The Torturing, The Endless Spying, the Bogus Wars-- was it really just a result of 9/11?

[spooked911]

Or did the evil of 9/11 spring from the same criminals who were so eager to spy and to torture and to start wars?

[AZCat]

1. I don't agree with either of your choices. n/t

[spooked911]

8. well-- how do you explain it?

you saying they would have done this without 9/11?

[AZCat]

30. I think they had a lot of it in mind prior to September 11th, 2001.

I think the events of that horrible day helped them enact some provisions (it certainly sped the process along) but it is my opinion that the Bush Adminstration wanted to do those things before the terrorist attacks gave them an excuse.

[seemslikeadream]

2. proof is in the pudding, isn't it? We are all torturers now

[AZCat]

3. Ehhh. Speak for yourself.

I refuse to let anyone diffuse the guilt of a vicious, inhuman group over the rest of us, especially those who were working against such horrific crimes.

[seemslikeadream]

7. The United States of America (you and me) tortured

[LARED]

4. I just know I'm going to regret this, but

please explain exactly how "We are all torturers now." That makes no sense.

[seemslikeadream]

6. We Are All Torturers Now

http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0106-26.htm

We Are All Torturers Now
by Mark Danner

......

When Alberto Gonzales takes his seat before the Senate Judiciary Committee today for hearings to confirm whether he will become attorney general of the United States, Americans will bid farewell to that comforting story line. The senators are likely to give full legitimacy to a path that the Bush administration set the country on more than three years ago, a path that has transformed the United States from a country that condemned torture and forbade its use to one that practices torture routinely. Through a process of redefinition largely overseen by Mr. Gonzales himself, a practice that was once a clear and abhorrent violation of the law has become in effect the law of the land. Shortly after the 9/11 attacks, Americans began torturing prisoners, and they have never really stopped. However much these words have about them the ring of accusation, they must by now be accepted as fact. From Red Cross reports, Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba's inquiry, James R. Schlesinger's Pentagon-sanctioned commission and other government and independent investigations, we have in our possession hundreds of accounts of "cruel, inhuman and degrading" treatment - to use a phrase of the Red Cross - "tantamount to torture."

So far as we know, American intelligence officers, determined after Sept. 11 to "take the gloves off," began by torturing Qaeda prisoners. They used a number of techniques: "water-boarding," in which a prisoner is stripped, shackled and submerged in water until he begins to lose consciousness, and other forms of near suffocation; sleep and sensory deprivation; heat and light and dietary manipulation; and "stress positions." Eventually, these practices "migrated," in the words of the Schlesinger report, to Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, where for a time last spring the marvel of digital technology allowed Americans to see what their soldiers were doing to prisoners in their name.

Though the revelations of Abu Ghraib transfixed Americans for a time, in the matter of torture not much changed. After those in Congress had offered condemnations and a few hearings distinguished by their lack of seriousness; after the administration had commenced the requisite half-dozen investigations, none of them empowered to touch those who devised the policies; and after the low-level soldiers were placed firmly on the road to punishment - after all this, the issue of torture slipped back beneath the surface. Every few weeks now, a word or two reaches us from that dark, subterranean place. Take, for example, this account, offered by an unnamed F.B.I. counterterrorism official reporting in August, more than three months after the Abu Ghraib images appeared, on what he saw during a visit to Guantánamo: "On a couple of occasions, I entered interview rooms to find a detainee chained hand and foot in a fetal position to the floor, with no chair, food or water. Most times they had urinated or defecated on themselves, and had been left there for 18-24 hours or more...When I asked the M.P.'s what was going on, I was told that interrogators from the day prior had ordered this treatment, and the detainee was not to be moved. On another occasion...the detainee was almost unconscious on the floor, with a pile of hair next to him. He had apparently been literally pulling his own hair out throughout the night."

....

