Leon Panetta has always conducted himself with dignity on the public stage. And in this exchange with Brian Williams, he comes off as a pretty stand-up guy, not milking the dispatch of Bin Laden to partisan ends and giving credit to the immediate past president and his team for their efforts in tracking down the Saudi-born terrorist.
In this video, he indicates that our intelligence officials gained some information that would later help us track down the hide-out of the Al-Qaeda leader through, um, well, “enhanced interrogation techniques“.
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VIdeo via Gateway Pundit.
When asked, Doug Powers reports, “whether or not advanced interrogation techniques helped get Bin Laden,” Attorney General Eric Holder “said he didn’t know.” You’d think an official of an administration which has been most critical* of such polices would have given an unequivocal response (in the negative) if they hadn’t helped.
Of all the Democrats the president could have tapped to take over from Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Panetta seems the best choice. He acknowledges truths at odds with his party’s anti-Republican talking points and acknowledges the accomplishments of Republicans as well as the merits of their policies.
RELATED: Ed Driscoll alerts us to this observation in Investor’s Business Daily, “If President Bush had not invaded Iraq, President Obama likely would not have found Osama bin Laden. The al-Qaida operative who fingered bin Laden’s courier was caught in Iraq helping terrorists in 2004″. Ed’s initial roundup on the death of Mr. Bin Laden also has a plethora of pithy points and interesting links.
ALSO RELATED AND WELL WORTH YOUR TIME: Michael Barone contends that to get bin Laden, Obama relied on policies he decried.
*UPDATE: Peter Wehner reports: “After all, Barack Obama was a fierce critic of EITs [Enhanced Interrogation Techniques] during and after the 2008 campaign.“
That is some tortured logic.
First of all, it’s exceedingly desperate to try to justify an invasion that costs hundreds of billions of dollars and thousands and thousands of lives because we caught one guy that held a piece of information we were able to exploit in the search for Bin Laden.
Secondly, it is extremely unlikely that he was in Iraq before we invaded. Jihadis came from all over the region to fight us in Iraq and for the most part were not present in that country until after the war began. Our invasion of Iraq gave these people a huge country to hide in while they planned future attacks, sabotage our operation, and recruit new members into their ranks. It’s entirely likely that our invasion of Iraq delayed his capture.
Levi keeps desperately trying to deny he was wrong about so many things.
Even his tortured attempt to argue Iraq delayed the capture of this guy is full of fail. By Levi’s own statement he might have been anywhere in the world. By liberating Iraq and cutting off Saddam’s terrorist support (and uncovering his Migs, chemical weapons, etc) We had this guy deliver himself to us.
Now hush Levi, Adults are talking.
You will notice how conspicuously absent that phrase “that I inherited” is in Obama’s discussions about the killing of Bin Laden. He never says anything about the intelligence programs “that I inherited” or the military resources “that I inherited.”
But when he talks about the economy or the deficit, every single problem with it is something “that I inherited.”
Obama eats crow, again. Notice, Obama will not say water boarding, but goes for a more vague term.
The notion that squirting water in a terrorist’s nose is “torture” is pure distilled idiocy. And the same people who get self-righteously indignant about OBL’s co-conspirators getting a little water up the nose are the one’s cheering because OBL got two bullets in the head. This tends to make me doubt that humanity and compassion are their real motives.
I think Driscoll and Levi are on the same page playing the “what if” game. So I will see Driscoll and Levi and up the ante. “What if” Clinton had any gonads and took Osama when he was offered to him? “What if” Jamie Gorelick had not crippled the intelligence community with here iron wall? “What if” Clinton didn’t cave and sell out the Rangers after “Blackhawk Down” in Mogadishu? “What if” Clinton sensed the magnitude of terrorism after the first World Trade Center bombing? “What if” Clinton had taken the embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 seriously? “What if” Clinton had gotten an epiphany when the USS Cole was bombed in 2000? “What if” the 9/11 Commission was not politically stacked to the ceiling to protect Clinton and his document stealing cronies?
From my perspective, Levitoid, if you want to play the “costs hundreds of billions of dollars and thousands and thousands of lives” card on anybody you would play it on Clinton.
Clinton was a chucklehead having a grand time being mister big and eating any lunch he wanted while ducking and dodging responsibility and glad handing, and grifting and grinning his way along. GW Bush inherited Osama bin Laden from Clinton.
But you never once heard GW Bush complain about the mess he inherited. Grown-ups tend to business, children complain.
A few things about the humanity/compassion objections to torture;
1. We capture the moral high ground when we reject the methods of our enemies. There are a lot of advantages to being recognized as a moral leader, and giving that up to take shortcuts and indulge your violent revenege fantasies doesn’t seem worth it to me. How are we supposed to win the hearts and minds of an oppressed population like the Iraqis, who lived in constant fear of being tortured by Saddam Hussein, if they have to fear the same fate from their American ‘liberators?’
(Of course, that last statement is predicated on your ability to acknowledge that Bush’s torture program was far more widespread and violent than simple ‘splashing of water on people’s faces.’ If you think that Abu Ghraib was the result of ‘a few bad apples,’ if you don’t think there’s anything suspicious about the CIA destroying interrogation recordings, if you blissfully ignore the individual cases of the many perfectly innocent people who were released after years and years of confinement, if you find nothing startling about the OLC memos, then I suspect that argument won’t on you.)
2. We ended up torturing people who are completely innocent, and any program where innocent people can be abused or injured is not jusified. Do you have any compassion for those people who’ve been swept up by Bush’s dragnet and endured intense physical and psychological pain, sometimes for years?
As far as I’m concerned, these are the important morality issues involved with torture, and it isn’t contradictory to hold those positions and be pleased that we finally got Bin Laden. I don’t exactly care that KSM experienced discomfort and pain so much as I care that we would resort to such barbaric tactics. We’re supposed to be evolving past this stuff, which should be easy to do since aside from all of the moral objections, it simploy doesn’t work.
V the K,
Remember, Levi defined being locked in a cell, and fed three meals a day as ‘torture’. So In Levi-land, we’d never have held KSM so we’d not have any information (and would have had another 9/11 on the west coast).
Levi’s the worst kind of coward. He doesn’t care about dead innocents. Whether they be the result of terrorist attacks (9/11, aborted efforts) or examples of what happens when you ‘drag people kicking and screaming to the future’ (various socialist countries, whose policies he claims to follow.)
Now, getting a terrorist wet, or *gasp* locking him in a room… That’s torture.
Here’s an example Levi might be able to understand with pictures.
Note how Levi now objects to prisons, trials, probation, etc since “any program where innocent people can be abused or injured is not jusified”
“aside from all of the moral objections, it [EIT] simploy doesn’t work.”
Now Levi contradicts the evidence right in front of him. That EIT got us Bin Laden, that EIT saved lives on the west coast. But Levi holds to the conviction that EIT doesn’t work. Then again, Levi’s history of ignoring evidence that suits his narritive has long been documented.
In fact, Levi is opposed to taxes, since you can suffer injury when the IRS makes a mistake.
Watching him spin and spin is more and more hilarious.
Livewire,
Levi is also apparently stupid enough to believe that waterboarding was utilized for “revenge,” it was not. It was to gain information to spare innocent lives. But, as noted, Levi is an idiotic partisan hack.
But then, he also believes Sarah Palin is dumber than he is, despite the fact that she’s wealthy, successful, and influential… and he sells phones for Verizon.
Oh I forgot… Levi trots out the LIE again that Abu Grahb was an organized effort by the administration, but still holds President Obama blameless for the ‘kill squad’ scandle.
Again, Levi is forced to resort to lies to make his argument.
Bravo for Panetta. He’s smart enough to understand that constant political spin and faux moral posturing just don’t fit with reality sometimes. Also, he’s apparently perceptive enough to realize the American public is not buying into this crap any more since respect for and approval of government is at an all time low. Circumstance may have forced the truth out of him, but at least it was the truth.
The ‘mess’ that George Bush inherited sent him a PDB a month before 9-11 that said Osama Bin Laden might be trying to hijack an airplane inside the United States. Given what happened, I’d consider that to be timely, specific, and accurate intelligence. Bush yawned. The guy had been in office for eight months and his national security priorities involved missile defense and finding an excuse to invade Iraq. If your argument is that it was blatantly obvious that Clinton should have been doing so much more more to catch Bin Laden, then shouldn’t you extend that criticism to George Bush as well, especially considering that memo? George Bush was aware that the Cole and the embassies were bombed, so why wasn’t he scrambling to implement a broad counterterrorism policy? You can’t fault Clinton for not having a sense of urgency because of these things and then excuse Bush.
You should watch the last press conference that George Bush gave as President and tell me who is the child. It’s so pathetic that even I feel embarrassed for him.
This from an avowed moral relativist who stands on no firm moral principle other than the ethics of the situation as he sees it at the time with no confusing facts or dissenting views allowed.
I shudder to wonder what Levi’s definition of The Moral High Ground would be.
Are any of these Levi“FACTS in dispute?
Do “barbaric tactics” like flying airplanes into the Twin Towers work? Can we make war on tactics? I forget. When we splatter human flesh across the pavement by a drone is that more moral and less barbaric than shooting Osama “in the face?”
