Warner/McCain/Graham/Powell to Bush: "Drop dead." (aka, the US, torture and the Geneva Convention, fall 2006)

http://graphics10.nytimes.com/images/2006/09/16/us/16bush600.1.jpg

Speaking at a late-morning news conference in the Rose Garden, Mr. Bush said he would have no choice but to end a C.I.A. program for the interrogation of high-level terrorism suspects if Congress passed an alternate set of rules supported by a group of Senate Republicans.

Those alternate rules were adopted Thursday by the Senate Armed Services Committee in defiance of Mr. Bush. Setting out what he suggested could be dire consequences if that bill became law, Mr. Bush said intelligence officers — he referred to them repeatedly as “professionals” — would no longer be willing and able to conduct interrogations out of concern that the vague standard for acceptable techniques could leave them vulnerable to legal action.

“Were it not for this program, our intelligence community believes that Al Qaeda and its allies would have succeeded in launching another attack against the American homeland,” he said. “But the practical matter is if our professionals don’t have clear standards in the law, the program is not going to go forward.”

Today's radio address.

BTW, get a load of the radio graphic on that second page -- Bush, Cheney, Rice and Rumsfeld look like your local newscasters!

tonight, the I-team's Dick Cheney investigates links between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein. plus Condi with sports, and Don and the Accu-Weather forecast to tell you about storms heading our way.

known knowns and all that, of course

I do suspect that Bush is covering his ass. Because I suspect he ordered that torture be used on suspects some time ago (or Dick told him to order it)

As the Head of a Sovereign State he does have a certain amount of immunity under International Law, but soon he won't be Head of State. As was proved by the Pinochet case, that means if he shows up in Europe after that time he could be arrested and deported to a country who were willing to try him for Crimes Against Humanity and could make a case for doing so.

Which would be amusing. For me at least.

The last ABC News poll I read said its approval ratings were in the high twenties.

An honest question: was Vietnam one of the Geneva Convention signatories? Didn't it still torture prisoners?

i guess in some ways the net never changes

The point is that even elements of the end-all/be-all of Evil found that physical torture didn't work.

And Bush is called a bully, but not a National Socialist.

...The attack from the right, which coalesced over the weekend, could undercut McCain's effort to woo Bush backers and other party regulars for an anticipated 2008 presidential bid. His position on terrorism prisoners has fueled critics' skepticism about McCain's conservative credentials.

"This very definitely is going to put a chilling effect on the tremendous strides he has made in the conservative evangelical community," said the Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, chairman of the Traditional Values Coalition, one of several conservative activists who support Bush's proposal on interrogation techniques.

Norquist, in an interview Monday, accused McCain of "showboating" and foiling a White House political strategy of framing this year's midterm elections as a choice between Republicans who support tough treatment of terrorists and Democrats who are standing in the president's way.

The White House "would like to have a conversation between now and the election about punishing the people who did 9/11," said Norquist. "McCain is interrupting that conversation and confusing the message."

Rush Limbaugh, the conservative radio talk show host, charged Monday that McCain was part of a "cabal" in Washington that was "trying to thwart the policies of the Bush administration."

The push for torture has never been about trying to extract useful intelligence; it's always about punishment. Remember, these guys have the full-on authoritarian/"strict father" thing going. Doesn't matter if the captives are innocent or rounded up by lazy bounty hunters, the system is always correct and so these guys must be guilty. And the guilty must be punished.

I'm less concerned about what ends up getting directed at Bush, than I am with the possibility that for the sake of political convenience, warrantless searches may forever after be a legal tool for the administration.

"This very definitely is going to put a chilling effect on the tremendous strides he has made in the conservative evangelical community," said the Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, chairman of the Traditional Values Coalition, one of several conservative activists who support Bush's proposal on interrogation techniques.

yeah i don't get this considering jesus could've been said to be a political prisoner tortured by the romans, but hey.

In one of his books, W.G. Sebald describes an SS interrogation technique that involved handcuffing the prisoner behind his back, then attaching a chain from the ceiling to the handcuffs and lifting the prisoner by the chain. This would cause the shoulders to dislocate.

but that's just it -- if you'd had pansy-boy mccain there instead of some hardass romans, you'd have probably no torture, no crucifixion, no resurrection and then where would we be? you have to think about the consequences of not martyring people.

and of course then NO RAPTURE

I really don't see Bush ever having this problem.

doesn't matter that the shit doesn't work, as long as you are "tough" and "aggressive," you'll be victorius and righteous and blah blah blah

ROFL @ "GOP Rebels"

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/topicons/thomas_sowell.jpg...Even with a nuclear Iran looming on the horizon and the prospect that its nuclear weapons will end up in the hands of international terrorists that it has been sponsoring for years, many in the media and in the government that is supposed to protect us have been preoccupied with whether we are being nice enough to the terrorists in our custody.

The issue has been brought to a head by the efforts of Senators John McCain, John Warner, and Lindsey Graham to get us to apply the rules of the Geneva convention to cutthroats who respect no Geneva convention and are not covered by the Geneva convention.

[...]

Congress has the power to impeach judges, including Supreme Court justices, but apparently not the guts. Runaway judges are not going to stop until they get stopped.

In short, the clash between Senator McCain, et al., and the President of the United States is more than just another political clash. It is part of a far more general, and ultimately suicidal, confusion and hand-wringing in the face of mortal dangers...

courtesy of Glenn Greenwald

Y'know, if we survive all this, we're going to look back on the era of history with great confusion and/or anger.

except that most eras don't have the sheer WTF-ness of our present time

I agree, but I think the hand-wringing is on the administration's end

good with accepted media narratives? Able to use his campaigning of years ago to cover with his voting of today? the fact that no one actually questions what he says or compares it with how he votes?

anyway,

russ feingold on this torture bill

and john kerry.

