The Democrat Thread

[BigSqwert]

I'll make one more point here. I think it's fascinating that this s*** three times in a row now has gotten released when our president goes on a foreign trip and has a speech coinciding about how sorry we are for all of the world's wrongs. What bulls***. The asshole can't go anywhere without telling everyone everywhere about how bad our country is. If it's that bad, just stay over in Europe or Mexico.

Stay classy.

[kapkomet]

Stay classy.

I will. I'm tired of our president, who is supposed to uphold our constitution, and our interests, cowtowing to everyone else in the world.

[NorthSideSox72]

I will. I'm tired of our president, who is supposed to uphold our constitution, and our interests, cowtowing to everyone else in the world.

Let us know when he actually does that.

 

[Balta1701]

Now, I'm being a propagandist, right? Spreading hate, lies, because we don't know what would have happened, right? We have 3,000 people dead. I don't want any more AMERICANS dead from this. He's alive, somewhere, IIRC, and probably not living too badly compared to what he was. He endured 10 minutes of waterboarding. Yes, it sucks. But when our country is on the line, you bet your ass I side with them for doing it. THREE f***ing people had this done to them. THREE. Again, yes, it sucks. But it had/has to be done - we're not the ones who started this (oh wait, yes we are, we're supposed to be SORRY (thanks, Mr. Obama) for everything we do, I forgot.).

I didn't want to bother replying to this again, but there's new facts to post. And they disagree with your caps.

The memos include what in effect are lengthy excerpts from the agency’s interrogation manual, laying out with precision how each method was to be used. Waterboarding, for example, involved strapping a prisoner to a gurney inclined at an angle of “10 to 15 degrees” and pouring water over a cloth covering his nose and mouth “from a height of approximately 6 to 18 inches” for no more than 40 seconds at a time.

 

But a footnote to a 2005 memo made it clear that the rules were not always followed. Waterboarding was used “with far greater frequency than initially indicated” and with “large volumes of water” rather than the small quantities in the rules, one memo says, citing a 2004 report by the C.I.A.’s inspector general.

 

[kapkomet]

I didn't want to bother replying to this again, but there's new facts to post. And they disagree with your caps.

Cool! We suck more!

 

And NSS, he is. He is apologizing for us. How many quotes do I have to string together?

 

[NorthSideSox72]

Cool! We suck more!

 

And NSS, he is. He is apologizing for us. How many quotes do I have to string together?

first of all, you said "cowtowing" to the rest of the world - as if to say we were capitulating to their desires, which are definitely not.

 

And frankly, I don't mind his apologies at all - our leaders in the executive acting like drunken, selfish assholes in the way they acted towards their neighbors. So when Obama adds as part of his speeches that we, the US, have acted with some arrogance in recent years... he is right, and its good he says it. It does no harm to us, but it goes some way towards getting back to positive relationships.

 

[kapkomet]

first of all, you said "cowtowing" to the rest of the world - as if to say we were capitulating to their desires, which are definitely not.

 

And frankly, I don't mind his apologies at all - our leaders in the executive acting like drunken, selfish assholes in the way they acted towards their neighbors. So when Obama adds as part of his speeches that we, the US, have acted with some arrogance in recent years... he is right, and its good he says it. It does no harm to us, but it goes some way towards getting back to positive relationships.

I certainly do. These are things that you do not write in speeches, you take care of business when you need to person to person.

 

It's a weakness, it will be played as weakness, and will eventually cause us greater harm then good. If by acting in Iraq was of the highest arrogance, they can take that arrogance and shove it up their ass, simply because it's been proven the reason Europe didn't want to go in was the oil for food program, among other business transactions and really, even more then that... but whatever, we all know we were WRONG for it...

 

As far as Mexico, allowing millions into our country is treating them with arrogance?

 

Yea, we're arrogant muthafer's that must PUBLICLY "apologize" everywhere we go and take out newspaper ads YES cowtowing to whatever country he's in that day. No way, Jose. Not in my book.

[lostfan]

We were wrong for invading Iraq because, "morality" or whatever aside, it was a breathtakingly and appallingly stupid decision that was badly mismanaged for the first 3 years to boot. If we were so dead-set on doing it the least we could've done was not half-assing it.