Levi, don’t ride off like Shane… Come back, Levi and do tell us all about the morality and ethics and nice ways to combat terrorism. How about the TSA feeling the vagina of a girl trying to take a flight in the United States…. wouldn’t you consider that immoral, barbaric, torture authorized by Barack Hussein Obama? Miss USA was perfectly innocent and endured intense psychological pain that might last for years. She was swept up by Obama’s TSA dragnet and felt up repeatedly.
Talk to us, Levi. We love to watch your moral compass spin like a drunk on ice skates.
We’re fighting people who butcher and behead our soldiers when they capture them out of sheer barbarism. We are fight an enemy that straps bombs onto little kids and sends them to blow up other little kids. We squirt a little water in terrorist’s noses in order to get information that saves lives.
Our moral high ground is Denali. They’re somewhere between Death Valley and the Marianas Trench. I’m not worrying how subjecting terrorists to temporary discomfort might take us down a few centimeters.
Then again, I’m not an idiot.
Levi,
You people are amazing. You throw hyperbole like tomorrow you will have a new pot of greater certainty at your disposal.
Here is the August 6, 2001 daily briefing as redacted and issued:
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB116/pdb8-6-2001.pdf
Richard Clark, in hindsight, played this up as “the smoking gun” and you are here trying the same old ploy. Well, you can’t push a chain uphill and you can not get anything more than the buzz and chatter out of this.
George Tenet had myriad ways of reaching President Bush if he had specific information on which to act.
You have a nice little piece of a conspiracy theory and it is all you have. All that smart layer of Democrat insulation that was stacked on the 9/11 commission could not save Clark from himself or pin 9/11 on Bush.
The fact remains, Clinton diddled with both Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden. He was the consumate chucklehead who ran from anything that looked like he might have to take a principled stand. He did DOMA, DA/DT, welfare reduction, and all sorts of compromises with the right in order to continue to chuckle and strut around the world without any serious concerns. And you protect him like he wasn’t the best moderate Republican President we ever had. You people are amazing. He peed on your leg and told you it was raining and you are still here spinning on the joy and wonder of the man. When you get conned, you stay conned.
If your argument is that it was blatantly obvious that Clinton should have been doing so much more more to catch Bin Laden, then shouldn’t you extend that criticism to George Bush as well, especially considering that memo?
But Levi, since your argument is that Bill Clinton had no responsibility whatsoever for bin Laden given eight YEARS, why, then, would you attack Bush for eight MONTHS?
Since you refuse to hold Clinton responsible for anything having to do with bin Laden, trying to hold Bush accountable demonstrates two things:
1) You are a hypocrite
2) You acknowledge that Republican Presidents are far more competent and intelligent than Obama Party ones and should be held to a higher standard.
We’re fighting people who butcher and behead our soldiers when they capture them out of sheer barbarism. We are fight an enemy that straps bombs onto little kids and sends them to blow up other little kids.
Absolutely correct, V the K.
And the priorities of Levi, Barack Obama, the Barack Obama Party, and “progressives” in general become blatantly obvious when you consider that they will smear and lie about our soldiers and insist that those children deserved to die because of their parents’ political beliefs — but defend and support and protect the people who killed our soldiers and those children.
When you are a complete moral degenerate like Levi and his Barack Obama, the only thing you think about is power. Levi thinks he and his fellow “progressives” can gain political and social power by screaming about the “rights” of terrorists who systematically murder thousands of people.
Also, just because Levi is desperately running away from this remark, let’s remind everyone how Levi shrieked that the confinement and interrogation of KSM and other terrorists was in and of itself torture:
If I was being held in a cell, given three meals a day, time to exercise, and not being physically abused in any way – I would consider that torture, wouldn’t you?
Bluntly put, the delusional Levi is sitting here whining and crying that putting terrorists like KSM in this position constitutes torturing them.
You could not provide a better example of the sociopathic impulses that govern Levi, Barack Obama, and all other “progressives”. These people are so desperate for political power that they will turn imprisoning known terrorists into a fit of screaming about “torture” and demanding that we release these individuals to seize the “moral high ground”.
There is a certain segment of the left that believes any action the USA takes to defend itself is morally indefensible.
Oh, get of your imaginary religious high horse. You don’t get to accuse me of moral relativism just because I’m an atheist. The same basic morality is intrinsic to all human beings (because it helps us survive, not because God put it there) and nothing about my moral high ground would shock you at all.
I’m sorry there’s no dimension of my ethics that doesn’t involve voodoo and speaking in tongues, but I’ll leave you to it.
And your blissful ignorance continues. What about the people we tortured that aren’t KSM, V to the K? What about the people that George Bush released from Guantanamo Bay after years of captivity? What about the people in the photos in Abu Ghraib? What about the Canadian citizen we shipped to Syria to be tortured? What about the people that have died in our custody?
Oh, get of your imaginary religious high horse. You don’t get to accuse me of moral relativism just because I’m an atheist.
Yup.
We get to accuse you of moral relativism because your complete and total hypocrisy in terms of standards of evidence, interrogation, imprisonment, and counterterrorism activity is blatantly obvious to anyone who looks.
You and your fellow liberals enter outright lies and smears about our soldiers into public record, but believe any and all statements made by KSM and other al-Qaeda terrorists as gospel proof.
You and your fellow liberals want to imprison and torture people like Sarah Palin for imaginary crimes without any evidence or proof, but scream that even detaining terrorists like KSM consists of torture REGARDLESS of evidence or proof.
And actually, the reason you’re an atheist is pretty obvious: you don’t want any type of moral code or value interfering with what you want right at the moment you want it.
What about the people we tortured that aren’t KSM, V to the K? What about the people that George Bush released from Guantanamo Bay after years of captivity? What about the people in the photos in Abu Ghraib? What about the Canadian citizen we shipped to Syria to be tortured? What about the people that have died in our custody?
They got far better treatment than Daniel Pearl and the people in the WTC, Pentagon, and hijacked airliners got.
And that’s what you cannot and will never acknowledge, Levi.
Your obsessive attempt to scream about “innocents” in your attempt to spin for and defend your al-Qaeda friends is blown away when you consider what your al-Qaeda friends did to THOUSANDS of innocents.
There’s no question about who the “innocents” are in this case. They are the people who died in the WTC, the Pentagon, and the hijacked jetliners. They are Daniel Pearl. They are the people killed at the hotels in Mumbai and Amman.
And you are here wailing about how their killers are being “mistreated”. You defend their murderers and those who support them. You piss and spit on their bodies in your desperate, disgusting attempt to defend the indefensible.
You want political power and revenge against George W. Bush, filth, and you are willing to endorse terrorists to get it.
Sickening.
I can’t really buy that gays who are cool with the open-air BDSM of the Folsom Street Fair are really in high dudgeon about what happened at Abu Ghraib.
Conspiracy theories don’t have evidence. I have a memo that crossed the President’s desk entitled ‘Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US,’ dated a month before he did just that, wherein aircraft hijackings are discussed.
If your contention is that Bill Clinton had left the intelligence community unprepared and flat-footed, you have to explain how such a beseiged, leaderless apparatus had produced such a prescient memo.
I was 8 when Bill Clinton became President. I disagree with a lot of things he did and recognize that most of the economic growth that occurred during his presidency was the result of a once-in-a-generation technology boom and the associated dot-com bubble. But he unquestinonably made attempts to get Bin Laden and took the Al-Qaeda threat far more seriously than Republicans pretend.
You really don’t have a leg to stand on with this claim, but if you did, that still doesn’t excuse George Bush. With the advantage of hindsight, you can’t sit there and talk about how obvious it was that Bill Clinton should have been doing more to stop Al-Qaeda and then stop short of making the same claim about George Bush. Bill Clinton was diddling? Bush spent the entire month of August 2001 on vacation.
*yawn* More Levi lies.
Levi means the Canadian/Syrian citizen we shipped to Syria, you know, his native country.
Levi again lies about Abu Grahib.
To Levi ‘torturing’ is locking the ‘suspected’ drunk driver in a cell overnight.
Levi refers to ‘people released from captivity’ I’m not sure if he means the ones who were investigated and cleared and released, or if he means the ones who were investigated, cleared, released and went back to terrorism. It’s an example of our system being too forgiving I guess.
Let’s recap.
Levi: We found, and killed, Bin Laden in 45 minutes, like a Call of Duty video game.
Reality: We found, and killed Bin Laden after 7+ years of intelligence gathering, with policies started by President Bush, and continued by President Obama.
Levi: We didn’t need to invade Iraq!
Reality: We invaded Iraq for supporting terrorists and harboring same, WMD were found. Also the intel on the courier’s name came from terrorists kidnapped in Iraq.
LevI: Guantanamo’s horrible, we should have closed it!
Reality: Guantanamo is needed, even the Red Cross couldn’t find ‘violations’, and it is fine.
Levi: We shouldn’t have tortured that kindly old KSM!
Reality: We didn’t. EIT, performed under carefully monitored and controlled conditions produced the information we needed to find OBL and deliver him to 72 sturgeons.
Levi: We are horrible people, no better than the terrorists!
Reality: Care to provide any proof?
Levi: Um…..
Which is why certain leftists are in conniptions. By killing OBL – unilaterally and extralegally, no less – *and* bragging on it like it’s a good thing, the Obammies validate the entire Bush administration security policy and then some.