But what we are unlikely to hear, given the balance of votes in the Senate, are many voices making the obvious argument that with this record, Mr. Gonzales is unfit to serve as attorney general. So let me make it: Mr. Gonzales is unfit because the slow river of litigation is certain to bring before the next attorney general a raft of torture cases that challenge the very policies that he personally helped devise and put into practice. He is unfit because, while the attorney general is charged with upholding the law, the documents show that as White House counsel, Mr. Gonzales, in the matter of torture, helped his client to concoct strategies to circumvent it. And he is unfit, finally, because he has rightly become the symbol of the United States' fateful departure from a body of settled international law and human rights practice for which the country claims to stand.

On the other hand, perhaps it is fitting that Mr. Gonzales be confirmed. The system of torture has, after all, survived its disclosure. We have entered a new era; the traditional story line in which scandal leads to investigation and investigation leads to punishment has been supplanted by something else. Wrongdoing is still exposed; we gaze at the photographs and read the documents, and then we listen to the president's spokesman "reiterate," as he did last week, "the president's determination that the United States never engage in torture." And there the story ends. At present, our government, controlled largely by one party only intermittently harried by a timorous opposition, is unable to mete out punishment or change policy, let alone adequately investigate its own war crimes. And, as administration officials clearly expect, and senators of both parties well understand, most Americans - the Americans who will not read the reports, who will soon forget the photographs and who will be loath to dwell on a repellent subject - are generally content to take the president at his word.

.....

The general's concerns are understandable. The war in Iraq and the war on terrorism are ultimately political in character. Victory depends in the end not on technology or on overwhelming force but on political persuasion. By using torture, the country relinquishes the very ideological advantage - the promotion of democracy, freedom and human rights - that the president has so persistently claimed is America's most powerful weapon in defeating Islamic extremism. One does not reach democracy, or freedom, through torture. By using torture, we Americans transform ourselves into the very caricature our enemies have sought to make of us. True, that miserable man who pulled out his hair as he lay on the floor at Guantánamo may eventually tell his interrogators what he knows, or what they want to hear. But for America, torture is self-defeating; for a strong country it is in the end a strategy of weakness. After Mr. Gonzales is confirmed, the road back - to justice, order and propriety - will be very long. Torture will belong to us all.

[spooked911]

10. we're definitely all torturers when the president won't even prosecute these war crimes

having elected Obama-- we're now all responsible for what he does-- and he is sanctioning past use of torture.

[LARED]

12. Sorry, not buying that

because the government does something "we" become that same thing. I disagree and agree with lots of what many administrations have done or not done. In a civil society there is the individual sphere, the public sphere, and a state shphere that forms our world. "We" are not THE government, we are individuals that partake in the public square and have a voice in the form and function of the state. You seem to believe in a big cosmic "WE".

[spooked911]

15. "we" is relative

in a general sense we are all complicit in the crimes that are carried out in the name of our govt

[LARED]

17. I suggest you look up the word complicit. - nt

[defendandprotect]

5. No . . . Bush always planned to invade Iraq . .. he said so before he was appointed president--!!!

Also PATRIOT ACT was obviously written before 9/11 -- ready to go!
Only people who knew 9/11 was going to happen would have had it ready . . . ????

The spying started 7 months BEFORE 9/11 -- as soon as Bush got into the White House
they were all over the communications companies to set it up!

TORTURE, IMO . . . is what it always is -- a threat to everyone. And intended to be!

[spooked911]

9. yes-- this sounds like the evil was already there before 9/11

which leads me to think the same evil did 9/11

[jberryhill]

11. Yes, and...

...it also leads other people to believe the same evil caused the Christmas Tsunami and Hurricane Katrina...

Am I right, DefendAndProtect?

[defendandprotect]

20. Maybe . . .

you and others believe that . . .

However, I think most of us know increased hurricane activity is being caused

by Global Warming --- as outlined in the Pentagon memo to Bush which advised him

that Global Warming was a larger threat to our survival than "terraism" ...

Increased earthquakes as well -- heating the atmosphere will increase all kinds

of chaotic weather conditions.