[kapkomet]

We were wrong for invading Iraq because, "morality" or whatever aside, it was a breathtakingly and appallingly stupid decision that was badly mismanaged for the first 3 years to boot. If we were so dead-set on doing it the least we could've done was not half-assing it.

I couldn't agree more. However, I don't want my current president going around talking how much better he is then the last one. You just don't do that. I don't ever, EVER remember that being done. It's always been a move on, here's what I want to do thing. I have heard more "I have inhereted XYZ" from this adminstration... and the selected releasing of documents when it's timed with speeches and advertisements in foreign countries... that's BS to me.

[lostfan]

I couldn't agree more. However, I don't want my current president going around talking how much better he is then the last one. You just don't do that. I don't ever, EVER remember that being done. It's always been a move on, here's what I want to do thing. I have heard more "I have inhereted XYZ" from this adminstration... and the selected releasing of documents when it's timed with speeches and advertisements in foreign countries... that's BS to me.

I agree that he's been far too focused on optics and trying to look good. I'm all about diplomacy and the warming of relations with countries we haven't gotten along with (Cuba, Venezuela) but he's kind of getting on my nerves with the emphasis on how he's going to make it a point to respect them instead of talk down to them. You already made that point in your inauguration, the world is waiting. If you're serious about it then your actions will show it, you don't have to constantly remind everyone. I guess at the end of the day that's all that will matter when people look back at his presidency, but in the meantime, he's just serving up alley-oops to his opponents.

[lostfan]

Although when he talks about what he inherited, he does have a point about the deficit. It's really disingenuous for the GOP to be attacking him on it like it was his fault when they know full well it was their doing, and it took time for them to get it that way.

Edited April 19, 2009 by lostfan

[kapkomet]

Although when he talks about what he inherited, he does have a point about the deficit. It's really disingenuous for the GOP to be attacking him on it like it was his fault when they know full well it was their doing, and it took time for them to get it that way.

Yes, sir... you've seen me say several times that GWB's legacy is getting Barack Obama elected.

 

The issue is, we had to incur deficit spending - even Balta agrees with that. However, the deficit that Obama has now put us into - and projects out to be, makes GWB's deficit look like a drop of piss in the ocean. You have to find a way to reduce spending or gain revenue. But that would mean the Democrats would have to give up control (and I don't mean elections, I mean running everything for us)... which is obviously not going to happen until they get voted out of office. They are now doing what they have wanted to for the last 40 years.

[BigSqwert]

You save lives by pouring water over his face or putting a cockroach in with him, I don't give a s***, and neither do most Americans given the choice.

I think Limbaugh and Scarborough and the pro-torture gang are getting a little confused with their logic. On one hand, they're downplaying the discomfort -- it's just slapstick or dribbling water, they say -- but on the other hand, they're praising its effectiveness.

 

It can't be both. It can't be harmless fun and effective at the same time. "Effective," by the torturer's logic, indicates that the prisoner is under such duress that he'd betray everything he stands for. Harmless fun wouldn't, by the torturer's logic, get any results at all.

 

The truth is that neither is effective. The Washington Post:

In the end, though, not a

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ingle

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ignificant plot wa

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foiled a

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a re

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ult of Abu Zubaida'

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tortured confe

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ion

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, according to former

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enior government official

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who clo

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ely followed the interrogation

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. Nearly all of the lead

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attained through the har

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h mea

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ure

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quic

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ly evaporated, while mo

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t of the u

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eful information from Abu Zubaida -- chiefly name

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of al-Qaeda member

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and a

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ociate

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-- wa

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obtained before waterboarding wa

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introduced, they

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aid.

Zubaida was waterboarded 83 times in a single month. Didn't give up information on a "single significant plot." Effective!

 

LINK

[kapkomet]

LINK

Anyone who says this is "discomfort" is nuts (meaning, hell no it's not fun...) and frankly I am not sure any of these people have said that, but they have certainly gained information. Frankly, I do not believe for a single second the validity of this story. Any "official" can say what they want to make up a story.

 

Furthermore, it's laughable that you all want to make it like they just did this for jollies. Riiiiiiight. But it's a damn good story and continues the hatred.

[Balta1701]

Anyone who says this is "discomfort" is nuts (meaning, hell no it's not fun...) and frankly I am not sure any of these people have said that, but they have certainly gained information. Frankly, I do not believe for a single second the validity of this story. Any "official" can say what they want to make up a story.

