that could have prevented the school attack in Pakistan, we shouldn't pour water up his nose or deprive him of sleep to save those lives? We're willing to sacricice the lives of little kids, on the altar of some "moral high ground" that serves no purpose except to make things easier for the wolves? In my mind, it would be immoral not to torture someone who was planning such an attack, and if the attack is imminent, i'd go a hell of alot further than waterboarding, and I'd sleep like a baby after (after talking with my priest first).

I don't get it. I shoud have been alive in the 1950s, I can't say I like the look of things...the cops are the enemy, and cop killers like Abu Mumia Jamal get honored to speak at college graduations. And 99% of our college professors who teach our kids, have no quarrel with that. That's super.

Jim, you are a Marine, the elitists "can't handle the truth"..
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