Torture poll

[kendo1]

Worms, it seems to me that no-one takes you seriously because you talk a load of shit. Your attempts at trying to appear to be an intellectual are laughable.

Don't give up your day job.

Lighten up.

 

[Guest]

Worms, it seems to me that no-one takes you seriously because you talk a load of shit. Your attempts at trying to appear to be an intellectual are laughable.

Don't give up your day job.

Lighten up.

(And I'll bet that sounds so amazing with your accent. *swoon*)

 

[Pure]

note to ami:

ami Pure defines human life in such a way that if an individual cannot play the game of Marbles, then that individual is not human. Attempting to define life by listing the things a living human being can or cannot accomplish, is silliness to the nth degree.

Ami shows his usual reading comprehension problem, for i explicitly said the following.

pure In the narrow/basic sense, human life refers to the just the basic physical and physiological processes in the human individual, in his/her brain (including cortex), nervous system and body (esp. those of metabolism) which sustain him as such, allowing the existing, higher, typical human functions to occur. IOW the person in a coma without brain degeneration/atrophy still has (basic) individual human life, as does the helpless newborn whose main and typical human activity is grasping and suckling.

nothing about /playing marbles/

my definitions are consistent with the merriam webster entry cited by ami, himself, to wit:
c: an organismic state characterized by capacity for metabolism, growth, reaction to stimuli, and reproduction



this statement is false, as well:

ami It becomes more insanely difficult when Pure and company cannot decide whether human life exists one minute before birth or one minute after; or nine minutes, nine hours, or nine months before birth.

pure: it's plain to any careful reader that my definition poses no problem at all for the 1, or 9 minutes before birth near-borns. nor even 9 hours.

i stand with Ayn Rand: a soon-to-be-born fetus with cortex, lung functioning and general present ability to function as an individual (baby, that is) deserves protections against arbitrary loss of life. ami loves to debate fertilized eggs at every opportunity. if there was a thread on lamborghinis, ami would be posting, "never forget that liberals drive lamborghinis on their trips to abortionists."

in terms of the actual thread topic, no one should miss that ami has justified the state torturing individuals, including citizens, who are terror suspects. this is for "information". the ends justify the means, for ami; life may be terminated because of 'suspicion': so much for this 'absolute value.' while ami debates how many fertilized eggs can rationally inhabit the head of a pin, actual lives are being ruined or terminated, and all he can say, is "Aint America Great" and "civil liberties is an issue raised by traitors."

 

[amicus]

This post becomes even more pertinent in view of the last one.

http://www.aclu.org/safefree/extraordinaryrendition/22203res20051206.html

Beginning in the early 1990s and continuing to this day, the Central Intelligence Agency, together with other U.S. government agencies, has utilized an intelligence-gathering program involving the transfer of foreign nationals suspected of involvement in terrorism to detention and interrogation in countries where -- in the CIA's view -- federal and international legal safeguards do not apply. Suspects are detained and interrogated either by U.S. personnel at U.S.-run detention facilities outside U.S. sovereign territory or, alternatively, are handed over to the custody of foreign agents for interrogation. In both instances, interrogation methods are employed that do not comport with federal and internationally recognized standards. This program is commonly known as "extraordinary rendition."

The current policy traces its roots to the administration of former President Bill Clinton.

~~~

To add even more hops to an already tart brew, leading members of the current Democrat Administration were present at Intelligence briefings outlining, 'extreme rendition' and 'waterboarding'. Thus not only were they aware of the procedures, they signed off on them, in essence, 'approved' them.

We will now discover whether Pure & the Gang are truly expressing concern over their interpretation of interrogation tactics as, 'inhumane', and torture, in general or just as a political ploy to attempt to embarrass the previous adminstration.

Stay tuned for the latest details.

 

[cloudy]

(And I'll bet that sounds so amazing with your accent. *swoon*)

Have you ever heard his voice? Definitely swoon-worthy.

eta: worms plays one of the oldest internet flame games around, as I said on the depression thread: ooze false sympathy while loudly, and as often as possible, stating that the opponent is mentally ill.

Kind of stupid, if you ask me.

 

[Guest]

Have you ever heard his voice? Definitely swoon-worthy.

No, I've never had the pleasure.

Is he on that old recording our voices thread? We need to do another one of those, I'm thinking.

 

[cloudy]

No, I've never had the pleasure.

Is he on that old recording our voices thread? We need to do another one of those, I'm thinking.

That would be very cool.

He sent me a recording several years ago. I don't have it anymore, since it was on my old computer that fried, but it was a gorgeous Scottish purr.

 

[wmrs2]

Worms, it seems to me that no-one takes you seriously because you talk a load of shit. Your attempts at trying to appear to be an intellectual are laughable.

Don't give up your day job.

Lighten up.

Fartface says:
I

t's all very relative. Compared to some of its more incoherent posts, this is really quite advanced. Still lacking in the logic department, but at least here we have polysyllabic words and a stab at punctuation.

To not take me seriously Kendo, you and Fartface for sure watch and comment on everything I say.

You two intellectual giants never have anything to rebut my positions, you only follow the leadership of the crazies on the forum that always threaten to kill themselves. None of you know why you hate, you simply do. You fellows show real logic and promise. You are leaders in the pack of RABD.

My sweet old mother told me that you could always tell who the stupid people are because they never backed up what they said with facts. That fits you to a tee. It takes an idiot and a fool to tell a person that no body pays attention to them and then remark on everything they do. Now that is dumb. But that is the way your brains work.

 

[Dragonlipz]

This post becomes even more pertinent in view of the last one.

http://www.aclu.org/safefree/extraordinaryrendition/22203res20051206.html



