When even sarcasm won’t make a difference.
Depressing
This post is in: Torture, DC Press Corpse, Our Failed Media Experiment
This post is in: Torture, DC Press Corpse, Our Failed Media Experiment
When even sarcasm won’t make a difference.
Comments are closed.
thejoz
At this rate, the debate over the word “torture” will itself become torture. Because we’ll all go crazy as “journalists” trip over themselves trying to define it.
But they’ll say I have “enhanced cognitive dissonance”, am not “crazy”, have not suffered enough, and thus have not been tortured.
Thus proliferating the torture-industrial complex for generations to come.
KG
torture is like pron, I can’t define it, but I know it when I see it.
frankdawg
This is god news! The U.S. does not torture, Viet Nam does not torture, China does not torture – we are living in the golden age of human rights!
NobodySpecial
Countdown to anti-Greenwald screed in 3…2…
Sgt. Jrod and his Howling Commandos
It’s not like the Chinese beheaded the guy. That would have been truly heinous.
AxelFoley
@NobodySpecial:
Fuck Greenwald.
Does that count?
Guster
I find Greenwald’s style quite off-putting. Why can’t he make the same points while acknowledging that his opponents on the other side of the argument, the pro-torture crowd, are motivated only by the highest hopes and dreams for our country, and for freedom at large? His personal attacks against the pro-torture media are just hurtful.
robertdsc
I’m not sure this is right. Is there evidence the Obama administration backs this view?
liberal
@NobodySpecial:
Heh.
burnspbesq
Must be a slow news day in Greenwaldland is all he can come up with is snark fail
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@AxelFoley: I like short and sweet screeds and second that emotion.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@robertdsc:
Does there need to be?
fucen tarmal
ok i think this is an argument that can be solved by a term that on one hand, isn’t quite as loaded as “enhanced interrogation”, and on the other, isn’t quite so defined, and refined by yoo, and all the bad governments who’ve gotten caught as “torture”
i hereby propose, that when someone does something such as waterboarding, using a suspect as an ashtray, or punches someone in the nuts in a pile up, we use the term…
giving ’em the business
jwb
@frankdawg: The best of all possible worlds.
Svensker
@Guster:
:)
JG
@Guster:
This is some delightful sarcasm…I think? If so, kudos.
ChrisB
@fucen tarmal:
Yes, a Ben Dreith reference!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Dreith
Chad N Freude
From a comment on the Jonathan Schwartz link in the Greenwald article:
Damn! I wish I’d thought of that.
El Cid
The Independent‘s Robert Fisk on the way that the media practice of not referring to things as their logical names, given the exigencies of power. Beyond absurdities not just quoting, but picking up and using such absurd propaganda terms as a “surge” of US troops (traditionally called “reinforcements” or some such), the fiddling about of terms in order to avoid controversy frequently reaches the absurd.
burnspbesq
@frankdawg
“we are living in the golden age of human rights!”
Then why does the ACLU keep asking me for money?
El Cid
@Chad N Freude: We don’t get them, they get them.
burnspbesq
@Guster:
“Why can’t he make the same points while acknowledging that his opponents on the other side of the argument, the pro-torture crowd, are motivated only by the highest hopes and dreams for our country, and for freedom at large?”
Because when everything is transparently, overwhelmingly self-evident (gee, that line ought win me a prize in a fake-Greenwald contest), the idea that people can disagree with you and still be acting in good faith doesn’t compute.
Greenwaldland is a lot like Ericksonland.
El Cid
I don’t think there’s much convincing evidence at all that governmental officials denying that waterboarding, a traditional form of torture which would be denounced as such if foreign forces [well, at least those nations to which US foreign policy were opposed, say, Venezuela or Cuba or Iran] were carrying said practice out on US citizens or armed forces, were torture when done by the US or the regimes to which it was exporting individuals detained to be tortured were in any way acting in good faith.
I think the notion that there are ‘good faith’ efforts to distinguish between our torture and their torture is without any substantive meaning.
frankdawg
@jwb:
Damn, more sarcastic then mine!
@burnspbesq:
Because they are E-vile lib-a-rules & can only stay in business if they make people believe some countries torture – same for Amnesty International who seem to only want to point out the bad things countries do & never accept the clear statements from these governments that they don’t do bad things.
Chad N Freude
@El Cid:
I don’t want to appear rude or condescending (although I am both), but this sentence could really use a good editor.
Chad N Freude
@burnspbesq:
But with less spittle flying about.
Mark S.
And people say Greenwald’s complaining doesn’t make a difference!
eemom
in an uncharacteristic spirit of compromise, and to try to inject some new perspective into a tired old topic, I hereby propose the following Three Articles of Agreement About Greenwald:
1. He is not concise.
2. He is not humble.
3. He generally lacks a sense of humor.
any objections and/or additions?
El Cid
@Chad N Freude: It probably could, but I can’t afford to pay one.
Snarki, child of Loki
@El Cid:
(sorry for the rewrite, but the nested parentheticals were hurting my eyes)
Considering that the US prosecuted waterboarding as torture, both as a war crime committed ON US servicemen (WWII) and as a crime committed BY US servicemen (Philippines pacification), it takes a huge heapin’ helpin’ of bad faith, hypocrisy, willful blindness, cretinism, and just plain evil to claim “torture? maybe, maybe not”.
burnspbesq
Meanwhile, on the other side of Blogistan, Larison disembowels Fred Hiatt, and it is truly a glorious sight.
http://www.amconmag.com/larison/2010/07/05/freedom-agenda-failures-and-failed-states/
fucen tarmal
@ChrisB:
best. penalty. ever.
burnspbesq
@El Cid:
Apparently, neither can Greenwald.
MattR
@ChrisB: @fucen tarmal: As always, Youtube has the videotape.
El Cid
@burnspbesq: And if I happen to decide that torture deniers were not likely acting in good faith, and Greenwald concludes the same, how would this relate to the strength or weakness of either’s conclusion?
mclaren
Quick! More fireworks videos! More Star Spangled Banner recitations!
Patriotism, to update Dr. Johnson’s maxim, is the last refuge of the torturer.
Speaking of torturers and their enablers, we come to General Crack Fake Name, who has proclaimed himself “an obot,” an adoring acolyte of torture and indiscriminate mass murder.
Let’s clear away the lies about Barack Obama right now.
Obama is guilty of ordering torture. That makes Barack Obama a war criminal.
Obama needs to be arrested, dragged in chains before the International Tribunal at The Hague, and tried for crimes against humanity, along with the torturer Gen. Stanley McChrystal and the operators of the drones and their immediate superiors in the Air Force.
DOCUMENTED FACT: Torture has continued in Iraq and in Afghanistan after Barack Obama became president.
Source: Stanley McChrystal’s Torture History in Afghanistan and Iraq, Esquire magazine, 19 May 2009.
Of course, General Crackpot Fake Name will deny this documented fact as he screams the lie that McChrystal’s torture occurred under Bush’s watch, not Obama.
General Crackpot Fake Name is lying, and it’s easy to prove he’s lying, as always. The date on the Esquire magazine article is 12 May 2009. It describes ongoing torture directly and personally supervised by Stanley McChrystal occurring after 20 January 2008.
But that’s only one piece of evidence that Obama tortures prisoners. Here’s another piece of evidence that Obama tortures prisoners:
Staney McChrystal — A History of Condoning Torture?” by Andrew Sullivan. Sully quotes Kaplan, so there are multiple sources on this evidence:
That’s from 11 May 2009. More than a year after Obama took office. Obama specifically selected a torturer and mass murderer to head military operations in Afghanistan.
As you can see, General Crackpot Fake Name is a liar when he claims Obama doesn’t torture — but we all knew that, of course. Every time he opens General Crackpot Fake Name opens his mouth, he lies…so what else is new? Liars lie, birds fly, fish swim. No surprise there.
(We now pause to allow General Crackpot Fake Name to scream that I’m mentally ill and that the reporter who documented McChrystal’s torture is insane. This is General Crackpot Fake Name’s only contribution to this forum: screaming that anyone he doesn’t like is mentally ill. Finished screaming those lies? Good, let’s continue.)
DOCUMENTED FACT: Obama has not only continue torture, he’s moved torture from overseas “black” prisons to American soil.
Source: Obama’s interrogation policy and the use of torture in the army field manual,, Firedoglake, 6 January 2010.
Notice the phrase “contemporaneous use of the abusive Appendix M.” That means “continuing today, right now, this minute.” This very minute prisoners at Bagram are screaming like animals in unendurable agony under torture approved and directed by Barack Obama.
DOCUMENTED FACT: Barack Obama has continued to authorize use of the Army Field Manual appendix M which authorized the torture ordered by Bush and Cheney.
