Bush vetoes ban on harsh interrogation

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You can't start saying it is okay to torture some people but not others. When it starts to be okay to torture even the worst people then it is okay to torture anyone as long as you can try and label them as bad people.
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Why not? It's okay and morally responsible to imprison some people and not others. Child molesters, rapists, and murderers are among the worst people, we label them as bad people - child molesters, rapists, and murderers - and it is okay and morally responsible to imprison them, whereas it is not okay and morally responsible to imprison other people who are not child molesters, rapists, murderers, or other types of felons.

It's okay and morally responsible to kill some people and not others. For example, it's okay and morally responsible for me or the police to kill the bad guy who enters my home intent on killing me and raping my wife. We label such people as bad people: attempted murderers and attempted rapists.
When it starts to be okay to torture even the worst people then it is okay to torture anyone as long as you can try and label them as bad people.
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This statement is a red herring argument. For thousands of years, humanity has drawn lines between the innocent and the guilty; among the guilty, humanity has also drawn lines between the heinous, the more heinous, and the less heinous. The man cited for jaywalking is distinguished from the man imprisoned for murder. Humanity has drawn such lines for thousands of years, we currently draw such lines every day, and there's no reason we cannot continue to do so.
 
Wow, you obviously have no intelligence experience. Those methods are only proven to do one thing...not work. I was in MI for my entire 8yr stint and all those methods accomplish are getting someone to tell you what you want to hear whether it is true or not.
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Oddly enough, the media actually interviewed several career CIA officers that stated the methods under discussion do work.

Also reported....

Waterboarding was only used on three persons.

The democrats do not have enough votes to override the veto.

The US still hasn't chopped off anyone's head and released the video.
 
It's okay and morally responsible to imprison some people and not others. Child molesters, rapists, and murderers are among the worst people, we label them as bad people - child molesters, rapists, and murderers - and it is okay and morally responsible to imprison them, whereas it is not okay and morally responsible to imprison other people who are not child molesters, rapists, murderers, or other types of felons.
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But we don't simply label them bad people. There is an entire system of justice in place with protections and due process that try to ensure the people we imprison have actually done something wrong.

Not so when someone is labeled an enemy combatant.
 
"Terrorists have no rights in my opinion. I frankly don't care what they have do to them to keep America safe."
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Just go ahead and substitute terrorist with "Gun Nut" in that sentence and I hope you get what's coming to you some day. Freedoms are lost 1 at a time. Usually they affect "somebody else who deserves it", until of course somebody decides that they don't like the look of you. And then it's too late.

I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.
James Madison

If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.
James Madison

Off you go, have fun getting your testicle electrocuted!
 
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Well, PlayboyPeguin may know more than most of us but I strongly suspect he doesn't know as much as the people doing the interrogations at Guantanamo and elsewhere. I want to leave those people free to do what they determine needs to be done. If waterboarding or waterskiing or whatever doesn't work, they'll know that better than we do (that includes you, whoever you are). Let them decide what works. Don't let Nancy Pelosi decide what they can or can't do.
 
But we don't simply label them bad people. There is an entire system of justice in place with protections and due process that try to ensure the people we imprison have actually done something wrong.

Not so when someone is labeled an enemy combatant.
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Generally, that isn't a problem because the enemy combatant will have established his status by virture of the fact that he engaged in battle with our troops. That process is the same as with captured POWs, for whom a different set of laws apply. For those who are labeled enemy combatants under different circumstances, we can develop the requisite processes.

The point is that we can and should develop such processes to determine status. There is no reason why we can't do that. To say, as the quoted poster said, that once we place a label everything becomes boundless is the ultimate slippery-slope argument in that it turns into an "edge of the cliff argument": You're either at the edge or you're free-falling. But thousands of years of human experience and it's daily operation in our current lives say it's not true.
 
Just go ahead and substitute terrorist with "Gun Nut" in that sentence and I hope you get what's coming to you some day. Freedoms are lost 1 at a time. Usually they affect "somebody else who deserves it", until of course somebody decides that they don't like the look of you. And then it's too late.
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Are you comparing an american "Gun Nut" to a foreign terrorist? Terrorists don't deserve any of the American rights we all enjoy. They are hell bent on destroying our freedom and would gladly kill you and all of your family without thinking twice about your rights. If the CIA or whoever needs to do a little waterboarding, then so be it.
 
Are you comparing an american "Gun Nut" to a foreign terrorist? Terrorists don't deserve any of the American rights we all enjoy. They are hell bent on destroying our freedom and would gladly kill you and all of your family without thinking twice about your rights. If the CIA or whoever needs to do a little waterboarding, then so be it.
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Also, the last time I checked, islamofascists aren't fighting under uniform. Therefore, I don't think the Geneva Convention applies.
 