The real problem of Katrina, however, wasn't the hurricane . . . it was the deadly

non-response by the evil Bush.

[defendandprotect]

19. Hi spook . . .

agree re 9/11 . . .

did you see my question re 9/11 and particle beam weaponry?

[spooked911]

25. no, sorry I didn't

you want to PM me?

[noise]

13. How can one not question their government?

Former CIA Director Hayden is already pushing these talking points:

1) The torture program was extremely valuable.

2) Revealing details about the program will harm national security.

Senator Bond is also making these claims.

At what point do we stop pretending that torture was a good faith effort to prevent terrorist attacks? At what point do pro-torture officials stop getting a pass when they play the patriot card?

1) Hayden lied about 9/11. He has never accounted for his conduct while head of the NSA. The bigshots at the CIA lied about 9/11. Officials like Tenet have never accounted for their bizarre pre-9/11 conduct.

2) Torture isn't a reliable method of interrogation. We had the unreal NY Times article by Scott Shane where he reported that one of the main CIA interrogators didn't speak Arabic, didn't have a counterterrorism background and had no interrogation experience. Evidently this interrogator talked to high level al Qaeda detainees in between torture sessions. From available reports (i.e. Mayer's book The Dark Side and Suskind's book The One Percent Doctrine) we learn that the torture didn't work as claimed by its' advocates.

3) The use of torture has disgraced the country.

We are supposed to accept the use of torture because some corrupt officials told us they couldn't do their jobs without it? That is absurd. When is the patriotism of the pro-torture crowd going to be up for review?

To recap:

1) The NSA (on Hayden's watch) engaged in warrantless surveillance programs before 9/11. At the very same time Hayden failed to use FISA, a failure that has never been explained (except with bullshit).

2) The CIA officials in charge when the al-Hazmi/al-Mihdhar information was withheld for 20 months were key advocates of torture.

3) The torture didn't work as advertised.

IMO the available public information indicates that the post 9/11 counterterrorism programs were premeditated and were not desperate actions ordered by panicked officials.

[Bolo Boffin]

14. "At what point do we stop pretending torture was good faith effort to prevent terrorist attacks?"

At what point did anyone in this forum start?

[spooked911]

16. are you saying the torture was done in good faith?

[Bolo Boffin]

18. I'm using English, spooked.

It's quite clear what I mean. I don't know of any person posting in this forum that has ever pretended that torture was done in good faith to do anything whatsoever. Please stop your foolish semantic games about this subject.

[spooked911]

23. I'm asking you your opinion.

Do you have a problem with giving it on this issue?

[Bolo Boffin]

27. Any rational person could figure out my opinion in what I wrote.

If you think there's room for doubt in what I've said, then you just go right on believing whatever foul thing you like about me.

[spooked911]

28. well... it sounded like you thought the torture was done in "good faith"

but then when I asked you directly, you evaded a direct answer.

So-- please tell me yes or no: do you think the torture was done in "good faith" to prevent more attacks?

And we're talking about the overall endorsement of torture in the Bush administration-- not just a few people who may have been acting misguidedly but in good faith.

[Bolo Boffin]

29. Bullshit. You're only revealing your prejudice against me.

My answer is clearly discernable in what I have written. Go hang if I answer any such insulting questions from you.

[spooked911]

31. the problem is that I don't understand how you reconcile your support of the official 9/11 story

with torture not carried out in good faith.

If you can reconcile this-- I'd be happy to hear your explanation.

[Bolo Boffin]

32. Perhaps you could first explain how you imagine the two issues to be related

And then perhaps I can clear up the confusion you have. I have no problem understanding that, for example, the buildings on 9/11 simply collapsed and also understanding that torture is a line that you don't cross for any reason.

[spooked911]

33. so if you don't cross the line-- why did so many do it?

I say because they are evil-- the same type of evil that would perpetrate 9/11.

[spooked911]

34. to expand on this a bit---

if they the torturers WEREN'T doing it in "good faith", that would suggest they KNEW the intel they might or might not get from a particular captive was useless. And if the intel was useless, then how on earth did the govt stop another attack -- that was surely coming-- from "al qaeda"?

