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Bush Approves use of Torture

Billo_Really

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This just gets more disgusting by the day. How anyone can defend this guy is beyond me. If you think I just hate Bush, its not without good reason. For the record, I don't hate the person, just his actions as our President. He has destroyed everything this country has stood for. To support him and his policies is as anti-American as you can be. And for those of you that think for one minute you know what an American is, then riddle me this Batman:
"Who is Thomas Paine?"

Immorality in America is alive and well. If your not part of the solution, then your part of the problem. I have never in my life believed that until now. Americans do not torture people. Anti-Americans do.

Prison Abuse Decisions Came from the Top
Monday 01 August 2005

"Closing Guantánamo or Abu Ghraib will not stop torture", ex-White House Aide asserts.
Washington, DC - The prison torture decisions "came from the top," asserts Robert Weiner, a former Clinton White House senior public affairs official. "No matter where these prisons are, so long as our policy is the same, torture will take place - closing Guantánamo or Abu Ghraib will not stop the outbreak of abuses and torture."

In an op-ed in today's Cleveland Plain Dealer, Weiner, now president of a public affairs issues strategies company, contends, "The orders to torture came from the top down. In the pyramid of power, first and foremost was President Bush's Jan. 25, 2002 executive order disavowing the Geneva Conventions for the 'new' kind of war we are fighting. Moreover, then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzalez (now Attorney General) assisted in writing the 2002 memo, which also asserted that the Geneva Conventions - respected worldwide - were 'quaint' and 'obsolete.' Last May, before all our eyes in televised hearings, Department of Defense Under Secretary for Intelligence Dr. Stephen Cambone, who coordinates DOD intelligence policy, visibly waived off and interrupted key parts of Major General Antonio Taguba's testimony before the U.S. Senate on the depths of abuses."

In the piece, Weiner and co-author Emma Dick, a human rights analyst for Weiner's issue strategies company, contend that "calls to close the U.S. prison at Guantánamo Bay have diverted attention from the policies that have made both Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib infamous." They call it "astounding" that "the White House is claiming it would 'restrict the president's authority' to pass bipartisan legislation prohibiting the 'cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment' of detainees, and that Vice President Cheney is meeting with Congress saying the president will veto any such bill." Cheney has even stated that "if we didn't have that facility at Guantánamo to undertake this activity, we'd have to have it someplace else," words which Weiner and Dick say "send a chill to the human rights community".

The writers point out that "the torture strategy we've seen was hardly accidental or random. Army prison guards and wardens have stated that they often had to yield their turf to DoD Intelligence operations, and then the torture occurred. A June 25, 2004 memo between the FBI and DoD gave instructions to two generals: 'DoD has their marching orders from the Sec Def" about policies in the torture-questioning of prisoners."

They add, "The administration fought with Amnesty International and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) over the use of the word 'gulag' in reference to the prison at Guantánamo Bay. In fact, such hyperbole may be needed to bring an end to the policies."

Weiner and Dick assert, "Torturing prisoners, making people pile up naked, electric shock in private areas, using vicious dogs to bite, holding people in secret in perpetuity and denying them access to their families and the legal process are not the human rights values this nation stands for. As prisoners' families, colleagues and countrymen hear of the abuses, support swells rather than diminishes for Jihad against us. We have dramatically reduced our national reputation as a human rights leader."


bushpsycho3if.jpg
 
Do you have a picture to make bush or any other republican politician look bad for every occasion because I think ever since I got here I have seen you post at least ten of them. Anyways If we didn't do these tortures of confirmed terrorists we would be fighting blind in this war we're in. I mean if you look at one of them I pretty sure that one of the prisoners at getmo was released and then brought back to custody because he was captured on the war front. If getmo was closed things would be a heck of a lot worse. A lot worse. Because in some cases torturing dose work.
 
Aaron said:
Do you have a picture to make bush or any other republican politician look bad for every occasion because I think ever since I got here I have seen you post at least ten of them. Anyways If we didn't do these tortures of confirmed terrorists we would be fighting blind in this war we're in. I mean if you look at one of them I pretty sure that one of the prisoners at getmo was released and then brought back to custody because he was captured on the war front. If getmo was closed things would be a heck of a lot worse. A lot worse. Because in some cases torturing dose work.