Are you comparing an american "Gun Nut" to a foreign terrorist?
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Ask the Weavers or the Branch Davidians what exactly the difference is; when the people in power have the ability to rewrite the definitions they choose on a whim or with a stroke of a pen, you'd better hope that someone doesn't decide that YOU'RE the next target.
 
And waterboarding has been used to crack stubborn terrorists, what, two times - or was it three - in the past seven years?

Which is worse, waterboarding a guy for 60 seconds, or spending six months controlling every aspect of his life 24x7 carefully cultivating his willingness to cooperate?
 
Are you comparing an american "Gun Nut" to a foreign terrorist? Terrorists don't deserve any of the American rights we all enjoy. They are hell bent on destroying our freedom and would gladly kill you and all of your family without thinking twice about your rights. If the CIA or whoever needs to do a little waterboarding, then so be it.
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I'm not, but there are plenty who do. Remember Oklahoma? Gun nut militia freaks with "stockpiles of arms and ammunition" and "explosives" i.e. reloading supplies were the biggest threat to the nation. Not to forget the school shootings. They want our children dead so they can keep their guns!

When the feds come for your guns I hope they believe the "They were lost in a tragic boating accident" excuse and decide not to waterboard you to find the truth, because, after all, it's not real "torture".

You psychopathic gun lovin' threat to all the children.

Like I said, when the electrodes are already attached to your testicles, it's too late for a Supreme Court challenge.
 
Like I said, when the electrodes are already attached to your testicles, it's too late for a Supreme Court challenge.
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Bring it on, I say. Don't have anything to fear if I keep my nose clean and don't go shootin' school kids and military personnel...:p
 
I want to leave those people free to do what they determine needs to be done.
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Wow, dangerous waters there. I guess we should just leave it up to the politicians to decide whether they think gun ownership should be allowed or not.
Why not? It's okay and morally responsible to imprison some people and not others.
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It is okay to imprison and punish those found guilty of a crime in a humane and reasonable manner. It is not okay to physically torture someone that has not been found guilty of anything for the purpose of establishing guilt. If I accused you of child molestation and I was allowed to torture you until you confessed I would have you admitting guilt very quickly...despite the fact that you are innocent.
 
To quote somebody who might have some insight into the matter

They came first for the Communists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant.
Then they came for me,
and by that time no one was left to speak up.

Pastor Martin Niemöller

Who will speak up when they come for you?
 
Don't have anything to fear if I keep my nose clean and don't go shootin' school kids and military personnel
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Unless a friend or family member does something suspicious and the govt decides you might know something of value despite your claims of ignorance...or you just happen to be walking in the wrong place at the wrong time.
 
Unless a friend or family member does something suspicious and the govt decides you might know something of value despite your claims of ignorance...or you just happen to be walking in the wrong place at the wrong time.
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That's the chances I'll take. And, like you requested from another member...sources, please? Where does that happen in the U.S.? And, if so, how many cases is it compared to the millions of people that are arrested, interrogated, and then tried in our justice system? I think the water is getting pretty muddied up.

People here are trying to use examples in a domestic society that are protected by court of law. I don't see an FBI team barging down my doors without a warrant, tying me up, throwing me in a black van, and proceed to ScotchBrite my eyeballs until I say Colonel Mustard in the Kitchen with the Rope....
 
Oddly enough, the media actually interviewed several career CIA officers that stated the methods under discussion do work
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Sources please?
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Found this one in less then a minute
http://www.venturacountystar.com/news/2007/nov/05/three-cheers-for-waterboarding-al-qaida-leaders/

Been waterboarded? Beats a colder then comfortable room too small to lay down in with lights that don't go out IMHO. It works...and fast.......CANNOT kill or injure but IS very convincing that it will.

It's sheer panic inducing brain game. VERY difficult to gain permission to use, and very effective. MI (and actual Intelligence) knows it so you ought to also. Admissions aren't the application, actionable intelligence is. Those subjected are known to have capital, they're not fishing with this method or looking for confessions.

They have the info, we know they have the info, not suspect or reasonably assured. This is used very effectively and very selectively. And yes, lives have been saved by making these guys THINK they are drowning despite that being impossible via watebording. They will gurgle, but the air will still get through. Nobody lasts past the coughing anyway........
 
Bruxley

You might want to re-read that article. It does not provide any evidence of torture being effective in actual intelligence gathering. It is simply one person defending his own previous actions and even when doing so he never claims it get viable or fact based information...he states "Waterboarding makes tight-lipped terrorists talk."

When the obviously biased report goes on to report that question this single man led to arrests it does not in any way actually make true ties between waterboarding and the arrests nor does it make true relevant connections for the claims it makes. It simply makes vague claims and tries to persuade you to make the connections.

Even John McCain admitted that torture does not work...and he should know.
 
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