Quote: r3x29yz4a said: I believe Colin Powell and John Mccain (a man who has been tortured) say it doesn't work. In facts soldiers are traditionally trained to withstand physical pain. So I don't think it has any real benefit. That's why governments worldwide have studied psychological warfare and tactics for decades.
And I dissagree w/ them. Why would soldiers be trained to whithstand phisical pain if phisical pain didn't help to extract information.
i guess you have firsthand experience with being tortured and trained as a soldier to offer a valid disagreement? or did you just watch 24 last season?
Quote: You're right though, governments DO study the effects of psychological and governments and iterregators, not John McCain, have concluded that torture works. It's even a cliche among POWs that "everyone breaks". Yes John McCain was a POW, but he's also a politition and you have to factor both of those in decifering what he says.
he's a republican. going against the president who is a member of your own party is risky, bad politics in fact, especially on such a divisive issue.
Quote: Were you aware that our Marines are subjected to watter boarding? And that thier instructions are thet when enduring this form of torture they will break but the goal is to withhod as much information as they can? Are you aware that the average detainee can withstand watterboarding for about 30 seconds before breaking? Were you aware that when someone is held by the enemy who is known to have critical information that they will try as much as possible to change thier plans assuming the enemy will have extracted at least some crucial information. Why do you suppose that is? It's because as you mentioned governments have studied these things and to reiterate what governments concluded is that torture works. McCain can offer us anecdotal evidence from a political perspective, that is all.
there are clear lines on these matters. what people like you are attempting to do is blur the lines and the laws that have existed on this for years.
Quote: wannabuyamonkey said: I'm sure G-Mans point wasn;t to deny the difference between volentry and involentary actions, but rather to demonstrate how mild these techniques are when you consider they're being done to terrorists caught on the battle field.
Exactly.
We have a duty to define our terms when we debate an issue.
The people who are blasting the administration for "torturing" terrorists should realize, and/or be honest about, exactly what forms of "torture" we are talking about.
The word "torture" conjures up images of the rack, hot coals, electrodes, etc., and unfairly creates an impression of what we are contemplating.
This isn't "torture," its "hazing." And its not particularly worse than what we do to our soldiers in basic training...or what happens in frat houses every weekend.
Quote: i guess you have firsthand experience with being tortured and trained as a soldier to offer a valid disagreement? or did you just watch 24 last season?
Nope, but if you want to say that McCain is right about matters of war due to his experience as a soldier then you must agree with him that we were correct to go into Iraq in the first place. While I do have a friend who has infact undergone torture training (traing to whithstand torture not administer) I have not acctually had the first hand experience. Usually when someone uses the personal experience argument they are attemting to dodge the acctual argument, but I don;t want to jump to that conclusion to see if you adrees the meat of what I said later on...
Quote: he's a republican. going against the president who is a member of your own party is risky, bad politics in fact, especially on such a divisive issue.
hmm, I made to points one major regarding effectiveness of torture and one minor about the fact that McCain was a politition you seem to have only adressed the latter. Well in hopes that the real issue is discussed later in your post allow me to quickly adres the issue of McCain making political decisions... Have you ever watched the news when McCain is in it? Yes he's a Republican, but his bread and butter is to be a maveric Republican.
Quote: there are clear lines on these matters. what people like you are attempting to do is blur the lines and the laws that have existed on this for years.
Sadly the post is over and you completely avoided the issue of the effectiveness of torture. Well, i guess we'll have to move on. So please tell me what re the "clear lines on these matters" that you're refering to? I'm not trying to blur any lines at all. What "people like me" are doing is trying to .... Never mind, I don't even know why I bother.
Putting the "fun" back in Fundamentalist Christian Dogma.
" I know God exists because WBAM told me so. " - theory9
JLA brand RACK points = 514k
Quote: the G-man said: We have a duty to define our terms when we debate an issue.
The people who are blasting the administration for "torturing" terrorists should realize, and/or be honest about, exactly what forms of "torture" we are talking about.
fair enough. and of course "waterboarding"
Quote:
This isn't "torture," its "hazing." And its not particularly worse than what we do to our soldiers in basic training...or what happens in frat houses every weekend.
again we go back to voluntary. you didn't address that did you? rape and sex are differentiated by consent. by your standards anyone arrested as a suspect should be tortured. i believe the constitution says something about "cruel and unusual punishment."
Quote: wannabuyamonkey said: Nope, but if you want to say that McCain is right about matters of war due to his experience as a soldier then you must agree with him that we were correct to go into Iraq in the first place. While I do have a friend who has infact undergone torture training (traing to whithstand torture not administer) I have not acctually had the first hand experience. Usually when someone uses the personal experience argument they are attemting to dodge the acctual argument, but I don;t want to jump to that conclusion to see if you adrees the meat of what I said later on...