In other words, if the torture wasn't in "good faith", it casts doubt on the whole value of the "war on terror" and on capturing "terrorists"-- and tends to imply that "al qaeda" is/was a bogus threat and that 9/11 was an inside job.

[Bolo Boffin]

35. Cum hoc -- you're soaking in it. n/t

[spooked911]

36. apparently you're soaking in "post hoc" then (as I indicated in my OP)

as you've given no other rationale for this psychopathic behaviour on the part of the Bush admin and the CIA

[SDuderstadt]

37. why would we give a rationale...

for the bush administration? your attempt to paint us as bush apologists is really pathetic.

[spooked911]

39. I am making the case the instead of the torturing being done because of 9/11

that 9/11 came from the torturing mindset-- an argument that makes increasing sense in light of things like KSM being waterboarding 183 times in a month.

You have not presented a counter argument for why my reasoning is wrong. I'm not asking you to apologize for the Bush administration-- though frankly, when you defend 9/11 so actively you become de facto apologists for the Bush administration-- I'm asking for an alternative explanation for their psychopathic behavior regarding torturing.

[SDuderstadt]

40. That's enough, Spooked

Your continuous attempts to link people who disagree with you on the facts to tacit approval of the Bush administration is silly. It must be nice to live in your black and white world.

[Bolo Boffin]

41. So when you attack the official story, do you become de facto apologists for Al Qaeda?

That's a mighty nice goose sauce you're cooking there.

[NowHearThis]

43. No counter argument could be logically correct, S9/11

From everything I've read, 9/11 could not have possibly been carried out by 10 young Arab men, and the videos that have been released
look like they were made in a studio and for sure, airplanes can't just melt into buildings or crash into the Pentagon without leaving behind more evidence than a few blurred images which prove nothing except the very plausible theory that the whole Pentagon
part of the 9/11 activities was as phony as a three dollar bill.

[noise]

42. There has been a successful propaganda

effort by the Bush administration to equate torture with super patriotism...going beyond the call of duty into the "dark side" where the squeamish ACLU dare not go. The main propaganda theme of the Bush administration was that they simply had to have illegal police state powers to prevent terrorist attacks. Yet when one looks at 9/11 closely it becomes apparent that the attacks weren't at all attributable to the lack of intelligence/law enforcement powers. It is also very suspicious that the same officials who failed to follow standard procedure were leading advocates of police state tactics after 9/11.

One must ask why Bush/intelligence officials were advocates of an interrogation method that is considered unreliable. The link between the pre-9/11 conduct and the post 9/11 police state tactics is the bad faith conduct.

[defendandprotect]

22. Remember how many denied that it was even torture when we first heard about it?

And then tried to deny that it went any further than a few "bad apples" . . .!!!

Too many here have a need to live in denial!

[spooked911]

24. Yes-- and I think it's important to remember what other regimes used torture

and remember the evil they were capable of.

[SDuderstadt]

26. please produce evidence of your claim...

i'm pretty sure you won't find anyone here who has even remotely defended torture. more importantly, ''truthers'' don't seem to be able to grasp that we debunkers despise bush, but we reject goofy mihop and even lihop claims due to the lack of credible evidence.

[defendandprotect]

21. Totally agree with you . . .

Especially with this . . .

1) Hayden lied about 9/11. He has never accounted for his conduct while head of the NSA. The bigshots at the CIA lied about 9/11. Officials like Tenet have never accounted for their bizarre pre-9/11 conduct.

[bottomtheweaver]

38. They've been at it for decades.

It's truly unbelievable how many times we've been whacked, going back before the CIA even existed. An early instance someone posted here recently is a school bombing in Bath, Michigan, on May 18, 1927, that killed 45 people and injured 58:



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_School_disaster

Scary isn't it? I imagine the CIA was put together largely to make these kinds of "operations" more efficient.