You are condoning torture?!? Are you serious? This is 2005, and we live in AMERICA, not medieval Europe. Torture is wrong. Always for anyone. Especially for the US, which is supposed to uphold certain ideals.
 
Originally posted by Aaron:
Do you have a picture to make bush or any other republican politician look bad for every occasion because I think ever since I got here I have seen you post at least ten of them.
Alright, here's one for your side. So I throw the dog a bone...

hillarykfcspecial5tn.jpg


Originally posted by Aaron:
Anyways If we didn't do these tortures of confirmed terrorists we would be fighting blind in this war we're in. I mean if you look at one of them I pretty sure that one of the prisoners at getmo was released and then brought back to custody because he was captured on the war front. If getmo was closed things would be a heck of a lot worse. A lot worse. Because in some cases torturing dose work.
You should donate to this message board for having some degree of censorship that does not allow me to talk to you the way I would if I met you on the street. You have know idea the words I am not using to respond to you. Because statements this sick require special attention. So thank them for the rules that prevent me from giving you that special attention. But I will say this, it is crap like that which gets peoples heads cut off.

If we didn't have to "...GETMO...", they wouldn't have to come GETSOME!

propagandashockawe6yx.jpg
 
Last edited:
Originally posted by Kelzie:
You are condoning torture?!? Are you serious? This is 2005, and we live in AMERICA, not medieval Europe. Torture is wrong. Always for anyone. Especially for the US, which is supposed to uphold certain ideals.
Thank you for being human.
 
Yes I am condoning it because it serves them right for what they are doing. They make the Muslim comunity look like a bunch of Terrorists. They make the Muslim comunity to some people look like a religion of hate. That Is why I aprove of what getmo is doing.
 
Aaron said:
Anyways If we didn't do these tortures of confirmed terrorists we would be fighting blind in this war we're in. I mean if you look at one of them I pretty sure that one of the prisoners at getmo was released and then brought back to custody because he was captured on the war front. If getmo was closed things would be a heck of a lot worse. A lot worse. Because in some cases torturing dose work.
You can't be serious? You think torture is OK! When I read a crappy post like this it makes me realize that some Americans are on a par with our enemies.

Here's a newsflash for all of you PRO-TORTURE Americans:

Torturing anyone is as Un-American as anyone can get. Not only is it a proven fact that torture does not yield any useful information, but lowering ourselves to the level of our enemy makes us no better than our enemy.

My God! You're OK with torture. :damn
 
Aaron said:
Anyways If we didn't do these tortures of confirmed terrorists we would be fighting blind in this war we're in.
What is the info you used to reach this conclusion?
 
Aaron said:
Yes I am condoning it because it serves them right for what they are doing. They make the Muslim comunity look like a bunch of Terrorists. They make the Muslim comunity to some people look like a religion of hate. That Is why I aprove of what getmo is doing.
This is one of the top 10 stupidest posts I've ever read in this community.

Thanks for proving that ignorance begets ignorance. We're stupid assholes for torturing our prisoners and we have stupid Americans who are intellectually retarded and agree with this sick policy.
 
yes sometimes it is sick but sometimes it is necessary. Sometimes these terrorists will crack and we will have incredibly valuable information on our hands. Information that could lead to the capture of Zarqauwi possibly or the end of terrorism in Iraq and a quicker process of getting our troops home.
 
Billo_Really said:
"Who is Thomas Paine?"

Thomas Paine is one of the founding fathers who, if he were alive today, would tell you knock it off with the pics 'cause you're 47 years old and still debate like a child who doesn't get a cookie.
 
Aaron said:
yes sometimes it is sick but sometimes it is necessary. Sometimes these terrorists will crack and we will have incredibly valuable information on our hands. Information that could lead to the capture of Zarqauwi possibly or the end of terrorism in Iraq and a quicker process of getting our troops home.

No. I don't care. I would rather die than have America degraded to the point where we condone torture, and I hope that the men and women fighting over there would too.
 
