Durbin compares servicemen to Nazi's

[FlaSoxxJim]

One point Nuke and I can agree on 

Although we could probably trace this back to Martin Luther who perverted Catholicism to start his cult.*

 

*just pointing out defining cult is nearly impossible.

That it is, as a good number of Christian fundamentalists - most notably of the Jack Chick variety - consider Catholicism and worship of its 'Wafer God' to be a cult. Getting beyond these extremists, there still is a lot that is quite cult-like in Catholocism: all of the emphasis on the saints, elevation of the Apocrypha and other non-canonical sources to the level of dogmatic, near idolotry of the blessed virgin - even by mainstream Catholics, and the general abundance of mystical religous vestiges that post-Reformation Christian denominations renounce.

 

I highly respect Catholic traditions despite my own falling out with the Church of Rome, but I wanted to add this in support of your statement about the difficulty in defining waht is and isn't a cult.

[FlaSoxxJim]

Here is some of Durbin's commentary after being rebuked on the Senate Floor by Senators Warner abd McConnell.

 

Durbin said his comments had been misinterpreted as an attack on the U.S. military, adding he did not even know who was in charge of the particular interrogation cited in the FBI agent's account. "Sadly, we have a situation here where some in the right-wing media say I've been insulting men and women in uniform," he said. "Nothing could be farther from the truth."

 

Durbin conceded that the regimes he had cited had committed horrors far beyond the techniques he had condemned at Guantanamo. But he said it was "no exaggeration" to suggest that the techniques cited by the FBI agent were not acceptable in a democracy. "This is the kind of thing you expect from repressive regimes but not from the United States," he said.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...5061601500.html

 

One of the more important things he said yesterday was not in the Post article, however, but it can be heard in the audio clip found at NPR on this page:

 

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4707429

 

He basically pointed out that none of the interrogation techniques he had described previously were anything NOT condoned and approved by the Administration. These are not unsanctioned abuse allegations. It's a glimpse at business as usual with the Presidential Seal on it.

 

Taken with the emerging picture we have of a facility 80-90% filled with people having nothing to do with the conflict and you can't help but agree with Daniel Schorr and other commentators who note that Guantanamo is likely to sit right alongside Japanese-American internment camps in World War II as a shameful place in American history.

[Rex Kickass]

But sadly, that doesn't fit into the "he said nazi" narrative.

[Texsox]

I think this decade is going to be viewed as the second most changed filled in us old guys lifetimes. The 60's and the 00's are filled with events that will ripple for decades to come. It would be overly optimistic to believe that as a society and our leaders have made nothing but correct, or nothing but incorrect decisions. I believe we should all accept that some mistakes will be made, and hopefully we will learn from them. Likewise, what looks like mistakes today may turn out correct.

 

As long as we stay vigilant, protect the American ideals, value our freedoms, we will be ok.

[LowerCaseRepublican]

Sen. Frist, repeating a false headline in the Washington Times, accused Sen. Durbin of saying Guantanamo is “a death camp." Durbin never said that. Frist also falsely claimed that Durbin said our service members are “committing genocide and war crimes.” Durbin never said that either. Most outrageously, Frist essentially accused Durbin of encouraging suicide bombers.

 

Shows how much our Senate pays attention. f***ing impotent idiot bureaucrats.

[southsider2k5]

Stop the presses, Rich Daley weighs in with his thoughts....

 

I would think he would be kinda busy with the indictments and the like flying around City Hall, and the potential collapse of the O'Hare expansion.

 

http://www.wqad.com/Global/story.asp?S=3502171

[Balta1701]

Dick Durbin has apologized for his remarks last week. I mostly still think he's right, but as John Stewart so eloquently put it...whoever mentions the Nazis first, loses.

 

Under fire from Republicans and some fellow Democrats, Sen. Dick Durbin apologized Tuesday for comparing American interrogators at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp to Nazis and other historically infamous figures.

 

"Some may believe that my remarks crossed the line," the Illinois Democrat said. "To them I extend my heartfelt apologies."

 

His voice quaking and tears welling in his eyes, the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate also apologized to any soldiers who felt insulted by his remarks.