~~~

To add even more hops to an already tart brew, leading members of the current Democrat Administration were present at Intelligence briefings outlining, 'extreme rendition' and 'waterboarding'. Thus not only were they aware of the procedures, they signed off on them, in essence, 'approved' them.

We will now discover whether Pure & the Gang are truly expressing concern over their interpretation of interrogation tactics as, 'inhumane', and torture, in general or just as a political ploy to attempt to embarrass the previous adminstration.

Stay tuned for the latest details.

I'll stay tuned as long as you don't try to distort or misrepresent the facts but then you are you, right .........the only good facts are the ones you like to quote.....if the real facts get in the way, you just have to ignore them and repeat the talking points you get from Rush and FOX.....whole lotta intellectual activity there.....yessir!!!!

 

[Dragonlipz]

Fartface says:
I
To not take me seriously Kendo, you and Fartface for sure watch and comment on everything I say.

You two intellectual giants never have anything to rebut my positions, you only follow the leadership of the crazies on the forum that always threaten to kill themselves. None of you know why you hate, you simply do. You fellows show real logic and promise. You are leaders in the pack of RABD.

My sweet old mother told me that you could always tell who the stupid people are because they never backed up what they said with facts. That fits you to a tee. It takes an idiot and a fool to tell a person that no body pays attention to them and then remark on everything they do. Now that is dumb. But that is the way your brains work.

Your sweet old mother probably pimp-slapped you for trying to play her.....So you should heed her advice and back up the rap wit da fax......y'dig?

 

[Pure]

the tide is turning

ami used to say waterboarding the individual is not torture and is just fine. now, however, the tide turns:

ami: To add even more hops to an already tart brew, leading members of the current Democrat Administration were present at Intelligence briefings outlining, 'extreme rendition' and 'waterboarding'. Thus not only were they aware of the procedures, they signed off on them, in essence, 'approved' them.

We will now discover whether Pure & the Gang are truly expressing concern over their interpretation of interrogation tactics as, 'inhumane', and torture, in general or just as a political ploy to attempt to embarrass the previous adminstration.
=========

the new line of ami and Faux News is "Yep, it's awful and it was started by democrats under Clinton!"

how exactly, is torturing *anybody* evidence of one's "pro life" orientation?

only based on mythic "facts". there is nice article here about the lie that waterboarding got Zubaydah talking in 30 seconds. In fact, it was done 80 times in a month. CIA agent Kiriakou appeared on ABC news Dec 10, 2007, saying Zubaydah broke in about 30 seconds, a claim picked up by Fox, Limbaugh, etc. In fact Kiriakou was present at only a single session with Z.


http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/28/business/media/28abc.html

fbi agent ali soufran has, in a newsweek article cited earlier, said the Z supplied the basic info before the CIA took over the interrogation.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/195089


there is a plausible theory as to WHY the interrogations of Z went on so long after: the attempt was to find a scrap of evidence tying al qaeda to iraq!

--

foreign policy magazine produced a concise timeline of the torture policies as they evolved after 9-11.

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=4891

survey of actual methods used:

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/22614

 

[romeothethird]

I first read these verteran interviews at Washington Post. Google turned up this version http://www.thenation.com/blogs/notion/240810

Very nice. That's how I thought it worked. And I mean worked!

