The Fiction Behind Torture Policy

Many years ago President Reagan was filmed quoting from what he said were the words of an admiral during world war two, who on seeing his young pilots take off from an aircraft carrier, ???where do we get these men from???? The trouble with this was the quote was not one from a real person rather it was from a war film based on a book of fiction. To top it all the book and film were set in and about the Korean War not WW2. Reagan confused what he saw on screen and spoken by a fictional character with the real thing. Years later this confusion between reality and fiction happens under the Bush administration with a television series called ???24???.
I note that some people who have written abusive comments in response to this article and I am amazed at their inability to accept anything was wrong with what officials in the Bush administration has done in the name of the American people following the example of a television show. They also seem to ignore that this confusion with reality has happened before. Some segments of American society are so out of touch they really scare the rest of us who have to live in the real world.

are you kidding me. save one life for the death of many others? the risk is worth it. just look at the writer shes as dumb as crap.

John Yoo is that yoo? Loved your last post. Brilliant legal analysis! Go git'm big guy! You totally rock! Love you! Thanks for saving America, you legal studmuffin.

what a pathetic and patently snooty, priveleged liberal article who doesn't really have to worry about protecting anyones life because real people have been tasked with it, not snobbs in their ivory towers.
you lefties are really such a joke

IF BUSH HAD DONE HIS JOB, YOU WOULDN'T BE HAVING TO WORRYING ABOUT IRAQ OR THIS CONVERSATION .

Interesting article, but there are no facts to back it up, only hearsay and accusations. The author and publisher have failed the very basics and should either retract the article or prove this theory.

Lithwick's conjecture is pretty preposterous. Having interviewed some of those "charged" with abusing prisoners, it is pretty clear that there was no central authority who granted permission for abuse. Yes, the cuprit IS Hollywood, the center of so much moral outrage and hand-wringing over the inhumanity of the Bush administration's effort to actually treat terrorists as enemies instead of misunderstoood teenagers or righteous avenging angels for America's s "misdeeds" around the world But it is hardly Jack Bauer or the fictional escapades of "24". that taught everyone in America that doing whatever it takes to make the right thing happen, whether it is legal or not, is the "moral" thing to do. Having grown up on Mickey Spillane and endless movie/TV depictions of police detectives and private eyes "getting their man" through legally questionable or downright illegal means, it doesn't surprise me or any thinking person that young officers and soldiers, confronted with real-life moral dilemmas (unlike most of their twit critics) have often opted to "do whatever it takes" and let the consequences fall on them. Thank you Hollywood. Now lay off them or do something constructive in this mess, rather than hassle the men and women doing the job or their Commander-in-Chief.

The Nixon Administration had Watergate precipatated by his underlings watching too much Mission Impossible. Now we have "24' and Jack Baurer. The Bush GOP has done it to us again. How anyone could vote for a republican after some of the fiascos I've been reading about lately is beyond me. His fiascos in foreign policy will take a hundred years to repair. Likewise our children will be paying for the deficit created by his domestic/war fiascos.

The Nixon Administration had Watergate precipatated by his underlings watching too much Mission Impossible. Now we have "24' and Jack Baurer. The Bush GOP has done it to us again. How anyone could vote for a republican after some of the fiascos I've been reading about lately is beyond me. His fiascos in foreign policy will take a hundred years to repair. Likewise our children will be paying for the deficit created by his domestic/war fiascos.

The Nixon Administration had Watergate precipatated by his underlings watching too much Mission Impossible. Now we have "24' and Jack Baurer. The Bush GOP has done it to us again. How anyone could vote for a republican after some of the fiascos I've been reading about lately is beyond me. His fiascos in foreign policy will take a hundred years to repair. Likewise our children will be paying for the deficit created by his domestic/war fiascos.

The infamous Watergate breakin was a result of watching too much Mission Impossible by the Nixon underlings. Now this. More policy based on fiction and movies. The Bush GOP has done more to ruin my country than I believed possible. I can't wait to have these oafs out get a President that can put a subject, verb, and object in a sentence. It will take a hundred years to regain the trust of other people.

It's very simple: either a person is a prisoner of war or he or she is a criminal suspect. There are rules for dealing with either. Using physical pressure to make someone talk isn't part of either set of rules.
People on the government payroll who behave otherwise are my enemies and enemies of the Constitution and of the entire free world--they'r esubhuman scum, and their motives don't matter.

Discussion over.

So what is being said is legal and good to do! Now if one of these blogger or one of there relatives, children, parents, etc pissed someone in the federal government off by blogging an illegal happening of this person and he, she, or they decided, like the scientist suspected of using the anthrax on people, to send him to Guantanamo as a terrorist, it would be OK?? With all that this administration has gone out of it's way to deceive the American People this would be very acceptable behavior. Those creeps lie to themselves, never mind what they've done to this country. Look in a mirror. You need some soul searching!!

Wasn't there a case a few years ago where an Army Officer held a gun to a suspected terrorist, fired off a round next to his head thereby, getting information that saved the lives of one of his platoons. The reason I remember this, the media reported that he was being court-martialed for this "offence???.

You can't expect us to take you seriously. The only disconnect is between political parties in powwer at the time of war. We have become so civilized that we can no longer defend ourselves when it gets past the lawyers waving their flaccid little legal papers in the cold hard wind of the reality of rabbid murderers we are facing worldwide. War is not civilized and if you think it is anything less than murdering your fellow man and it can be fought humainly then you are deluding yourself.. The only humane way to fight a war is once your IMPOTENT diplomats have reached a point where vague threats and bribes have failed and we commit troops to battle is to," cry havoc and loose the dogs of war." in other words, become war destroy your enemys without mercy or remorse until our sons and daughters can return home victorious and any other regime that might choose to take us on would think long and hard before being stupid enough to do so. The term torture has been redifined by a worldwide group of individuals who do not believe that war is never justified. I am an individual that believes that war is the absolute worse endeavor that man can undertake, BUT there is a difference between discomfort even extreme discomfort and torture. None of the individuals claim to have been beaten, or have their finger of toenails pulled out or their testicles pummeled or actually have their heads submerged under water for two minute+ periods. We certainly have not cut off their heads which is their favorite ending to a session of torture. My biggbest question I need answered is why is our Fourth Estate quoickly becoming our enemy's Fifth Column? Do you think they believe in the First Amendment?

I once met the man who trained interrogators for the army during WWII. He emphatically stated that the US did not use torture techniques against Nazi leaders during that War.