Sometimes a person has first hand experience with a horrible event and that event makes a person biased in their viewpoint. It doesn't mean they are acting improperly or duplicitously but that their emotions are affecting their views more than they perhaps should.
Quote: r3x29yz4a said: (listed pictures of what he considered tortured and concluded with) i believe the constitution says something about "cruel and unusual punishment."
And you're probably right. Most of those probably could be considered torture. And those examples are of things that the White House prosecuted people for doing. And those examples are things that aren't on the White House list as detailed above.
This is precisely why its important to be honest about what we are discussing.
I didn't repost the pictures because it makes the thread load slower. That's it. And since I made at least partial concessions that the examples you cited were wrong, your claim I somehow "trivilized" something is inaccurate.
However, you are tending to demonstrate exactly what I mean by not defining terms.
We have an article here that describes the techniques employed, or to be employed, by the U.S. They are different than what you posted pictures of.
This tends to demonstrate that you aren't really interested in discussing the pros and cons of the policy as it exists. It instead indicates that you seek to distort the facts and debate something other than what is at issue.
I'll assume that by ignoring the topic Ray has conceded that torture works so now we can move on to whether or not it's right to slap a terrorist or make him stand for too long in order to get information that will save the life of American troops (Who I'm sure we all support) or citicens. My poition is it i ok to do these things as well as harsher methods of interrogation like watterboarding. I draw the line at anything that would cause injury, mutilation or death.
Putting the "fun" back in Fundamentalist Christian Dogma.
" I know God exists because WBAM told me so. " - theory9
JLA brand RACK points = 514k
Attorney General nominee Michael Mukasey’s confirmation hearings got underway yesterday and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Pat Leahy (D-Vt.) explored Mukasey’s position on administration torture policies. His response was surprising.
Not only did Michael Mukasey repudiate the so-called 2002 “torture memo” signed by Office of Legal Counsel chief Jay Bybee — which appears to have survived in spirit, if not in letter, but he compared U.S. torture to the Holocaust.
Quote:
The Bybee memo is “worse than a sin, it’s a mistake,” Mukasey said. He referenced the photographs taken by U.S. troops who liberated the Nazi concentration camps in 1945 to document the “barbarism” the U.S. opposed. “They didn’t do that so that we could then duplicate it ourselves.” Beyond legal restrictions barring torture clearly, torture is “antithetical to everything this country stands for.”
Weren’t Republicans apoplectic when Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said something similar two years ago?
Specifically, Durbin, on the Senate floor, said,
Quote:
“If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime — Pol Pot or others — that had no concern for human beings. Sadly, that is not the case. This was the action of Americans in the treatment of their prisoners.”
The reaction was overwhelming. One suspects the ensuing firestorm to Mukasey’s remarks will be a little less intense (which is to say, non-existent).
Indeed, this is going back a couple of years, so it’s probably worth taking a moment to consider just how far the right pushed this.
In June 2005, shortly after Durbin’s remarks, Karl Rove delivered a speech to the New York Conservative Party in which he said Durbin’s historical comparison was literally dangerous to the safety of Americans.
Originally Posted By: Karl Rove
“Let me just put this in fairly simple terms: Al Jazeera now broadcasts the words of Senator Durbin to the Mideast, certainly putting our troops in greater danger. No more needs to be said about the motives of liberals.”
It was, even by Rove standards, breathtaking demagoguery. On the one hand, he said Durbin was encouraging terrorists. On the other, Rove said liberals in general, and Durbin specifically, intend to undermine the safety of U.S. troops.
In other words, according to the president’s top political aide, Durbin’s comparison was proof that liberals are literally treasonous. (The White House later said Rove was just “telling it like it is when it comes to the different approaches for winning the war on terrorism.”)
Durbin, shortly thereafter, made a tearful apology, but from time to time, you’ll still see conservatives reference his historical analogy (”The Senate Majority Leader says the war is ‘lost’; the Senate Minority Leader compares Americans to Nazis….”)
And yet, here we are, and the president’s nominee for Attorney General is making the same analogy. No one gasped, or expressed outrage, or demanded an apology. Mukasey’s comparison made sense, just as Durbin’s did.
Well, again, I don't see it that way. I see Republicans as responding directly to specific statements by Democrats when they attack them. Not just personally smearing Democrats, but specifically criticizing the poor judgement and wrong policies of what specific Democrats have said.
For example, Sen Dick Durbin's inflammatory and ill-advised remarks saying U.S. soldiers were comparable to the Pol Pot regime, Soviet Gulags, and Nazi storm troopers
But I disagree that "support the troops" is used to discourage criticism of the leadership conducting the war (both of military/Pentagon leadership, and of the higher Bush cabinet leadership). As I've said often: constructive criticism, in a checks-and-balances way asking valid questions, and pushing for an efficient war and diplomatic policy, is supportive.