Naturally our resident self-described obot will frantically denounce anyone who points out the documented fact that torture continues under President Obama’s administration — it has simply moved from Guantanamo to Bagram airbase and other “black” prisons.
The only difference between Bush and Obama in terms of torture is that Obama is cleverer about trying to cover up his torture of innocent prisoners than was Bush.
Unfortunately for Obama, he failed in his effort to cover up the ongoing “contemporaneous” torture at Bagram and other “black” prison sites. Obama failed in his coverup because prisoners from Bagram have been transferred to Guantanamo, where the Supreme Court has ordered that they must have access to lawyers, and as a result the story of Obama’s ongoing torture has come out.
Barack Obama is a war criminal and a torturer, and General Crackpot Fake Name and the other “obots” are defending Obama for his torture.
We hung people like General Crackpot Fake Name at Nuremburg after WW II for defending and covering up and enabling torture. Google the name “Julius Streicher” and see what happened to him. If we lived in a just world, General Crackpot Fake Name along his idol Barack Obama would be in the dock at a war crimes trial for crimes against humanity. Crackpot Fake Name here serves the same function that Julius Streicher did during the Third Reich: he has denied, excused and attempted to defend inexcusable crimes against humanity.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@mclaren: You jumped several Jaws with this one Mclaren. This is for you.
eemom
there is a difference between trolls and crazy people.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@eemom: Ya think:)
burnspbesq
@El Cid:
Well … if you got there independently of Greenwald, I might be interested in hearing how you got there.
But you would still have some convincing to do.
Earlier in my career I used to deal on a fairly regular basis with people (tax protestors) who sincerely and in the utmost good faith believed things that were objectively ridiculous – for example, that the income tax is unconstitutional because the Sixteenth Amendment wasn’t properly ratified.
Based on that experience, I don’t doubt that Dick Cheney sincerely believes that under the Constitution the President is effectively an elected dictator who can do whatever the fuck he pleases (including ordering people to do things that anyone with a lick of sense knows are contrary to our laws and our treaty obligations) and Congress’ sole check is the power of the purse. He’s wrong – you know it, I know it, and every credible person who has ever studied Con Law knows it – but it is absolutely possible to sincerely believe shit that is obviously wrong.
YMMV.
Bob Loblaw
Oh shit! Did you hear that everybody? burnspbesq is a fucking lawyer! Never heard that one before…
mclaren
As the hysterical denials erupt that Barack Obama is a war crime, let’s return to the documented facts.
DOCUMENTED FACT: Torture is a war crime.
Source: United Nations information site about the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity at The Hague.
Barack Obama’s widespread and systematic authorization of torture at Bagram Air Base and other “black” prison sites fits the definition of “crimes against humanity.” The torture supervised by General Stanley McChrystal at Bagram and other “black” prison sites, as authorized by Barack Obama, is not random or isolated: it is widespread and systematic.
Moreover, the evidence that McChrystal’s torture flagrantly violated the Geneva Convention is conclusive — McChrystal systematically refused the Red Cross access to any of the “black” prison sites under his command, both in Iraq and in Afghanistan. The only reason for this is that McChrystal knew his torture directly violated the Geneva Convention and grossly violated the statues governing war crimes which can be prosecuted by the international court at The Hague. See the Esquire article “Who Is General Stanley McChrystal?,” 12 May 20009, cited in the previous post for proof.
The United Nation’s Convention against Torture defines torture and sets out the conditions under which states which engage in torture shall be subject to the International Criminal Court at The Hague for crimes against humanity.
Source: United Nations Convention Against Torture, 1985.
DOCUMENTED FACT: Barack Obama is guilty of violating nearly every article of the U.N. convention against torture. Obama has directly authorized torture, a violation of article 1, and Obama has also
[U.N. Convention Against Torture, Article 1, op. cit.]
Notice that Obama’s authorization of continued use of Appendix M of the Army Field Manual fits this definition of torture — as we’d expect. Freezing prisoners nearly to death to the point of coma, use of sensory deprivation to drive them insane, and sleep deprivation to the point of hallucination and mental breakdown and near death, all fit the United Nations definition of torture according to the 1985 Convention Against Torture.
In case you’re not aware, sufficient sleep deprivation can kill. See “Can you die from lack of sleep?”, Salon, 11 May 2009.
Of course various self-described “obots” will now rush forward to scream lies at me and to deny that Obama has in fact authorized the continued use of torture. They’re lying, and it’s easy to prove they’re lying.
The “Black Jail” : Obama’s Afghan Torture Center and the American Psychological Association.
(We now pause for General Crackpot Fake Name to scream his usual hysterical smears that I’m “off my meds” and “mentally ill.” Since this is the only response he can ever offer to documented facts, it has no significance and we shall therefore ignore it. Finished screaming lies? Good, let’s continue with the overwhelming mountain of evidence for Obama’s authorization of continued ongoing torture.)
Since the “obots” live in a fantasyworld where Barack Obama can do no wrong and would certainly never commit crimes against humanity by authorizing torture, they’ll continue to frantically deny the documented facts.
DOCUMENTED FACT: The U.S. Army continues to use Appendix M of the Army Interrogation Field Manual.
How do we know?
Because a journalist took the startling step of…phoning the army and asking them. And they confirmed it.
Source: Torture confirmed at Guantanamo: Army Field Manual Codified Abuse.
Continuing the Bush-era torture in secret prisons isn’t enough for Obama — he wants to bring torture home, to American soil. Yes, Obama’s plans for expanding torture include the use of the Army Interrogation FIeld Manual’s Appendix M at secret prisons run by the CIA here in America.
Source: Military torture to be transferred to the United States.
We now pause to allow the hysterical “obots” to denounce this documented fact, and the flimsy excuse they’ll use is the fact that congress and individual states have refused to transfer prisoners from Gitmo to domestic CIA-operated prisons.
That’s irrelevant. The fact remains that Obama wants to
expand torture by brinigng it from overseas “black” prisons to CIA-operated domestic prisons here in America
So the fact that Congress refused to participate in Obama’s expansion of torture does not change the fact that Obama tried to expand the use of torture to include prisons in America, and Obama still wants to set up CIA-operated torture chambers (known under the euphemism of “military prisons”) here in America.
These are war crimes.
Barack Obama is clearly guilty of war crimes under international law. The “obots” who try to defend his indefensible continued authorization of torture and Obama’s even more unspeakable proposal to expand torture and bring it to domestic prisons here in the heart of America, are equally culpable with Obama for these indefensible atrocities.
As predicted, the sociopaths and liars who futililely persist in attempt to defend Obama’s indefensible continued use to torture at Bagram Air Base and other “black” prison sites have called me “mentally ill.” This is their only defense. They cannot deny the documented facts that Obama has authorized the continuing use of torture. They cannot deny that Obama has authorized the continued abduction of people to other countries where they might be tortured, which is also a war crime in violation of the United Nations Convention Against Torture. (The UN Convention against torture recognizes sending someone to another country where they will be tortured as equally a war crime to conducting the torture yourself — as common sense assures us. After all, what’s the difference between torturing a prison, and telling someone else to do it?)
We witness here the moral bankrupcty of the Obama supporters in their full debasement. Confronted by the overwhelming evidence that Barack Obama continues to authorize torture, and that he even intends and has vigorously tried, to bring torture home to America in CIA-operated prisons, the Obama supporters can come up with nothing better in Obama’s defense than the smear that anyone who cites these documented facts is “insane.”
Of course we’ve heard that kind of desperate smear before. Caught in a web of lies in 1953, Senator Joseph McCarthy lashed out against General George Marshall and called him “a medical miracle — born with no guts and no brains.” The “insanity” smear is just more of the same, the usual McCarthy-style lie told in a fractic effort to distract us from the documented fact that Obama has continued to torture prisoners and has tried to bring torture to prisons in America.
If there were any justice, every “obot” who attempts to defend Obama’s indefensible continuation and attempted expansion of torture by the U.S. military and by the CIA would be dragged into the international court at The Hague and shufled up before the magistrate in shackles and an orange jumpsuit for aiding and abetting crimes against humanity.
Mnemosyne
Is anyone surprised to hear that the articles that mclaren links to don’t actually say what she claims they do? That the Esquire article doesn’t talk about any torture taking place after 2006 — you know, two years before Obama was elected — and that the article that Sullivan links to is actually from 2006?
Nope, me neither.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Mnemosyne: Whew, thanky you. Guess I won’t have to hang for being an Obot.
mclaren
Notice that anyone who cites documented facts proving that Obama continues the use of torture gets smeared as “a troll” and “crazy.”