 

[xssve]

Real moral progress does not depend on evolution. All progress depends on the scientific method that man discovered and uses to discover more things. It is good logic, which man also discovered. Improvement in morality comes from understanding the concept to love better. Improvement in cities, roads, churches, schools, colleges, medicine, astronomy, space travel and all things, is the product of man making discoveries (through the scientific method, correct reasoning and logic).

You might want to start here: Arabella Buckley

A Christian, She wrote a number of excellent books on evolution, and was onto the role and value of ethics in evolution before anybody:

Buckley's evolution is subtle, complex, humane, and then (as now) it offered not a whisper of conflict with her strong religious convictions. In Life and Her Children, she says of evolution,

"There has been no halting in this work from the day when first into our planet from the bosom of the great creator was breathed the breath of life, -- the invisible mother ever taking shape in her children."​

Here's a couple of audiobooks, Birds of the Air and The Fairyland of Science from the Internet Archive.

 

[Pure]

Krauthammer on torture.

One of the leading Republican/conservative intellectuals (there ARE about a half dozen in the US.)..

Torture? No. Except . . .


By Charles Krauthammer
Friday, May 1, 2009

Torture is an impermissible evil. Except under two circumstances. The first is the ticking time bomb. An innocent's life is at stake. The bad guy you have captured possesses information that could save this life. He refuses to divulge. In such a case, the choice is easy. Even John McCain, the most admirable and estimable torture opponent, says openly that in such circumstances, "You do what you have to do." And then take the responsibility.


Some people, however, believe you never torture. Ever. They are akin to conscientious objectors who will never fight in any war under any circumstances, and for whom we correctly show respect by exempting them from war duty. But we would never make one of them Centcom commander. Private principles are fine, but you don't entrust such a person with the military decisions upon which hinges the safety of the nation. It is similarly imprudent to have a person who would abjure torture in all circumstances making national security decisions upon which depends the protection of 300 million countrymen.


The second exception to the no-torture rule is the extraction of information from a high-value enemy in possession of high-value information likely to save lives. This case lacks the black-and-white clarity of the ticking time bomb scenario. We know less about the length of the fuse or the nature of the next attack. But we do know the danger is great. (One of the "torture memos" noted that the CIA had warned that terrorist "chatter" had reached pre-9/11 levels.) We know we must act but have no idea where or how -- and we can't know that until we have information. Catch-22.

Under those circumstances, you do what you have to do. And that includes waterboarding. (To call some of the other "enhanced interrogation" techniques -- face slap, sleep interruption, a caterpillar in a small space -- torture is to empty the word of any meaning.)

Did it work? The current evidence is fairly compelling. George Tenet said that the "enhanced interrogation" program alone yielded more information than everything gotten from "the FBI, the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency put together."

Michael Hayden, CIA director after waterboarding had been discontinued, writes (with former attorney general Michael Mukasey) that "as late as 2006 . . . fully half of the government's knowledge about the structure and activities of al-Qaeda came from those interrogations." Even Dennis Blair, Obama's director of national intelligence, concurs that these interrogations yielded "high value information." So much for the lazy, mindless assertion that torture never works.

Could we not, as the president repeatedly asserted in his Wednesday news conference, have obtained the information by less morally poisonous means? Perhaps if we'd spoken softly and sincerely to Khalid Sheik Mohammed, we could equally have obtained "high-value information."

There are two problems with the "good cop" technique. KSM, the mastermind of 9/11 who knew more about more plots than anyone else, did not seem very inclined to respond to polite inquiries about future plans. The man who boasted of personally beheading Daniel Pearl with a butcher knife answered questions about plots with "soon you will know" -- meaning, when you count the bodies in the morgue and find horribly disfigured burn victims in hospitals, you will know then what we are planning now.

The other problem is one of timing. The good cop routine can take weeks or months or years. We didn't have that luxury in the aftermath of 9/11 when waterboarding, for example, was in use. We'd been caught totally blind. We knew there were more plots out there, and we knew almost nothing about them. We needed to find out fast. We found out a lot.

"We have people walking around in this country that are alive today because this process happened," asserts Blair's predecessor, Mike McConnell. Of course, the morality of torture hinges on whether at the time the information was important enough, the danger great enough and our blindness about the enemy's plans severe enough to justify an exception to the moral injunction against torture.

Judging by Nancy Pelosi and other members of Congress who were informed at the time, the answer seems to be yes. In December 2007, after a report in The Post that she had knowledge of these procedures and did not object, she admitted that she'd been "briefed on interrogation techniques the administration was considering using in the future."