Oh boy. What good are you if you can’t tell the difference between people who choose to do take part in a certain kind of activity versus people being forced?
And I suppose that I am one of the gays who don’t mind ‘the open-air BDSM’ in this joke of a post of yours?
But he unquestinonably made attempts to get Bin Laden and took the Al-Qaeda threat far more seriously than Republicans pretend.
Another leftist assertion stated as though it were a fact without any supporting evidence.
Unfortunately, the real evidence is to the contrary. There were multiple Islamic terror attacks against the USA throughout the Clinton Administration (WTC 1993, the embassy bombings in Africa, the Khobar Towers bombings, the USS Cole) and the Clinton response was weak and feckless; he treated it like a law enforcement issue. His administration strengthened barriers between the CIA and FBI that prevented them from sharing information. When Somalia offered Bin Laden to his administration, they refused.
The weight of the evidence is that Clinton did not take the threat of Islamic terrorism seriously.
(continued) How can you preen about waterboarding, when you carry out hits? and you use intelligence strands developed from waterboarding, to tell you where and when to hit? If you are going to preen, well, isn’t taking someone’s LIFE as it suits you, morally worse than taking his comfort and serenity? If the fact that he’s a terrorist enemy justifies taking his life (and I believe it does), it surely justifies the lesser offense of waterboarding him.
I define torture rationally, and I think there have to be two elements present for something to qualify as torture:
1. There must be severe, prolonged physical pain and/or long-term physical injury or disfigurement; humiliation and discomfort do not suffice.
2. The pain or injury must by inflicted for purposes of retribution or raw sadism; not for purposes of gaining information.
Waterboarding terrorists to gain strategic intelligence does not meet either criteria.
When has any liberal ever argued against the killing of Osama Bin Laden?
Conservatives have created a fantasy-based caricature of liberals in which we’ve been depicted as having a desire to coddle terrorists. This has never been true, and now you’re using your delusion as a strawman to accuse liberals of being hypocrites. I’m glad he’s dead, I’m glad he’s incapable of doing any more damage to anyone.
As for your line about this ‘unilateral, extralegal’ action – it was entirely appropriate in this situation, but that doesn’t mean that so, too, was Bush’s invasion of Iraq. I’ve never been opposed to these kinds of actions, particularly in parts of the world that are hostile and uncooperative with us. But to try and conflate this type of special operations mission with the invasion of an entire goddamn country is insanse. Bush’s disastrous foreign policy remains not validated.
#20: “There is a certain segment of the left that believes any action the USA takes to defend itself is morally indefensible.”
BINGO! What Levi calls “capturing the moral high ground by rejecting the methods of our enemies,” is nothing more than embracing moral relativism. There is literally no action that the US has taken to prevent or prosecute terrorism that the Left has not characterized as “indulging in revenge fantasies” INCLUDING subjecting enemy combatants to military trials instead of civil criminal trials (with the full range of constitutional protections).
In the decade since 9/11, what leftists like Levi mean by “capturing the moral high ground” has become crystal clear and it requires the following: (1) Americans must abandon all moral judgment concerning the perpetrators of attacks like 9/11 and suppress any strong moral condemnation of the individuals involved because that could be interpreted by the Muslim community as the condemnation of Islam; (2) Americans may only express condemnation of THE ACT ITSELF, provided that the condemnation stays within the confines of a generalized, touchy-feely “violence is never the answer” sentiment; (3) Americans must tacitly accept that 9/11 was an unfortunate “tragedy” and that while the perpetrators should not have done it, the terrorists were human beings just like us and no human being could ever participate in such an attack unless they were compelled to by overwhelming injustice and oppression (in other words, for the perpetrators to do something so shocking and horrible, they must have had legitimate reasons); and (4) Americans must not respond with military action of any kind and instead focus on “healing” and being more open to the concerns and frustrations of the Muslim world so that such a tragedy never happens again.
This is how Levi and the Left think we could “win the hearts and minds” of “oppressed populations” in the Middle East. We must accept mass-murder and terrorism as legitimate expressions of political unrest in Muslim culture, which is to say that as long as it continues, it is because we deserve it and have not done enough ameliorate the history of oppression and bigotry that we subjected them to. Of course, this is why I have no problem concluding that leftists like Levi are irrevocably fu*ked in the head and that if we continue to allow people like him to occupy positions of responsibility, it will lead to the elimination of all objective moral standards from our society. And once that is accomplished, then we will be nothing but savages and like all savages, we will die out and become extinct shortly thereafter.
I’m sure Levi thinks I’m wrong and what I’ve said sounds crazy to him, but he is more than welcome to provide even ONE historical example of a society that thrived by abandoning all of its objective moral standards.
Evidence:
http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2006/osama_bin_missing_whos_tried_hardest_to.html
And now 5 years later, we find that President Bush’s agencies were gathering intelligence (in Iraq too) chasing down an illusive courier. finding his real identity (in 2007) and starting tasks that lead to the Obama administration pulling the trigger.
Congratulations Levi. you post something from 5 years ago, that’s been out dated by facts you refuse to accept.
Bush was better on the environment than Clinton, better on terror than Clinton, and better on freedom than Clinton.
Now hush Levi… adults are talking.
Osama Bin Laden is an extraordinary circumstance, and while I think the mission that resulted in his death was appropriate, we shouldn’t be making this an every day kind of thing.
This is a separate issue from the kind of institutionalized torture program that George Bush implemented. Torture is a bad policy because it isn’t effective and because it creates a bunch of unnecessary problems (propaganda for your enemies, false intelligence, diminished cooperation from locals, legal consequences) that bogs down your resources and productivity. There are better ways of interrogation that don’t create these problems and provide better information. It’s quite literally better in every respect.
Oh, but you see, Levi, since Bill Clinton never GOT bin Laden despite having eight years to do it, he wasn’t trying at all, everything he did was a waste of resources, his actions only made it worse, and he passed no information or anything of value on to his predecessor.
Remember? That’s merely applying the same standard you were screaming all the way through this thread.
The little relativist spins again. Levi literally does not have the mental or moral capacity to make a consistent judgment. His hypocrisy in defending Clinton when Clinton was an abject failure BY LEVI’S OWN ESTABLISH STANDARDS only demonstrates the degree of hypocrisy and lies under which Levi operates.
You lose, Levi. You’ve been humiliated on every single thread on this topic by people who are clearly far better informed, far less ignorant, and of far better moral character and judgment than you have ever demonstrated.
Yes, you’re wrong. I don’t believe any of the things you listed and I don’t know anyone who does. Your view of the left has been carefully crafted by people like Karl Rove and Rush Limbaugh who need cover for their counterproductive policies from people like you who can be tricked into believing pretty much anything. You don’t think I condemn the people who attacked the US on 9-11 because I’m a liberal? You think I believe that the United States deserved what happened on 9-11? You’re out of your mind.
This is a separate issue from the kind of institutionalized torture program that George Bush implemented.
No, it isn’t.
George Bush’s practices got the information that led directly to this hit.
You are attempting to take credit for something that never would have happened if you had gotten your way.
You ran away from the proof of how feckless and incompetent “police action” liberalism is against terrorism, Levi. You couldn’t face facts, so you ran and hid.
Furthermore, we have proof of you screaming and shrieking that merely incarcerating terrorists constitutes “torture”. You have already established that you will not in any way allow terrorists who murder thousands of innocents to even be imprisoned, much less interrogated or punished.
I don’t believe any of the things you listed and I don’t know anyone who does.
Sure you do.
Barack Obama’s pastor Jeremiah Wright, who you support and endorse.
Barack Obama’s fellow liberals who referred to the WTC victims as “little Eichmanns” who deserved to die.
And you yourself, who are screaming that people like KSM are innocent and are being “tortured” by being incarcerated.
We keep throwing your words back at you, Levi. Your own words. And here you sit in shrieking denial insisting that you never said them. You can’t even acknowledge linked, obvious, direct quotes of yourself supporting and endorsing terrorists and those who murder and slaughter Americans.
You’re in the process of having a mental breakdown, Levi. Your own ability to recognize reality is vanishing when you’re denying even the quotes that Livewire, myself, and others are putting up as your own words, with links to demonstrate where and how you said them.
it’s hilarious that it requires five or six handles to take on one Levi.
Levi, institutionalized torture program that George Bush implemented”? Huh? Oh, you must be referring to the enhanced interrogation techniques used on a very limited (I think it was three) high value terror detainees.
More commentary on the success of waterboarding here
Hmm, there’s praising Bin Laden:
Sen. Patty Murray in 2004: ”He’s been out in these countries for decades, building schools, building roads, building infrastructure, building day-care facilities, building health-care facilities, and the people are extremely grateful. He’s made their lives better. We have not done that.”
Here‘s a report on a liberal lamenting that we ‘celebrate’ his evil being gone.
And just for fun.. how about a quote from the man supported by so many on the left (and the President.) “We condemn the assassination and the killing of an Arab holy warrior. We ask God to offer him mercy with the true believers and the martyrs.”
I know, terrorists supporting terrorists, who’d imagine?
#26 Levi:
These tired old Slate and Huffpo themes only prove how weak the left is on pinning 9/11 on Bush being lazy, stupid and arrogant.
