Ex-MI5 chief: US misled allies over torturing detainees

By GottaLaff

How many times have we heard this now? Enough to finally act on it? Nah, too bothersome. Keep looking forward, don't look back. Learning from our past is so true justice ago:

United States intelligence agencies misled key allies, including Britain, about its mistreatment of suspected terrorists, the former head of the country's domestic spy agency, MI5, said Tuesday.

Eliza Manningham-Buller, who retired in 2007 and is now a member of the House of Lords, said the U.S. deliberately suppressed details of its harsh handling of some detainees, including accused 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

No way! Piffle! Why, BushCo would never think of doing such a thing!

"The Americans were very keen that people like us did not discover what they were doing," Manningham-Buller told a meeting at Britain's Parliament.

Of course they were. They knew they'd get nailed for war crimes.

A few years ago, back in 2002 or so, Manningham-Buller wondered how the U.S. got KSM to spill his guts, as it were, and the response was that it was KSM's pride in "his achievements" that made him talk when interrogated. However:

"It wasn't actually until after I retired that I read that, in fact, he had been water boarded 160 times," Manningham-Buller said.

See how proud he was? And how proud BushCo has been of that "achievement"?

"Americans were very keen to conceal from us what was happening, as they were from many of their own people." Manningham-Buller spent 33 years in British intelligence, and was head of MI5 between 2002 and 2007. [...] "The government did lodge protests and I'm not going to say any more on that," Manningham-Buller said.

So, hey, remember all the jokes about how BushCo was like, totally into "24"? And how it affected their policies? Yes, a Tee Vee show...

Here's the sick punch line:

"One of the sad things is Cheney, Rumsfeld and Bush all watched '24,'" Manningham-Buller said...

Some jokes just aren't funny.

VIDEO: CPAC audience boos Bob Barr for condemning waterboarding as torture

By GottaLaff



I still can't get used to agreeing with Bob Barr on anything, but I sure do agree with him on this.

This afternoon, the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) held a debate titled “Does Security Trump Freedom?” that featured former GOP congressman and Libertarian Presidential candidate Bob Barr, Rep. Dan Lungren (R-CA), and former Bush Assistant Attorney General Viet Dinh.

Torture. Doesn't. Work.

What amazes me even more than my palling around with Bob Barr is the number of Americans who still don't realize the truth about waterboarding, or any form of torture-- that it does not produce usable testimony or reliable information.

Then again, I can't figure out that whole concept of loons wearing tea bags on their heads either.

U.S. soldier 'waterboarded his own daughter, 4, because she couldn't recite alphabet'

By GottaLaff

Now where would anyone get an idea like this? Think... think... Waterboarding. It's something I'd never heard of until... until... ahhh yes.

Money see, monkey do. And the chimp in chief made it a household word. Some role model, eh Sarah Palin?

A soldier waterboarded his four-year-old daughter because she was unable to recite her alphabet.

Joshua Tabor admitted to police he had used the CIA torture technique because he was so angry.

As his daughter 'squirmed' to get away, Tabor said he submerged her face three or four times until the water was lapping around her forehead and jawline.

This is the example the United States set under BushCo. Be proud, Cheney supporters. Give yourselves a high five, Yoo, Bybee, et al.

[His girlfriend] told [the police] about the alleged torture and the terrified girl was found hiding in a closet, with bruising on her back and scratch marks on her neck and throat.

Asked how she got the bruises, the girl is said to have replied: 'Daddy did it.' [...]

Police have not revealed Tabor's military service, but his base is home to units that have served in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"Daddy did it."

Why, one could imagine that quote coming from Jenna or Not Jenna, because their daddy did it, too... hundreds and hundreds of times.

H/t: TexBetsy

DOJ official reportedly clears torture memo authors Yoo and Bybee.

By GottaLaff

I'm sure I'll hear from die-hard Obama supporters about how anti-Obama I am (which is laughable if you read TPC regularly), but this, in a word, sucks:

Newsweek now reports that a senior DOJ official has essentially cleared the two men of misconduct in an upcoming office of Professional Responsibility report:

While the probe is sharply critical of the legal reasoning used to justify waterboarding and other “enhanced” interrogation techniques, NEWSWEEK has learned that a senior Justice official who did the final review of the report softened an earlier OPR finding. Previously, the report concluded that two key authors — Jay Bybee, now a federal appellate court judge, and John Yoo, now a law professor — violated their professional obligations as lawyers when they crafted a crucial 2002 memo approving the use of harsh tactics, say two Justice sources who asked for anonymity discussing an internal matter. But the reviewer, career veteran David Margolis, downgraded that assessment to say they showed “poor judgment,” say the sources. (Under department rules, poor judgment does not constitute professional misconduct.) The shift is significant: the original finding would have triggered a referral to state bar associations for potential disciplinary action — which, in Bybee’s case, could have led to an impeachment inquiry.

