War crimes: Dick Cheney & George Bush still torturing in 2008, Rachel Maddow comments

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AntiConformist911
October 11, 2008

The torture techniques deployed against anyone George W. Bush unilaterally labeled an enemy combatant drove some of them insane:
A U.S. military officer warned Pentagon officials that an American detainee was being driven nearly insane by months of punishing isolation and sensory deprivation in a U.S. military brig, according to documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union and provided to The Associated Press...

They were deprived of natural light for months and for years were forbidden even minor distractions such as a soccer ball or a dictionary.

"I will continue to do what I can to help this individual maintain his sanity, but in my opinion we're working with borrowed time," an unidentified Navy brig official wrote of prisoner Yaser Esam Hamdi in 2002. "I would like to have some form of an incentive program in place to reward him for his continued good behavior, but more so, to keep him from whacking out on me."

This was not even in Gitmo. It was in a military brig in Norfolk, Virginia and Charleston, South Carolina, where the torture occurred on American soil and even against an American citizen, Jose Padilla. Many decent people in the armed forces resisted Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeld, but they couldn't stop them:

An officer was still raising alarms about Hamdi's mental state after 14 months of jail with no contact with lawyers, his family or even other prisoners. "I told him the last thing that I wanted to have happen was to send him anywhere from here as a 'basket case,' of use to no one, to include himself," the officer wrote in an e-mail to undisclosed government officials in June 2003. "I fear the rubber band is nearing its breaking point here and not totally confident I can keep his head in the game much longer."

These people we made insane are the people we were trying to get intelligence from! You think insane people give us reliable information? Now recall the consequences of this torture with respect to Jose Padilla:

"During questioning, he often exhibits facial tics, unusual eye movements and contortions of his body," Mr. Patel said. "The contortions are particularly poignant since he is usually manacled and bound by a belly chain when he has meetings with counsel."...

Now recall what we found out about Qahtani:
At the end of months of sleep deprivation and other forms of torture, Qahtani, according to an FBI letter, "was evidencing behavior consistent with extreme psychological trauma (talking to non existent people, reporting hearing voices, crouching in a cell covered with a sheet for hours on end)."

The established legal definition of torture is the infliction of "severe mental or physical" "pain or suffering" to gain intelligence. If you do believe these individuals have been subjected to severe mental pain and suffering, then George W. Bush is a war criminal.
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com...
The far right is obsessed with the question of Bill Ayers, much more obsessed than with the war in Iraq or Afghanistan or the Palin farce or the financial meltdown. Their obsession is unseemly but it is not, alas, without any basis in truth. I find Bill Ayers' refusal to disown his use of political violence in the 1960s to be repulsive...But the question of association raises broader questions.

I don't think I could serve on a board with Ayers in good conscience. But neither could I serve on a board or participate in an organization that employs a war criminal. John Yoo is such a war criminal, a man who gave oral consent to war crimes and then provided phony legal cover for torturing suspects. He is responsible for policies that have led to the death-by-torture of well over a dozen individuals that we know of, and the brutal torture of countless more. Without Yoo's green light, and willingness to make a mockery of the rule of law by signing off on torture, these people would be alive or susceptible to real and reliable non-coercive interrogation. If Obama deserves some censure for consorting with Ayers, why is there no censure in Washington or Berkeley for consorting with a war criminal? Why is Ayers anathema and Yoo not?
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com...

Category: News & Politics

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rubiconsedge (2 months ago) Show Hide

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Getting impeached, esentially for having oral sex is absurd. However, you're grossly misguided on 9/11. Bush is responsible for the Iraq war--not sure what your problem with going after Al Qaeda in Afghanistan is, I agree with Obama that we should've done more there--but, the fact is Bush was only pres for 7.5 months--Clinton had an opportunity to get Bin Laden--easily--and turned it down
He has blood on his hands for that

darkvampire5555 (2 months ago) Show Hide

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Al Qaeda doesn't excist. Its made up by our government. 9/11 the gov destoryed the twin towers/

rubiconsedge (2 months ago) Show Hide

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You're mentally ill

darkvampire5555 (2 months ago) Show Hide

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your ill

rubiconsedge (2 months ago) Show Hide

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What are you, 3 years old? I wasn't saying that to be cruel--you're either ill or grossly underinformed. I watch MSNBC too, but if you get all your information from this one source, and you listen to leftist professors--I'm guessing your in college because of your age--you're not really developing a full intellect

darkvampire5555 (2 months ago) Show Hide

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Oh i am very informed. I might be young but i know alot about whats going on and what George Bush did. I don't watch news media they all lie.

rubiconsedge (1 month ago) Show Hide

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You don't watch news but you're very informed. Only one thing you've said is accurate, and that is that you're very young.

Don't worry, we all say stupid things when we're young, because our minds are still forming

rubiconsedge (2 months ago) Show Hide

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Ok, that was crazy and paranoid

I have a feeling-and it's pure speculation-that the rift that has grown between Bush and Cheney is sour grapes from Cheney caused by Bush overruling him on torture at the end of the admin

kd5icr1967 (2 months ago) Show Hide

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looking at madcow (maddow) now thats torture. Oh and I forgot to add Olberman
watching that ass is pure hell

Hammers65 (3 months ago) Show Hide

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Good, torture away.

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War crimes: Dick Cheney & George Bush still torturing in 2008, Rachel Maddow comments

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