Levi conveniently fails to note that Tenet also was out of the office for much of August. Levi fails to show that Clarke, Tenet, the DIA, etc. were all unable to make GW Bush stir from his lethargy and react to the screamingly, totally obvious, couldn’t be missed signs that Osama was going to hit the Twin Towers on 9/11.
I say “screamingly, totally obvious,” because that is the way Levi always, completely and innocently and totally correctly speaks.
Levi has his sources and they are totally, completely, irrefutably correct and true and unassailable and so there. And if you read the link, you are an idiot if you do not see that Levi has proved his case conclusively and if you don’t see it that way I can’t help you because you see angels and you know it.
The Crawford White House had no phone, you know? Bush cut brush and sent messages by smoke signals. Furthermore, he was planning Katrina. And recovering from his DUI.
It’s amazing that Levi stoops to sock puppets to come to his defense DaVinci
Though watching Levi desperately try to have his cake and eat it too is fun.
Note now how he’s carving out exceptions for going after Bin Laden. Using ‘tainted’ intelligence? Good for President Obama, bad for President Bush.
Invading a soverign country? Good for President Obama, bad for President Bush (especially bad for President Bush that the liberation of Iraq was legal and justified)
Not coming to his defense, just making an observation, TLW. But, you seem to have an obsession with Levi, so I can’t imagine you taking yourself out of your Levi-tunnel-vision. (your obsession with Levi being another observation)
Can we please waterboard Levi and be done with it? Forgive me if I don’t give much weight to the opinions of a 20 something know-it-all.
it’s hilarious that it requires five or six handles to take on one Levi.
So since it took an entire team of SEALs to kill bin Laden, that means they’re cowards and wusses? Or that bin Laden is superior to SEALs?
Or does it mean that Levi’s fellow liberal anklebiters are down to sniping, whining, and crying about how facts, logic, and reality are mean, and that we should just sit back and let the stupid terrorist supporters like them do as they wish?
Well DaVinci,
I’m sure you failed to notice the various other posts I make commenting and replying to others. Pointing out that Levi’s a coward, a socialist, a racist and a fool can take a lot of effort, though.
Still, if you accuse me of ‘tunnel vision’ I find you need your reading abilities checked.
#39: “I don’t believe any of the things you listed and I don’t know anyone who does.”
No, of course you don’t. Liberals express shock and indignation at the suggestion that they believe America deserves to be attacked by terrorists, and then publish cover stories in national publications titled, “Why Do They Hate Us?” You hear celebrities like Michael Moore call insurgents trying to kill American soldiers “freedom fighters” and you applaud and excitedly mark your calendar with the release date of his next anti-American propaganda film. You demand the closure of Gitmo based on the contention that it’s a recruitment tool for Al Qaeda (because you are so INSANE and STUPID that you think we will somehow win the favor of AL QAEDA if we shut it down).
No, Levi, you don’t openly admit that America deserves to be attacked by terrorists. But every single talking point you shriek about this issue contains an undeniable premise that there is an underlying cause and effect dynamic that only America has the obligation to fix.
And it’s funny that you claim that I’m out of my mind by identifying all of this as components of your world view. Levi, that’s what I’m telling YOU. YOU are out of your mind. YOU are the one that believes we can somehow “make it up to” AL QAEDA, you fu*king dope. Nothing that you say about this issue is substantiated by reality. NOTHING. And everything that I know about the Left has been confirmed by THE LEFT. Not Limbaugh, not Rove. YOU.
TLW, It’s funny that whenever you do disagree with anyone else, they don’t get the condescending catchphrase you tag at the end of all of your responses to him.
Again, just an observation.
The funny part about the idiot Levi is that he regularly screams and whines that we should not set policy based on whether or not it offends peoples’ religious beliefs — only to go off yelling how evil the United States is and why our policies should change because they offend Muslims.
The way to deal with Levi most effectively is for Christians to simply respond to the behavior of liberals like him in the same fashion as do Muslims when their beliefs are insulted or when government policies are not established and/or changed to their liking.
And if Levi screams and cries that this is encouraging violence, then one needs only ask why Levi supports and endorses violence from Muslims.
Well, you certainly don’t act like a Christian as it stands.
TLW, It’s funny that whenever you do disagree with anyone else, they don’t get the condescending catchphrase you tag at the end of all of your responses to him.
The irony is thick with this one.
If you’re an idiot, and you’re trying to help some other idiot get into a position of power to drag down civilization with your collective idiocy, the smarter among your countrymen are going to have some harsh words for you. I’m smarter than most conservatives, this is beyond any doubt. I’m also a better person – you guys have given up any claim to that argument with your morally decrepit positions on torture and wars. If that sounds condescending, it’s because it is. And you should probably spend more of your time teaching yourself things and thinking, rather than complain about the mean people that make fun off you for not being very smart.
People like you need people like me to drag you kicking and screaming into the future.
So if you don’t like “condescending catchphrases”, Davinci Smetana, you might want to go after your Levi, who is directly admitting he uses them.
Of course, no one here really believes that being condescending is the problem. More likely, it’s the fact that your little Levi boy is being pounded to a pulp by reality and facts, being publicly humiliated, and in general demonstrating the complete lack of intellect, rationality, and logic that are at the core of the Obama Party’s ideology.
Thanks for trying to play the Mommy role and come running to defend your little precious. But like Levi’s mother, all that means is that people think you’re a fool too.
Nah, it doesn’t take five people to swat down Evil. It’s just the Levi spews five times as much stupidity as an ordinary person; so, there’s plenty to go around.
Well, you certainly don’t act like a Christian as it stands.
Oh, I see; let’s try to use peoples’ religious beliefs to bully and browbeat them into shutting up when we and our fellow liberals are smearing and telling lies about other people.
What’s really entertaining about this is how the libbies like Davinci Smetana only try to pull this one with Christians and Jews. For some reason, despite their constant blabbering about how Islam is a “religion of peace”, you don’t EVER see them publicly stating that Muslims who threaten violence, such as the Obama Party voters in Dearborn, Michigan and the Black Panthers aren’t acting in accordance with the principles of their religion.
And keep in mind, we’re all motivated by love and concern…
Levi’s spinning so fast we’re worried that he’s going to hurt his widdle brain.
BTW: My son just asked me if killing an unarmed prisoner violates the Geneva Convention. It does, doesn’t it?
To be intellectually consistent, the left must now brand Obama a ‘war criminal.’
V,
Dhimmy Carter already did that over North Korea, since we’re in a cease fire with them, not a peace.
The part of the GC I focus on is that we’re bound by Geneva, unless the other party violates the tennets of that convention. Since AQ doesn’t follow those rules, we don’t have to either.
To use another example when Hamas hides a rocket launcher in a civilian building and Israel bombs it to hell, it’s not a war crime on Israel’s part. since Hamas wasn’t following Geneva to begin with.
The part of the GC I focus on is that we’re bound by Geneva, unless the other party violates the tennets of that convention. Since AQ doesn’t follow those rules, we don’t have to either.
I totally agree with that. But the lefties who brand Bush a ‘war criminal’ don’t. I am merely pointing out the intellectual inconsistency.
Does that make us all war criminals on some level, beating on an unarmed man with facts and truth?
Or is that more of a hate crime attacking the mentally challenged?
Damn you people are a bunch of liars.
Smetana of Vinci must have fallen off a Gypsy cart on its way to Rome. The Vinci neighborhood is very provincial and Smetana would stand out like a ripe, rosy red nose zit.
Has Levi no higher minded people than the clouded crew that seems to show up to defend him? I hate to judge him by the company he keeps to protect him, but if that is the calibre of leftist brainpower, what are we to do?
And another non-sequitor post by our back up racist, Dooms.
Not quite. It’s actually hilarious, Vince, that you could think that (and still, I would presume, claim to be a sensible person 😉 )
Precisely.
As I said: By killing OBL – unilaterally and extralegally and after telling us that Islamist terrorists are not battlefield combatants, but ordinary criminals who deserve the rights of the accused – *and* by bragging on that killing like it’s a good thing, the Obammies validate the entire Bush administration security policy and then some.
Hence: Levi’s astounding inventions and beyond-Orwell mental gymnastics.
Oh, Levi, one more thing, do you have evidence to back up your comment #1? If so, please provide it. Thanks!
Observe a dog-piling and then get personally insulted.
I see your true colors . . .
I see your true colors . . .
Indeed.
What you see are people who are among the brightest and nicest I’ve met when you have your facts in order and your arguing in good faith ready.
But when someone like you comes in to snark, bash peoples’ religious beliefs, and whine about “condescension” in defense of someone who openly brags how condescending he is to others, “cascade of disdain” doesn’t even come close to describing what you’re going to get.
You don’t suppose the liberals delaying and obstructing his appointments had anything to do with it, do you? Also, would you mind sharing with the class where Congress and the rest of Washington was that August???
In the spirit of having facts straight, NPR did a nice segment on this issue today. As with all things, the real situation is murky–evidence for both sides–with the result that the truth probably lies somewhere in the middle…
http://www.npr.org/2011/05/05/136005405/did-harsh-interrogation-tactics-lead-to-bin-laden
What insult? I only observed what’s hilarious here, as you tried to. Can’t take what you dish? Want to touch, but not be touched? Tsk, tsk.
And here is a link to problems concerning how “enhanced interrogation” techniques can interfere with memory retrieval. http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=torture-interferes-with-memory-09-09-21
http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2009/09/torture-cant-pr.html
More complicated issue, I think.
