Obama released these memos for political gain only but the advantage of the release shows that the most controversial methods were used in only a small number of cases. Now he needs to release the memos on the effectiveness of the techniques because guess what they worked. These same techniques are used on our own soldiers in training and clearly they were effective in gathering valuable info on other membersof Al Queda planned attacks etc.. Incidentially new information shows that the armed forces committee signed off on the techniques and that included a lot of democrats who again lied about their knowledge and support. Transparency, honesty, hope and change. More of the same and worse because the media covers for the leftists..
The Lawyer and The Caterpillar
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Posted By: John Dough @ 04/21/2009 10:34:58 PM
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Posted By: Jurr @ 04/22/2009 8:44:06 AM
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Posted By: jjaffie @ 04/20/2009 2:04:56 PM
Ok, Ok, I'm convinced. Torture is necessary to preserve the security of our nation. Thankfully GWB is from my home state of Texas so there is a precedent. I'm glad that's out of the way. I can't wait to waterboard my neighbor. I don't have any proof, but that will change after a few simulated drowning sessions when he fesses up to laying in wait for me to go to work then hooking his hose up to my outdoor faucet & steals my water to water his lawn.
Do I need to get a licensed water-boarder for that or can I just hire a mexican crew to do it for me? Any ideas are appreciated, Thanks!-
Posted By: Jack999 @ 04/22/2009 6:37:51 AM
So you want us to become terrorists in order to defeat terrorism? Sorry, but we either survive upon our principles or we fail as a nation upon our principles, you seem to be all to willing to sacrifice your principles and the Constitution and everything this nation was founded upon in order to save your life, and that my dear is just disgusting.
If your way of life is not worth dying for then it most certainly is not worth killing for. You just seem to think we need to kill our way of life to save our lives. I'm sorry, but I will not sell my soul to save my ***. You may be comfortable with Nazi-esque philosophies and ethics, but some of us still remember why America is a great nation. And for our sakes stop trying to flush it down the toilet.
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Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/21/2009 5:11:12 PM
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30325495/
My, my...perhaps some of the Nazi-esque torturers WILL be going to prison.
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Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/20/2009 1:21:49 PM
So, Yanks...still pulling the wings off of flies, are we?
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Posted By: BG.Bryan @ 04/21/2009 12:46:32 PM
Dude (or Mate): you're typically arrogant British attitude in bashing the "Yanks" is tiring. Your country compromised any position of critism through its role as Bush's lap-dog over the last 8 years. It's prior role (though remote in time and relevance) as the number #1 abuser in the role of Imperial power further negates your arguments. Twice in the past century your country's dependence upon the intervention of your American cousins has saved you from the necessity of either a disgraceful negeotiated peace or outright surrender, so enough already. Verstehen Sie?
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Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/21/2009 12:53:31 PM
"Dude (or Mate): you're typically arrogant British attitude in bashing the "Yanks" is tiring."
I am positive I shall lose sleep over that.
"Twice in the past century your country's dependence upon the intervention of your American cousins has saved you from the necessity of either a disgraceful negeotiated peace or outright surrender, so enough already."
Yes, and we thank your grandfathers and great-grandfathers. They were a superior breed...unfortunately, their line has declined almost to the level of the Nazi bastards they destroyed.-
Posted By: BG.Bryan @ 04/21/2009 3:14:51 PM
I'm happy that you won't lose sleep--that was not my intent. I cannot see where our "breed" has declined or improved much since the time of my grandfather's sacrifices (he did fight in Europe, although he probably couldn't have found it on a map), nor can I see where British arrogance has abated, either. I don't defend America's current role in global events: however, I don't se ANY justification for a Brititsh subject's criticism, as your government has been a willing accomplice, and given your country's history as the original abuser of imperial power
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Posted By: maunalio @ 04/21/2009 3:09:06 PM
Oh give me a break. All this American horrible torture is nothing like real torture. Victoria Secret underwear for Abu Ghreib killers. Oh horrors!! Waterboarding. It's something I wouldn't like but it beats having my head cut off on You Tube for all my friends and family to see. Let's stop with the 'I'm more humaine than thou" This is a war for survival of freedom and all our western values. This is not a game. We let one Gitmo prisoner go two years ago and now he is one of the most vicious American killers in Afganistan. Maybe he didn't like the orange jump sutis or the food in Gitmo. Maybe his koran was handled by infidels so was rendered impure. Who knows but he wasn't waterboarded. Only three terrorists were waterboarded, only three. One was the mastermind of 911 , one was the Cole bombing leader and one was that Zubadiah guy. All deserving of being shot.