But the scorched-earth rhetoric of Democrats, likening the minor abuses at Abu Ghraib to "atrocicties" comparable to the genocide of "Nazi storm troopers, Soviet Gulags and the Pol Pot regime..." (Democrat Sen Dick Durbin, and similar rhetoric from Howard Dean, Nancy Pelosi, John Kerry, Harry Reid, Jon Murtha, etc.)... this is falsely painting these abuses to be larger than they are. Smearing all the 150,000 troops in Iraq with the same brush, and ignoring that the military prosecutes and punishes these abuses. Undermining the morale of all the troops, not just the prosecuted abusers. Undermining public opinion and support for all the troops, not just the abusers.
Democrat(ic) leaders, and Democrats at the grassroots level, have been spiteful and indiscriminate, mouthing damaging rhetoric that undermines the entire war effort, not just the mistakes and setbacks in the mission. And at every stage, Democrats have demoralized our soldiers' efforts, encouraged their immediate removal, and questioned their ability to do the job under any circumstances.
And ultimately, Democrats are providing defeatist un-American soundbytes, that are re-broadcast in the Muslim world. That inflame, encourage and give new life to the Iraq insurgency by raising the constant spectre of premature U.S. withdrawal, and painting a tiny number of abuses (which are punished) with the unmitigated beheadings and mass killings of our enemy.
I see absolutely nothing supportive or constructive about Democrat(ic) participation in the Iraq war dialogue. It is absolutely not supportive of the troops for precisely these reasons.
I love the part (at my link, but not excerpted above) where Sen. Bond brings up Sen. Durbin's nationally televised remarks a few weeks ago ( where Durbin compared U.S. military treatment of prisoners to that of the Nazis, Russian Gulags, the Cambodian Pol Pot regime's extermination of over 3 million of that nation's civilian population between 1975-1979, ad nauseum. )
Remarks for which Sen. Durbin received so much heat for the hyperbolic distortion of his own remarks that he finally retracted them. And in this PBS discussion, tries to deny he even made them.
This is often true of inflammatory remarks by Democrats: that if the remarks are given visibility, it exposes them to be false, and downright anti-American in their partisan rhetoric.
Smearing the reputation of our troops, branding our soldiers falsely as thugs and murderers in the eyes of the world, just to pander to the liberal fringe that is their voter-base.
Liberal rhetoric that is emotionally charged, but devoid of any factual basis.
But when repeated enough by Democrats in Washington, and reported unchallenged by a complicit liberal-dominated media, becomes perceived as fact, although having no factual basis.
Democrats are saying that our troops are comparable to : "Nazi storm troopers, Soviet Gulags, and the Cambodian Pol Pot regime." ( Dem Sen. Dick Durbin)
I guess this was mostly Wonder Boy's point of contention since a casual search could not find the same outrage being expressed by G-Man. So Bush's nominee for Attorney General and his anti-American, Anti-troop inflammatory remarks are going to receive the same intense denouncement and assumptions of doing Bin laden's dirty work from you as well?
EDIT:
It has been well over 24 hours, and I am still waiting for the collective freak-out from the frothing right about Mukasey’s traitorous proclamations yesterday.
Where are all the patriots? As we learned with Dick Durbin, we must condemn Mukasey’s comments or mullahs everywhere will be laughing at us.
BTW, The use of “torture” — as a word — is irrelevant. Geneva forbids abuse. Whether something is or isn’t “torture” is meaningless. We should encourage our Congress to focus on the real issue: The laws of war prohibit all abuse: Just because “something isn’t torture” doesn’t mean that it is lawful under Geneva.
By JAN CRAWFORD GREENBURG and ARIANE de VOGUE Nov. 2, 2007
A senior Justice Department official, charged with reworking the administration's legal position on torture in 2004 became so concerned about the controversial interrogation technique of waterboarding that he decided to experience it firsthand, sources told ABC News.
Daniel Levin, then acting assistant attorney general, went to a military base near Washington and underwent the procedure to inform his analysis of different interrogation techniques.
After the experience, Levin told White House officials that even though he knew he wouldn't die, he found the experience terrifying and thought that it clearly simulated drowning.
Levin, who refused to comment for this story, concluded waterboarding could be illegal torture unless performed in a highly limited way and with close supervision. And, sources told ABC News, he believed the Bush Administration had failed to offer clear guidelines for its use.
Bush Administration Blocked Critic
The administration at the time was reeling from an August 2002 memo by Jay Bybee, then the head of the Office of Legal Counsel, which laid out possible justifications for torture. In June 2004, Levin's predecessor at the office, Jack Goldsmith, officially withdrew the Bybee memo, finding it deeply flawed.
When Levin took over from Goldsmith, he went to work on a memo that would effectively replace the Bybee memo as the administration's legal position on torture. It was during this time that he underwent waterboarding.