Cas, your bias is showing. Your comment assumes that waterboarding is actually torture, something very much in dispute. And the link only addresses torture as such; not waterboarding.
To all that, I could add something else that others have pointed out: that no pro interrogator would expect the information yielded by *any* specific technique to be reliable. Hence, arguments along the lines of “it’s been shown that this technique is not reliable” are just straw man tactics. No technique is reliable. Building intel threads from whatever techniques is a process of sifting, checking and re-checking.
Do you image that a technique such as asking the terrorist nicely, yields reliable information? It doesn’t. Sometimes, the key information may be what the terrorist *doesn’t* say when placed under pressure. Or it may be one little bit, given once by accident – such as a name, a nationality, a random detail that was strongly attached to memory XYZ (and therefore accurate in the moment it was uttered, even while the terrorist couldn’t remember or account for their lunch meeting of October 7, 1996).
Hi! Cas! Did you read what you posted in #75? Did you scan the comments? Did you ask yourself why such a vacuous, non-statement of hazy opinion was published? Did you note that the only “scientific” evidence (Scientific American, my foot!) was a convoluted reference to research by the dreaded military? Did you understand that the reference did not differentiate between short term and long term memory?
The Nazi regime experimented with all forms of torture and left documents which carry much information. They were systematic and analytical about their torture and the results they got. However, some of current mankind are revolted by trying to mine the “good” from the evil such people unleashed.
Here is a truly meaningful link for your edification:
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/naziexp.html
(Waterboarding was a Cub Scout initiation to these people.)
Hi ILC,
“Cas, your bias is showing. Your comment assumes that waterboarding is actually torture, something very much in dispute. And the link only addresses torture as such; not waterboarding.”
Waterboarding is mentioned in the reviews, however, I thought I would see if I could find evidence “direct from the horses mouth,” so to speak. Here is a copy of the paper. I would be interested in what you think.
I agree that this is an issue in dispute.
“To all that, I could add something else that others have pointed out: that no pro interrogator would expect the information yielded by *any* specific technique to be reliable. Hence, arguments along the lines of “it’s been shown that this technique is not reliable” are just straw man tactics. No technique is reliable. Building intel threads from whatever techniques is a process of sifting, checking and re-checking.”
Let us grant you your claim in this and the following paragraph. Does it make a difference? I think not. What you appear to be saying is that we cannot trust this method alone. We must use it in concert with other methods. But what is not clear is any rationale for using it, apart from the unstated claim that people dislike pain and the fear of death, so they are more likely to give information if we subject them to this fear in a very real way (and waterboarding is apparently very good at making those who undergo it, feel like they are drowning). But, if the author is right, then this basic premise is wrong, and it is arguable that you can do better without these techniques. I do not see that as a straw man at all.
If it is unreliable, why not go with other methods of interrogation that do not run the risk of becoming torture (if they are not already?), and which can use all of the processes of cross-checking you describe so well in your comment?
The torture (or enhanced interrogation) argument, as far as I can tell, is mostly defended by those who offer the “ticking bomb” defense–there is no time–we need to go extreme measures to save lives… Yet, this article casts doubt on its efficacy. If we are dealing with interrogation over a long period of time (as in the hunt for bin Laden), this “ticking bomb” defence is less and less relevant, and if this author is right, when used to support “sharpened techniques” clearly counterproductive. It will lead to lots of goose-chases. I grant that normal interrogation will probably do so as well.
Hi HT,
“Did you ask yourself why such a vacuous, non-statement of hazy opinion was published?”
Cool. Could you please give me the links to the scientific refutations of his claims. I have been trying to find them, but no luck so far, and your confidence suggests that you can help me out here.
“Did you scan the comments?”
Yes. They are mostly the old back and forth I have come to expect here.
“The Nazi regime experimented with all forms of torture and left documents which carry much information. They were systematic and analytical about their torture and the results they got. However, some of current mankind are revolted by trying to mine the “good” from the evil such people unleashed.”
Thanks for the link, but I am unclear what the point of this is? Are you critiquing the author for writing a research paper based on people’s suffering? Or…?
“(Waterboarding was a Cub Scout initiation to these people.)”
Yes, I think you are right. But they also used it, and other forms of “enhanced” or “sharpened” techniques.
http://www.theatlantic.com/daily-dish/archive/2007/05/-versch-auml-rfte-vernehmung/228158/
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2011/04/19/nazi-home-of-waterboarding-torture-technique-to-be-opened-as-museum-115875-23070987/
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/10/books/stephane-hessel-93-calls-for-time-of-outrage-in-france.html?_r=2&pagewanted=2&hpw
Here is what Hi! Cas linked in #75:
This nearly meaningless banter was published in Scientific American for unknown purposes. For equally unknown reasons, Hi! Cas drags it here.
I asked Hi! Cas some simple questions that apparently missed their target. Paragraph #2 above states: “torture’s not likely to work.”
Paragraph #3 states: “Proponents claim that waterboarding’s effective because prisoners will tell the truth to make the interrogation stop. (These are the words of Karen Hopkin, not the researcher, Share O’Mara.) Really? The claim is that waterboarding makes people tell the truth? I would love to find responsible citations for that. The fact is, waterboarding makes people talk. What they say may result in more waterboarding. Waterboarding is demonstrating to the victim where the differences between cooperation and non-cooperation lie. In the extreme case of staving off an immediate attack, waterboarding is a crap shoot.
Karen Hopkin has set up a false argument and any editor worth his salt would have spotted it and never allowed it to be branded “scientific.” Shane O’Mara is referenced in paragrapgh #3 reporting exactly what I said in the previous paragraph. Share and I are in agreement. Not Karen.
So, we still do not know why Karen Hopkin says why Share O’Mara declares: torture’s not likely to work.”
Paragraph #4 is mumbo-jumbo about sleep deprivation and food deprivation and what has been discovered about American Special Ops soldiers. (This information was certainly obtained by studies conducted by the military, not Share O’Mara.) Strangely, this paragraph says nothing about waterboarding. The tie is “torture” and “stress.” So, instead of torture, we move on to “stress.”
We learn that stress hormones can compromise brain activity and memory. Fine. But what happens when the “stress hormones” subside? Is the memory permanently altered? Of course, not. Sully Sullenberger managed his stress hormones just fine during his landing on the Hudson River and afterwards.
The last paragraph floats by without any reference, let alone proof, that: “torture’s not likely to work.”
If there was ever a case of much ado about nothing, this is it.
Karen Hopkin might very well have smeared honest research and Scientific American had no business printing such tripe.
The rationale is: it works, when done correctly and in the most difficult cases. They only ever waterboarded 3 people. And after some number of applications (I believe it was several in KSM’s case), the prisoners became fundamentally more cooperative and yielded good new information (which, of course, had to be verified – but you can’t verify something without having something to verify, i.e., without the initial statement or lead).
All these claims “it doesn’t work” are so much blather. The CIA tried it carefully in the 3 most difficult and important cases, and it worked. It works by inducing an overwhelming, primal feeling of panic in the body and therefore the lower brain centers, which weakens or chips away at willpower-type decisions which the person had made in their higher brain centers such as “I am not going to talk”. I’m no expert on the details, but from what I recall, after 3 or 4 applications and with more in sight, KSM said forget it, you got me, I’m talking.
By the way, narcotic drugs work similarly, except with pleasure: they induce an overwhelming, primal feeling of pleasure in the body and the lower brain centers, which chips away at willpower-type decisions which the person had made in their higher brain centers such as “I will work now” or “I will not steal”. One difference is that the person usually administers the narcotic to themselves and can make a higher-brain choice to simply never again administer it.
Most of the time, they do. They waterboarded as a last resort on 3 terrorists. And it was apparently an effective last resort. Again, it apparently changes the prisoner’s basic attitude, in a way that other inducements (including actual torture, the infliction of pain) do not.
Hi HT,
You disliked the first piece I found, and accepting your skepticism about lack of clarity, as a dutiful interlocutor, I went and found the original, I gave you a link to the actual article that was published in Trends in Cognitive Sciences Vol.13 No.12. It is pretty clear you ignored that, preferring to stay with your attacks on the Sci Am article. OK. But, we don’t have anything to discuss. This is a pity, because the actual article is much more interesting then what Sci Am reported. The last section in the article is very thought provoking, focusing on the importance of “signaling.”
Further, when you say:
“I asked Hi! Cas some simple questions that apparently missed their target. Paragraph #2 above states: “torture’s not likely to work.””
And I give you the actual article to read, you can check out the conclusion:
“In sum, coercive interrogations involving extreme stress
are unlikely to facilitate the release of veridical information
from long-term memory, given our current cognitive
neurobiological knowledge. On the contrary, these
techniques cause severe, repeated and prolonged stress,
which compromises brain tissue supporting memory and
executive function. The fact that the detrimental effects of
these techniques on the brain are not visible to the naked
eye makes them no less real.”
How the author gets there is a lot more interesting than what Scientific American has to say. I agree, SA sensationalizes things, looking for the salacious bits, but your beef is with SA’s reporter, rather than the actual author of the article or the article itself.
Is this “mumbo jumbo” to you?