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Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/21/2009 1:36:29 PM
"Here in America we aren't afraid to discipline our children"
Yes, that's why they're all f*cked up on meth amphetamine, yes?
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Posted By: LynnC @ 04/21/2009 10:54:50 AM
I read the articles, I looked at the photos. Yeah, we aren't walking on the side of angels here, but we aren't on the side of the devil either. You might be in a stress position and naked with panties on your head, and forced to suffer mockery, but we aren't slitting your throat, or raping you (at least, not that the CIA or any agency is going to disclose, although rape is used as a weapon of war quite frequently), or cutting off your limbs, or forcing you to become a drug addict, or selling you to your enemies. We might torture you, but we are also feeding you, making sure you receive medical care, and clothing. I'm pretty sure that the rest of the world's torturers aren't as gentle in their treatment..and you know what? If we were convinced we were holding the right people, we wouldn't be either. Gitmo and Abu are nothing compared to the real black box camps I believe we have to have throughout the world. Where DO America's enemies go when they suddenly become quiet?
I appreciate the fact that people thing torture is wrong, or that people support it. It exists. It happens. You either look away, or you don't. I don't look away. I appreciate the sins I ask people to commit to keep me free, even if I think those sins are being perpetrated on the wrong people. Push it up the chain, people...don't punish the tool, punish the people who fail to wield the tool with any degree of accuracy.-
Posted By: jjaffie @ 04/21/2009 1:07:19 PM
Had to repost this:
Posted By: Dredd (April 21, 2009 at 11:43 AM)
Yes, the warsters using Cheney want to change the discussion on torture to it "works".
Have we had a discussion about whether or not murder, bank robbery, rape, black mail, or a whole host of other illegal activities ???work????
Work for whom? Rape "works" for the rapist so that makes it ok?
If something is illegal there is no valid discussion of this type. -
Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/21/2009 11:12:11 AM
"I read the articles, I looked at the photos. Yeah, we aren't walking on the side of angels here, but we aren't on the side of the devil either. You might be in a stress position and naked with panties on your head, and forced to suffer mockery, but we aren't slitting your throat, or raping you (at least, not that the CIA or any agency is going to disclose, although rape is used as a weapon of war quite frequently), or cutting off your limbs, or forcing you to become a drug addict, or selling you to your enemies. We might torture you, but we are also feeding you"
So you're not QUITE as bad as, say, Idi Amin. Congratulations, Yanks!-
Posted By: LynnC @ 04/21/2009 11:27:03 AM
Tsk tsk.
As if the British don't have a long history of crimes against humanity and oppression or practice torture today (you do, you know, your government sends the people it would like to extract information from to us, and we do your dirty work for you).
And you do practice torture today: I've seen your television programming.-
Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/21/2009 12:58:25 PM
" (you do, you know, your government sends the people it would like to extract information from to us, and we do your dirty work for you)."
You of course have some evidence of this. Please post it.
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Posted By: BG.Bryan @ 04/20/2009 10:57:11 AM
Torture is a cruel and ultimately useless exercise. Leave it to the lessers--we're supposed to hold superior ideals, aren't we? Sometimes we are presented with challenges to our beliefs and standards--the measure of the value of these beliefs and principles is our willingness to adhere to them despite the temptation of short-term gain or expediency. In the case of torture, it is not about weakness or softness; it is about taking the more difficult high road rather than the easy, low road. They both lead to the same place, the only question is what principles are we willing to betray to get there...
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Posted By: YOUSOCRAZY @ 04/20/2009 11:47:32 AM
we're supposed to hold superior ideals, aren't we?
Absolutely not!
Life is not a "we are better than that" contest, especially the lives of American children.-
Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/21/2009 12:54:23 PM
"we're supposed to hold superior ideals, aren't we? "
Yes, and for 200 years, you did.
Too bad you cannot maintain the greatness of those who came before you. -
Posted By: jjaffie @ 04/21/2009 12:50:39 PM
haha children????? Look at the 100,000 Iraqi CIVILIAN deaths, and you bring up children......