Lee Ann McBride, a spokeswoman for Cheney, denied that Cheney had confirmed that U.S. interrogators used water-boarding or endorsed the technique. "What the vice president was referring to was an interrogation program without torture," she said. "The vice president never goes into what may or may not be techniques or methods of questioning."

i hate my city sometimes.

U.S. Col. Harry Summers to North Vietnamese officer: "You never defeated us in the field."

North Vietnamese officer: "That is true. It is also irrelevant."

That story gets repeated a lot as a reminder of what war is not. It is not a sporting event in which the winners of various battles are awarded points, and the team with the most points wins.

Dick Cheney doesn't know this.

"Keep in mind," Cheney told NPR yesterday: "We've never been defeated in a stand-up fight in Iraq in over three years."

This is true. It is also irrelevant.

The Effective Terrorists Prosecution Act:

-Restores Habeas Corpus protections to detainees

-Narrows the definition of unlawful enemy combatant to individuals who directly participate in hostilities against the United States who are not lawful combatants

-Bars information gained through coercion from being introduced as evidence in trials

-Empowers military judges to exclude hearsay evidence they deem to be unreliable

-Authorizes the US Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces to review decisions by the Military commissions

-Limits the authority of the President to interpret the meaning and application of the Geneva Conventions and makes that authority subject to congressional and judicial oversight

-Provides for expedited judicial review of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 to determine the constitutionally of its provisions

I consider it obscene & horrifying that we actually have to specify this shit, but such is life in these modern times.

offered w/out comment:

http://www.allannairn.com/2009/01/torture-ban-that-doesnt-ban-torture.html

A prediction is not a future history already written in stone.

auditioning for a reboot of Kung Fu?

oh, that's where A Nairn went!

Hahaha, I was thinking the same thing, Dan!

offered w/out comment:

http://www.allannairn.com/2009/01/killer-in-chief-obamas-choice-will-this.html

http://www.allannairn.com/2009/01/obama-to-america-drop-dead.html

it's amazing how we can read each other's biased non-comments perfectly, aint it

Morbs, Allan Nairn (not to be confused with "a nairn") has been blogging about torture since 2004. No one on ILX, via a rudimentary search, has quoted his News And Comment blog until you have, just after Obama has been president for 5 "business" days.

Just admit you have a fucking axe to grind, already.

And no, I don't think Obama is going to defy being disingenuous -- similar to presidents of past. I'm don't worship the guy, nor will I ever. So keep your faux-sly "biased non comments" to yourself.

no idea what that first post of yours means

That might be the problem.

who cares who hasn't been quoted before? ppl here read THE CORNER.

& stfu Ned

That's an awesome argument.

"BUT PEOPLE HERE POST TYRA GIFS"

I don't argue w/ Amen Choruses

Morbs just wants to take Rush Limbaugh's "I want to see our new president fail" idea to the next level. With more experimentation, 5/4 beats, etc.

I don't argue w/ Amen Choruses

That's all you've been doing for over a year!

Sorry, you haven't really been "arguing" technically. You've been exhibiting passive aggressive catty observations.

you couldn't be more awesome, you must like Spiderman.

Life becomes easier when you realize talking to Morbs about politics is like talking to Geir about music, with the caveat that Geir is willing to tell you why he thinks the way he does.

like that

I'm glad you admit the "practical Dem" CW around here is an Amen Chorus, tho. Changing One Mind at a Time.

Life becomes easier when you realize talking to Morbs about politics is like talking to Geir about music, with the caveat that Geir is willing to tell you why he thinks the way he does, even though both will just make up shit up if cornered.

fxd, otm

haha "make shit up", but i like it the way it is.

Dan, nobody knows why they think the way they do.

eg, that "US president" is a synonym for "killer" is obvious to me. How much more of that do you wanna hear? Didn't think so.

You really missed your calling; political punditry would fit you like a glove.

Morbz, I agree that there's less difference between Obama, Clinton, GWB, Bush I, Reagan than most Americans, especially Obama fans, realize. Duh. Duh. And duh.

How many times do you have to repeat this on ILX? We get it, STFU, etc.

Dan once again OTM. Rehashing same point over and over and over again is the golden prereq for a polit pundit career.

At least the LaRouchies have the balls to go out in public and say similar shit to this, instead of creep around on 20s-30s demographic free internets discussion forum.

lol "creep around 20s-30s" very subtle! I'm a poli-pedophile.

You'd regret saying that to me in "public."

I love how your contemptuous old ass made all these bullshit, bullshit, BULLSHIT promises to shut the FUCK up about this shit for 100 days or what the FUCK ever and you couldn't even keep yourself off the sauce for TWO.
You're a piece of shit poster and every goddamn thing you write lately is disgusting troll nonsense and you know I like you IRL but SHIT GOD.

SHUT. THE. FUCK. UP.

stick to movies, at least there your schtick is vaguely amusing from time to time. We get it, you hate america and we murder innocents with our tax dollars because we're all too stupid to know better. Now eat shit and quit reviving politics threads with your wingnut concern frottage

Wow. Your ability to misconstrue and extrapolate whatever is said to you in the most comically-unintended manner while remaining ensconced in your bubble of righteousness surpasses Momus. It's like watching Ann Coulter with all of the biases inverted.

xpost: wow u broke TOMBOT

YAAAAAAOOOOOOOW!

This is a return to the status quo ante, the torture regime of Ford through Clinton, which, year by year, often produced more US-backed strapped-down agony than was produced during the Bush/Cheney years.

strapped-down agony

u got it T-bot

(I literally kept my vow, but yeah, I'm just spoilin the fun)

strapped-on ecstasy