I’ve provided documented evidence showing that Stanley McChrystal oversaw systematic torture and that Obama picked McChrystal to head military operations in Afghanistan.
I’ve provided documented evidence showing that Obama authorized the continued use of Army Interrogation Field Manual Appendix M, the appendix under which torture was authorized by the war criminals Bush and Cheney.
I’ve provided documented evidence showing that Obama has tried to expand the use of torture by bringing it home to America in CIA-run prisons on American soil.
In the face of these documented facts, all eemom and General Crackpot Fake Name can do is scream that I’m a “troll” and “crazy.”
Do you have any evidence to back your assertion that I’m crazy, eemom?
How about a court order remanding me to a psychiatic institution?
No?
Or a court finding that I’m mentally incomeptent — do you have that?
Of course your don’t.
Do you have a psychiatrist’s report diagnosing me with clinical mental illness?
Of course not.
You have no evidence. Nothing. I’ve provided reams of evidence that Barack Obama is guilty of the war crime of authorizing continued torture, while you’ve provided no evidence whatever for your baseless assertion that I’m “crazy.”
Do you really think anyone takes you people seriously?
Do you actually believe that’s all you have to do to magically wipe out of existence the overwhelming evidence that Barack Obama has continued the Bush regime war crimes of torture — just call anyone who cites the evidence of Obama’s continued use of torture “a troll” or “crazy”?
Is that really your entire argument? That the facts don’t matter because whoever states them is “a troll” or “crazy”?
El Cid
@burnspbesq: First let me clarify that I don’t care in the possible slightest whether or not you have concluded that I did or did not arrive at a conclusion based on my opinion of Greenwald. I realize you have a thing with him, and I’ll leave that to you two. Maybe it’s the blog version of the ‘one drop’ rule.
I guess part of my perspective on ‘good faith’ efforts to defend US actions as not being torture have little to do with sincere belief — there are all sorts of people who think animals are telling them the future and UFOs visit their bedrooms each night — and more to do with the kinds of things people do if they’re interested in finding out what really is true or not, as best as can be determined.
Saying ‘what we do isn’t torture because it just isn’t and because I sincerely believe what we do to be different than what other bad governments do’ (or more elaborate versions) isn’t a ‘good faith’ argument. It’s simply what any unquestioning agent says.
There are all kinds of people who deeply believe nonsense yet make little effort to question that belief. It’s a key part of justifying much of foreign policy to have plenty of people who do not question the nonsense they’re spewing. This helps the jobs of the Cheney’s and Abrams’ a lot.
asiangrrlMN
@El Cid: I agree with you. Again, going to motives of a person makes things sticky. Did a person take time to research his claims? Is he well-versed on the subject past the talking points? Is the defense of torture (in this case) anything more than a “we’re America, fuck yeah!” stance? There were some brutal consequences of our decision to torture–therefore, a person willing to defend said decision must have a pretty sound reasoning to back up that position.
As for GG, I thought the article was delightfully snarky. Once again, I am reminded of why I used to regularly read him.
Mnemosyne
@mclaren:
Actually, I’m pointing out that your “documented facts” don’t actually exist except inside your head and that the articles that you yourself cited don’t support your claims. The “facts” you keep citing about the current administration’s behavior are not actually in those articles because their claims end in 2006, two years before Obama’s election.
When you read articles and claim that you see things in them that aren’t actually there, either you’re a liar or you’re insane. Which is it?
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Mnemosyne: Whether Mclaren is a liar or insane is not the point. The point is I just don’t give a fuck whichever. Wasted energy even acknowledging it’s existence. Attention seeking seems more like it.
burnspbesq
@Mnemosyne:
In this case, I wouldn’t be so quick to conclude that those are mutually exclusive.
mclaren
Has anyone noticed that Mnemosyne is a liar?
The Esquire article talks about McChrystal’s use of torture in Iraq in 2006. It also talks about McChrystal’s ongoing support for torture and the allegations of torture at Bagram, going on now, today.
The Sullivan article talks about events prior to 2006 and also points out that McChrystal has a history of supervising and approving torture, and since McChrystal now supervises “black” military operations in Afghanistan, instead of Iraq, he’s doing exactly the same thing in Afghanistan that he did in Iraq — torturing prisoners to death in “black” prison sites like Bagram.
Also see Marc Ambinder’s Atlantic article “Inside the Secret Interrogation Facility at Bagram,” 14 May 2010. The same details about torture by freezing and sleep deprivation, the same stuff we heard when Dilawar the cab driver was tortured to death, the same torture methods used in Iraq, the same torture methods reported by the torture victims at Guantanamo.
Once again, the evidence shows that Mnemosyne is lying. This torture continues today, right now. This minute. And of course, as usual, there lots more evidence that Mnemosyne is lying.
Because the New York Times also picked up on this story. See “Afghans Detail Detention in ‘Black Jail’ at U.S. Base,” 29 November 2009, by Alissa J. Rubin. This one is behind the NYTimes registration wall, so I can’t link to it directly. You can read it by registering at the NYTimes site.
The New York Times articles details the same freezing and sleep deprivation torture now familiar from the torture chambers in Iraq. Same torture, same methods, continuing today. “A U.S. camp is holding, now, today. Not “was holding.” Not “used to do this before Obama became president.” No, it’s going on NOW, today, this moment, continuing Bush’s torture practices under Obama’s administration, using the exact same methods outlined in Yoo’s infamous torture memo.
So Mnemosyne is lying, as usual. No surprise there. She’s a compulsive pathological liar, so what else would you expect?
We’ve got the two clinical sociopaths on this forum hard at work trying to defend torture — General Crackpot Fake Name, a guy who unstable that he begged John Cole to ban him, and Mnemosyne, a classic example of a clinical type who fits virtually every bullet point on Hare’s sociopathy checklist.
Gee. Two clincial sociopaths defending torture…who would’ve thought?
As predicted, the obots are screaming their usual lies, and, also as usual, I’m now going to prove they’re lying with even more evidence:
The “Black Jail” : Obama’s Afghan Torture Center and the American Psychological Association.
Washington Post: 2 Afghans allege abuse at Bagram, from November 2009.
Hey, there, Mnemosyne, your lies are falling apart so fast we can hear a sonic boom.
What about the sentence detailed, consistent portrait suggesting that the abusive treatment of suspected insurgents has in some cases continued under the Obama administration, despite steps that President Obama has said would put an end to the harsh interrogation practices authorized by the Bush administration don’t you understand?
Of course, since Mnemosyne is a proven pathological compulsive liar, she’ll immediately scream that “the Washington Post article doesn’t prove what mclaren claims it does.”
Of course the Washington Post article proves what I claim it does — it presents convincing evidence that Obama has continued to torture people.
You’re a liar, Mnemosyne. And you’ve been caught in your lies. Everyone now knows you’re lying. And what’s worst of all, you’re lying in a frantic effort to defend torture..
That’s a whole new level of slime. You’ve finally reached rock bottom, Mnemosyne. You’re not just lying for your usual reasons (to cover up your own gross ignorance and shocking sociopathy), you’re now lying in a failed and futile effort to defend torture.
Naturally, the Washington Post isn’t the only place we find evidence that Obama has continued the torture of prisoners. Since Obama picked Stanley McChrystal as his hand-chosen general to run the war in Afghanistan and since Obama knew full well McChrystal’s history of supervising the torture of prisoners and the systematic murder of innocent women and children with so-called “targeted killings,” common sense tells us that Obama was signing off on more torture and more murder of innocent civilians in Afghanistan.
But common sense isn’t enough: we need evidence. And the BBC provides yet more evidence that torture continues at Bagram Air Base.
Source: Red Cross confirms ‘second jail’ at Bagram, Afghanistan, BBC World News Service, 11 May 2010.
August 2009 is well after Obama’s inauguration. A “black jail” is of course Stanley McChrystal’s euphemism for “torture chamber.” McChrystal supervised these kinds of torture chambers in Iraq (specifically, at Nama), and when Obama put McChrstyal in charge of Afghanistan, McChrystal promptly opened up a torture chamber (AKA “black jail”) at Bagram.
Once again, the circumstantial evidence is overwhelming. Since we’re talking about top secret “black” prisons inside a military base, obviously we can’t get a direct video feed. So we must rely on Red Cross reports and the testimony of people who were tortured in these facilities. That testimony and those reports are damning.
Mnemosyne is a liar. Torture continues at Bagram Air Base to this day. She’s lying in a frantically failed effort to defend torture.
Shame on you, Mnemosyne. You’re not only an incompetent liar, you’re a despicable liar, degrading yourself by telling lies in order to defend the most depraved form of human atrocity…the torture of one human being by another.