Quit pretending to care about children. Let me guess, you're one of the pro-lifers that thinks abortion is an abomination regardless of reason, but is perfectly willing to send our youth into war to kill other people's children???? -
Posted By: BG.Bryan @ 04/21/2009 12:31:51 PM
Yes we are. Simple as that. If not, why not just go along with the flow. The whole idea of democracy as a superior form of government (regardless of its occaisonal dysfunctions) is pointless. If an ideal is not worthy of the loss of some lives, then what is the point...
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Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/20/2009 1:18:59 PM
LOL
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Posted By: Osama Bin Login @ 04/20/2009 12:52:47 PM
Get out of my country.
You'd be more comfortable in North Korea anyway. -
Posted By: EZRead @ 04/20/2009 12:52:37 PM
You're wrong. It is about weakness. If we always take the high-road then those who take the low road exploit the weaknesses to ultimately destroy us. At least you can say, we took the high road when they start the beheadings and the women are wearing the burkas. It's kind of like UFC match where one guy is fighting by the boxing rules and the other guy is fighting using the no biting or eye-gouging rules only. Chances are pretty good the boxer is going to lose but at least he can say he lost by the rules. However, unsophistacated torture is not very effective. Mental toture such as Political Correctness (i,.e, sensitivity training, re-education, diversity training) is much better in breaking people.
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Posted By: kimme051 @ 04/20/2009 6:57:56 PM
it's hard to not want to torture terrorist creeps, but the US is so wrong under Bush et all that they should all be let go. remembering Furman at OJ when prosecution is that far off let em go Bush kept innocent people tortured and imprisoned for years in the name of his bullshit god that foisted on all of us and now we and Obami have to pay the price. screw neocons
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Posted By: LynnC @ 04/21/2009 11:36:33 AM
And OJ went free because the prosecution let the case suddenly become about race instead of managing to say "hey, the glove SHRANK when we saturated it with fluids trying to get the blood and dna off the damn glove?".
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Posted By: Roger Lamb @ 04/21/2009 4:05:13 AM
Note to all present and future CIA operatives: you have a conscience - next time, please consult it before Obeying.
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Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/21/2009 11:13:10 AM
Why should they? They'll never be punished, apparently, no matter how heinous their acts may be.
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Posted By: jjaffie @ 04/21/2009 9:40:47 AM
Hatred is not solved with more hatred. All arabs are not the problem, only a few of the crazies are. It's not the race or religion, it's the nutjobs, white people have them, black people have them, etc etc. Remember that Texas polygamist compound? Or Maybe Tim McVeigh? Or Madoff? Those people are just as dangerous as any terrorists. Don't repeat history by dehumanizing a group's nationality, race, creed, or religion. Why that happens attrocites of the worst sort always follow.
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Posted By: Roger Lamb @ 04/21/2009 4:02:05 AM
Note to all present and future CIA operatives: you have a conscience - consult it before obeying.
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Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/20/2009 5:19:14 PM
From the article: " According to the FBI, which initially questioned him, most of the useful intelligence he shared came out before he was roughed up."
So there's really no point to any of this, other than sadism.
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Posted By: YOUSOCRAZY @ 04/20/2009 11:44:11 AM
Time to rethink our inclusion of those accepting the Geneva Convention. That is what amendments to the constitution were designed for. American parents did not raise their children so that they could be shot, blown up, or decapitated in an effort to carry bales of American taxpayer cash for some b/s idea of gifting them a democratic society!
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Posted By: Osama Bin Login @ 04/20/2009 12:55:29 PM
"Time to rethink our inclusion of those accepting the Geneva Convention. That is what amendments to the constitution were designed for. "
Try reading article VI sometime, Jethro.-
Posted By: YOUSOCRAZY @ 04/20/2009 1:20:45 PM
So, you believe that the majority of Ameican voters are on board with the rules that apply to us, but not our foes, my bet is not, Nancy!
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Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/20/2009 1:27:52 PM
He was talking about your constitution, you stupid git. What the hell are you on about? That has nothing to do with "the majority of voters".
I think you may be right, though. The majority of Americans must be ignorant savages, if this sort of nonsense is considered excusable.-
Posted By: YOUSOCRAZY @ 04/20/2009 1:37:42 PM
Well, mate, the majority is what is supposed to drive the bills in congress and our constitution has been ammended many times and will be in the future.