In December 2004, Levin released the new memo. He said, "Torture is abhorrent" but he went on to say in a footnote that the memo was not declaring the administration's previous opinions illegal. The White House, with Alberto Gonzales as the White House counsel, insisted that this footnote be included in the memo.
But Levin never finished a second memo imposing tighter controls on the specific interrogation techniques. Sources said he was forced out of the Justice Department when Gonzales became attorney general.
Critics Decry Waterboarding as Torture
Critics say waterboarding should never be used.
According to retired Rear Adm. John Hutson, "There is no question this is torture -- this is a technique by which an individual is strapped to a board, elevated by his feet and either dunked into water or water poured over his face over a towel or a blanket."
The legal justification of waterboarding has come to the forefront in the debate swirling around Michael B. Mukasey's nomination for attorney general.
While Democrats are pressing him to declare waterboarding illegal, he has refused to do so. He calls it personally "repugnant," but he is unwilling to declare it illegal until he can see the classified information regarding the technique and its current use.
Here's a guy who put his money where his mouth was and actually volunteered to see if it was indeed torture, which as I explained above is really irrelevent to the Geneva Conventions wording anyways. And for his now more INFORMED opinion, was summarily fired.
"Please don't pour water on my face! All I did was try to kill you as part of my sworn goal to eradicate your way of life!"
Would you volunteer as well to see if it's no big deal, then?
I have to respect the Acting Attorney General that he actually put his money where his mouth was to see if it was the big nothing that supporters claim it is.
On Friday’s Countdown Keith Olbermann talked to Newsweek’s Richard Wolfe and Former Nixon White House Counsel, John Dean, about Senators Feinstein and Schumer’s caving on President Bush’s Attorney General nominee and the ABC News report that claims former acting Assistant Attorney General Daniel Levin was forced out of the DoJ when he declared waterboarding to be torture — after allowing himself to be waterboarded.
You know, I just love the fact that, in the middle of a friggin' war, the administration is supposed to let people who work for the government go on TV and blab about national security.
These people seem to think the only secret in Washington worth keeping was that some blowhard diplomatic holdover from the Clinton administration got a job because of his wife's CIA connections.
These people seem to think the only secret in Washington worth keeping was that some blowhard diplomatic holdover from the Clinton administration got a job because of his wife's CIA connections.
[b]Wilson served in the U.S. diplomatic corps from January 1976 through 1998, with postings in five different African nations between 1976 and 1988.[8]
From 1988 to 1991, he was the Deputy Chief of Mission (to U.S. Ambassador to Iraq April Catherine Glaspie) at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq. In the wake of Iraq's 1990 Invasion of Kuwait, he became the last American diplomat to meet with Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, telling him in very clear terms to "get out of Kuwait".[9] When Hussein sent a note to Wilson (along with other embassy heads in Baghdad) threatening to execute anyone sheltering foreigners in Iraq, Wilson publicly repudiated the dictator by appearing at a press conference wearing a homemade noose around his neck, and declaring, "If the choice is to allow American citizens to be taken hostage or to be executed, I will bring my own fucking rope."
Despite Hussein's threats, Wilson sheltered more than one hundred Americans at the embassy, and successfully evacuated several thousand people (Americans and other nationals) from the country. He was praised by President George H. W. Bush for his actions: "...when I arrived back in Washington on January 13, 1991, the very next day I was in the Oval Office ... The President introduced me to his War Cabinet as a true American hero."[10]
Wilson next served for three years as U.S. ambassador to Gabon and São Tomé and Príncipe, and subsequently helped direct Africa policy for the National Security Council during the administration of President Bill Clinton.[11]
You know that weird assertions like the one you just made are ridiculously easy to rebut, right?
Or was "Clinton Administration holdover" supposed to immediately discredit him and cow us into accepting the rest of your narrative?
The point was that he was, in fact, there during the Clinton administration and was, in fact, a vocal Clinton supporter. And that small digression in no way diminishes my main point which was, and is, the fact that the left thinks leaking national secrets is a great thing EXCEPT when it comes to the fact that Plame worked for the CIA.
The point was that he was, in fact, there during the Clinton administration and was, in fact, a vocal Clinton supporter.
Oh, ....... THE HORROR!!!!!!
Is that suppsed to discredit him? Was his actions during the George HW Bush Administration, and Bush's flowery praise of Wilson supposed to discredit him in MY view then?
Funny how to you, supporting Clinton somehow discredits his assessment about bogus yellowcake. Funny how no WMD's have been found tothis day either...
But we're still attacking Wilson to this daybecause he contradicted Bush's speech.
Quote:
And that small digression in no way diminishes my main point which was, and is, the fact that the left thinks leaking national secrets is a great thing EXCEPT when it comes to the fact that Plame worked for the CIA.
How is this story leaking national secrets? And if you'd like, I can run the whole litany of the Bush Administration leaking secrets when it wanted to bolster it's anti-terror rep. In fact that thread is called "Bush Incompetence # ___ ".