 

Furthermore, it's laughable that you all want to make it like they just did this for jollies. Riiiiiiight. But it's a damn good story and continues the hatred.

You know what I find remarkable? It's that every claim you make has been repeatedly debunked by multiple sources. But because you have it 100% set in your mind that the 24, beat people senseless technique always works, has no negative consequences, and is somehow far more effective than standard interrogation techniques, you keep repeating those claims no matter what.

 

Abu Zubaydah gave up 3 things. The identities of Bin Al shibi, the identity of KSM, and something else I don't recall. He gave all that up under standard interrogation. The Bush administration was convinced he knew a lot more, so they made sure he confessed to knowing a lot more. At least 1 move to terror alert orange was based on the intel he gave up under torture. He also failed a polygraph when questioned again on that intel; he lied to get the torture to stop. He gave up everything that was true under normal interrogation, and gave up what the torturers wanted under torture. link

The escalation to especially brutal interrogation tactics against the prisoner, Abu Zubaydah, including confining him in boxes and slamming him against the wall, was ordered by officials at C.I.A. headquarters based on a highly inflated assessment of his importance, interviews and a review of newly released documents show.

 

Abu Zubaydah had provided much valuable information under less severe treatment, and the harsher handling produced no breakthroughs, according to one former intelligence official with direct knowledge of the case. Instead, watching his torment caused great distress to his captors, the official said.

 

Even for those who believed that brutal treatment could produce results, the official said, “seeing these depths of human misery and degradation has a traumatic effect.”

 

C.I.A. officers adopted these techniques only after the Justice Department had given its official approval on Aug. 1, 2002, in one of four formerly secret legal memos on interrogation that were released Thursday.

 

A footnote to another of the memos described a rift between line officers questioning Abu Zubaydah at a secret C.I.A. prison in Thailand and their bosses at headquarters, and asserted that the brutal treatment may have been “unnecessary.”

 

Quoting a 2004 report on the interrogation program by the C.I.A. inspector general, the footnote says that “although the on-scene interrogation team judged Zubaydah to be compliant, elements within C.I.A. headquarters still believed he was withholding information.”

[kapkomet]

You know what I find remarkable? It's that every claim you make has been repeatedly debunked by multiple sources. But because you have it 100% set in your mind that the 24, beat people senseless technique always works, has no negative consequences, and is somehow far more effective than standard interrogation techniques, you keep repeating those claims no matter what.

 

Abu Zubaydah gave up 3 things. The identities of Bin Al shibi, the identity of KSM, and something else I don't recall. He gave all that up under standard interrogation. The Bush administration was convinced he knew a lot more, so they made sure he confessed to knowing a lot more. At least 1 move to terror alert orange was based on the intel he gave up under torture. He also failed a polygraph when questioned again on that intel; he lied to get the torture to stop. He gave up everything that was true under normal interrogation, and gave up what the torturers wanted under torture. link

Well, we'll go back to this... what's "torture"? And no one ever said that this guy got "beat senseless", your words, not mine. What are the negative consequences you speak of? That they recruit terrorists? Oh, wait, 3,000 people dead isn't enough - oh, now I'm "fear mongering"... and "we're supposed to be better then that". I've said it before, I'll say it again - Mr. Dickhead Zubaydah lost his "rights" when he wanted to kill more, and he beheaded Americans for the world to see. I'm supposed to cry about this guy getting waterboarded? Hell no.

 

Let me take a different tact.

 

What does waterboarding a handful of known leadership of terrorist networks do to our country?

 

What good does it do to release memos about "supposed" questionaire techniques?

 

What good does it do to go to foreign soil and say "I am Barack Hussein Obama and not Beorge W Bush"?

 

What does our country do if attacked again?

 

I'll start with these questions and try to be a good boy and debate the issues without Kaperbole ™.

 

 

Edited April 19, 2009 by kapkomet

[kapkomet]

"The whole notion was that if we showed courtesy or opened up dialogue with governments that had previously been hostile to us, that that somehow would be a sign of weakness," Obama said, recalling his race for the White House and challenging his critics today.

 

"The American people didn't buy it," Obama said. "And there's a good reason the American people didn't buy it — because it doesn't make sense."