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Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/20/2009 1:40:23 PM
Of that I have no doubt. You've failed as an advanced nation, so I suppose you may as well just amend away everything that requires you acting as a civilized people.
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Posted By: YOUSOCRAZY @ 04/20/2009 2:12:42 PM
Evidently, since you describe us as "you", we did succeed at least not having you as one of our compatriots, cheers to us!
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Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/20/2009 2:23:12 PM
Thank God for that. I could have been born in a nation full of morbidly obese sadists. Like America.
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Posted By: YOUSOCRAZY @ 04/20/2009 2:36:33 PM
Must have been the lean and powerful Brits or Aussies that out medaled us in , what Olympics???????????
Probably just a case of those countries taking pity on the morbidly obese, you see, winning all those medals might have been a type of torture!-
Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/20/2009 2:49:06 PM
It stands to reason that a FEW of you wouldn't be fat.
Out of 300,000,000 of you, there's bound to be a few that can see their own feet.-
Posted By: YOUSOCRAZY @ 04/20/2009 2:57:12 PM
Since when did reason apply to the Horrible Bastard means of discussion, name calling, attempted guilt throwing, spewing drivil, yes those are your mainstay!
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Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/20/2009 3:01:47 PM
And you're a saint, right? LOL.
Typical Yank. "Do as I say, not as I do".
That's why nobody likes you.-
Posted By: YOUSOCRAZY @ 04/20/2009 3:39:17 PM
So, what was it that made the Brits so saintly countless decades of true, not the new interpretation, Imperialism?
Maybe the thoroughly ecologic move of manufacturing London from a wet land?
Perhaps the Aussies "kid glove" treatment of the Indiginous Aborigini people brought them the sainthood they now enjoy?
Maybe the introduction of the foreign species that have destroyed the indiginous one got them the hallowed ground from which their convict forefathers sprung?
I am no saint, but I understand that if any group sets themselves as second in any consideration it sucide plain and simple, and yes that includes what was done in the name of national security.
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Posted By: Still Free in the USA @ 04/20/2009 10:29:01 AM
MARDAM; check out this MSNBC story: Bin Laden deputy slams Obama's Afghan plan. THERE IS EVIL IN THIS WORLD. You NEED to wake up and so does OBAMA instead of bowing and shaking hands with EVIL. Yes, lead by example with values and being decent human beings; gosh golly Gomer; wouldnt it be a warm and fuzzy world if everyone were like that. WELL SORRY TO SPOIL YOUR WHITE WINE SPRITZER DEMOCRATIC FUND RAISER BUT ITS NOT!!!!!! So get over it and understand the men and women being eaten alive by camel spider, sand fleas and wiping the sand off their sweat covered faces are protecting your sorry ass. Mean while their commander in chief; whom they OBEY no matter what has no TARP money of budget money set aside for their return. Is Michelle proud of America now?
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Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/20/2009 1:53:33 PM
"THERE IS EVIL IN THIS WORLD."
And you are part of it.
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Posted By: 2MUCHreality @ 04/20/2009 1:53:17 PM
I think everybody's missing the point here...these people are willing to kill themselves to become martyrs to their faith. All we have accomplished with this sordid exercise is to demean ourselves to the rest of the world. No lives were saved. No attacks prevented. Nothing. Those justifications are just WMD-II.
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Posted By: formersubscriber @ 04/19/2009 5:50:17 PM
I'll bite news555,
The radical Jihadists consider western secular culture an abomination. The Taliban think women should not be allowed to refuse their husbands or receive an education. Western culture is an existential threat to their continued way of life.-
Posted By: news555 @ 04/19/2009 6:31:25 PM
Well, thanks for replying. By now, you are probably right. After years of being attacked, loss of land, ridiculed, deprived of standard international rights, they did become extreme in everything and desperate. They were not extreme before all that happened, in fact, they wanted to become more Westernized. We had a great opportunity of avoiding confrontation and we didnt and now it is a mess as you say
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Posted By: formersubscriber @ 04/19/2009 7:37:43 PM
Read up. Islamic radicalism had nothing directly to do with G W Bush. Ayman al-Zawahiri, Al Qaeda's number 2 is a committed Islamic revolutionary. He headed Egyptian Islamic Jihad, which tried to overthrow Egypt on a numbers of occasions, organized the assassination of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat in 1981 and attempted the assassination of Mubarak. G W Bush had nothing to do with the formation of these Jihadists. In fact 911 was planned when Clinton was president.