 

"They're the best. I never, ever intended any disrespect for them," he said...

 

Durbin said in his apology: "I made reference to Nazis, to Soviets, and other repressive regimes. Mr. President, I've come to understand that's a very poor choice of words."

[KipWellsFan]

boo!

[FlaSoxxJim]

Dick Durbin has apologized for his remarks last week.  I mostly still think he's right...

As do many many others.

[Balta1701]

boo!

Personally, I think he's right to apologize for using the Nazis as a reference.

 

The fact is that anyone who brings up the Nazis is doing so not because of that particular part of the Nazi behavior, but because of the war and the Holocaust. That is the only reason to bring up the Nazis in any political discussion today; to try to link the behavior of your opponent to the Holocaust because you believe that the Holocaust is so evil, any remote connection to it will immediately discredit your opponent.

 

It's simply wrong, and it does in fact trivialize the Holocaust. If our President erects gas chambers at Gitmo and starts killing people without due process, then I'll start making that comparison myself. But otherwise, it's just not a good method of arguing.

 

Personally, if I were to use a metaphor like Durbin, my choice would have been the Hanoi Hilton from the Vietnam conflict. In that mess, our soldiers were tortured without any due process or any protections from Geneva, exactly as we've done at Gitmo. I think that reference is a lot closer than the Nazi one anyway.

[KipWellsFan]

Personally, I think he's right to apologize for using the Nazis as a reference.

 

The fact is that anyone who brings up the Nazis is doing so not because of that particular part of the Nazi behavior, but because of the war and the Holocaust.  That is the only reason to bring up the Nazis in any political discussion today; to try to link the behavior of your opponent to the Holocaust because you believe that the Holocaust is so evil, any remote connection to it will immediately discredit your opponent.

 

It's simply wrong, and it does in fact trivialize the Holocaust.  If our President erects gas chambers at Gitmo and starts killing people without due process, then I'll start making that comparison myself.  But otherwise, it's just not a good method of arguing.

 

Personally, if I were to use a metaphor like Durbin, my choice would have been the Hanoi Hilton from the Vietnam conflict.  In that mess, our soldiers were tortured without any due process or any protections from Geneva, exactly as we've done at Gitmo.  I think that reference is a lot closer than the Nazi one anyway.

 

I don't know anything about Durbin but those comments to me aren't insulting and I think he got pressured into a weak apology.

[NUKE_CLEVELAND]

Personally, I think he's right to apologize for using the Nazis as a reference.

 

Personally, if I were to use a metaphor like Durbin, my choice would have been the Hanoi Hilton from the Vietnam conflict.  In that mess, our soldiers were tortured without any due process or any protections from Geneva, exactly as we've done at Gitmo.  I think that reference is a lot closer than the Nazi one anyway.

 

 

We're you able to keep a straight face when you were writing that horses***? I hope not.

 

In the Hanoi Hilton each and every one of our people were brutally beaten day after day a good many were murdered, all suffered from disease becaue of the utter lack of any sanitation and starvation many of which died of it. Practicing religon? Yeah if they got caught praying they probably got dragged out of their cells and beaten some more.

 

In Gitmo we have a bunch of terrorists who are given 3 good meals a day ( I read somewhere that the average Gitmo detainee has GAINED 12 pounds since arriving at the prison ) they are given better health care than many Americans get and certainly better than anything they have ever seen much less deserve. They are given religous materials and allowed to pray 5 times a day as per their culture.

 

 

Now here's a real stumper. Guess which set of prisoners is covered under the Geneva Conventions. If you guessed the GITMO detainees you are WRONG. You again decided to endow them with rights they don't have given their status as enemy combatants who do not belong to any standing army or governmental organization. We've been over this ground before.

 

What went on at the Hanoi Hilton and whats going on at Gitmo couldn't be more different than night and day. Dont take my word for it though, ask someone who's been there like John McCain and see if he doesn't laugh in your face.

Edited June 22, 2005 by NUKE_CLEVELAND

[Rex Kickass]

He apologized for something he never said. That's so f***ing sad. The GOP never apologizes for using that kind of comparison.