Emptywheel (Marcy Wheeler, who you can see here in Blunt, the Sequel), has more.

I'm heartbroken, angry, frustrated, baffled, you name it. But I pretty much expected this outcome. How depressing.

Apparently, Margolis didn't get "input" from A.G. Holder. Maybe he should have.

I simply don't understand sweeping the entire foundation for legalizing torture under the rug, as it obviously was in a Friday night dump (when it was released).

Don't even bother trying to talk me down. I'm way past that.

Red State: Jesus Would Have Approved Waterboarding

By GottaLaff

Red State sure has that whole compassion thing going for them, don't they? :

More pearls of wisdom from that bastion of politicized Christianist exceptionalism:

It’s likely even Jesus would have OK’d water boarding if it would have saved his Mom. He would’ve done the same to save his Dad, or any one of His disciples. For that matter, He even died to save all humans.

It’s obvious He would not be happy with those who voted for the candidate who kills because it’s above his “pay grade” to know if they’re alive. Checking the Commandments, killing innocents is against the 5th. Because pro-aborts don’t know for sure life does not exist at conception, they are still willing to risk that it’s not killing.

(h/t John Cole)

There's that tortured logic again (pun intended). Does convolution come naturally to these people, or is it learned? And if it is learned, how does one go about studying it? In books? Home schooling? In the Church of Our Lady of Sick and Twisted Rushpublics?

So, Jesus wouldn't be cool with killing babies in the womb but he'd be fine with torturing people? Yep, nothing says "Christ's love" like strapping a guy to a bench and drowning him to extract information.

Amen.

VIDEO: What David Waldman did to expose Cheney's disturbed worldview

By GottaLaff



David Waldman, aka KagroX, makes the points beautifully, as he does in his writings, consistently. Watch.

View the full segment here.

Memos shed light on sleep deprivation...aka torture

By GottaLaff

Hint: Sleep deprivation is right up there with waterboarding:

From the beginning, sleep deprivation had been one of the most important elements in the CIA's interrogation program, used to help break dozens of suspected terrorists, far more than the most violent approaches. And it is among the methods the agency fought hardest to keep.

The technique is now prohibited by President Obama's ban in January on harsh interrogation methods, although a task force is reviewing its use along with other interrogation methods the agency might employ in the future. [...]

A CIA inspector general's report issued in 2004 was more critical of the agency's use of sleep deprivation than it was of any other method besides waterboarding, according to officials familiar with the document, because of how the technique was applied. [...]

The memos said that more than 25 of the CIA's prisoners were subjected to sleep deprivation. At one point, the agency was allowed to keep prisoners awake for as long as 11 days; the limit was later reduced to just over a week. [...]

The Justice Department memos also cited research that suggested sleep deprivation was not harmful.

"Experience with sleep deprivation shows that 'surprisingly, little seemed to go wrong with the subjects physically,' " said the May 10, 2005, Justice Department memo -- one of many instances in which government lawyers cited scientific papers in asserting that the program was safe.

But some authors of those studies have since said that the conclusions of their research were grossly misapplied.

James Horne, director of the Sleep Research Center at Loughborough University in Britain, said he was never consulted by U.S. officials and didn't know how his work was being used until the memos were released.

"My response was shocked concern," Horne said in an e-mail interview. Just because the pain of sleep deprivation "can't be measured in terms of physical injury or appearance . . . does not mean that the mental anguish is not as bad."

Horne said that it was dangerous for the CIA to extrapolate from independent research in which subjects had gone for as long as a week without sleep, voluntarily, and were free to eat, rest, watch television or leave the research facility at any time. By contrast, CIA prisoners were subjected to major additional stresses that risk physical and mental collapse.

"To claim that 180 hours is safe in these respects is nonsense," Horne wrote in a separate online posting. Even if sleep deprivation succeeded in getting prisoners to talk, he said, "I would doubt whether the state of mind would be able to produce credible information, unaffected by delusion, fantasy or suggestibility."

The CIA and BushCo can try to explain it away, twist it, turn it, excuse it, justify it, and support it all they want, but the fact remains: It is torture. And torture is illegal and ineffective.