Torture is a very extreme measure, and one that can be expected from only a very few. This whole story is a slander to those who serve, and should be treated as such, this does not go on in everyday life, and nor should it, it's really a non issue with our brave men and women. DICK Durbin made a grave mistake in his broad assumptions, I can only hope he pays dearly come election time, but somehow I doubt it.:roll:
 
Originally posted by Deegan:
Torture is a very extreme measure, and one that can be expected from only a very few. This whole story is a slander to those who serve, and should be treated as such, this does not go on in everyday life, and nor should it, it's really a non issue with our brave men and women. DICK Durbin made a grave mistake in his broad assumptions, I can only hope he pays dearly come election time, but somehow I doubt it
Well apparantly, it is an issue with some former brave men and women...

VETERANS FOR PEACE STATEMENT ON IRAQ PRISONER ABUSE SCANDAL

Veterans For Peace believes that the recent allegations of abuse of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib Prison, and other places, by U.S. military personnel should not come as a surprise to anyone who has been to war.

In his investigation of the 800th Military Police Brigade, Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba found: “… numerous incidents of sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses were inflicted on several detainees. This systemic and illegal abuse of detainees was intentionally perpetrated by several members of the military police guard force”.

Some of our members served in Military Intelligence or Military Police units. We were part of a culture that gives lip service to the Geneva Conventions in training but encourages psychological and physical brutality in the pursuit of “intell”. In other words, the problem has been and is systemic.

For many veterans the painful feeling that we have been here before is overwhelming. We recall that such brutalities were commonplace in Korea and Vietnam, wars fought, as is Iraq, in the midst of a civilian populace, where combatants blend into and disappear among the civilian population.

Operating in a foreign land, hostile to our presence, coupled with the administration’s demonstrated disdain for the restraints imposed by the Geneva Convention on prisoner treatment has led, inevitably, to these abuses. Can our soldiers, if captured, expect treatment governed by the terms of an agreement their own government has violated?

The abuse at military prisons is the latest step in the shameful course that our nation has been following in Iraq. It began with an invasion for reasons that have proven to be falsehoods and lies. This is more than the criminal activity of a few “bad apples”, it is the brutal, systemically embedded result of a misguided national policy.

There must be a full and public Congressional investigation and those all the way up the chain of command to General Myers and Defense Secretary Rumsfeld who should be held accountable.

The United States government must change course and admit to the unjust nature of this war, the disastrous miscalculations of the response of the Iraqi people to invasion and occupation, begin the withdrawal of US forces from Iraq and restore real self-rule.

We expect there will be token dismissals. However we must not hang on to the policies that have led to these horrors, have further compromised our nation’s security and lost us the respect of the world. They must be excised, swiftly and thoroughly.

That is the only way to restore dignity and honor to our military and to our country.

Adopted by VFP National Board of Directors 5/14/04
 
Billo_Really said:
Well apparantly, it is an issue with some former brave men and women...

VETERANS FOR PEACE STATEMENT ON IRAQ PRISONER ABUSE SCANDAL

Veterans For Peace believes that the recent allegations of abuse of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib Prison, and other places, by U.S. military personnel should not come as a surprise to anyone who has been to war.

In his investigation of the 800th Military Police Brigade, Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba found: “… numerous incidents of sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses were inflicted on several detainees. This systemic and illegal abuse of detainees was intentionally perpetrated by several members of the military police guard force”.

Some of our members served in Military Intelligence or Military Police units. We were part of a culture that gives lip service to the Geneva Conventions in training but encourages psychological and physical brutality in the pursuit of “intell”. In other words, the problem has been and is systemic.

For many veterans the painful feeling that we have been here before is overwhelming. We recall that such brutalities were commonplace in Korea and Vietnam, wars fought, as is Iraq, in the midst of a civilian populace, where combatants blend into and disappear among the civilian population.

Operating in a foreign land, hostile to our presence, coupled with the administration’s demonstrated disdain for the restraints imposed by the Geneva Convention on prisoner treatment has led, inevitably, to these abuses. Can our soldiers, if captured, expect treatment governed by the terms of an agreement their own government has violated?

The abuse at military prisons is the latest step in the shameful course that our nation has been following in Iraq. It began with an invasion for reasons that have proven to be falsehoods and lies. This is more than the criminal activity of a few “bad apples”, it is the brutal, systemically embedded result of a misguided national policy.