I'm still waiting for a conservative response on that one BTW.
Well, again, I don't see it that way. I see Republicans as responding directly to specific statements by Democrats when they attack them. Not just personally smearing Democrats, but specifically criticizing the poor judgement and wrong policies of what specific Democrats have said.
For example, Sen Dick Durbin's inflammatory and ill-advised remarks saying U.S. soldiers were comparable to the Pol Pot regime, Soviet Gulags, and Nazi storm troopers
But I disagree that "support the troops" is used to discourage criticism of the leadership conducting the war (both of military/Pentagon leadership, and of the higher Bush cabinet leadership). As I've said often: constructive criticism, in a checks-and-balances way asking valid questions, and pushing for an efficient war and diplomatic policy, is supportive.
But the scorched-earth rhetoric of Democrats, likening the minor abuses at Abu Ghraib to "atrocicties" comparable to the genocide of "Nazi storm troopers, Soviet Gulags and the Pol Pot regime..." (Democrat Sen Dick Durbin, and similar rhetoric from Howard Dean, Nancy Pelosi, John Kerry, Harry Reid, Jon Murtha, etc.)... this is falsely painting these abuses to be larger than they are. Smearing all the 150,000 troops in Iraq with the same brush, and ignoring that the military prosecutes and punishes these abuses. Undermining the morale of all the troops, not just the prosecuted abusers. Undermining public opinion and support for all the troops, not just the abusers.
Democrat(ic) leaders, and Democrats at the grassroots level, have been spiteful and indiscriminate, mouthing damaging rhetoric that undermines the entire war effort, not just the mistakes and setbacks in the mission. And at every stage, Democrats have demoralized our soldiers' efforts, encouraged their immediate removal, and questioned their ability to do the job under any circumstances.
And ultimately, Democrats are providing defeatist un-American soundbytes, that are re-broadcast in the Muslim world. That inflame, encourage and give new life to the Iraq insurgency by raising the constant spectre of premature U.S. withdrawal, and painting a tiny number of abuses (which are punished) with the unmitigated beheadings and mass killings of our enemy.
I see absolutely nothing supportive or constructive about Democrat(ic) participation in the Iraq war dialogue. It is absolutely not supportive of the troops for precisely these reasons.
I love the part (at my link, but not excerpted above) where Sen. Bond brings up Sen. Durbin's nationally televised remarks a few weeks ago ( where Durbin compared U.S. military treatment of prisoners to that of the Nazis, Russian Gulags, the Cambodian Pol Pot regime's extermination of over 3 million of that nation's civilian population between 1975-1979, ad nauseum. )
Remarks for which Sen. Durbin received so much heat for the hyperbolic distortion of his own remarks that he finally retracted them. And in this PBS discussion, tries to deny he even made them.
This is often true of inflammatory remarks by Democrats: that if the remarks are given visibility, it exposes them to be false, and downright anti-American in their partisan rhetoric.
Smearing the reputation of our troops, branding our soldiers falsely as thugs and murderers in the eyes of the world, just to pander to the liberal fringe that is their voter-base.
Liberal rhetoric that is emotionally charged, but devoid of any factual basis.
But when repeated enough by Democrats in Washington, and reported unchallenged by a complicit liberal-dominated media, becomes perceived as fact, although having no factual basis.
Democrats are saying that our troops are comparable to : "Nazi storm troopers, Soviet Gulags, and the Cambodian Pol Pot regime." ( Dem Sen. Dick Durbin)
I guess this was mostly Wonder Boy's point of contention since a casual search could not find the same outrage being expressed by G-Man. So Bush's nominee for Attorney General and his anti-American, Anti-troop inflammatory remarks are going to receive the same intense denouncement and assumptions of doing Bin laden's dirty work from you as well?
EDIT:
It has been well over 24 hours, and I am still waiting for the collective freak-out from the frothing right about Mukasey’s traitorous proclamations yesterday.
Where are all the patriots? As we learned with Dick Durbin, we must condemn Mukasey’s comments or mullahs everywhere will be laughing at us.
I've had better things to do than deconstruct your latest misrepresentations.
Musakey did not make, as you allege, the same kind of comparisons of U.S. soldiers in Iraq to "Nazi storm troopers, Soviet Gulags and the Pol Pot regime..."
Musakey was speaking in the abstract of a hypothetical situation, saying: "whatever is specifically defined as torture, if we did allow our nation to use torture..." it would negate the very principles this nation stands for. But he left it for others to define whether "water boarding" (i.e., simulated drowning as an intimidation technique during interrogation of prisoners) is or is not torture.
Richard Lowry on PBS' News Hour on Friday pointed out that waterboarding can't be that bad, if U.S. soldiers endure it during military training, and if even journalists have volunteered to be subjected to it, to understand what it is. No one would volunteer for something that is truly torture.