Today Pelosi protests "we were not -- I repeat -- were not told that waterboarding or any other of these other enhanced interrogation methods were used." She imagines that this distinction between past and present, Clintonian in its parsing, is exonerating.

On the contrary. It is self-indicting. If you are told about torture that has already occurred, you might justify silence on the grounds that what's done is done and you are simply being used in a post-facto exercise to cover the CIA's rear end. The time to protest torture, if you really are as outraged as you now pretend to be, is when the CIA tells you what it is planning to do "in the future."

But Pelosi did nothing. No protest. No move to cut off funding. No letter to the president or the CIA chief or anyone else saying "Don't do it."

On the contrary, notes Porter Goss, then chairman of the House intelligence committee: The members briefed on these techniques did not just refrain from objecting, "on a bipartisan basis, we asked if the CIA needed more support from Congress to carry out its mission against al-Qaeda."

More support, mind you. Which makes the current spectacle of self-righteous condemnation not just cowardly but hollow. It is one thing to have disagreed at the time and said so. It is utterly contemptible, however, to have been silent then and to rise now "on a bright, sunny, safe day in April 2009" (the words are Blair's) to excoriate those who kept us safe these harrowing last eight years.

letters@charleskrauthammer.com

 

[Huckleman2000]

Krauthammer is a finely-engineered tool.

The ticking-time-bomb scenario has been discussed already.

The second(!) "exception" to the "impermissible evil" is something new, and seems to amount to saying that if the torturers had good intentions, but tortured because they were so incompetent that they were pissing themselves in fear over plots that existed only in their imaginations, then it was okay.

And how, after establishing his good/evil "objective" viewpoint in the first sentence, can he then spring to a breezily utilitarian justification for this "impermissible" evil just three paragraphs later? "Did it work? The current evidence is fairly compelling." He seems to say that he thinks we'd be crazy NOT to torture, because when WE do it, it's not wrong, it's just a really useful medical procedure.

Krauthammer has cabbage for brains.

 

[Pure]

k's position.

yes, there is the ticking time bomb:

1) when you REALLY need to know in a hurry and a large evil for many people is in the offing,

to this K adds,

2) when you really need to know and a large evil for many is, in your view, in the offing.

essentially, it's a utilitarian approach, which i tried to capture in choice 7:

It's definitely wrong to torture UNLESS there is some immensely great, 'social good' [general welfare] that is preserved (e.g., keeping a city from suffering an atomic explosion).

[editorial deleted]

 

[shereads]

Torture Poll has become a tortured poll.

 

[sr71plt]

Torture Poll has become a tortured poll.

My thought exactly.

 

[Dragonlipz]

One of the leading Republican/conservative intellectuals (there ARE about a half dozen in the US.)..

Torture? No. Except . . .


By Charles Krauthammer
Friday, May 1, 2009

Torture is an impermissible evil. Except under two circumstances. The first is the ticking time bomb. An innocent's life is at stake. The bad guy you have captured possesses information that could save this life. He refuses to divulge. In such a case, the choice is easy. Even John McCain, the most admirable and estimable torture opponent, says openly that in such circumstances, "You do what you have to do." And then take the responsibility.


Some people, however, believe you never torture. Ever. They are akin to conscientious objectors who will never fight in any war under any circumstances, and for whom we correctly show respect by exempting them from war duty. But we would never make one of them Centcom commander. Private principles are fine, but you don't entrust such a person with the military decisions upon which hinges the safety of the nation. It is similarly imprudent to have a person who would abjure torture in all circumstances making national security decisions upon which depends the protection of 300 million countrymen.


The second exception to the no-torture rule is the extraction of information from a high-value enemy in possession of high-value information likely to save lives. This case lacks the black-and-white clarity of the ticking time bomb scenario. We know less about the length of the fuse or the nature of the next attack. But we do know the danger is great. (One of the "torture memos" noted that the CIA had warned that terrorist "chatter" had reached pre-9/11 levels.) We know we must act but have no idea where or how -- and we can't know that until we have information. Catch-22.

Under those circumstances, you do what you have to do. And that includes waterboarding. (To call some of the other "enhanced interrogation" techniques -- face slap, sleep interruption, a caterpillar in a small space -- torture is to empty the word of any meaning.)

Did it work? The current evidence is fairly compelling. George Tenet said that the "enhanced interrogation" program alone yielded more information than everything gotten from "the FBI, the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency put together."