 

This is really an addendum to what I posted above, sort of. I guess my paralell here is, hello, Mr. Chamberlain. When you appease radicals, they cut your gonads off eventually. Now, you all will say that it is simply not true - but explain to me why.

[lostfan]

Who is being appeased, exactly... he pretty much laid out the same demands/expectations of Iran that Bush did but in different language, he made a good faith gesture to Cuba and then said the ball was in their court along with a series of things the US wanted to see them do but it's basically the same list the US has had for decades. He hasn't backed down from the "war on terror," he just changed some words around and has a different strategy from Bush. He's still the American president, he's still pursuing American foreign policy objectives. He hasn't really "appeased" anyone except to use the carrot/stick approach which is more or less basic diplomacy.

Edited April 20, 2009 by lostfan

[kapkomet]

Who is being appeased, exactly... he pretty much laid out the same demands/expectations of Iran that Bush did but in different language, he made a good faith gesture to Cuba and then said the ball was in their court along with a series of things the US wanted to see them do but it's basically the same list the US has had for decades. He hasn't backed down from the "war on terror," he just changed some words around and has a different strategy from Bush. He's still the American president, he's still pursuing American foreign policy objectives. He hasn't really "appeased" anyone except to use the carrot/stick approach which is more or less basic diplomacy.

Allowing Iran to continue enrichment of uranium and wanting to talk to them is an act of appeasement, for example. GWB wanted enrichment to stop before talks. You have to give something to get something... we're not the ones in the wrong - oh wait, yes we are - by apologizing all over the globe...

 

I find it interesting that you think Obama is doing the exact same thing GWB did from a foreign policy standpoint.

[lostfan]

Allowing Iran to continue enrichment of uranium and wanting to talk to them is an act of appeasement, for example. GWB wanted enrichment to stop before talks. You have to give something to get something... we're not the ones in the wrong - oh wait, yes we are - by apologizing all over the globe...

 

I find it interesting that you think Obama is doing the exact same thing GWB did from a foreign policy standpoint.

That's not really appeasement, it's just doing things differently. Functionally, what's the difference? Short of us bombing their facilities and/or going to war, Iran is going to do what it wants to do whether we talk to them or not.

 

I could've said "every other president" but I used Bush's name on purpose. Bush wasn't wrong about everything, I mean some of this stuff is cookie-cutter and it doesn't matter if you have a Democrat or a Republican in office. IMO Bush's biggest mistakes on that front were unilateralism (this is OK when you have a very serious problem that needs to be addressed immediately, but when you have to hype something up and bulls*** everyone so they can believe it's justified, something is wrong), and thinking terrorism was an existential military threat that we could just bomb a lot and it'd go away.

[kapkomet]

That's not really appeasement, it's just doing things differently. Functionally, what's the difference? Short of us bombing their facilities and/or going to war, Iran is going to do what it wants to do whether we talk to them or not.

 

I could've said "every other president" but I used Bush's name on purpose. Bush wasn't wrong about everything, I mean some of this stuff is cookie-cutter and it doesn't matter if you have a Democrat or a Republican in office. IMO Bush's biggest mistakes on that front were unilateralism (this is OK when you have a very serious problem that needs to be addressed immediately, but when you have to hype something up and bulls*** everyone so they can believe it's justified, something is wrong), and thinking terrorism was an existential military threat that we could just bomb a lot and it'd go away.

You are more level headed about this then most others, and I have also agreed with you on the last sentance of your post.

[BigSqwert]

Andrew Sullivan sums it up best wrt waterboarding:

 

So even by the Bush-Cheney standards of legality, the waterboarders far exceeded what was allowed. They broke the law even by Bush's standards. And why, pray, is breaking the law in such a grave matter as a war crime no longer subject to prosecution or even investigation in the United States?

 

The US is a banana republic if this stuff is allowed to go unpunished. A banana republic with a torture apparatus.

[lostfan]

You are more level headed about this then most others, and I have also agreed with you on the last sentance of your post.

I didn't used to be.

[kapkomet]

Andrew Sullivan sums it up best wrt waterboarding:

If this is true, then I agree. There's trying to get information, and then there's stupid.

[Soxy]

So, the father of one of my good friends from college just threw his hat in the gubernatorial race in Minnesota.