Originally Posted By: Rich Lowry
I think waterboarding -- look, reasonable people can conclude it's torture, but I sort of apply a commonsense standard here. Journalists are volunteering to be waterboarded to see what it's like. You would not do that with any infamous, obvious torture techniques. Journalists wouldn't volunteer, "Please, pull out my fingernail. I'm really curious how that feels."
And they're only volunteering because it's two minutes of panic. It's a horrifying procedure, but then you walk away. And we use it in our own training for the Army and the Navy, the training of survival and resistance. If it's torture, that training itself is illegal and wrong and shouldn't be happening.
So, look, obviously it's right up there, right to the line. I think it's a technique that should be used in reserve, that we should have in reserve, in extremely limited circumstances, in cases where you have very high-level al-Qaida officials who might have knowledge of ongoing plots. So you don't have time to deal with them over a period of months and you want to break them quickly, and that's exactly what happened with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
Democrats on the Senate panel were infuriated that Musakey wouldn't specifically say whether "water-boarding" fell in the category of torture or not, but Musakey said repeatedly that his job is to enforce the law, and that it is for others to decide whether water-boarding falls within the law or not.
But even so, Sen Chuck Schumer (D- NY) and Sen Diane Feinstein (D- CA) both had enough confidence in Musakey's interpretation of the law to say they will vote "yes" for his Attorney General nomination.
So the facts are not as you represented them here, Whomod. Not by a long shot.
Democrats on the Senate panel were infuriated that Musakey wouldn't specifically say whether "water-boarding" fell in the category of torture or not, but Musakey said repeatedly that his job is to enforce the law, and that it is for others to decide whether water-boarding falls within the law or not.
as an Attorney General it will be his job to interpret the law and decide whether something merits prosecution. The fact that he'd let his superiors tell him how to interpret the law makes him another Bush Bitch.
Quote:
But even so, Sen Chuck Schumer (D- NY) and Sen Diane Feinstein (D- CA) both had enough confidence in Musakey's interpretation of the law to say they will vote "yes" for his Attorney General nomination.
no, they just caved like the wimps that they've been.
Quote:
So the facts are not as you represented them here, Whomod. Not by a long shot.
wondy, you wouldn't know the facts if they dressed up like a Filipino girl and took you to a clan rally.
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
wondy, you wouldn't know the facts if they dressed up like a Filipino girl and took you to a clan rally.
Originally Posted By: WB
Sometimes I wish had enough meanness in me to give you a full taste of the mocking antagonism you live your miserable life to dish out every day. But I stood at the edge of the abyss, and I stepped back. Better to let you roast in your own bile, than to leap off there with you.
___________________________________________
Battle not with whomods, lest ye become a whomod. And if you gaze into the whomod, the whomod gazes also into you. --Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzche (abridged)
Democrats on the Senate panel were infuriated that Musakey wouldn't specifically say whether "water-boarding" fell in the category of torture or not, but Musakey said repeatedly that his job is to enforce the law, and that it is for others to decide whether water-boarding falls within the law or not.
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
as an Attorney General it will be his job to interpret the law and decide whether something merits prosecution. The fact that he'd let his superiors tell him how to interpret the law makes him another Bush Bitch.
Point of information: Congress makes laws, not the President. Therefore, if the Democrat majority in congress want waterboarding to be declared illegal, they can just pass a law to do so. They don't need an attorney general opinion and, in fact, such an opinion would be non-binding.
Second point of information: Musakey did not say he would "let his superiors tell him how to interpret the law." He said that he would need to know all the facts, including information that is currently classified, from both sides of the debate, to make up his mind.
This is, in fact, the proper course of action for any attorney to take. One of the first things taught in law school is that the law has to be applied to the facts of a case in order to reach a correct ruling. An incomplete set of facts can, and sometimes does, lead to an incorrect legal opinion.
As for your allegation that Schumer is some sort of wimp who doesn't like to take on the White House, you obviously don't live in his home state. I do. The guy has made a career out of bashing Bush, sometimes deservedly so (the Dubai Port deal, for example), other times no so deservedly.
Democrats on the Senate panel were infuriated that Musakey wouldn't specifically say whether "water-boarding" fell in the category of torture or not, but Musakey said repeatedly that his job is to enforce the law, and that it is for others to decide whether water-boarding falls within the law or not.
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
as an Attorney General it will be his job to interpret the law and decide whether something merits prosecution. The fact that he'd let his superiors tell him how to interpret the law makes him another Bush Bitch.
Point of information: Congress makes laws, not the President. Therefore, if the Democrat majority in congress want waterboarding to be declared illegal, they can just pass a law to do so. They don't need an attorney general opinion and, in fact, such an opinion would be non-binding.
Second point of information: Musakey did not say he would "let his superiors tell him how to interpret the law." He said that he would need to know all the facts, including information that is currently classified, from both sides of the debate, to make up his mind.