“Extreme stress studies in Special Operations Soldiers
[8] have found impaired visuo-spatial capacity and recall of
previously-learned information in stressed soldiers (who
undergo stress, including food and sleep deprivation,
during training modelled on the experiences of American
prisoners-of-war). Brain imaging in people previously subjected
to severe torture suggests that abnormal patterns of
activation are present in the frontal and temporal lobes [9],
leading to deficits in verbal memory for the recall of traumatic
events [10,11]. A recent meta-analysis [12] of the
relationship between pharmacologically induced cortisol
elevations (in the upper physiological range) concluded
that such elevations impair memory retrieval in humans,
as do psychosocial stress-induced cortisol elevations. By
contrast, mildly stressful events generally facilitate recall.
The experience of capture, transport and subsequent challenging
questioning would seem to be more than enough to
make suspects reveal information.”
Actually, reading its technical presentation again, it sounds a little that way to me, I have to admit! 🙂 But, I get the underlying argument–high stress creates chemical events in the brain that can interfere with the brain’s ability to accurately report memories (and which might permanently damage the brain). The author speaks specifically to waterboarding’s induced effects on brain activity. The author of the article, O’Mara has surveyed the literature and written in a peer-reviewed journal. He might be wrong, but I haven’t turned up any evidence yet of refereed peer-reviewed comments to the contrary. Do you have something to point to? Otherwise, whether we call it torture or “sharpened” or “enhanced” interrogation techniques, it appears that it doesn’t do what those in authority in this country would like us to believe it does–give us “the release of veridical information from long-term memory.”
PS. I am unclear if the “Special Forces” the article cites in its bibliography refers specifically to US Spec Ops, or Spec Ops in general. I haven’t found anything as yet. Any ideas?
Hi! Cas,
You are right, I did not notice that you had sent along a link to the original.
I have no interest in the “research.” I am not going to read it and I am not going to chit chat with you about it.
If you are at all wise, you will understand that your initial link is why the internet is a bad place to acquire the skills for critical thinking. If you care a whit about critical thinking, you will follow the deconstruction I provided in #79. If that sounds arrogant, just realize that I am not charging you for the analysis.
Oh, I know, I am supposed to pull on the toy you are shaking in front of me and run after it when you toss it and bring it back to you and wag my tail and beg for more.
The world of academic “researched” nostrums is over-flowing with psychobabble and specific sociological research which becomes the broad brush of enlightened prognostication. Let me put that in real words for you: For a dime a dozen you can find professors who have cooked up research to promote their special game plans for curing a perceived societal ill and predicting a wide-reaching positive outcome that has nothing to do with the anecdotal evidence of the limited research. They feed the world of “community organizers, quacks and liberals.
Show me the successful firm of sociologists and psychotherapists who plan and supervise the interactions of a neighborhood. In other words (again) show me a community that has been elevated and moved forward in a positive manner by a “community organizer.”
In the event you still do not get the message: I am not interested in belaboring a link you provided which was inane. I pointed out to you in an extended way why it was an inane link and you presume to impose more “stuff” on me? Why? You do not have a point, you just want to shoot the bull.
Hi HT,
“You do not have a point, you just want to shoot the bull.”
“If you care a whit about critical thinking, you will follow the deconstruction I provided in #79.”
“I have no interest in the “research.” I am not going to read it and I am not going to chit chat with you about it.”
“The world of academic “researched” nostrums is over-flowing with psychobabble and specific sociological research which becomes the broad brush of enlightened prognostication.”
“I am not interested in belaboring a link you provided which was inane. ”
Shorter HT: If you actually respond to my claims concerning the poor quality of a link you initially offered, with a link that might actually meet my standards of rigour, I will ignore it because it very likely doesn’t accord with my view of how the world should be; and that is incovenient. As such, this “academic” paper is obviously likely to be mumbo-jumbo and I will label it as such without reading it–unlike the authors I favour, who are the very model of clarity, especially since I agree with what they present…
Cool, dude. I get it.
Hi ILC,
I notice you quote part of my claim, but leave the rest out:
“But what is not clear is any rationale for using it, apart from the unstated claim that people dislike pain and the fear of death, so they are more likely to give information if we subject them to this fear in a very real way (and waterboarding is apparently very good at making those who undergo it, feel like they are drowning). But, if the author is right, then this basic premise is wrong, and it is arguable that you can do better without these techniques. I do not see that as a straw man at all.”
What we do not know is how successful these techniques were, against the counter-factual–what if we had used other methods. I am sure people break under these EI’s. But could you get this information any other way? And would it have been higher quality? I guess we won’t know.
However, the “last resort” issue you raise is an interesting question. Do you have some links on that–I wonder why and when it was seen as a last resort?
I am persuaded by the argument that the administration has already released far more information than is appropriate for a covert op.
Kindly excuse me for having tried to answer the most important part of your claim as directly as I could.
*You* don’t know. Someone knows, somewhere. Others have us have seen general comments in the media about what might be known, and believe it.
Umm… because it takes a team of people to do it carefully and safely? And because it might be misunderstood? You know, a bunch of people who don’t like the U.S. and who already want to run with anything that can be made to sound remotely bad, might start trying to claim it’s actual torture – something like that?
Shorter HT: If you actually respond to my claims concerning the poor quality of a link you initially offered, with a link that might actually meet my standards of rigour, I will ignore it because it very likely doesn’t accord with my view of how the world should be; and that is incovenient.
Actually, Cas, it’s more the fact that you have proven to be an imbecile incapable of reading the most basic facts on a link that contradict your narrative.
As Helio aptly put it, you expect us to pull on the toy you are shaking in front of us and run after it when you toss it and bring it back to you and wag our tails and beg for more. Your strategy to make yourself relevant is to spout irrelevance and demand that we obey you, then insist that we are somehow inferior when we choose to ignore you.
This strategy only works when one is a worthy opponent with a demonstrated history of understanding and intelligence, Cas. However, given that you aren’t even capable of determining the difference between actual numbers and predictions when they are labeled and spelled out for you, “worthy” is something to which, with a lot of practice and study, you might have a faint hope of a chance to aspire.
NDT,
Thanks. I is EX-asperated.
NDT and Heliotrope, Do not get exasperated or worked up because of Cas. She’s not worth it.
Hi ILC,
” I wonder why and when it was seen as a last resort?
Umm… because it takes a team of people to do it carefully and safely? And because it might be misunderstood? You know, a bunch of people who don’t like the U.S. and who already want to run with anything that can be made to sound remotely bad, might start trying to claim it’s actual torture – something like that?”
I don’t follow your train of thought here–I was asking about why you thought normal interrogation methods were believed to not be ever able to work in these situations (or because of time constraints–ticking bomb scenario I discussed above, etc)–so as to require these EI techniques. I was asking for links to those who made these claims, so I could evaluate them,
As for whether you or I think this is torture or not, you can assert that they are not. I could assert they are. No one’s mind will be changed on that score, I suspect. The article I cited (Cog Sci, OMara) is an interesting read–EI or torture–these techniques can cause lasting damage to people’s minds. I just hope they are guilty and that it is a last resort, because it would be a terrible thing to do that to some one who is innocent.
Hi NDT!!!!
Long time no hear! I am pleased. Thank you for raising the previous thread we interacted on. It does show some things. It shows I make mistakes. I agree with you. And I will make more. It also shows that I am wiling to admit that I do make mistakes, and come back and continue the conversation, even when you are unpleasant about it. I notice that most people on this site don’t ever really do that–on either side. And that is a pity. After all, as far as I can tell, if one believes that one is never ever wrong or never acknowledges it, how does one ever learn? I love that peanut gallery thing you have going with HT and VK by the way. 🙂 I think that is a stressful place for you to be, but you seem to enjoy it NDT. Different strokes for different folks.
So, I gave you my reply at #56 in that thread. You didn’t reply at the time–cool, its all good. But if you do decide to engage on the issue, you’ll have to do your own math I am afraid. But the basic facts I raise at #56 are not in dispute with anyone. Cheers
That is as rich as it gets. When did one sided meandering dialog with no identifiable topic become conversation? Conversation is a willing exchange of thoughts and opinions. Trolling is not conversation.
And you have nailed it exactly, Heliotrope.
As I stated in that thread:
Again, instead of engaging with those FACTS, which were provided to you in that very post, you decided to spin off and try to argue that comparisons of the “four years following the 1990 business cycle” were needed to prove that, quote, “the Clinton tax hikes led to real growth”.
I then pointed out, again with links, that a) the 1990 business cycle had dropped, then gone well back into recovery growth YEARS before any of Clinton’s tax hikes and b) that you had previously disdained historical comparisons of business cycles because the circumstances were “different”.
And I also pointed out that you were dodging the original point – tax cuts demonstrably increase private sector growth and, in doing so, drive tax revenue even higher. Three years after the Bush tax cuts, which liberals screamed would permanently lower Federal revenues, Treasury receipts were breaking record high amounts.
You then tried to quote a partisan source, breaking your own rule that partisan sources were not reliable information, tried to claim that my news sources were not reliable, breaking your own rule that sources like the AP or news organizations were reliable, and insisted that years at what you claimed was the end of a speculative bubble were not valid for comparison while you yourself were touting the year 2000, which was clearly at the tail end of a speculative bubble, as a valid comparison.