If there were any justice, Mnemosyne and General Crackpot Fake Name would be shuffled into the dock at the International Court at The Hague alongside Barack Obama for aiding and abetting crimes against humanity.
FlipYrWhig
@eemom:
4. He believes the only possible explanation for any disagreement with him is that you have been brainwashed.
asiangrrlMN
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: Ditto this. Too bad because when s/he (I think it’s a he, but that could just be a default assumption) on his/her meds, s/he is quite engaging. This shit, though, I don’t even read. I can tell by the length of a post whether it’s a good day or a bad day for him/her.
kdaug
My general rule is that, if on an online community where the standard of response is a snarky sentence or two, and one participant decides on multi-paragraph broadside of accusatory posts whose point isn’t immediately clear in the first two lines, then then benefit of the doubt goes to the snarky one-liner, not the over-winded gasbag who’s trying too hard to prove their point.
They may have one, but they need to work on the packaging.
Lupin
@mclaren
I’m not “pro-Obama” at all; in fact, I’m very disappointed (but not surprised) by his performance so far BUT I have to say that IMHO reviewing your posts Mnemosyne wins the debate no contest. Maybe you should take a deep breath and rethink.
Yutsano
@kdaug: Succinctness: it ain’t just for breakfast anymore. Honestly, mclaren is the very master of tl;dr. Even if he (I’m pretty sure I saw the self-identification somewhere before) is completely correct in all his assertions (which hasn’t happened yet) the fact that the sheer length and aggressive attitude turns off any point he makes. There’s an older writer’s adage: never use ten words when you can use two. I think it applies here.
mclaren
Anti-social personality disorder, also known as “sociopathy,” characterizes Mnemosyne’s responses on this forum.
Since Mnemosyne is now the only person even attempt to mount any sort of argument in defense of Barack Obama’s continued use to torture, I’ll concentrate on her arguments and ignore those of eemom and General Crackpot Fake Name and burnspbesq, since those latter 3 people aren’t actually offering any sort of argument. They’re merely calling anyone who cites the documented facts of Obama’s continued use of torture “insane.”
That’s not an argument, so we need not concern ourselves with it.
Mnemosyne, by contrast, has actually tried to confect an argument to defend Obama’s continued use of torture — albeit an exceptionally weak argument.
Mnemosyne’s argument is that “those articles don’t prove what you say they do.” She claims that I am “seeing things that aren’t there” and therefore my statements are factually incorrect.
This is peculiar type of argument, since it’s nothing but the old Karl Rove “deny the obvious facts” strategy. When Bush blew a trillion-dollar surplus left by Clinton into the biggest deficit in American history, Rove’s simply argued that the facts didn’t prove what Bush’s critics claimed they proved. Just because Bush spent insane amounts of money and just because a Republican congress authorized those expenditures, Rove argued, didn’t mean that Bush was responsible for gigantic world-historic deficits.
But of course, the facts do mean exactly what Bush’s critics said they meant. The fact that Bush spent money like a drunken sailor and that the Republican congress authorized those historic deficits does mean that Bush is responsible for our current gigantic deficits.
The facts tell us that. If A then B, if B then C, therefore requires us to conclude that if A, then C. It’s simple logic.
This “deny the evidence of your lying eyes” is a peculiar argument because no one with a brain or an ounce of conscience would believe it. Basic logic and bare facts require us to conclude that Bush is responsible for our record deficits, just as basic logic and bare facts require us to believe that torture continues today at Bagram Air Base and that Barack Obama authorizes that torture.
Look at the bare facts:
[1] As reported by the BBC, the Red Cross testifies to the ongoing existence of a second “black” prison site at Bagram Air Base. Not 5 years ago, not 10 years ago, not in Iraq. NOW. TODAY.
[2] As reported by the Washington Post, Afghan detainees tell stories about how they were subjected to exactly the same kind of torture techniques described in Iraq — freezing to the point of coma, sleep deprivation to the pont of hallucination, and so on. That’s not “happened years ago.” That’s allegations by Afghan detainees of torture that occurred after Barack Obama put Stanley McChrystal in charge of the war in Afghanistan.
[3] Stanley McChrystal has a long history of supervising torture. He did it in Iraq. Simple logic tells us Obama must have known this when he picked McChrystal to run the war in Afghanistan. Are we really supposed to believe that Obama didn’t know about McChrystal’s history of using torture on prisoners? Please. Get real. Obama has to have known about McChrystal’s long history of torturing prisoners. So what logical conclusion should be draw when Obama picks McChrystal to run the war in Afghanistan? Common sense tells us that if you want to end torture, you pick someone to run your war who is not a torturer. Conversely, if you pick someone who is a known torturer to run your war, then common sense tells us you are authorizing continued tortute.
[4] The stories told by detainees about their torture exactly match up with McChrystal’s known use of those exact same torture techniques. These stories, told by detainees who were tortured over the last 2 years after Obama became president also match exactly the tortute technique specified in Appendix M of the Army Interrogation Field Manual.
[5] Appendix M of the Army Interrogation Field Manual is the “bible” used in the torture of prisoners by the Bush administration. Appendix M is what guides the torturers in their “enhanced interrogation” techniques, AKA torture.
Connect the dots. Use simple logic. Obama appoints a torturer to run the war in Afghanistan. The torture uses Appendix M. Detainees report being tortured at Bagram over the last 2 years with techniques described in Appendix M. The Red Cross reports a second “black” prison site at Bagram to which the Red Cross is not permitted access — exactly like the Nama “black” prison site to which Red Cross was not permitted access when Stanley McChrystal supervised torture in the Nama prison in Iraq.
Now let’s look at Mnemosyne’s so-called “argument”…
Her “argument,” if you can call it that, is that these facts mean nothing. The fact that the Red Cross reports a second black prison site at Bagram means nothing. The fact that detainees report they’re being tortured with methods described in Appendix M, the “torture” appendix of the Army Interrogation Field Manual, proves nothing. The fact that Obama appointed the known torturer McChrystal to run the Afghan war means nothing.
All of these facts don’t mean anything, according to Mnemosyne. They don’t prove what I claim they prove. They don’t prove there’s any torture going on in Afghanistan. They don’t prove Obama has authorized continued torture.
Does that make sense?
Mnemosyne is just using the old Karl Rove “Don’t believe your lying eyes” argument (if you can even call it an argument). In other words, she’s just lying outright.
The facts show clearly that torture is going on right now, today, at Bagram Air Base. The facts show clearly that Stanley McChrystal was a known torturer and he was in charge of the Afghanistan war. The facts show clearly that detainees report being tortured using methods described in Appendix M of the Army Interrogation Field Manual. Simple logic leads us to conclude that since torture is going on now, today, in Afghanistan under McChrystal’s supervision, Obama must have authorized it, since he obviously knew McChrystal was a torturer and since Obama clearly and obviously hand-picked McChrystal to run the war.
But, no, Mnemosyne tells us all these facts don’t mean what I say they mean.
That’s crazy.
It’s like saying “Sure, that guy held down that woman, and sure, that guy unzipped his pants, and sure, that guy pulled out his penis and inserted it forcibly in that woman while strangling her, but that doesn’t mean that guy raped that woman! In fact, if you claim that mean the guy raped that woman, you’re insane!”
That’s the argument Mnemosyne is offering.
Now ask yourself: what kind of argument is that?
The obvious facts don’t mean what they obviously mean. And anyone who claims they mean what they obviously mean is insane.
That’s an interesting argument.
What kind of person would offer an argument that bizarre?
A sociopath.
Mnemosyne is showing us a classic example of sociopathic thinking by offering her bizarre “don’t believe your lying eyes” argument. The facts don’t mean what you think they mean, so just ignore them. That’s the classic modality of a socoipath — when you encounter inconvenient facts, jsut deny ’em.
Which brings us back to Dr. Donald Hare’s sociopathy checklist. Notice how many of these traits George W. Bush and Dick Cheney and Mnemosyne exhibit:
Notice Mnemosyne’s reponse to my statement of documented facts — I’m insane, and the obvious facts don’t prove what they obviously prove. A normal person would exhibit some hesitation at calling someone else “insane” when they provide hard evidence of ongoing torture at Bagram Air Base — but not Mnemosyne. As a classic sociopath, the facts don’t even slow here down. She remains glib and never gets tongue-tied, even in the face of overwhemling evidence that she’s lying.