Michael Hayden, CIA director after waterboarding had been discontinued, writes (with former attorney general Michael Mukasey) that "as late as 2006 . . . fully half of the government's knowledge about the structure and activities of al-Qaeda came from those interrogations." Even Dennis Blair, Obama's director of national intelligence, concurs that these interrogations yielded "high value information." So much for the lazy, mindless assertion that torture never works.

Could we not, as the president repeatedly asserted in his Wednesday news conference, have obtained the information by less morally poisonous means? Perhaps if we'd spoken softly and sincerely to Khalid Sheik Mohammed, we could equally have obtained "high-value information."

There are two problems with the "good cop" technique. KSM, the mastermind of 9/11 who knew more about more plots than anyone else, did not seem very inclined to respond to polite inquiries about future plans. The man who boasted of personally beheading Daniel Pearl with a butcher knife answered questions about plots with "soon you will know" -- meaning, when you count the bodies in the morgue and find horribly disfigured burn victims in hospitals, you will know then what we are planning now.

The other problem is one of timing. The good cop routine can take weeks or months or years. We didn't have that luxury in the aftermath of 9/11 when waterboarding, for example, was in use. We'd been caught totally blind. We knew there were more plots out there, and we knew almost nothing about them. We needed to find out fast. We found out a lot.

"We have people walking around in this country that are alive today because this process happened," asserts Blair's predecessor, Mike McConnell. Of course, the morality of torture hinges on whether at the time the information was important enough, the danger great enough and our blindness about the enemy's plans severe enough to justify an exception to the moral injunction against torture.

Judging by Nancy Pelosi and other members of Congress who were informed at the time, the answer seems to be yes. In December 2007, after a report in The Post that she had knowledge of these procedures and did not object, she admitted that she'd been "briefed on interrogation techniques the administration was considering using in the future."

Today Pelosi protests "we were not -- I repeat -- were not told that waterboarding or any other of these other enhanced interrogation methods were used." She imagines that this distinction between past and present, Clintonian in its parsing, is exonerating.

On the contrary. It is self-indicting. If you are told about torture that has already occurred, you might justify silence on the grounds that what's done is done and you are simply being used in a post-facto exercise to cover the CIA's rear end. The time to protest torture, if you really are as outraged as you now pretend to be, is when the CIA tells you what it is planning to do "in the future."

But Pelosi did nothing. No protest. No move to cut off funding. No letter to the president or the CIA chief or anyone else saying "Don't do it."

On the contrary, notes Porter Goss, then chairman of the House intelligence committee: The members briefed on these techniques did not just refrain from objecting, "on a bipartisan basis, we asked if the CIA needed more support from Congress to carry out its mission against al-Qaeda."

More support, mind you. Which makes the current spectacle of self-righteous condemnation not just cowardly but hollow. It is one thing to have disagreed at the time and said so. It is utterly contemptible, however, to have been silent then and to rise now "on a bright, sunny, safe day in April 2009" (the words are Blair's) to excoriate those who kept us safe these harrowing last eight years.

letters@charleskrauthammer.com

More tired, fetid drivel from the intellectual right.........wrong is wrong no matter who you coerce into exonorating your actions......sick, sad, and sorry....just like thier daddy Reagan and his daddy Nixon........(intellectual right is an oxymoron)

 

[JackLuis]

We wouldn't be having this discussion if Dick and W hadn't freaked out after 9/11. 3,00 casualties out of a nation of 300,000,000, in the large picture the "terrorists' only terrorized the people who had shirked their duty to thier country.

When W stood on the ruins and said, "and the people who did this will hear you too" (Paraphrased), I almost cried, even when he almost forgot the line, I was ready to send the troops out, but I wasn't afraid of terrorists.

But Dick and W apparently were scared shitless and went over to the "Dark Side" just as the Spy novels warned about in the Cold War Era. Dick and W didn't have the guts to stand up to the Islamo-Crazies and treat them as a police matter, that might require some Military persuasion.

Cowards both of them and their little Wolfie too!

Asshole draft dodging pencil dicked ........

 

[KitKat85]

People who engage in heinous acts always want everyone to look forward and not backwards, the crooks always want everyone to forget their crooked behavior and their support of it. They say things like "Let's move forwards, and forget the past", that it would too "disruptive" to investigate their crooked buddies. Those who defnd crooks are equally monsters.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_MnYI3_FRbbQ/Sp_kq6M04OI/AAAAAAAACGY/B232XJ6mUH8/s1600/tomorrow.png