There must be a full and public Congressional investigation and those all the way up the chain of command to General Myers and Defense Secretary Rumsfeld who should be held accountable.

The United States government must change course and admit to the unjust nature of this war, the disastrous miscalculations of the response of the Iraqi people to invasion and occupation, begin the withdrawal of US forces from Iraq and restore real self-rule.

We expect there will be token dismissals. However we must not hang on to the policies that have led to these horrors, have further compromised our nation’s security and lost us the respect of the world. They must be excised, swiftly and thoroughly.

That is the only way to restore dignity and honor to our military and to our country.

Adopted by VFP National Board of Directors 5/14/04


Your article proves my point......"several detainees" does not a wide spread problem make!

I suggest moving to........well, you couldn't move anywhere really, just suck it up and accept the facts, we all suck at life and liberties, it's just a measure of how much, and how high profile you are in the worlds eye!;)
 
I see no reason why we shouldn't be nicer to them. Let them stay at the Hilton while there in town. That way they can eye up a good place were lots of children gather. MAkes blowing them up easier. I mean obviously it's just a misunderstanding, all of these men are just common everyday folks. They have no desire or intentions of destroying our country or detonating homemade bombs in crowds of people.

Gots to do what ya gots to do :shoot
 
Calm2Chaos said:
I see no reason why we shouldn't be nicer to them. Let them stay at the Hilton while there in town. That way they can eye up a good place were lots of children gather. MAkes blowing them up easier. I mean obviously it's just a misunderstanding, all of these men are just common everyday folks. They have no desire or intentions of destroying our country or detonating homemade bombs in crowds of people.

Gots to do what ya gots to do :shoot


I think you and Aaron are under the impression that all of the detainees at Gitmo and Abu Ghraib were/are hard-lined Islamic terrorists. That couldn't be further from the truth. It's also proven so far that the torture inflicted on it's prisoners has resulted in no important information. Zip. Nil. Nada.

The only thing that it has accomplished is a growing hatred towards Americans/America, which is sad. The US should be above those who do not believe in human rights. This is what makes your country so great.

At least it did.
 
Hey if it can stop another 9/11/01 terrorist attack by torturing some of the scum at GITMO then I am all for it..........

You Liberals complain about abuse and torture in GITMO..............You have no clue what real torture is......If you want to find out what it is ask John McCain......

He can tell you...
 
galenrox said:
So why has John McCaine spoken out against the treatment of the detainees at Gitmo? I mean, if it's really so ok over there, I mean, since he's the expert, why would he do that?

Because the Senator is a maverick and plans to run for President in 2008........He is looking for the liberal vote from people like you.........But come on even a liberal like you has to admit the so called torture going on in Gitmo is nothing compared to what the POWs in nam went through.....

I notcie you did not comment about what I said about tortring one of those scum and gaining info that would prevent another 9/11/01......
 
Middleground said:
I think you and Aaron are under the impression that all of the detainees at Gitmo and Abu Ghraib were/are hard-lined Islamic terrorists. That couldn't be further from the truth. It's also proven so far that the torture inflicted on it's prisoners has resulted in no important information. Zip. Nil. Nada.

The only thing that it has accomplished is a growing hatred towards Americans/America, which is sad. The US should be above those who do not believe in human rights. This is what makes your country so great.

At least it did.

If information was gathered from one of these guys do you honestly think you would find out about it?

I have no doubt information has been gleaned from the interogations. Wether we hear about it for a while is another story
 
My question is how reliable is information gained by a suspect that is being tortured? I mean wont anybody say anything to make the pain stop...true or untrue?Although I am Muslim I dont have the issues with torture that I guess some here do....I mean if the person is indeed guilty you cant really expect him to respond to questions by saying "please" do you? And if someone knows the crimes for murder or treason is torture and they do it anyway well then why should I feel sorry for them?



peace
 
Calm2Chaos said:
If information was gathered from one of these guys do you honestly think you would find out about it?

I have no doubt information has been gleaned from the interogations. Wether we hear about it for a while is another story


I don't have specific details, but it is generally known that torture is mostly ineffectual when trying to get specific information. Is the cost of committing such human rights violations in the eyes of the world worth the little bit of information that might transpire? That is a question that I would ask myself.