Notice that both Mnemosyne and General Crackpot Fake Name always call other people “insane” and “stupid.” Never for an instant could these two entertain the possibility that they might not be the brightest people on this forum — let alone wrong. No, these two present themselves as Superwoman and Superman, always right, and everyone who disagrees with them is insane or a troll. Once again, a classic sociopathic mindset. Compare with my repeated admission that I’ve been wrong — for example, when someone asked pointedly how come I supported John Edwards even though he was a big booster of the Iraq War, I replied, “Because I was a fucking idiot.” I’ve been wrong lots of times. I could be wrong that Obama has authorized continued ongoing torture. But if I am wrong, so is the Red Cross and the Washington Post and Esquire magazine and the Atlantic magazine and the New York Times and the BBC World News Service. That’s an awful lot of folks to be wrong. Notice, also, that if I’m “insane” and “seeing things that aren’t there,” as Mnemosyne claims, that requires us to believe that the Red Cross and the Washington Post and Esquire magazine and the Atlantic magazine and the New York Times and the BBC World News Service are also insane and “seeing things that aren’t there.” Ask yourself — which is more credible? That all these people (including me) are hallucinating and nuts and seeing things that aren’t there? Or that Mnemosyne is exhibiting classic sociopathic narcissistic personality disorder?
This one is obvious. General Crackpot Fake Name begged John Cole to ban him. Now he’s back, after wailing about how allegedly miserable the internet made him. Why is Crackpot Fake Name back? The obsessive need for stimulation, so typical of sociopaths. Why does Mnemosyne zero in like a heat-seeking missile on every thread in which I comment? Once again, the excessive need for “novel thrilling, and exciting stimulation, taking chances and doing things that are risky,” like telling obvious lies in public and trying to win an argument by doing nothing other than claim that the obvious facts don’t mean what they obviously mean. That probably doesn’t work too often, but, then again, when it does, I’ll bet Mnemosyne gets a huge thrill out of claiming black is white and up is down and just because the BBC and the Washington Post and the New York Times have reported people being tortured under Obama’s watch, that doesn’t really mean they’re being tortured. Denying observed reality can give people a huge sense of power. Just look at the Global Warming deniers.
As we see, this described Mnemosyne and General Crackpot Fake Name to a T.
Mnemosyne isn’t bright enough to succeed in being manipulative — after all, the “Are you going to believe your lying eyes?” argument isn’t much of an argument, and she knows it. But notice that Mnemosyne is trotting out her deceiptfulness, as inept and feeble as it is, in defense of torture. This adds the element of “callous ruthless” so typical of the sociopath, and assures us that Mnemosyne has this classic trait of the sociopath in spades.
You’d expect a normal person to exhibit some concern for the suffering of the Afghans who are alleged to have been tortured — but not Mnemosyne or General Crackpot Fake Name. It’s all about them. To hell with the people screaming in unendurable agony, they just want to win this argument. And they’ll tell any lie to do it. This is a perfect illustration of the sociopath’s mindset. Whereas the real point here is that Afghans are being tortured, even now, today, under Obama’s supervision. It’s not so much that Obama continues torture, as that it’s torture. This is the horrible central fact that Mnemosyne and General Crackpot Fake Name have utterly ignored — the human suffering, the shrieks and the despair, the spiral into madness from 10 or 20 or 30 days of sleep deprivation, the horror as the freezing Afghan victim slips into a coma after being doused with ice-cold water for the fiftieth time that evening…. That’s what really matters here. But of course Mnemosyne and General Crackpot Fake Name have no concern at all for the victims of the torture. They coudn’t care less. Classic socoipathic mindset.
Boy, this one really characterizes Mnemosyne and General Crackpot Fake Name, doesn’t it? These two are Johnny-One-Notes, all “you’re insane! you’re insane!” That’s all they have to offer. That’s the entire repertoire of their response — they sound like robots, as true sociopaths tend to do. Their only response in a debate is that anyone who disagrees with ’em is insane — classic “limited range or depth of feelings” typical of the sociopath.
This so obviously characterizes Mnemosyne and General Crackpot Fake Name that little discussion is required. It’s woth pointing out that both these people are trying to defend torture, which says it all in terms of this item on the Hare Sociopathy Checklist.
We can’t say much about Mnemosyne but it’s easy to guess. General Crackpot Fake Name has described in detail his hopeless internet addiction and has begged Cole to ban him, so clearly Crackpot Fake Name has admitted his hopeless parasitic relationship with this forum. Another check mark on the Hare Sociopathy Checklist.
Perfectly describes both Crackpot Fake Name and Mnemosyne, doesn’t it?
No information here on either Mnemosyne or General Crackpot Fake Name, so this item must be left blank. We simply don’t know.
Once again, we have no information here on either Mnemosyne or General Crackpot Fake Name. It would be interesting to unseal their juvenile police records.
We don’t know about Mnemosyne, but General Crackpot Fake Name’s open admission of his internet addiction certainly qualifies on this score. Another classic sociopathic trait.
Obviously describes both Mnemosyne and General Crackpot Fake Name so accurately that it’s positively eerie.
Mnemosyne’s and General Crackpot Fake Name’s obvious refusal to abide by basic intenet etiquette clearly fulfills this part of the Hare Sociopathy Checklist. Like all true sociopaths, these two have no compunctions about making any accusation or calling anyone any name that might prove momentarily convenient. These two sociopaths have no verbal filter, and will accuse anyone of anything to win an argument — classic irresponsibility it its purest form on the internet.
The mention of “denial” really seals the deal here. Mnemosyne and General Crackpot Fake Name obvious refuse to accept any responsibilty for their own statements, simply denying that they have said what they have obviously said, and denying any facts that prove inconvenient to them. George W. Bush was reported by one of his Yale professors to deny that he has said things he said mere minutes ago; as we all know, his steadfast denial of obvious facts confirms this sociopathic trait, and it’s eerily similar to Menomsyne’s bizarre claim that the proven facts of detainees testimony of their torture under Obama’s administration nevertheless doesn’t mean that Obama has continued to torture detainees. Just deny, deny, deny — when faced with reality, crank up the denials to fever pitch. A classic characteristic of the sociopath, and abundantly evident in Mnemosyne’s and General Crackpot Fake Name’s behavior.
No evidence here as regards Mnemosyne or General Crackpot Fake Name, so we’ll have to leave this check box with an unanswered question mark.
Once again, no evidence here for or against Mnemosyne or General Crackpot Fake Name. It would prove interesting indeed to see how many dead pets these two had as kids. Did their kittens or puppies always die mysteriously? Perhaps in fires? Perhaps with their heads crushed by rocks? It would be fascinating to get the facts about that.
This doesn’t apply in the case of non-violent sociopaths. Those people who lack a conscience or common human decency often avoid contact with the justice system entirely — as, for example, George W. Bush, Karl Rove, and Dick Cheney. Mnemosyne and General Crackpot Fake Name belong to this category, and thus we wouldn’t expect them to have gone through the penal system. So this item just doesn’t apply.
As stated above, this doesn’t apply to non-violent sociopaths, who often enter professions in which their sociopathic traits can lead to a great personal success — politics, the law, law enforcement, a managerial position in a large company, etc.
Adding up, we find that Mnemosyne and General Crackpot Fake Name score 14 out of 20 on the Hare Sociopathy Checklist. Dr. Hare has pointed out anyone who scores 10 or more is probably a sociopath, so draw your own conclusions.
In any case it should now be amply obvious why these two are telling lies and hurling smears in an effort to defend torture. That’s exactly what you’d expect a sociopath to do, isn’t it?
mclaren
@kdaug:
So when Karl Rove claimed “democrats want to give the terorrists therapy” when Demos objected to the revocation of habeas corpus, the benefit of the doubt goes to Rove, right?
mclaren
kdaug has inadvertently explained cotnemporary American politics, and most of world history.
Shorter kdaug: witty, concise and superficially convincing lies always beat detailed unpleasant truths.</B.
Alas, it's incredibly easy to tell snarky superficially credible one-liner lies that requires many hundreds of pages to refute:
Example: "Jews are Christ-killers"
Example: "Liberals are godless atheistic perverts who want to murder unborn children"
Example: "Conservatives are tough manly he-men, while liberals are wimpy girly-men"
Example: "Blacks are the sons of Ham and cursed by God in the Bible"
..And the list goes on. Welcome to brain-dead modern America, where the popular answer to every complex problem is:
tl;dr "too long, didn't read"
Global warming? Lol, tl;dr
Peak oil. Lulz! tl;dr
Afghan war? STFU, tl;dr.
Torture? ROTFL, tl;dr.
FlipYrWhig
Unpleasant commenter != “unpleasant truth.”
JGabriel
mclaren:
Honestly, that’s pretty easy to refute. Just point to David Brooks, Bill Kristol, or George Will. Between the three of them, they have about as much butch as a homesick nanny.
.
burnspbesq
@mclaren:
“Is that really your entire argument? That the facts don’t matter because whoever states them is “a troll” or “crazy”?”
