Torture: Still doesn't work

[RandomGuy]

I've made my ethical determination the techniques do not cons ute torture, were warranted, legitimate, and effective. Your bias is not allowing you to understand my position, vis-a-vis a legal determination. While I believe the Bush administration did due diligence in developing a regimen of harsh interrogation techniques that were not torture, you claim the opposite. The way to settle the argument is not by shouting each other down on the internet or fostering a narrative in the media. It is by dragging the techniques into a court of law and having them examined and found to be either torture or not torture. That hasn't happened. And, until it does, you have nothing more than the blathering of a bunch of Bush haters that have dragged this out for over a decade without being willing to actually have the argument settled in court. I believe that's because they know it'll be discovered the techniques were, in fact, not torture.


I think the more appropriate question is, where is your proof the techniques cons uted torture?


Again, are the techniques torture? And, it would also depend on what they were CONVINCED I knew. Was I in the leadership of an organization that had just murdered 3,000 people and, for all we knew, were in the process of executing a follow on attack?


Again, if only our enemies would engage in such due diligence when deciding on how to interrogate our servicemen.

Um, yeah.

I"ll have to get back to this. Quite frankly, the level of sophistry and sheer bloody-minded lack of ethics you display seriously here make me a bit too disgusted to respond at the moment.

In the meantime, keep dissembling. It makes your arguments look tier. I'll give you a day to find a shred of decency, and maybe answer the questions I have posed in an intellectually honest way, after that I am pissed enough that I will start treating you like Cosmored, and string together my honest questions, and your evasive dishonesty.

I will assert you cannot under just about any commonly accepted view of ethics determine that the kinds of waterboarding is ethical. I think that if you elaborated a bit on that, you would be forced to see it, or at the very least provide an amusing bit of mental gymnastics.

Until then:
How do you decide what is ethical, Yonivore? What are your guiding principles or precepts?

[Yonivore]

Um, yeah.

I"ll have to get back to this. Quite frankly, the level of sophistry and sheer bloody-minded lack of ethics you display seriously here make me a bit too disgusted to respond at the moment.

What are you, a Columbia student?

In the meantime, keep dissembling. It makes your arguments look tier. I'll give you a day to find a shred of decency, and maybe answer the questions I have posed in an intellectually honest way, after that I am pissed enough that I will start treating you like Cosmored, and string together my honest questions, and your evasive dishonesty.

My argument has not changed. Do what you want.

I will assert you cannot under just about any commonly accepted view of ethics determine that the kinds of waterboarding is ethical. I think that if you elaborated a bit on that, you would be forced to see it, or at the very least provide an amusing bit of mental gymnastics.

There's a difference between ethics and law. But, even so, I'm not questioning the ethics of the techniques just claiming they were legal, warranted, and effective. I can't help that it bothers you.

Until then:
How do you decide what is ethical, Yonivore? What are your guiding principles or precepts?

How do you decide what's legal, RandomGuy? And, the gum wrapper definition of ethical behavior is "doing the right thing even when you don't think anyone is watching." The CIA knew people were watching and they did the right thing.

[RandomGuy]

What are you, a Columbia student?


My argument has not changed. Do what you want.


There's a difference between ethics and law. But, even so, I'm not questioning the ethics of the techniques just claiming they were legal, warranted, and effective. I can't help that it bothers you.


How do you decide what's legal, RandomGuy? And, the gum wrapper definition of ethical behavior is "doing the right thing even when you don't think anyone is watching." The CIA knew people were watching and they did the right thing.

So, you are going to double down then, and keep dissembling. Gotcha, then you get the Cosmored treatment.

You can't ing answer a straight question, Cosmored can't answer a straight question.

When pressed to give an answer that might not present your case in a good light, or point out a weakness, you can't ing admit it.
When pressed to give an answer that might not present Cosmoreds case in a good light, or point out a weakness, Cosmored can't ing admit it.

It should bother you, were you not likely something of a sociopath, that there are some disturbing parallels in your thought processes with Cosmored.

[RandomGuy]

Until then:
How do you decide what is ethical, Yonivore? What are your guiding principles or precepts?

How do you decide what's legal, RandomGuy? And, the gum wrapper definition of ethical behavior is "doing the right thing even when you don't think anyone is watching." The CIA knew people were watching and they did the right thing.

Again, not an answer.

Answer my question, fairly asked, and asked first.

How do you decide what is ethical, Yonivore? What are your guiding principles or precepts?

If you prefer:

How do YOU determine what "the right thing" is?

Note:

I've made my ethical determination the techniques do not cons ute torture, were warranted, legitimate, and effective. Your bias is not allowing you to understand my position, vis-a-vis a legal determination. While I believe the Bush administration did due diligence in developing a regimen of harsh interrogation techniques that were not torture, you claim the opposite.

