With the Democratic leadership continuing to block any impeachment effort or any serious effort to hold officials liable for the U.S. torture program, Congress was free to hold another bizarre hearing today to calmly discussed our use of torture. Even though current Attorney General continues to evade the question, former Attorney General acknowledged and defended water boarding.
This is not the first hearing where the value of our use of torture was addressed as a routine matter of discussion, click here. Indeed, we have now gotten to the point where we openly compare our acts of torture with those of other nations, click here.
Thus, it was no surprise to see members bantering about on the use of a war crime today like it was some chicken subsidy going to mark up.
For his part, Ashcroft fulfilled his stereotype as more general and attorney. When asked if he felt that other nations could legitimately waterboard our own soldiers when captured, Ashcroft did not contest that possibility. Instead, he gave a non-answer: “Well, my subscription to these memos, and my belief that the law provides the basis for these memos persisted even in the presence of my son serving two tours of duty overseas in the Gulf area as a member of our armed forces,.” Some could easily read that response as affirming that it would be permissible to waterboard our own soldiers when captured.
With the International Red Cross informing the Administration that high officials could be tried for war crimes over our torture program, here, many of us are left with this out-of-body sensation in watching these hearings unfold. Just yesterday, Speaker Pelosi reaffirmed that (no matter how strong the evidence might be that President Bush committed crimes, including war crimes, in office) she would not allow impeachment proceedings to begin. So, instead, we just sit around and calmly discuss war crimes like some interesting factoids and conversation points.
For the full story, click here.
Miles:
You can fight the beast, but you need not become the beast. Were we torturers like the Japanese or the Nazi’s to gain information, or did we fight the ethical and legal way? It’s a false choice perpetrated by the Neanderthals running this show. When it’s all said and done you have to live with your actions. If a nation loses its moral compass in the battle to survive, it has already lost.
Art,
I agree with what you said. I wonder if Congresspeople can be legally charged with obstruction of justice.
Jill
Gyges:
Bravo.
What I mean is in the sense of waterboarding. When dealing with the terrorists who planned the attacks on 9/11 and other terror schemes, I am all for sleep deprivation, loud music, and waterboarding. All of which most of you consider “torture”. When the plotter of 9/11 endured 33 seconds of waterboarding, and then gave valuable information, I think you have to think of the lives cost. I think in a terror war, with jihadists cutting heads off and using real torture techniques, you need to take a step back and realize what we are dealing with. I’m not sure the terrorists care if we are moral, and I’m not sure I care if other countries think we are moral when in fact I think this is the right thing to do. If I’m choosing either to be moral or to save an American life, you can surely bet I’m saving my countryman. Also, the media plays this up so much. Don’t you think terrorists are over there laughing? Saying, ha, if we make them think they are torturing us, the media is gonna catch wind and expose this. If Osama is caught, would you care if he was sleep deprived, waterboarded, and tortured inhumanely? Be honest because I’m sure most of you moral people wouldn’t give a damn if he was.
Miles,
If patriotism means a lack of empathy you can count me out.
I’m going to do something most people here won’t do (and I probably shouldn’t either), I’m going to assume you’re willing to listen to a reasonable argument. I’m even going to assume that everything you say is true.
First, you say we care more about the terrorists feelings then our country. This is wrong, we care more about the rule of law of the country than we care about revenge. Or you could say we care more about protecting the innocent than punishing the guilty. We work from the assumption that not everyone that’s suspected of something is guilty.
As for the rest it’s just lazy thinking. You appeal to the antiquity of torture. Magic has been used to cure illness for longer than modern medicines, do you go to a doctor or a shaman? You say the terrorists have been trained to resist being tortured then say that we should therefore torture them. Do you also suggest a treatment of penicillin for an infection that’s penicillin resistant?
I feel for anyone who dies (or rather their family). Regardless of if they’re a youth who’s been fed a doctrine of hatred his whole life or if they’re an American Soldier who put his life on the line to do what he has been told is necessary to protect his country.
Some of the questions and testimony centered on “Did it work, or not?” (could we gain valuable information from this?). I submit that, if you get to the question of whether it works or not – you have lost your moral bearing. If the satisfactory answer to justify waterboarding is “it works” – then the next question, when it doesn’t work,is “what does work?” And your justification for “Burning at the stake” or any other brutality, is provided.