No, the argument is that in order to find someone guilty of a crime, you have to have admissible evidence that proves every element of the offense beyond a reasonable doubt, and you have nothing, zip, nada, rien, nichevo, and bubkes.
Yutsano
@burnspbesq: I find certitude annoying. I find it doubly so from those who claim to be of liberal countenance. And just for your edification the Japanese word for zero is “rei”. The numeral is “maru” (literally circle) but something that is a null is “rei”.
burnspbesq
@Yutsano:
Thanks for the edification, but if saying it in English, Spanish, French, Russian, and Yiddish doesn’t get the point across, reiterating it in Japanese isn’t likely to seal the deal.
How ya doin? Didja get the job with the Service?
Yutsano
@burnspbesq: In the immortal paraphrase of Inigo Montoya:
I have zero issue with someone criticizing Obama, hell I’ve done it a few times meself. But for FSM’s sake have something to back your shit up or you’re just another pouter with a Cheeto stained keyboard. And I suppose pointing out that McChrystal got fired is pretty much pointless (officially he resigned but I get the feeling that whole meeting was Obama telling him he’ll let McChrystal save as much face as possible) so little of what mclaren says is true as far as Obama is concerned. Could he be doing Afghanistan better? Absolutely. Could he get our shit together better on civil rights and torture? You betcha. That takes pressure from us, because I truly think he could be an FDR if we just keep pressuring him with reasonable arguments and not firebagger pony dreams.
Incidentally, to stray off topic, I saw the notice about losing your girl today. I’ve been right where your son is: my first dog was our Newfoundland and my first memories of her are when she was taller than I was. I also remember the day we put her down after her cancer got too bad. I’m sure he has similar experiences. It’ll be rough on him, but he’s got a good dad, so he’ll get through it.
In response to your edit: I find out this week. I’m excited and amazingly enough part of me is nervous. This is by far the hardest I’ve ever had to work for a job in my life. I sincerely hope it pays off.
mclaren
@burnspbesq:
Therefore according to your argument, all the Nazi defendents at Nuremberg should have been acquitted since there was no detailed paper trail and no detailed chain of evidence linking those individuals specifically to the genocide of the Jews during WW II — and, in actual fact, the term “genocide” was never even mentioned in one single German piece of paperwork in the entire Third Reich, with relatively innocuous-sounding phrases like “final solution to the Jewish question” used instead.
No, crimes against humanity ordered by a government official will never have “evidence that proves every element of the offense beyond a reasonable doubt” so we have to rely on a chain of evidence which is largely circumstantial. The circumstantial evidence that Obama is continuing to torture detainees at Bagram Air Base is overwhelming — far greater than the circumstantial evidence against Slobodan Milosevic ordering ethnic cleansing in Kosovo.
mclaren
@Yutsano:
[1] I’ve provided a link to testimony by Bagram prisoners that they were tortured nearly a year after Obama took office. The source on that is the Washington Post.
[2] I’ve provided a link to evidence that McChrystal supervised torture in Iraq and Afghanistan prior to Obama’s presidency. The source on that is Esquire magazine.
[3] I’ve provided a link to evidence that Obama appointed McChrystal, a known torturer, to head up the military effort in Afghanistan, after Obama became president. Everyone knows that, it’s not even in doubt.
[4] I’ve provided a link to evidence that the Red Cross testifies that there exists a second “black” prison at Bagram which they are not allowed to enter as of two months ago, which continues to be used today after Obama became president, the same “black” prison at which the Afghan prisoners claim they were recently tortured during Obama’s presidency.
Torture is a war crime. I’ve provided links to a chain of circumstantial evidence which proves beyond a reasonable doubt that Afghan prisoners continued to be tortured after Obama became president. Therefore, logically, Obama is a war criminal.
You claim “little of what mclaren says is true as far as Obama is concerned” but you provide no evidence for your unsubstantiated claim.
Which of the statements I have made above (1, 2, 3 or 4) is untrue, and where is your evidence that my statements are untrue?
I’ve provided vast amounts of evidence. You’ve provided nothing. In your own words, Yutsano, For FSM’s sake have something to back your shit up or you’re just another pouter with a Cheeto stained keyboard.
the farmer
the term genocide was coined by Rafal Lemkin in 1943 or 1944.
*
mclaren
@JGabriel:
Typical garbled reasoning of the kind that abounds on the internet.
You can’t use a isolated exceptions to disprove a general assertion about some overall statistical character of a group.
Example: If someone claims “almost all prime numbers are odd,” you can’t disprove that assertion by giving the counterexample “2 is prime, and it’s an even number.”
That’s on the same level as the claim that global warming is a fraud because we had an unusually cold winter this year.
You aren’t really seriously trying to make that kind of argument, are you? You’re not actually engaging in that sort of grossly deficient reasoning, right? …Oh. Wait. This is the internet. Of course you are.
It is a general (unfortunately false) truism in contemporary America that tough macho he-men tend to be Republicans and wimpy guys tend to be liberal. It’s untrue but so many people believe it that it’s a deeply annoying canard. And when you look at well-known Republicans like John Wayne and Arnold Schwarzeneggar and Chuck Norris and Charlton Heston, and compare them with the well-known stereotypical liberals like Alan Alda the “sensitive passionate man” and Jimmy Carter fighting off the rabbit in his boat, that generalization seems superficially highly credible. The generalization only breaks down when you leave the stereotypes behind and start to examine individual cases across a broad spectrum, which takes time and detail.
Yutsano
@mclaren: Okay fine, let’s play this game:
Do you know what the phrase independent verification means? It means that, essentially, a third party can provide both substantiation and context to the allegations. So on that point, both you and WaPo need to try again.
I have a strong aversion to unnamed sources. I hate it when someone won’t speak on the record yet makes a damning allegation. This “Jeff” could be the duck in the reporter’s bathtub for all we know. An anonymous source material is hardly evidence. Strike two.
(not bothering with three because obviously McChrystal had the job. That’s called a stipulation. There, you got a point over me. Happy?)
Actually, the article you cite says no such thing. In fact, it states that the ICRC is pleased that they have access to the site. And I agree that nine prisoners going through sleep deprivation is deplorable, but is not a sign of systematic abuse. Disciplinary action to be taken against certain actors yes, but hardly systematic. And if the access was GRANTED in August 2009, who do you think authorized that access?
I can haz betr trollz plz?
Someone do me the favor of measuring the spittle that the firebagger puts out. I’m heading to bed.
mclaren
@the farmer: Thanks. I didn’t know that.
My point, that terms like “murder all the Jews” or “mass murder of Jews” never appeared in any of the Nazi records, remains valid. Unfortunately, this has caused some well-known Holocaust-deniers like David Irving, to write entire fraudulent books denying the documented reality of what the Germans actually did to the Jews.
David Irving’s libel trial in 1998, when he sued the scholar Deborah Lipstadt and Penguin publishing house, offers an excellent example of just how much evidence has to be piled up to debunk the claims of people who deny seemingly obvious facts like the Holocaust. Merely to disprove a few pages of Irving’s dishonest Holocaust-denying book, entire tomes had to be written in Lipstadt’s defense and presented at trial.
It remains sadly true that simple concise and superficially-credible claims can easily be made which often require vast amounts of evidence to debunk. To use a classic modern example, Reagan’s claim that “Forest fires have produced more smoke than all the factories in history,” or, as an another example, the assertion that Peak Oil can’t be true because Americans still have plenty of oil for their SUVs.
mclaren
@Yutsano:
Talking about the torture of human beings is not a “game.” Shame on you. For shame. You’re a disgrace to the basic values of America.
You go on to dismiss each of my pieces of evidence on spurious grounds. Let’s start with the first piece of evidence, the testimony from the Afghan prisoners cited in the Washington Post that you disregard.
You claim:
Excellent! Since we’re talking about atop secret military prison in which there can by definition be no such thing as indepenent verification, no allegation of torture can ever be proven according to your standards as long as it takes place inside a “black” prison.
Notice the grossly defective nature of Yutsano’s reasoning here: mere testimony by the torture victims is never enough proof, we require independent confirmation; but since the “black” prisons are top secret military installations, independent confirmation can never be provided; therefore, no torture occurs.
This is the kind of garbled reasoning used by ufologists. No one can ever provide definitive proof that UFO abductions don’t occur, therefore UFO abductions must be common.
In cases of war crimes involving secret “black” prisons we must rely on circumstantial evidence. The evidence will of necessity be fragmentary and not up to the standards of forensic evidence in a typical criminal case, especially insofar as the torture used by the U.S. military is specifically designed not to leave physical marks, so as to avoid prosecution. We can, however, build up substantial circumstantial evidence by combining the independent stories of torture victims with evidence of black prisons in Afghanistan of the same type at which torture was known and proven to occur in Iraq, the proven torture history of the General in charge of those black prisons, and the specific techniques described in Appendix M of the army manual. If all these pieces of circumstantial evidence line up, this provides a strong case — more than strong enough to stand up in a court of law.
