The Cia knew KSM was lying to them and they kept waterboarding

they not only knew he was lying to them, they knew he would be lying to them, as everyone knows, when you torture someone they lie to you

the cia told cheney the information he wanted was false, cheney told them to get it for him even though it would be false

What astonishes me is that such persons never pause to consider what if it were to be done to THEM? What if, at some point soon, it isn’t little brown people with funny-sounding names or unAmuurrican pinkos that takes the beatings and goes under the hose? Do the Bush apologists really believe this whole-heartedly in the high morality, rationality, and essential goodness of Liberals and the Left? That might–might–be a bad assumption. Others have made it before and gotten a surprise.

Historically, when an aristocracy tyrannizes a middleclass, steals its savings, and sends its children to the slaughter in arbitrary foreign wars, said middle class has exercised three remedies:

* the lamp post
* the pike
* Dr. Guillotine’s National Razor

These are the alternatives to normal, legal proceedings, to investigation, indictment, trial, and constitutional punishment. License for said aristocracy to continue its tyranny is NOT one of the alternatives, not in the long run.

So take your pick, America. Indict, try, and punish tyrants judicially and thereby destroy tyranny with law, once and for all. Or avenge tyranny with tyranny, making tyranny part of regime change now and in the future.

At this point, I could almost go either way, frankly.

So any Bush apologist that feels strongly enough about protecting Bush and company from legally mandated sanctions should feel free to reply to me with the exact spelling of his/her name, a detailed physical description (including identifying marks), and the addresses of current residence and workplaces. The Sea-green and Incorruptible Robspierre will file your info. When the time comes, perhaps a Committee of Public Safety will want to be in touch.

The policy was set out in written instructions sent to MI5 and MI6 officers in January 2002, which told them they might consider complaining to US officials about the mistreatment of detainees “if circumstances allow”.

Wow, not that Blair knew, but this early date for official UK reaction to US torture. I’ve been interested to know when the UK gov learned of torture since discovering Craig Murray, who has reaction to the Guardian story here: Discovering That I Do Not Exist.

perris, phred, if you want to flesh out the whys&wherefores on that timeline, try a search on rumsfeld + psyops.

A couple of the nuggets that bob up:

Blowback, by Laura Rozen (actually a second-level get);
US ‘Psychological Operations’ comes home, from Wikinews, with Information Operations Roadmap overview.

Might one use for, or at least result of, torture not have been to make use of believing idjits in government to whom the source of results could be leaked selectively, to put meat on the notion that these scares (that airplane report was a whole truckload of last straws) were the Real Thing? Sort of narrow-area psyops in ultimate support of the broadcast kind.

the almost rabid level thirst for revenge and hatred towards the Bush-Cheney administration. It has nothing to do with the reality as there is no question that Bush-Cheney were abominations and horrific for this country and the world. But enough is enough.

fuck YOU, asshole

I don’t “thirst for revenge”. I expect the LAWS OF MY COUNTRY TO BE UPHELD

and I expect the laws OF HUMANITY to be upheld

so stick your “thirst for revenge” quote up your ass

upholding the laws of humanity is ENOUGH

anything less is a pathetic abrogation of YOUR responsibility as a human being and as a Citizen of the United States of America

and as to this”

By the way – would be nice to hear “even once” here what a scum KSM is. I personally could care less what happens to him

it aint about KSM being scum. It’s about the scum within the body politic of MY NATION. I don’t give a shit about KSM. I do care about scum like george bush and YOU

there is no difference between osama bin laden and scum like you. both of you feel that the end justifies the means, and you both feel you have the right to violate the laws of humanity to satisfy your own personal anger and disappointment in life

I uphold the rule of law, defend my nation from it’s government, and respect the Laws of humanity

what’s your excuse, you fucking scab on the asshole of humanity ???

When you look at responses at the actual issues, Americans are overwhelmingly supportive of “far left” policies. Including in foreign policy. 4-5 weeks ago, before the Cheney Family Values Tour, 75% of people polled wanted either a truth commission or criminal investigation of the torture. If you didn’t spend all of your time telling people who want accountability to shut up and move on, and instead spoke out against the torture, maybe the Cheneys wouldn’t be winning that battle.

What might help, is if instead of telling the people who are trying to keep you from being held in preventive detention, eavesdropped on, spied on, and tortured when these assholes come back in power, you actually worked to convince Americans that they actually do agree with liberal policies.

Sorry, I have a problem with people who started a war on lies that killed probably 1 million Iraqis and 5000 soldiers and who tortured and killed numerous innocents don’t go to jail, while 2.5 million regular Americans are sitting in jail, a higher percentage of our population than were incarcerated in South Africa at the height of apartheid, many of them for smoking a little weed.

And anyone who would put a political party’s ambitions above justice is not, in my opinion, on my side. There are some things that just shouldn’t be traded away for “pragmatism.”

And I know I shouldn’t feed the troll, but I am just so sick of this amoral argument that it’s not convenient right now to uphold the basic values of America.