Truth commission to proceed despite Obama’s wishes

By GottaLaff

It's starting to take on a life of its own:

Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) plans to proceed with a special commission to investigate alleged Bush administration abuses of power, despite lacking President Barack Obama’s support, according to a report Tuesday. [...]

But Leahy plans to proceed despite lacking the approval of party leaders, sources familiar with the proposal told Politico’s John Bresnahan Tuesday.

“Leahy plans to move ahead with his proposal anyway,” Bresnahan writes. “While he has not found a GOP co-sponsor for legislation creating a truth commission, Leahy is expected to begin circulating a draft soon.”

In a statement, Leahy said his commission will ultimately jibe with the President’s wishes.

“When I first proposed establishing a nonpartisan commission of inquiry in February, I thought then, as I do now, that it was the best approach to conducting a thorough review of national security policies on detention, interrogation and rendition since Sept. 11,” Leahy said in a statement to Bresnahan. “Whether such a comprehensive review happens immediately or in the weeks and months ahead, the evidence that our country committed torture demands a review of the process by which these flawed policies were developed and implemented. President Obama was correct when he said that any review should be done outside of politics. A nonpartisan commission will accomplish just that.” [...]

Some liberals have critiqued the proposal, asserting that Bush officials shouldn’t be granted immunity from prosecution even if they’re forthcoming in a congressional investigation. Conservatives have attacked the proposed commission as a political witchhunt.

I can't fathom giving any of those thugs immunity. Isn't the whole point of finding out the truth dealing with the truth?

Immunity should not be an option for the likes of Rove, Rumsfeld, Cheney, Addington, or any of the other despicable BushCo war criminals. If I could scream that line, I would, but this isn't that kind of blog, and putting that in all caps would be annoyingly out of character. So, use your imaginations if you are so inclined.

But expect me to ask for a talking down if immunity becomes a reality.

FYI, earlier I posted about John Conyers and Jerry Nadler asking Holder for a special counsel.

Here it is: Ronald Reagan defined torture and its illegality

By GottaLaff

Via Andrew Sullivan:

The UN Convention on Torture, which Ronald Reagan signed and championed, is very clear and its definition of what torture is obviously broad and inclusive. There's actually a good discussion of it at Hot Air, which reproduces the legal definition thus:

Article 1.
1. For the purposes of this Convention, torture means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity. It does not include pain or suffering arising only from, inherent in or incidental to lawful sanctions.
2. This article is without prejudice to any international instrument or national legislation which does or may contain provisions of wider application.

Article 2.
1. Each State Party shall take effective legislative, administrative, judicial or other measures to prevent acts of torture in any territory under its jurisdiction.
2. No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat or war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture.
3. An order from a superior officer or a public authority may not be invoked as a justification of torture.

Once again: Torture is illegal. It cannot be justified. One cannot justify breaking the law. One cannot justify setting a horrific precedent. One cannot justify setting a new rock bottom global standard. Murder works, too, if you want to get someone out of your life-- but one cannot justify it. One cannot defend the indefensible.

Ronald Reagan has been idealized, deified, romanticized, and glorified ad naueam... with a glaring, exception: His position on torture. Yes, the very same people who have elevated him to sainthood are choosing to turn their backs on him about this one.

Why turn on St. Ronnie now? Because just like BushCo desperately scrambling to legitimize torture to connect Al Qaeda to their dirty, fraudulent invasion of Iraq, their minions are frantically trying to rationalize all that blind support of same. They're all freaking out more than The Boehner during a budget-cut shutdown of his favorite tanning salon.

Why are so many reluctant to investigate? Maybe because there is a reasonable chance they'd be implicated in the commission of egregious and abhorrent war crimes, or seen as supporters of those who could be. Democrats included, by the way.

I never thought I'd hear my self say this, but in this case ::deep breath:: Ronald Reagan was right.

H/t: Eve

VIDEO: Joe Scarborough: ‘Rational fear’ justifies torture ("putting hands in air for awhile")

By GottaLaff

Everybody's all-time favorite Tweeter on torture strikes again, this time on the Tee Vee Machine:

[H]ost Joe Scarborough did not see that as a problem and seemed to believe it was completely appropriate for what he called “rational fear” to far outweigh morality. [...]

“We can have the debate on morality,” Scarborough concluded. “But by every objectionable standard — objective standard — the intelligence community has succeeded in cracking the code on al Qaeda. … And if it upsets you that a terrorist is forced to sit down and put his hands in the air for a while — okay, we’ll have that debate.”

Cowardly lyin'

By GottaLaff

Shorter TPM:

If you're too wussy to use the word "torture", then how can you call it courageous to be 'tough enough to make the tough calls'?