W. on torture: help me understand

I think Jon Stewart called it "freedom tickling."

I couldn't find the full text on the bill, but the snippet that I did find is worded as such:



Personally, I think that's a bit ambiguous. The cruel I can understand, even though I agree with some of the interrogation techniques that some people might find cruel. Inhuman according to who? Most people would say locking someone up in a 6x8 steel cage 23+ hours a day is pretty inhuman and 100's of thousands of American citizens are subjected to that every day in our criminal system. Degrading? So now we should go out of our way to make accused terrorists feel as good about themselves as possible. Does that mean that we should now discipline guards who give them dirty looks and make them feel degraded?

I looked again and can't find the full text to see if maybe there's a more clear statement, have you had any luck?

bts

I guess that's the trouble with making laws in the first place: the more specific you make it the easier it is to find loopholes.

I just haven't heard or seen anything from the administration saying specifically why they oppose the bill.

So that's the trouble with saying the law is too vague. If specific language were built into it saying you can't rub sh*t in prisoners faces, you could say "oh well it doesn't say we can't strip them naked and force them to mock sex acts, so that must be OK."

Laws of this nature have to be vauge so as not to exclude anything specifically. You then apply the vague law by using your best judgement, knowing if you cross a line you're going to be held accountable.

It's all pretty meaningless, though, because the spooks are going to do what they will anyway.

I can think of countless ones. But saying anything degrading is unacceptable is far too much of a blanket statement.

Jim basically has it right, the spooks will do their spook things.

And Jim I can't think of the situation off the top of my head, I'll have to go look it up, but there was some situations not too long ago where the US and some other foreign bodies disagreed on what constituted inhumane treatment (i.e. sleep deprivation, sitting in uncomfortable positions, etc). So I think that's where some of the controversy stems from.

bts

While I NEVER, EVER agree with Jr., I have to say I never had a problem with the human rights violations that occured with these prisoners. I say torture their ****** some more.

Spreading democratic values accross the globe is somewhat lessened if basic human rights are ignored in the process.  In this case, the end does NOT justify the means ... is just not democratic.  To say so, is the the rhetoric of authoritarian and ideological regimes!

Very hypocritical to lecture the Chinese government about human rights abuses and then to say of our human rights abuses "But... but... we had a good reason for them!" The Chinese feel the same way about their abuses.

So you're comparing the folks who brought us Tiananmen Square to those who brought us Abu Ghraib?

bts

Degrading treatment is like pornography - I can't define it, but I know it when I see it.

Whether we torture or not shouldn't be measured against whether the Chinese do it, whether the Saudis do it or whether anyone else does it. We should measure ourselves against ourselves, against what we think is right and what we want our country to be. This "Do as I say, not as I do" crap just makes us weaker in the long run. As far as I can tell the bill basically says that we will follow the Geneva Conventions, which we're supposed to be doing anyway, which is why many miltary leaders are for it.

That it's the same thing to kill thousands of protesting students as it is to take pictures of accused terrorists in compromising positions?

bts

Brett, nice try, but I don't explain comments other people make on my behalf.

Fair enough, I think we've both made our points

Drew, very good point. We're either the Leader of the FREE World or we aren't. We're either champions of human rights or we're not. We're either a nation of laws or we're not.

You can't claim the moral high ground as an excuse to attack and invade another country and then LACK morality.

What cracks me up is that we need a law to do the right thing. Aren't these laws in some form already in place?

I don't think morality was the reason for invading Iraq, I believe it was a lie about WMD. So one could say it was the lack of integrity (maybe morality is interchangable) was the reason we invaded Iraq...

Finally found more on it...



Ah, the first part is what I wanted to hear. I'm not sure if that's the exact wording, but I'm all for specifics.

bts

Totally.

The morality argument was what they tried when it became apparent they lied, lied, lied about WMDs. Their argument(s) for war changed with each damning revelation. Talk about FLIP-FLOPPERS.

Seems pretty lame to me. "Feel Good" legislation. Last time I checked, the comedians in Abu were punished quite severely.







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Is it "always" impermissible for US personnel or agents of the US to engage in torture? Are there situations in which torture is justified? If 911 could have been prevented by the use of torture on a subject would it have been warranted? What about if torture could have gained knowledge of the Japanese plan to attack Pearl Harbor?

There seems to be a naivity built in here by some comments. A belief that our current administration invented the use of torture and that it has never occurred in previous administrations, be those administrations Democrat or Republican, is rediculous. The dirty little secret of every administration is that the intelligence community has used various means of "torture" to gain information.

Grow up people, the world is a nasty, horrible place. There are people and countries out there that want to kill you. Yes even the liberals that argue that the war in Iraq is illegitimate, the insurrgents our troops are fighting still want to kill you. Whether our country is in Iraq or not.

The truth is the reason you don't want to pass a law like this is because it ties the hands of your intelligence community. Its ugly, maybe in a perfect world the US wouldn't use torture to gain information, but the truth of the matter is that we, as a country are safer because of it. And, here's a news flash for you all, it's not a perfect world. Right now, around the world there are people, governments, and organizations that are plotting to kill Americans. Sometimes the only way to get that information is to resort to ugliness.

In theory, in a perfect world, I agree that torture should never be used. But I've been to far too many autopsies and seen far too much ugliness to believe in a perfect world. If it prevents the bombing of a US embasy, the planting of a "dirty bomb" on a NYC subway, the release of biological agents into a water reservoir, or the assasination of a clandestine US agent, then I am willing to turn a blind eye.

I let the professionals that deal with the ugliness in protecting this Country do their jobs.