And now you’ve capped it off with this latest screaming fit where you are quoting estimated numbers from 2004 to prove that actual numbers collected in 2006 and 2007 are wrong.
My argument has been consistent, strong, and fact-based throughout. You have presented nothing but irrelevant assumptions and cherry-picked quotes, establishing requirements and rules in one post that you then break at your convenience in the following.
In short, Cas puts up irrelevant information and lies, it demands that we refute its irrelevant information and lies, and then when we do, it simply repeats the process with a different set of irrelevant information and lies. Its strategy is to push irrelevance after irrelevance in the hopes of frustrating its opponent and making them leave in disgust, at which point, it comes in and claims victory since someone didn’t respond to its latest bit of irrelevance and lies.
V the K put it aptly. Cas is not worth the effort. Cas is an imbecile whose sole purpose in coming here is to troll, and should be treated accordingly.
And by the way, Cas, you did not state you were wrong. You whined and cried and tried to insist that I was wrong instead, as anyone who reads that thread will see. You had started out with the premise that I was wrong, and you were not emotionally or intellectually mature enough to acknowledge that I was right and that you had made several stupid and inane arguments, culminating by your imbecilic attempt to quote the 2005 budget as containing actual numbers for 2006 and 2007 tax receipts in a futile attempt to prove me wrong.
Poor imbecile. You are not capable of acknowledging that you were wrong and I was right. You are not capable of admitting that you were patently stupid. You are not capable of admitting that you demonstrated a complete lack of intellectual rigor. You are not capable of acknowledging that I am far more well-informed than you are on that particular topic.
In short, Cas, I demonstrated that I am better than you are. That’s why you had to ankle-bite and try to tear me down. That’s why your only tactic on this blog is to ankle-bite and try to tear others down.
Hank Reardon recognized his full potential when he realized that Lillian Reardon’s only motivation was to hurt him. And that’s what people should be recognizing about you, Cas; your only motivation and goal is to hurt, annoy, and upset people here.
You are a troll.
NDT,
A little catharsis here. For years I pretended to follow the convoluted blathering of neopseudointellectuals (not an actual word, but useful) and pay them a bit of polite attention. They are often frustratingly hard to shut off or usher out of the dialog. Then I rose to the crusty station of being able to tell them to research, refine and return or get out all together. But, in the final analysis, I still get suckered into being concerned that they may actually be trying to communicate a salient point and I can be of help. Color me heliotrope, I always turn to the sun and look for the light.
I notice Levi hasn’t said a word since he was reminded he branded Bush a war criminal for the same thing he considers heroic in Obama.
Oh, I agree, Heliotrope. That’s why you haven’t seen me publicly call for Cas or those like it to be banned; in every tailings mound, there are lumps of coal. But one must also be mindful that, especially here, looking for said lumps takes time away from enjoying the numerous veins of anthracite.
Toby Harnden in The Telegraph:
Is Wendy Chamberlain appearing here as Levi in drag?
Courage is, doing the right thing despite your instinctive fear. Perhaps Chamberlain has a point: For the “Blame America First”, “America is Always Wrong” type of leftie, perhaps *doing exactly what Bush would have done and bragging on it afterward* does take enormous, physical courage.
PuffHo reports on the start of the hand-wringing: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/06/osama-bin-laden-killing-legal_n_858580.html?icid=maing-grid7%7Caim%7Cdl1%7Csec1_lnk3%7C61001
You can bet that if it were Bush approving the operation, lefties would be calling for his prosecution and/or impeachment. So, Obama (in behaving like Bush) has really put them in a pickle.
Hi NDT,
Your comments in #93 and #94 are quite remarkable. I am torn between wondering if you are just plain nuts, playing games for the crowd and/or yourself, totally pissed, taking a stance of ironic self-distance, or just someone who has zero perspective or understanding about how they appear to others when they “talk”. On that last one I know that you have said the same about me, (on many occasions, with your friends VK and HT from the peanut gallery). I am worried for you. That may sound strange to your ears, but it happens to be true. I am also a little worried for me.
I am only quoting one part from your two posts:
“Hank Reardon recognized his full potential when he realized that Lillian Reardon’s only motivation was to hurt him. And that’s what people should be recognizing about you, Cas; your only motivation and goal is to hurt, annoy, and upset people here…. You are a troll.”
When I first read that, I basically blasted water through my nose. My first thought was–my goodness-now that is a rather dark pot calling the little teapot black. One could just call it projection and laugh it off as part of the muscular conversation of this site, as many others (including me) have. But it got me thinking. What if you really saw yourself as a persecuted individual, with me as your persecutor? As far as I can tell, to you it looks like a normal and completely true statement– you appear to be comparing and identifying yourself with the predicament of a character of fiction.
Sorry, NDT or Henry if you prefer, you are right, and it is true: I don’t currently recognize your “full potential.” If you are reduced to insults to try and make your point irrationally, fail to answer simple questions (I know, the “gotcha fear” is strong in you), as well as twist what I clearly say (dude, I even thanked you politely for pointing out that I was wrong! OK, I didn’t think it derailed the point, I was trying to make, so I went back and did some more homework, and reposted at #56–which you still refuse to engage for your own reasons), and make loathsome extrapolations as to speaker intent that no interlocutor was ever thinking of making, then I just think that you couldn’t possibly reach your “full potential” by that set of methods. Dealing with those you disagree with the way you do, how could you possibly compare yourself to this Reardon character? So, I have no idea what that all means, except that you appear to have been hurt by my occasionally irritated and sarcastic tone with you, and feel that I persecute you.
Having said that, I apologize for making you feel bad, NDT. And, that you appear to feel I persecute you (though thankfully for both of us, I am not your “mooching” wife). I did not mean to elicit that response in you, and I feel bad that I inadvertently made you feel that I was doing so. I just assumed that since you gratuitously like to insult people, and behave in the belligerent fashion that is your norm–for example, as you do above–quite regularly I might add in this and other threads (what did Pat call it again–oh, yes–“bullying”), that you wouldn’t mind if people occasionally treat you to a smidgen, and I do mean just a little taste, of what you dish out so freely and frequently to others you disagree with. I will remember in future that you are a pretty sensitive kind of person, and be more watchful of the impact of my occasional irritation with your antics; to hold back and try and be patient with what I see as your hurtful and insulting rhetoric.
I appreciate that you don’t want to call for me to be banned, but as for the idea of banning me–if Dan wishes to do so, it is his site. I abide by his judgement in this. If he honestly believes I am the troll you think I am, he can make the determination as to whether I add value to the discussion or not. But I wouldn’t worry too much. From my perspective, your behaviour has gotten more and more bizarre, over time, in your interactions with me. I feel increasingly uncomfortable with your escalating insults and viciousness. It doesn’t look to me like robust or even playful conversation anymore. You appear to be serious to me, and I am a little worried. I grant that you do the attack thing really well, but I occasionally worry that this sort of thing might go beyond mere words. Others know you better than I, so my worry is hopefully misplaced since they are comfortable with your approach. But, again, I am not.
But it got me thinking. What if you really saw yourself as a persecuted individual, with me as your persecutor?
Actually, Cas, you’re doing a fine real-life demonstration of Lillian Reardon — a small, petty, and jealous creature that thought she would demonstrate her own value by destroying something that was better than she was.
And like Lillian Reardon, your only effectiveness in doing so comes when your target allows it.
Frankly put, you might, with years of study, more intellectual and emotional maturity, and exposure to a decent environment, work your way up to a persecutor some day.
For now, as your diatribe shows, you remain a troll, obese vapidity hiding behind a telephone pole of verbosity, irrelevance hilariously and poorly attempting to masquerade as intelligence, and a viewpoint with as much relationship to reality as New York City to a Potemkin village.
Hi NDT,
You make my point for me, yet again.
Hi! Cas,
Obviously, you will regard this as a voice from the peanut gallery, but nonetheless, I have a question. What is your mission? That question leads to further questions:
Must we engage in endless “conversation” when you introduce a topic?
Must we delight in your meandering topic shifting?
Would we be more “polite” to ignore you?
Do you believe that your unanswered comments prove your suppositions?
You drop in with liberal notions and present a guise of being interested in how said notions are at odds with conservative views. You don’t state them as your own principle, just a topic for “conversation.” Then, when you are shown a flaw in the notion, you immediately try a variation to see if that will work. You are not a gadfly as Socrates would have it; you are a gnat with …….. well, ……. What is your mission/ Do you know?
Are you just desperate for recognition?
You have gotten a fair taste of how far you can push your chain uphill on this site. Frankly, my dear, NDT has not begun to take you to the woodshed and for that you should be thankful.
A formal argument can only proceed between people who agree to disagree. You do not morph into a formal argument through vapid “conversation.” Apparently you are stuck on searching for a valid premise and you can not understand that endless attempts to create a valid premise is sophomoric at best and weak minded in all likelihood.
I shall return to my assigned seat in the peanut gallery and don my “HT” dunce cap. (How does one create such an abbreviation? Is it a some deep seated form of control?)
Hi HT,
Thank you for your post.
First: “Obviously, you will regard this as a voice from the peanut gallery.” Never HT. I appreciate that you are talking to me directly. The voice from the peanut gallery is one that talks to others about someone without directly engaging the person they are talking about–though the person can hear them. It is useful in safely and indirectly “cutting someone down to size” and is usually an irrational form of argumentation (sometimes it can be a rational Greek choir, but it doesn’t operate like that here; hence why I call it a “peanut gallery”). It is one of the advantages that the home team usually has, and a visitor has to deal with it.