Cruelty is wrong because we’re better than that.
I think that Pelosi and the Democratic leaders need to be impeached, first, as legal obstructionists.
Miles:
If I didn’t know better, I’d swear your comments were written in German just substituting Jews, or Poles, or whatever group the Nazi’s were fighting at the time. You want to be a moral relativist on the topic of torture go ahead — just realize the company you keep. By the way, being “nice” to prisoners of war is precisely the approach our interrogators took in interviewing and living with Nazi and Japanese WW2 soldiers. It was imminently successful, your macho assumptions not withstanding. And I suspect that the Bushido Code of the Japanese was every bit as tough as you incorrectly assume these terrorist’s to be.
Miles: With that kind of reasoning you could justify just about any technique for torture. If we, as Americans, are not seen as a moral nation then there is no reason for us to ever expect any surrender or peaceful end to any conceivable war in which we are victorious. Why would any other nation agree to lay down their arms if they know that they may be tortured for information? If warring nations are not willing to surrender or agree to a peaceful end (accepting that a longer duration of combat implies more casualties) then this would imply that more American soldiers would die too. Think about the consequences.
This really is surreal. Ashcroft supposedly opposed some of this shit in private meetings with “the (un)pricipals”. Evidence of torture being both designed and approved by dick and george increases each day.
Ascroft considers himself a highly moral person (HMP). An ethical person who knew something was wrong, had genuinely tried privately to fix it with no real success; would speak out publically, screaming from the rooftops. The eagle isn’t soaring. It’s sitting in a nest full of its own excrement.
As to Congress. I find their behavior appalling. They are nattering nabobs–period! I’m certain taking on the dick and his george would be terrifying. It could get very ugly. But courageous people do things because they should do them. I am also guessing that there are Congresspeople with connections to those who know where many of this administration’s bodies are buried (besides the ones in Arlington and overseas). This would be a good time to put that info to work.
“Just yesterday, Speaker Pelosi reaffirmed that (no matter how strong the evidence might be that President Bush committed crimes, including war crimes, in office) she would not allow impeachment proceedings to begin.”
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Please mark July 16, 2008, as the day our generation’s moral corruption was complete, and our adherence to the Rule of Law ended. Let’s hope for better from the next.
Mespo,
I don’t see why that needs to be an either\or situation.
What’s insane is the complete loss of any patriotism and common sense these days. Sure George Bush was horrible in the White House, but are you really justifying the fact that we should be nice to known terrorists? These men have murdered innocent Americans. It’s come to the point where we care more about the terrorist’s “feelings” then our own safety. Wake up people, it’s a global war on terror and the information extracted from these goons could save thousands of lives. These terrorists are trained extensively to resist torture so I’m pretty sure being nice and asking them politely to hand out information is out of the question. It’s torture, so what, it’s been used for thousands of years. so start worrying more about your frickin country, that has provided so much for you, and less about a small boo-boo a terrorist gets. You are the people that probably feel bad for the evil 16-year old that blew up an American soldier as well.
“Let the eagle fly….” Wonder what kind of song he’ll sing at the war crimes trial? Are they all utterly and hopelessly corrupt, or just scared little men desperately covering their behinds? I think the latter is the best explanation, and not just because it exposes the hypocrisies of these “giants”, but merely because it is usually the case.
Include Bush and Cheney in the waterboarding line. In fact, just do all three of them at the same time. These people are criminals, plain and simple. I hope they are someday made to pay.
Ashcroft needs to be waterboarded. Then we’ll see if his opinion of it changes.
“We don’t torture.” __GB
Let’s waterboard John Ashcroft to get info on Bush and Cheney and see how quickly he cries!
How loudly do you think this and all neo-cons would scream torture if water boarding was done to them or their families? It boggles my mind that a former attorney general could say such nonsense or support such atrocious behavior..
Ashcroft is utterly and completely insane. He needs to be thoroughly waterboarded.
Thank you for continuing to speak out on these subjects. I usually just pound my head against the wall.