This is, in fact, the proper course of action for any attorney to take. One of the first things taught in law school is that the law has to be applied to the facts of a case in order to reach a correct ruling. An incomplete set of facts can, and sometimes does, lead to an incorrect legal opinion.
As for your allegation that Schumer is some sort of wimp who doesn't like to take on the White House, you obviously don't live in his home state. I do. The guy has made a career out of bashing Bush, sometimes deservedly so (the Dubai Port deal, for example), other times no so deservedly.
the last AG did in fact let the President tell him what to do versus following the law. This guy could've given some answer. Even one with wiggle room. And a congressman who sets out to challenge a president asks a question and then backs down without getting an answer to his question is a wimp in my book, no matter what party he is in. The congress is supposed to hold the president to high level scrutiny and these confirmation hearings are supposed to be tough. To back down on a valid question is wimpy.
That assumes a fact not in evidence, to wit, that the question was valid in the first place.
G-man, I could write out a long response to you explaining exactly why the question is valid and why an answer is needed. Unfortunately after knowing you on this board for so many years I don't think you'd be smart enough to understand it.
Democrats on the Senate panel were infuriated that Musakey wouldn't specifically say whether "water-boarding" fell in the category of torture or not, but Musakey said repeatedly that his job is to enforce the law, and that it is for others to decide whether water-boarding falls within the law or not.
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
as an Attorney General it will be his job to interpret the law and decide whether something merits prosecution. The fact that he'd let his superiors tell him how to interpret the law makes him another Bush Bitch.
Point of information: Congress makes laws, not the President. Therefore, if the Democrat majority in congress want waterboarding to be declared illegal, they can just pass a law to do so. They don't need an attorney general opinion and, in fact, such an opinion would be non-binding.
Second point of information: Musakey did not say he would "let his superiors tell him how to interpret the law." He said that he would need to know all the facts, including information that is currently classified, from both sides of the debate, to make up his mind.
This is, in fact, the proper course of action for any attorney to take. One of the first things taught in law school is that the law has to be applied to the facts of a case in order to reach a correct ruling. An incomplete set of facts can, and sometimes does, lead to an incorrect legal opinion.
As for your allegation that Schumer is some sort of wimp who doesn't like to take on the White House, you obviously don't live in his home state. I do. The guy has made a career out of bashing Bush, sometimes deservedly so (the Dubai Port deal, for example), other times no so deservedly.
Thank you for the slight correction on that detail, G-man. I'd forgotten that Mukasey said he would need to see more facts to make a decision.
And Schumer and Feinstein didn't "wimp" as Ray alleges, they were satisfied that Mukasey had enough respect for the law that they would vote for him as Attorney General. It was another Democrat Senator who postured outrage at Musakey's reluctance to declare "water-boarding" a form of torture to be banned from use. But since Musakey said he didn't fully know what water-boarding was, or what the law's position is on water boarding (i.e., whether it is legal or illegal), he could not commit himself to an answer without having all the legal facts.
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
Originally Posted By: Wonder Boy
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
eventually "i refuse to sink to your level" being said over and over again just make you look like a baby.
No, it makes me look like someone who won't sink to your level. Despite how you try to spin it.
yeah, you're the iconic symbol of an honorable and respected poster here and every post against you is just me.
I freely admit that I'm not above losing my cool here on occasion. The only one I've seen here who hasn't (from either the Left or Right of these discussions) is Rob Kamphausen.
But I certainly make one hell of a lot more effort to be respectful to you, than you do to myself or anyone who disagrees with you. Your contempt, insults, and ad-hominem personal attacks are the very definition of uncivil.
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
Originally Posted By: Wonder Boy
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
eventually "i refuse to sink to your level" being said over and over again just make you look like a baby.
No, it makes me look like someone who won't sink to your level. Despite how you try to spin it.
yeah, you're the iconic symbol of an honorable and respected poster here and every post against you is just me.
I freely admit that I'm not above losing my cool here on occasion. The only one I've seen here who hasn't (from either the Left or Right of these discussions) is Rob Kamphausen.
But I certainly make one hell of a lot more effort to be respectful to you, than you do to myself or anyone who disagrees with you. Your contempt, insults, and ad-hominem personal attacks are the very definition of uncivil.
maybe i said it wrong, but i meant no one liked you and no one cared what your standards are. and way to slip in the kamphausen ass kissing. you seem to forget that i didn't pick you out of the blue one day and decide to hound you to the gates of hell. you started it by responding to everything i said with "typical liberal tactics" and even then i pretty much ignored you. then you started with the whole racism thing on the black history month thread. that's what got my ire up. and from there i actually started paying attention to you and saw how much of a racist pedophile supporting douche you are.
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
Originally Posted By: Wonder Boy
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
Originally Posted By: Wonder Boy
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
eventually "i refuse to sink to your level" being said over and over again just make you look like a baby.