 

Last year during the campaign, the GOP created an internet Bush 04 ad interspersing Hitler between Kerry and Daschle. Ken Mehlman never apologized.

 

In 2003, Grover Norquist compared the estate tax to Auschwitz. He never apologized.

 

Dick Durbin quoted an FBI report about whats happening in our own camps and said some of these techniques you'd expect to find in... there's a big damn difference there.

 

Four years ago, we all seemed to think torture is wrong. Today, as long as our torture is a couple notches above what the other guy does, it's apparently OK.

 

So the Guantanamo Bay detainees aren't starving... but we are going too far sometimes. And to defend these actions is to abandon the basic freedoms and ethics that we came into this fight to protect.

 

I don't want to win the fight and lose the war.

[Texsox]

We're still discussing this? I didn't think the story had such legs. Interesting points of view. I am seeing some things that have shaped my opinion quite a bit. What saddens me is we cannot hold our justice system up to the world and tell them it works. We can justify treating these people differently but then concepts like innocent until proven guilty have been tossed out the window. Cruel and unusual punishment is being stretched at the least. Do as we say, not as we do.

 

And we wonder why some people have negative opinions of America and our way of life. :headshake

[EvilMonkey]

When Gitmo gets like this, feel free to b****.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/19/internat...=rssnyt&emc=rss

 

I wonder if they picked up the guide book at Borders?

[Rex Kickass]

I'm sorry the "They do it more/worse" doesn't wash with me. How is it everything is black and white for this administration except this issue?

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/24/politics...agewanted=print

 

Today's New York Times showed that doctors assisted in these sessions. That is a practice common during the Third Reich by the way.

[mreye]

I'm sorry the "They do it more/worse" doesn't wash with me. How is it everything is black and white for this administration except this issue?

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/24/politics...agewanted=print

 

Today's New York Times showed that doctors assisted in these sessions. That is a practice common during the Third Reich by the way.

 

 

Military doctors provided advice on how to increase stress levels and exploit fears, according to interrogators' accounts.

 

This is all I could read. (Bugmenot did not work and I tried to register, but it said an error occured...)

 

If that's all ther is to the story, I fail to see how you can compare it to the Third Reich. Could you paste the entire story?

[EvilMonkey]

I'm sorry the "They do it more/worse" doesn't wash with me. How is it everything is black and white for this administration except this issue?

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/24/politics...agewanted=print

 

Today's New York Times showed that doctors assisted in these sessions. That is a practice common during the Third Reich by the way.

 

It's not "They do it worse", it is "What we do is not torture". Pulling out fingernails, that's torture. Sleep deprivation is not.

[mreye]

It's not "They do it worse", it is "What we do is not torture".  Pulling out fingernails, that's torture.  Sleep deprivation is not.

Neither is stress and fear.

[KipWellsFan]

Neither is stress and fear.

 

Yup that's Andy Sipowicz!

[Texsox]

Midland, TX. City Councilman Ejected From Studio

T. Bubba Bechtol, part time City Councilman from Midland, TX, was asked on a local live radio talk show the other day just what he thought of the allegations of torture of the Iraqi prisoners. His reply prompted his ejection from the studio, but to thunderous applause from the audience.

"If hooking up an Iraqi prisoner's scrotum to a car's battery cables will save one American GI's life, then I have just two things to say":

"Red is positive"

"Black is negative"

[mreye]

Wow.

[NUKE_CLEVELAND]

Wow.

 

 

That's just f***ing awesome. I love it!!!!!

 

HAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

 

[EvilMonkey]

You know, if we were Norway, all these alleged torturers would be looing at community service, at best!

 

http://www.aftenposten.no/english/local/article1071523.ece

[FlaSoxxJim]

You know, if we were Norway, all these alleged torturers would be looing at community service, at best!

 

http://www.aftenposten.no/english/local/article1071523.ece

120 days of prison for one and 90(!!) hours of community service for brutally torturing somebody like that!?! I don't care how old the crime is - that light sentence is bulls***.