Yutsano then tries to debunk my second piece of evidence by deriding “unnamed sources.” Any member of the U.S. military who goes on the record about torture is going to be liable for courts-martial. So once again, you’ve raised the bar for evidence so high that we can never prosecute unless you want to posit America getting conquered by some foreign power and holding war crimes trials of American soldiers and American politicians (good luck with that one; I won’t hold my breath). Once again, if the unnamed sources provide corroborating testimony which lines up with all the other evidence it provides a significant (but not by itself probative) link in the chain of circumstantial evidence.
You ignore my third point, which seems the most damning of all — Obama appointed a known torturer as head of military operations in Afghanistan. What does that tell us? Once again, it’s a strong piece of circumstantial evidence that Obama condoned and authorized torture, which seems one of the most crucial issues here. After all, Obama could always claim “hoocoodanode?” But after appointing a known torturer to head up military operations in Afghanistan, can we really believe “hoocoodanode?” from Obama?
On my fourth piece of evidence, the second “black” prison site at Bagram, you quibble about whether or not the Red Cross were given access, entirely ignoring the real piece of circumstantial evidence here — that it was second separate “black” site of exactly the type in which McChrystal oversaw torture of prisoners in Iraq at the “Anand” black site torture prison.
Lastly, and most disgracefully, Yutsano ridicules sleep deprivation. That’s appalling. Shame on you. Sleep deprivation is a form of torture if carried on long enough.
Source: “Can You Die From Sleep Deprivation?” Brian Palmer, Slate magazine, 11 May 2009.
In actual fact, the torture techniques in Appendix M were taken from the Soviet Communists, who used these exact same methods to torture innocent people into confessing to phony crimes for Stalin’s show trials.
Before you disgrace yourself further by ridiculing Afghan prisoners whom you incorrectly describe as having “lost a little sleep,” I refer you to the Museum of the Genocide of the Lithuanian People, commonly known as the KGB Museum.
These are the exact same techniques used in McChrystal’s black prisons and they are the exact same techniques described by the Afghan prisoners who claim to have been tortured after Obama became president — the exact same torture methods used by the KGB to extract false confessions from political prisoners for show trials. Which is no surprise, since Appendix M in the Army Interrogation Field Manual was specifically derived from Soviet and Chinese Communist torture techniques.
I also remind everyone that according to Yutsano’s impossibly high standards of evidence, we would not be able to prosecute any war crimes except possibly the Nazi atrocities, courtesy of their meticulous record-keeping. We could not prosecute Pol Pot’s mass murders (no independent confirmation, too many unnamed sources), we could not prosecute Arkan’s mass murders and rapes in Bosnia (no independent confirmation, too many nameless victims, too many unnamed sources who wouldn’t go on the record), we couldn’t even prosecute the war crimes of the Confederacy at Andersonville Prison (once again no indpendent confirmation, too many nameless victims, too many unnamed sources who wouldn’t go on the record).
I asked Yutsano to provide evidence that “little of what mclaren says is true as far as Obama is concerned,” and he has provided zero evidence to back up his claim. Zip, nada, diddly, squat, bupkiss, rei, zilch. nichivo, null, nothing. All Yutsano has succeeded in doing is throwing some dust up in the air to cloud the basic issue that there is strong circumstantial evidence that torture (of the kind the KGB used on political prisoners under Stalin) has occurred in Afghanistan after Obama became president.
DBrown
mclaren – where were you when hundreds were tortured to death under bloody hands cheney and your fellow asswipe bush-jerk off?
SLKRR
This comment thread gives me an urge to root for Ferrari. ;-)
AxelFoley
@DBrown:
Hear that sound? That’s the sound of crickets.
sparky
@burnspbesq: i must disagree here. facts cannot speak for themselves, but it is more than reasonable to conclude that Cheney is correct, and that the WH can do whatever it wishes, at least as to the National Security State, without regard to the US Constitution or treaties.
why? because that’s what went on under Bush and it’s what’s going on now, and there were no prosecutions or even censures. thus, if you can do whatever you wish and there are no consequences, you are in the right, as right is now understood in the US.
so i’d say Cheney is correct and you are mistaken. all those con law cases turn out to be just words, rather like the old Soviet Constitution that simply evaporated with the fall of that state.
sparky
watching people defend Obama on the National Security State is, well, depressing, just like the post/title for this thread.
the US has adopted a policy that looks better under Obama. however, once one looks past the surface, it is unclear if anything has changed other than a certain sophistication about public relations.
From the L.A. Times, March 2010:
it is beyond dispute that the US operates a second, secret jail at Bagram that is unrelated to the publicly-known jail.
the BBC has documented abuse at this secret jail:
at this point, defending Obama on the National Security State is going to take a rather large amount of willful blindness.
thalarctos
Hiya, Yutsano–
Having enjoyed and been engaged by your commentary for some time now, I doubt you’re going to lose any sleep over some crackpot’s ravings. But just in case, as for that quote: “You’re a disgrace to the basic values of America”, I’d like to remind everyone that earlier s/he claimed that “Barack Obama is a war crime”.
Speaking as a professional ontologist, I’d say that this person clearly has no idea what is-a means, so I certainly wouldn’t take him/her seriously on any subject other than pie.
That is all.
burnspbesq
@mclaren:
“No, crimes against humanity ordered by a government official will never have “evidence that proves every element of the offense beyond a reasonable doubt” so we have to rely on a chain of evidence which is largely circumstantial.”
There lies a spectacular misunderstanding of how legal systems work. Anyone who actually knows what they’re talking about would know that even circumstantial evidence must satisfy the rules of evidence and be admissible in order to be used, and that successful prosecutions can be built on circumstantial evidence. Regardless of what kind of evidence you have, under US law you still have use to prove every element of the offense beyond a reasonable doubt. Although the International Criminal Court is largely irrelevant to this discussion because the United States has not ratified the Rome Statute, Article 66 of the Rome Statute also requires that offenses be proven beyond a reasonable doubt.
thalarctos
Hiya, Yutsano–
Having enjoyed and been engaged by your commentary for some time now, I doubt you’re going to lose any sleep over some crackpot’s ravings. But just in case, as for that quote: “You’re a disgrace to the basic values of America”, I’d like to remind everyone that earlier s/he claimed that “Barack Obama is a war crime”.
Speaking as a professional ontologist, I’d say that this person clearly has no idea what is-a means, so I certainly wouldn’t take him/her seriously on any subject other than pie.
That is all.
(Sorry if this is a mutiple post; I’m in Heathrow, and my mobile is getting uninformative error messages.)
burnspbesq
For the record, I have said repeatedly, on this blog and others, that I am strongly in favor of criminal trials or courts martial for any US government personnel or contractors in respect of whom there is sufficient evidence to go to trial. Unlike McClaren, apparently, I care about giving the accused appropriate procedural safeguards. Also unlike McClaren, having actually tried cases in an actual court, I think I appreciate the difficulties involved in such an undertaking.
sparky
@burnspbesq: you make a fair point as to the difficulties of bringing a criminal prosecution on this head. there are, however, any number of different sorts of inquiries that could be undertaken that need not produce a conviction. limiting the options to a criminal trial under the US system has the perverse effect of keeping illegalities under cover.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@SLKRR: Root for Ferrari? Never! Not as long as Alonso is there, anyway. But McLaren does have Ron Dennis’ way with words.
sparky
@thalarctos: come now, are you really going to base an argument on what might well be a typo in a blog post?
keestadoll
At the risk of seriously diminishing any hopes of being taken seriously in here in the future, I’d like to note that mclaren’s comments, upon review, had me holding the down arrow on my keyboard for an average of 5 seconds.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@sparky: It is hardly “a secret facility” if the US is reporting about it to the IRC. If it is true that prisoners are being purposely made cold and kept awake for long periods of time, I think that should stop. Keeping the lights on 24 hours a day is a common practice in county jails across American, so I doubt you could classify that as torture. I would agree that investigation is warranted to determine the voracity of the prisoners claims on sleep deprivation and cold temps. What I and others object to is in any way making claims like this.
There is simply no comparison to make between what is alleged to be happening under Obama with the Bush worldwide torture regime and general policy of torturing people with things like waterboarding, under a national policy with elaborate infrastructure to torture detainees, or send them to other countries for torture.
When folks like you and Mclaren and Greenwald put forth complaints about Obama’s detention policy in something rather than conflated hyperbole in perspective to reality, then I will listen to you. Methinks you and others have alternate agendas, so I won’t be holding my breath for you to get real.