“What is your mission?”
A fair question. My mission is to engage people with different points of view to me and to broaden my viewpoint. In this, I have succeeded. This does not require that I agree with my interlocutors’ point of view. It just requires that I sit back and think about what they have said. Thus, for me, the conversations on the meaning of being Republican and gay are interesting. The conversation with ILC on commodity inflation was helpful for deepening my understanding of the issue through Austrian eyes (though I still disagree with ILC). My conversation with SF on global warming was really helpful–I learned a lot, and have a testable prediction. Chatting with TL on the nature of fascism opened my eyes to the fact that one could see the New Deal as having fascist elements even if it wasn’t fascist. I did not know that before, and subsequent research supports this contention. Our conversation on the nature of faith was useful in getting clarity about some things I do and don’t believe. Even my dust-off with NDT that he cited earlier in the thread helped in one way–because I had to go back and crunch the numbers to get a clear idea of what was important–#56 is my reply. Doing that in heated circumstances can be helpful or unhelpful depending on circumstances, though it is easier and more fun when it is a little more collegial and respectful.
In answer to your other questions:
“Must we engage in endless “conversation” when you introduce a topic? No.
Must we delight in your meandering topic shifting? So, Cas, how many times do you beat your wife?
Would we be more “polite” to ignore you? That is your decision.
Do you believe that your unanswered comments prove your suppositions?” No.
Are you just desperate for recognition? No.
A lot of this is in the eye of the beholder, frankly.
Why not turn that mirror around?
One example. I entered this thread to talk about torture/EI/waterboarding. After all, the original claim of the thread is: “So, it seems waterboarding helped us track down bin Laden ”
I mentioned that that claim was open to dispute, and offered evidence–in the form of a link you did not like. You offered a critique. “Then, when you are shown a flaw in the notion, you immediately try a variation to see if that will work.” I don’t think that the claim that something is vague or apparently relies on one study necessarily ends an argument. However, whether I agree with your “deconstruction” or not, I respected your reservations enough to find more evidence to answer your question–did O’Mara only rely on one study? What methodology did he use? I thought that was your sizable complaint. I went to the horse’s mouth: http://www.scribd.com/doc/20252219/Trends-in-Cognitive-Science-Shane-O%E2%80%99Mara.”Torturing the brain: On the folk psychology and folk neurobiology motivating ‘enhanced and coercive interrogation techniques’ ”
You were kind enough to acknowledge that you had again filled holes in a different target to the one I was pointing at, but it was your next action that startled me.
If as you say, at #95, that “I rose to the crusty station of being able to tell them to research, refine and return or get out all together” then, your response to call what I found “mumbo-jumbo” and dismiss it, without reading it, goes against the very foundation of what makes an argument rational, and your own stated position. I apologize for being sarcastic in my reply; I should have been more patient, and asked you why you thought it was “mumbo-jumbo.”
The fact is that we rely on “experts” all the time. We all use the net to support claims–even you HT! We use them for the statistics we bring to bear; for comment; for academic support–whether it be an Austrian School economist or a Neoclassical School economist; liberal or conservative historian or commentator. O’Mara’s paper goes to the heart of this issue of the thread. Maybe he is wrong; and I looked for the rebuttals in the scientific journals. I haven’t found them yet, but that doesn’t mean that they are not there. I could be wrong about that. What it looked to me was that you didn’t want to engage with relevant evidence. The topic is a rich one–is waterboarding torture? Even if it is or isn’t, does water-waterboarding give reliable results? Does it cause real long term damage? Does the mix of true and untrue statements help or hinder an investigation? Could the information be gotten with less coercive techniques? These are all topics that have been explored in this thread by people on both sides of the ideological divide. I do not feel that my contributions were off-thread. You can of course disagree.
What was off thread was #88. It took the thread away from the issue of water-boarding and delved into ad-hominem territory with content that was irrelevant to the topic at hand. I grant I should have just ignored him, but bless me, I didn’t. So I helped make the mess by encouraging NDT. My apologies. And the thread never really went back to the topic we had been discussing (though ILC did his level best to help bring it back).
“You have gotten a fair taste of how far you can push your chain uphill on this site. Frankly, my dear, NDT has not begun to take you to the woodshed and for that you should be thankful.”
You raise an interesting issue. To avoid being a “peanut gallery” I also address NDT directly, along with you, on this issue, because it concerns him or her as well. If what you say is true, HT, then this site has a bigger problem than me, and you and other interlocutors should be worried. I grant that some liberal commentators here practice “hit and run” ad hominem, both giving and receiving; but NDT is in a whole category of his or her own. There should be no place for this level of intensity of ad hominem attacking. The use of irrational techniques you apparently indirectly approve of in that comment I quoted above do not further rational debate or conversation, they close it down. We all make mistakes, but it is different when someone mostly relies on these irrational forms of argumentation to dominate or in this case, hijack, an argument. It closes down conversation or, if you prefer, rational argument, and replaces it with intimidation and harassment.
“How does one create such an abbreviation? Is it a some deep seated form of control?”
I started using abbreviations for names because I was trying to respond to as many as eight posts at some points in conversations. “Cas” is short. “Heliotrope” is long ( “North Dallas Thirty” is longer), and I am a two finger typist. If I offended you, I apologize, and I will use “Heliotrope.” If you are comfortable with HT, given my explanation, then my fingers would prefer that!
As for the “dunce” comment. It doesn’t gel with what you say at #95 and what you have said on many other threads I have been part of, in the past.
Do you believe that your unanswered comments prove your suppositions?” No.
You are lying, Cas.
This is your statement above:
Shorter HT: If you actually respond to my claims concerning the poor quality of a link you initially offered, with a link that might actually meet my standards of rigour, I will ignore it because it very likely doesn’t accord with my view of how the world should be; and that is incovenient.
And this is another of your statements.
So, I gave you my reply at #56 in that thread. You didn’t reply at the time–cool, its all good. But if you do decide to engage on the issue, you’ll have to do your own math I am afraid. But the basic facts I raise at #56 are not in dispute with anyone. Cheers
In both of your statements you make it directly clear that failure to answer you is proof of your suppositions, and you state that the only reason people would not answer you is because they are wrong.
You are a liar, Cas. You have now been shown to be a liar by the quotation of your own words and cornered by your own tactics. You have now demonstrated that you will make a bald-faced lie in an attempt to save face.
Heliotrope asked that question for a reason: he is familiar with pseudo-intellectuals and trolls like yourself who are acting out of ideology and not out of intelligent thought. It was a trap, and you walked right into it.
You preen and posture and try to play the moderate, Cas, but as stated above, you remain a troll, obese vapidity hiding behind a telephone pole of verbosity, irrelevance hilariously and poorly attempting to masquerade as intelligence, and a viewpoint with as much relationship to reality as New York City to a Potemkin village. And that much is obvious to everyone here.
What was off thread was #88. It took the thread away from the issue of water-boarding and delved into ad-hominem territory with content that was irrelevant to the topic at hand.
Notice how, to Cas, demonstrated proof of its history of posting inane and irrelevant links with no value whatsoever to the topic at hand is suddenly an “ad hominem attack”.
Cas apparently believes that, in the name of “dialogue”, those of us with actual knowledge and understanding should shut up so that Cas can post a budget written in 2005 and claim that it proves actual numbers for 2006 and 2007.
Or, put differently, in Cas’s world, it is rude and wrong to correct the stupid and uninformed.
Furthermore, Cas, your game is now up. You have stated, quote:
Do you believe that your unanswered comments prove your suppositions?” No.
Again, brilliant tactical move on Heliotrope’s part. Now we can simply ignore you and, when you post one of your whining attempts to make others respond by saying their failure to respond proves they’re wrong and you’re right, we can simply post this rejoinder and demonstrate the blatant and obvious hypocrisy that underpins your whole methodology.
Hi! Cas,
As a point of fact: The “peanut gallery” was where the selected little kids sat in the NBC studios at Rockefeller Center as they viewed the live broadcast of the Howdy Doody Show in the early 1950’s.
Howdy Doody was a great American icon who, like Mickey Mouse, was without guile, eternally optimistic, self-effacing and genuinely moral and ethical.
I instruct you on this, because I know full well that modern children think the “peanut gallery” is a place for small minds and they do not not understand that the child in the peanut gallery is watching a morality play unfold. There is no danger, however, because happy is he who keeps a child’s heart.
As to the HT label, I find it as perplexing as if you would call a transgendered person TG. You are welcome to address me as you wish, but I am underwhelmed by your “shorthand” explanation considering the length of the comment that follows. I suppose, in the final analysis, I find HT to be a lazy and somewhat illiterate salutation.
Beyond this, I find the rest of your comments to be circular and exclusive of some of the points and questions I posed.
Hi HT,
Thanks for the history lesson on what a “peanut gallery” is in the US. That was fun to find out. It is a different thing elsewhere.
“Beyond this, I find the rest of your comments to be circular and exclusive of some of the points and questions I posed.”
I am a little unclear as to what this means, but its OK. You asked, I answered. Thanks again for taking the time and interest to ask.