And to be perfectly frank, I would be embarrassed if my government comitted such atrocities. I would be livid if it would happen to Canadian soldiers that were captured.

<snip>
Or listen to Army Col. Stuart Herrington, a military intelligence specialist who conducted interrogations in Vietnam, Panama and Iraq during Desert Storm, and who was sent by the Pentagon in 2003 -- long before Abu Ghraib -- to assess interrogations in Iraq. Aside from its immorality and its illegality, says Herrington, torture is simply "not a good way to get information." In his experience, nine out of 10 people can be persuaded to talk with no "stress methods" at all, let alone cruel and unusual ones. Asked whether that would be true of religiously motivated fanatics, he says that the "batting average" might be lower: "perhaps six out of ten." And if you beat up the remaining four? "They'll just tell you anything to get you to stop."

<snip>

Link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A2302-2005Jan11.html

Here's a nicely balanced article:

<snip>
I do not mean to advocate torture. I mean only to suggest that it's time to start wrestling with those moral and legal dilemmas, to face them straightforwardly. If al-Qaida strikes the United States again, our leaders—whoever they are—will be tempted to resort to torture as a method of getting vital intelligence quickly, and we or they or someone should have mapped out crucial distinctions ahead of time: What is acceptable, what isn't; who should engage in it, who shouldn't; for what purposes is it legitimate, for what purposes isn't it; or whether we should decide, after an honest appraisal of its costs and benefits, that the whole business of torture—however you define it—is irredeemably beyond the pale.
<snip>

http://slate.msn.com/id/2106702
 
Navy Pride said:
Hey if it can stop another 9/11/01 terrorist attack by torturing some of the scum at GITMO then I am all for it..........

You Liberals complain about abuse and torture in GITMO..............You have no clue what real torture is......If you want to find out what it is ask John McCain......

He can tell you...

Senator McCain is in the forefront of trying to end the abuses that have occurred on our watch, in our custody in Afghanistan, Iraq and cuba.

He recently proposed an ammendment that would require that detainees in the Army's custody be treated according to the Army field manual. Bush threatend to veto the bill this was attached to.

So, yeah. Let's talk to Senator McCain.
Also, btw, much of what Senator McCain had to endure has been recently redefined by the Bush Admin. It's no longer considered torture.

According to Team Bush, the traditional and reasonable definition of torture no longer applies. Many horrific acts are no longer considered torture under the new definition since they don't rise "to the level of death, organ failure, or the permanent impairment of a significant body function."

Electrodes on the genitals- no longer torture.
Bamboo under the fingernails- no longer torture.
Thumbscrews- no longer torture
Electrical shocks- no longer torture
Red-hot irons- no longer torture
Beatings- no longer torture

Our military services as well as Senator McCain think this is a very bad idea.

Military's Opposition to Harsh Interrogation Is Outlined

Senior military lawyers lodged vigorous and detailed dissents in early 2003 as an administration legal task force concluded that President Bush had authority as commander in chief to order harsh interrogations of prisoners at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, newly disclosed documents show.

In memorandums written by several senior uniformed lawyers in each of the military services as the legal review was under way, they had urged a sharply different view and also warned that the position eventually adopted by the task force could endanger American service members.

...deputy judge advocate general of the Air Force, Maj. Gen. Jack L. Rives, advising the task force that several of the "more extreme interrogation techniques, on their face, amount to violations of domestic criminal law" as well as military law.
Of course, it's not the first time that the civies in Team Bush decided that they knew better than the military and intel pros and then took actions directly contraindicated by the military and intel professionals.

So, despite the Pentagon plan to have US troop levels in Iraq down to 40,000 by fall 2003, we have 100,000+ troops still in place in summer 2005.
How were the civilian appointees to the DoD to have known that the professional military would know about making war?
As Gomer says to the Mayberry Machiavellis, "Surprise! Surprise! Surprise!"
[I just dated myself didn't I?]
 
Middleground said:
It's also proven so far that the torture inflicted on it's prisoners has resulted in no important information. Zip. Nil. Nada.
could we please have a citation for this assertion?
 
Navy Pride said:
Hey if it can stop another 9/11/01 terrorist attack by torturing some of the scum at GITMO then I am all for it..........
Do you have any evidence to suggest that it's likely to have that potential?
 
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