You can't claim it is my bias keeping me from understanding your ty opinion, if you refuse to tell me how you arrived at your ty opinion.

[Winehole23]

US Senate outlaws torture:

The Senate voted overwhelmingly Tuesday morning to permanently ban so-called “enhanced interrogation techniques” such as waterboarding, “rectal feeding” and hooding, in an effort stop what was widely seen as torture.


The 78-21 vote showed bipartisan support for the amendment of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which would ban the entire U.S. government — including the previously exempt CIA — from using torture on prisoners, according to The Hill.

Instead, the government would only be able to use what is in the Army Filed Manual, and would be required to update the manual every three years to make sure it is compliant with U.S. and international law.

Should the amendment clear Congress, it would make an executive order issued by Barack Obama in 2009 a law.

http://philadelphia.suntimes.com/nat...-s-use-torture

[RandomGuy]

With ISIS, for example "win" = exterminate because that is the only way you stop them.

I'm not stupid enough to think we are going to win anything in that hole part of the world.

It is a war of ideas. You win by making the idea discredited.

One thing this country tends to do poorly is idea warfare. We seem to have lost the knack for it.

[RandomGuy]

US Senate outlaws torture:

http://philadelphia.suntimes.com/nat...-s-use-torture

Some of the "plots" the CIA claims to have disrupted using information from torture included a plot to make a nuclear weapon by refining uranium by "swinging a bucket around on a rope".

FWIW... Helen Mirren reading the torture report, almost makes it sound interesting.

Torture still doesn't work, despite what Yonivore wants to think.

[boutons_deux]

FWIW... Helen Mirren reading the torture report, almost makes it sound interesting.

Torture still doesn't work, despite what Yonivore wants to think.

Scalia referencing at TV show proving torture works is irrefutable proof he's judicial garbage. Thanks, Repugs!

America is a better place for Repugs filling judgeships with judicial, ideological, religious, extremist, whoring garbage.

[Winehole23]

Alvin Bernard “Buzzy” Krongard, who was the CIA’s executive director from 2001 to 2004 — the number-three position at the agency — was asked on a BBC news program if he thought waterboarding and putting a detainee in painful stress positions amounted to torture.

“Well, let’s put it this way, it is meant to make him as uncomfortable as possible,” he said. “So I assume for, without getting into semantics, that’s torture. I’m comfortable with saying that.”


He added: “We were told by legal authorities that we could torture people.”

https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2...dmits-obvious/

[Winehole23]

mistaken iden y, 13 years at Gitmo. false imprisonment based on bad information in a legal black hole doesn't count as torture, but maybe is worse:

The Guantánamo parole board on Thursday approved the release of a Yemeni “forever prisoner,” dismissing U.S. intelligence that imprisoned the man for 13 years at the Navy base in Cuba as “discredited.”


The so-called Periodic Review Board heard the case of Mustafa al Shamiri, 37, on Dec. 1. His story captured the world’s attention because he was a victim of mistaken iden y. Intelligence analysts wrongly cast him as a captive of consequence, an al-Qaida facilitator or courier, rather than a run-of-the-mill jihadist — because his name was similar to actual extremists.

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nati...e55801630.html

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nati...#storylink=cpy

[RandomGuy]

When bluster meets stupidity: the CC way.

No need to be that unkind. CC can be reasoned with around the edges.

[RandomGuy]

mistaken iden y, 13 years at Gitmo. false imprisonment based on bad information in a legal black hole doesn't count as torture, but maybe is worse:

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nati...e55801630.html

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nati...#storylink=cpy

Shame.

It always shocks me that some are so glib about the "Terrorists" at Gitmo.

My country should not stand for indefinite detention without trial.

[boutons_deux]

My country should not stand for indefinite detention without trial.

American rights only apply to American citizens. They aren't human rights. non-Americans are second class humans. God Himself said so.

[RandomGuy]

Years later. Still doesn't work.

Doesn't stop Trump from saying it does though.

[Winehole23]

another way torture is counterproductive is that it's screwing up military commissions against Khalid Shaikh Mohammad and his co-defendants Walid bin Attash, Mustafa al-Hawsawi, Ramzi Binalshibh, and Ammar al-Baluchi (aka Ali Abdul Aziz Ali) -- 14 years later.


https://www.lawfareblog.com/military-commission-judge-bars-government-using-defendants-statements-fbi-clean-teams-911-case

[Spurtacular]

Torture still doesn't work, despite what Yonivore wants to think.

Today's bold-faced liar.

[RandomGuy]

Today's bold-faced liar.

