Credo
"Sign on, young man, and sail with me. The stature of our homeland is no more than the measure of ourselves. Our job is to keep her free. Our will is to keep the torch of freedom burning for all. To this solemn purpose we call on the young, the brave, the strong, and the free. Heed my call, Come to the sea. Come Sail with me." -- John Paul Jones
"Pardon him, Theodotus; he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature" --George Bernard Shaw, "Caesar and Cleopatra"
"And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music."--Friedrich Nietzsche
"A kind Providence has placed in our breasts a hatred of the unjust and cruel, in order that we may preserve ourselves from cruelty and injustice. They who bear cruelty, are accomplices in it. The pretended gentleness which excludes that charitable rancour, produces an indifference which is half an approbation. They never will love where they ought to love, who do not hate where they ought to hate."--Edmund Burke
“You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours.”--General Sir Charles Napier
"Μολὼν λαβέ" -- Leonidas
"Blogito Ergo Sum" -- Neptunus Lex
Which perhaps they should pass, except oh yes, the Senate will fillibuster it.
John Mc Cain is right on this subject and it diminishes the US as a nation. Not to mention the hidden message it sends to all the other nations.
Mukasey was hired to be an adminstration hack so I am not suprised. The White House probably wrote the opinion-Justice just Xeroxed it.
C’mon now Skip – if they were really serious about water boarding as a form of torture they would relish the opportunity to watch a Republican senator filibuster it.
Remember that senior Democrats were in the room when this policy was initially being discussed. It’s never been about elevated sensitivities, but rather whatever weapon they could wield to their partisan purposes.
I have yet to see a comprehensive, working definition of “torture” emerge in all of the national discussion. Everyone has their own understasnding of what constitutes ‘torture”, but there’s no governing definition (that I know of) to guide national decision-making on the subject. I must be wrong on this. Can anyone enlighten me?
From a purely pedantic point of view, the American Heritage Dictionary defines torture this way:
Do the ends justify the means?
But if they were to pass a law against waterboarding, they would be admitting that it isn’t already illegal.
I don’t see what the fuss is – waterboarding is great fun for those of us who can’t quite get the hang of water skiis. Who’d want to outlaw that?
Kris, as I see it the problem with that definition is that it’s ultimately subjective. It uses words like “severe” and “excruciating.” Who is to say whether some particular action causes “severe pain,” or is merely “unpleasant”? As I understand the government, the answer to that is “the executive and judicial branches.”
Congress is angry because those branches chose to draw the line in a different place than Congress claims they would have. But ultimately Congress has nobody to blame but themselves. They’re the ones who wrote a law with subjective definitions in it. If they want to dictate exactly what is and isn’t torture they should write a law explicitly defining it — just as Lex implied.
Crap, every US soldier/sailor/marine/fuzzy type in sage green cammies that has been to SERE school has been waterboarded. It’s no fun. In fact, it really, really sucks. So are all those combatants damaged? Living with inflicted pain? Scarred for life?
The only ones I know who really hate the practice of waterboarding are the ones in the island resort who spilled their guts in fear with the first drops. How do they live with themselves? I really don’t care.
Brian R: no disagreement from me. Those adjectives leave far too much open for interpretation and personal experience.
My thoughts also lean towards Zane – if our own soldiers can endure and survive waterboarding without physical or psychological damage, then why do we care so much about terrorists?
Sorry, but yes, they are lesser humans. IMO. YMMV.
The distinction in my mind, with waterboarding done at SERE as opposed to in the real world, is a matter of degree. How much of it is done in either place? When does it stop in the real world?
Not quite, Zane, only 1/2 have done it. East coast had a different way to have fun.
If extreme mental discomfort is considered torture, then Pelosi commits war crimes every time she opens her mouth.
Ahh, to define torture in a legally enforceable manner… kind of reminds me of Clinton and “is”. How do you define it? Torture for one man may not be intollerable for another. I’d rather spend a couple of minutes on the board than locked in a room with a continuous loop of the trash coming out of Hollywood these days. I remember the first night “in camp” at SERE in my little concrete dog house. Our captors were broadcasting the most hideous recordings over the PA and then for some unknown reason one of them put on Pink Floyd thinking it would continue the audio torture. Might have been torture for him but it was the best thing I heard all night.
In the grand scheme of things do we really want the bad guys to know what will or will not happen to them should they fail to blow themselves up and end up as a POW? From a purely strategic standpoint, this should not be public knowledge nor should it be legislated.
Indeed, Steve. Well put. Perhaps Our Country would be best served with a stated policy of “No torture of U.S. Citizens” and leave the rest to speculation. I’d rather leave the enemy guessing, too. Outrageous to some people’s moralistic principles? Worth the price.