No, it makes me look like someone who won't sink to your level. Despite how you try to spin it.
yeah, you're the iconic symbol of an honorable and respected poster here and every post against you is just me.
I freely admit that I'm not above losing my cool here on occasion. The only one I've seen here who hasn't (from either the Left or Right of these discussions) is Rob Kamphausen.
But I certainly make one hell of a lot more effort to be respectful to you, than you do to myself or anyone who disagrees with you. Your contempt, insults, and ad-hominem personal attacks are the very definition of uncivil.
maybe i said it wrong, but i meant no one liked you and no one cared what your standards are.
More factless insults on your part.
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
and way to slip in the kamphausen ass kissing.
I don't need to "kiss Rob's ass." What would that possibly gain me, even if I did? You can be polite to Rob, or say "fuck you, Rob Kamphausen," as many here have, often playfully, sometimes angrily, and it won't get you banned or cause you any hardhip or favor here. To allege otherwise is a bullshit argument.
I've had some harsh words with Rob, mostly about the way he runs his boards, allowing slanderous mean-spirited pieces of shit like you to run wild here.
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
you seem to forget that i didn't pick you out of the blue one day and decide to hound you to the gates of hell. you started it by responding to everything i said with "typical liberal tactics" and even then i pretty much ignored you.
You mean I actually criticized your slanderous attacks on myself, G-man, and on conservatives in general? That I pointed out your blatant factual innacuracies, and offered verifying facts to disprove your false arguments?
For example, to factually disprove how you portray Hitler as a "good Christian", when in fact he was, while giving lip-service to Christianity, in truth was just out-maneuvering Christians politically, in movement toward the goal of eradicating and/or imprisoning all Christians, and that many Christians risked their lives in Germany to openly criticize Hitler, and wound up by the thousands in concentration camps?
Yeah, that's pretty underhanded of me, to factually dispute your arguments, rather than just factlessly slander you, as you constantly do me, where you constantly blanket-label me a "racist", every time I disagree with your political views. When in truth I clearly interact with, and have friends of, many other races and cultures, even gays, who I politically disagree with, but do not hate.
I simply advocate other means than you do to acheive equality, true equality, and an absence of race-consciousness, by taking away the training wheels of minority quotas, awarding SAT points to minorities, and constant re-dredging of past racism, to bring about a unified society, instead of endless white apologies that liberals indulge in, which just makes minorities even more hostile to whites. Real equality, rewarding only real merit. Not liberal exploitation of race politics for political gain, and socialist handouts to those who haven't earned them, and depriving those who have earned them, in some perverted liberal notion of social justice.
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
then you started with the whole racism thing on the black history month thread. that's what got my ire up. and from there i actually started paying attention to you and saw how much of a racist pedophile supporting douche you are.
In other words (ignoring your usual over-the-top inflammatory personal insults) you have a different point of view, and since you can't dispute me on the facts, you engage in vindictive insults and character assassination.
You know calling me a racist is a lie.
You know calling me a pedophile is a lie. (I didn't excuse Mark Foley, but you did excuse Gerry Studds. Who's the true pedophile advocate, Ray?)
The bottom line is, regarding race issues, I just advocate a different approach than you do: dealing with the real issue, of flawed liberal ideology that perpetuates racial division, and not heaping all the blame on white America.
The way liberal views are set up, all the blame belongs on white America, and only whites are capable of racism. Whereas the truth is, all races engage in racism to some degree. Blacks in Africa --who began slavery hundreds of years before they began selling slaves to Europeans, and continued the slave trade hundreds of years after-- are just as guilty regarding black slavery, but are somehow absolved of guilt.
There are social reasons, within their respective ethnic communities, that more blacks and hispanics drop out of school and don't pursue higher education, and are more likely to get involved in drugs, crime, etc., than other racial groups.
We shouldn't sweep all those causes under the rug and say that's just "diversity" and that anyone who points out the achievement gap between blacks and hispanics (vs. that of whites and asians). And we shouldn't allow anyone who dares to point out the core problem to be blanket-labelled a "racist".
We should instead start dealing with the core social reasons that blacks and hispanics are not achieving the same level, and bring them up to the level of other racial groups. Not lower national standards, and harass anyone who dares to say what the problem is, as yourself and other liberals have been doing for 40 years.
I describe your tactics as "typical liberal arguments" because they are consistent issue-dodging personal attacks used by liberals, to silence their opponents without addressing the real issue.
There is not one time that I deliberately misrepresented you, or engaged in the kind of vicious attacks on me that you vomit out pretty much every day:
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
then you started with the whole racism thing on the black history month thread. that's what got my ire up. and from there i actually started paying attention to you and saw how much of a racist pedophile supporting douche you are.
Originally Posted By: Friendly Neighborhood Ray-man