Figured out how publicly-traded companies aren't the government?

[Chucho]

Figured out how publicly-traded companies aren't the government?

[Winehole23]

lawsuit against US contractors in Iraq moves forward.
.
if torture works, one would think the contractors would have come away at least with a few more false confessions

The case, brought under the Alien Tort Statute (ATS) and federal question jurisdiction, brings claims arising from violations of U.S. and international law, including torture; cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment; war crimes; assault and battery; sexual assault and battery; intentional infliction of emotional distress; negligent hiring and supervision; and negligent infliction of emotional distress. Through this action, the clients seek compensatory and punitive damages.


Our clients are Iraqis civilians who were ultimately released without ever being charged with a crime. They all continue to suffer from physical and mental injuries caused by the torture and other abuse they endured. Here’s a brief description of the acts to which they were subjected at the hands of CACI employees and certain government co-conspirators:


Suhail Najim Abdullah Al Shimari was detained from 2003 until 2008, during which he was held at the Abu Ghraib “hard site” for about two months. While he was there, CACI and its co-conspirators tortured him in various ways: he was subjected to electric shocks, deprived of food, threatened by dogs, and kept naked while forced to engage in physical activities to the point of exhaustion.


Taha Yaseen Arraq Rashid was detained from 2003 until 2005, during which he was imprisoned at the Abu Ghraib “hard site” for about three months. While he was detained there, CACI and its co-conspirators tortured Mr. Rashid by placing him in stress positions for extended periods of time; humiliating him; depriving him of oxygen, food, and water; shooting him in the head with a taser gun; and by beating him so severely that he suffered broken limbs and vision loss. Mr. Rashid was forcibly subjected to sexual acts by a female as he was cuffed and shackled to cell bars. He was also forced to witness the rape of a female prisoner.



Asa’ad Hamza Hanfoosh Zuba’e was imprisoned at Abu Ghraib from 2003 until 2004. CACI and its co-conspirators tortured him while he was detained there by subjecting him to extremely hot and cold water, beating his genitals with a stick, and detaining him in a solitary cell in conditions of sensory deprivation for almost a full year.


Salah Hasan Nusaif Al-Ejaili, an Al Jazeera journalist, was imprisoned at the Abu Ghraib “hard site” for approximately four months. While he was there, CACI and its co-conspirators stripped him and kept him naked, threatened him with dogs, deprived him of food, beat him, and kept him in a solitary cell in conditions of sensory deprivation.

https://ccrjustice.org/home/what-we-...i-v-caci-et-al

[boutons_deux]

https://ccrjustice.org/home/what-we-...i-v-caci-et-al

God's own Christian America! yeah!

[Winehole23]

US torture victim Gul Rahman's family sues to recover his body. The military contractors who designed the torture techniques used on him have settled the lawsuit against them.

the settlement left unresolved the mystery of what happened to Gul Rahman’s remains. Internal CIA investigations produced for the lawsuit recorded that the CIA ordered a freezer to preserve the body for an autopsy, and summarized an autopsy report that listed the likely cause of death as hypothermia. No records relating to the disposition of Rahman’s remains have been released.


The Geneva Conventions and other international treaties require that prisoners who die in custody in wartime be buried in marked graves, that the graves’ locations be recorded in a registry, and that their families be notified and allowed access to the gravesites when hostilities end.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...y-demands-body

[boutons_deux]

"an autopsy report that listed the likely cause of death as hypothermia"

they bothered with an autopsy?

God's very own Christ-loving USA froze GR to death?

[Winehole23]

the hostilities never ended, I guess.

[boutons_deux]

the hostilities never ended, I guess.

It's A Business, with Repugs privatizing their crimes to criminal contractors staffed by sadists, murderers, all sickos.

[Winehole23]

For the first time, open testimony about US torture.

Mr. Khan gained attention with the release of a 2014 study of the C.I.A. program by the Senate Intelligence Committee that said, after he refused to eat, his captors “infused” a puree of his lunch through his anus. The C.I.A. called it rectal refeeding. Mr. Khan called it rape.


The C.I.A. pumped water up the rectum of prisoners who would not follow a command to drink. Mr. Khan said this was done to him with “green garden hoses. They connected one end to the faucet, put the other in my rectum and they turned on the water.” He said he lost control of his bowels after those episodes and, to this day, has hemorrhoids.


He spoke about failed and sadistic responses to his hunger strikes and other acts of rebellion. Medics would roughly insert a feeding tube up his nose and down the back of his throat. He would try to bite it off and, in at least one instance, he said, a C.I.A. officer used a plunger to force food inside his stomach, a technique that caused stomach cramps and diarrhea.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/28/u...e-torture.html