I have criticized Obama for not taking the leap and afford by declaring full POW rights to prisoners, with an exception to questioning properly these prisoners for information. I believe even BTD supports this approach as well.
NobodySpecial
The biggest problem is that he hasn’t openly repudiated it with an Executive Order or pushed for Congress to do anything about the Bush excesses. As one presidential historian has noted, Presidents are loath to do anything that would restrict their future abilities. This is depressing when you consider what Bush/Cheney considered the legal rights of the President with regards to detainees.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@NobodySpecial: He certainly has issued Executive Orders regarding detainee policy and interrogation rules. The EO rescinded Bush’s policy on these things. The debate is over techniques listed in the Army Field Manual for interrogation. I agree that some of them are suspect. And freezing, or kept awake for long periods of time is over the line, but nothing compared to what Bush did. Here is one such EO on interrogation, there are others, I believe. Such as overall detainee policy.
thalarctos
@Sparky–while my comment was partly tongue-in-cheek, there’s also the thing about getting the little things right in order to get the big things right.
Not to mention mclaren’s clearly off his/her meds with those rants.
Only submitting this once; Heathrow network error messages can kiss my arse.
ThatPirateGuy
@mclaren:
Obama Inauguration Day Date
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
http://chicago.about.com/od/neighborhoodshistory/a/Inauguration09.htm
you
You clearly cannot do basic math. I seriously doubt your ability to perform basic research.
sparky
@thalarctos: agreed as to accuracy–at some point it becomes important, though i am loath to say where that line is as a general proposition, especially given the ubiquity of nit-picking as a distraction technique (and no i’m not suggesting that’s what you were doing) ;)
i confess i did not perceive your tongue-in-cheekness tone. as for myself, i would hate to be judged on a typo, especially here as i sometimes cannot edit my comments.
thalarctos
@sparky: if you can’t get the little things right, your grasp of the big things is suspect.
patroclus
Actually, several of the Nuremberg and Tokyo defendants were acquitted because the prosecution, in each case, failed to meet its burden in producing admissible evidence that led to a conclusion of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Mclaren’s “proof” that Obama is a war criminal falls within this general “lack of proof” standard. And the Nuremberg prosecutors had more than a WaPo article and an Esquire article too.
I’ve read Mclaren’s links. To reach the conclusion that mclaren reaches, I need LOTS more proof.
And if and when mclaren name-calls me like mclaren habitually does to anyone who disagrees, that’s not proof.
thalarctos
Yes, Sparky, I am positively asserting that if someone has time to write florid, manic, tl;dr rants like that, they have time to get the little things right; else, their grasp of the big things is suspect.
(And FY, Heathrow network!)
Allan
Hats off to mclaren for the brilliant Greenwald impersonation!
thalarctos
Test, and FY Heathrow network, also.
sparky
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
“no comparison”? interesting assertion. here are snippets from one such comparison–an NYT op-ed from earlier this year.
Last month marked the one-year anniversary of President Obama’s first signature foreign policy initiative: the issuance of three executive orders ordering the closure of the detention facility at Guantánamo Bay, the suspension of the C.I.A. interrogation program, and the review of all U.S. government detention policies and legal positions. The orders met with wide acclaim in Europe and were heralded as the return of the U.S. commitment to international law.
But one year later, the Obama administration is having difficulty implementing all three directives and has continued many of the Bush administration’s other counter-terrorism policies, including many that are highly controversial with America’s allies. In other areas, such as engagement with the International Criminal Court and compliance with rulings of the International Court of Justice, the administration has so far been less supportive of international legal institutions than its predecessor.
…[snip]
President Obama may be able to do more to translate his words into action with respect to international law and institutions in his second year in office. But given the continuing threat of terrorism against the United States and election-year politics, we should not expect dramatic shifts in U.S. policy. When it comes to international law, the international community may find that there will be more continuity than change between the Bush administration’s pragmatic second term and the Obama administration.
at the risk of belaboring the obvious, it appears that others besides myself do not share your belief there is “no comparison”.
in my opinion, Obama should be given credit for saying waterboarding is torture and for limiting the scope of prisoner abuse, and, if indeed it has occurred, shutting down the non-Bagram detention centers.
The Obama administration will continue the Bush administration’s practice of sending terrorism suspects to third countries for detention and interrogation, but pledges to closely monitor their treatment to ensure that they are not tortured, administration officials said Monday
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/25/us/politics/25rendition.html
so, while i can agree that Obama has made some welcome improvements, i think it is fairer to conclude that the hyperbole claim more justifiably resides with your assertion that “there is no comparison” between the Bush and Obama administrations. though i believe i have demonstrated this point sufficiently i will add in support that there are quite a number of positions taken by the Obama administration in this area of policy that are more in line with Bush policy than professed US legal standards.
When folks like you and Mclaren and Greenwald put forth complaints about Obama’s detention policy in something rather than conflated hyperbole in perspective to reality, then I will listen to you. Methinks you and others have alternate agendas, so I won’t be holding my breath for you to get real.
i cannot speak for Mclaren or Greenwald. if you wish to (mis)characterize my responses as hyperbole, well, that’s your prerogative. it’s also your prerogative to lump objectors together; after all, that is a rather tried and true tactic to minimize the objection.
and, since you decided to inject an ad hominem note, i’ll respond by observing that it’s interesting that you–an almost always reliable purveyor of mainstream D argumentation and confabulation–would insinuate that i have some alternate agenda.* i find your posts (when you are engaged in argument rather than your alternative free-wheeling commentator style) smack rather more of PR-style talking points than mine ever do, so it seems to me a bit unwise on your part to accuse me of of some other agenda, since, based on the style and kind of arguments you assert, that insinuation may be far more plausibly directed towards you than me.
*i would be most pleased if you would deign to inform me as well as the other readers of this blog what my agenda is. at least that way i’d know what direction i am supposed to take. thanks in advance.
Allan
Will we have war-crimes trials for BJ commenters? Will those convicted be sentenced to comment at abcnews.com?
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@sparky: I have no idea what your agenda is, and don’t care. But this comment is so full of shit, it only lacks fulminating aspect of a Mclaren. You are either stupid of willfully ignorant of what you post on this blog. Full of insinuation that Obama is rendering people to be tortured for information. This is a lie, unless you prove otherwise other than rank speculation. Rendition has always been legal for extraditing certain people internationally for criminal warrants of all kinds.
There is no evidence that Obama is directing anything outside what is allowed under the Army Field Manuel that is constructed by congress, and not Obama. The prison building at Bagram is not secret.
As far as bringing detainees to US mainland soil, that is hard to do when most of the congress has blocked it with no funding. There is a prison being readied as we speak in Illinois to bring them here. Sorry if it is moving slower than suits your whiny ass.
The hyperbole I was speaking of is black lies coming from you and others. No way to say that nicely, so suck it up precious. And there is “no comparison”, outside of your anti Obama mind, and wanking nonsense. I am sick of your shit, so I will say so in undiplomatic terms. Go circle jerk Greenwald, maybe Mclaren can watch.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@sparky: And the NYt’s article you scite is a year old, and contains the same old conflation and rank speculation I mentioned. Bring evidence dude, not a smarmy times article that is woefully outdated and contains nothing but entrails to read by folks like you.
patroclus
Actually, General, the op-ed sparky provided does provide a comparison between Bush-era policies and those of the Obama administration and Obama comes out looking quite a bit better. No Abu Ghraib’s, no separate CIA-torture program and no interrogation techniques by any U.S. agent or instrumentality beyond that allowed in the Army Field Manual. If his agenda is to slime Obama, he’s not succeeding.
burnspbesq
@Allan:
You clearly don’t believe in the Eighth Amendment.
Caravelle
What’s even more depressing is that to believe Glenn’s update sarcasm DID make a difference. The wrong freaking way>
JGabriel
@mclaren:
Seriously? Of course not. I’m trying to make the argument in terms even a GOPer could understand.
Ipso facto, the argument cannot be serious. If it were a serious argument, it would not be comprehensible to the typical wingnut.
.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@mclaren:
If you ain’t on Mclaren’s list, you ain’t shit round here. Take that bitchez.
thalarctos
Hey, sparky–I owe you an apology. Heathrow Vodafone was screwing with me, and so I did resubmit my comment, shortened.
The way it came out, though, made it sound like I was being a jerk in direct response to you. I apologise for that; it was certainly not my intention. It was just a shortened resubmit of a previous comment that the network lied to me about not submitting, and I did not see your comment, either. In fact, I quit seeing any new comments at all before I posted.
I’m sorry it sounded like I was following up your comment with rudeness. I didn’t mean it that way at all.