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Posted By: jjaffie @ 04/20/2009 1:53:07 PM
There's always crazies in the world. GWB legitmized many of those crazies thereby making it easier for them to get recruits. If you want examples, just talk to the relatives & loved ones of the almost 100,000 Iraqi civilian casualties.
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Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/20/2009 1:35:36 PM
I notice that they waited for Bush to take office before they attacked.
I wonder why? -
Posted By: YOUSOCRAZY @ 04/20/2009 10:56:35 AM
Very well stated.
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Posted By: zephirdx @ 04/20/2009 7:26:01 AM
Its sad really. These very people defend our "democratic media" and what do they get in return? The media wastes logical people's time and pulls the leash of simpletons to the cause of defending those who would mindlessly behead any one of us to prove a "point".
I guess anyone who'd read or post here would agree, so I its probably futile, but this article is a waste of time, and quite frankly, just angers me that anyone would write this dribble up. Let the CIA do their thing. WAR is dirty business. As long as we aren't lopping off limbs and hanging them them out to dry, what's the problem? These people are responsible for the deaths of 3000+ American citizens, regardless of their level of involvement.
I'm no Spec Ops or anything, but if it were up to me, I'd let them bleed out slowly over the course of a week. Water boarding is too good for them.-
Posted By: jjaffie @ 04/20/2009 1:49:36 PM
'These people' , exactly which people are you referring to? Are you just going to torture everyone, regardless of innocence, until you find out who 'these people' are?
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Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/20/2009 1:37:13 PM
"WAR is dirty business."
Bollocks. In America, war is pornography. Just look at you filthy savages lining up to masturbate over some torture, yes?
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Posted By: srwinn @ 04/19/2009 11:24:57 PM
Having been on the receiving end of this so-called torture, allow me to say this. There will always be times that the implied pain and suffering that comes as a result of one's thinking he is about to be tortured is enough to make him talk. I have been through extensive training on how to resist said practices, and the rationale for use of them in certain situations. As part of the training, I endured the actual "torture". None of it caused permanent damage, but it did make life nearly unbearable for a while. In the end, I realized the value of the use of enhanced interrogation techniques, and the threat of bodily harm. What the President did was take away the Intelligence Community's leverage in these cases. no longer is there a threat of torture. Some will say that we have no business using enhanced interrogation techniques (I don't use the word torture, because we didn't actually torture anyone. Waterboarding, while miserable, is not the same as having limbs broken, eyes gouged out, etc.).
Some of us have had to do some pretty nasty things because of the general ineptness of our government. Now we have to figure out a way to get information out of hardened when all we have is the threat of making them "uncomfortable" for a while if they don't cooperate.
It is amateur hour in DC folks. The President could have just as easily put out the word via classified memo that he will not tolerate enhanced interrogation - that is his prerogative. Making it all public just plays into the hands of the psychopaths we are fighting.
--A former Intel Officer-
Posted By: Osama Bin Login @ 04/20/2009 1:11:41 PM
That's okay. We're better off without an NKVD.
I'm glad you're retired. Your kind we can do without.-
Posted By: bobcat4424 @ 04/20/2009 1:34:41 PM
Sorry guy, but you're lying. You're not a former Intel Officer. They do not torture people in SERE school except for brief brushes with sleep deprivation and loud music. They used to open-hand slap trainees, but stopped that years ago. Every intelligence officer is taught that abuse does not work and that it never produces useful intelligence. Every analyst knows that reports that are produced with the use of torture are called "Clkever hans reports" and thrown away.
To say that waterboarding does not cause permanent harm is completely uninformed. When carefully done the mortality is around 20% per incident without prompt medical rescue. The resulting pneumonia is reliable treatable only when medical quality saline is used, not water. If tap water is used or shortcut methods (such as pinching the nostrils and pouring the water from a coke bottle) are used, the mortality rates fer up around 40-50% without rescue. It was so bad in Vietnam that the CIA routinely killed detainees after waterboarding them on the theory that they would die anyway.
For those who try to dismiss these techniques as doing minimal damage, they are just not in touch with the real world. All the so-called benign techniques such as sleep deprivation, hypothermia, ear-shattering noise, being slammed against unreinforced plywood walls, stress positions for hours, certain drugs --- all aim at putting the person into a disassociative state. This is where the brain goes when death is imminent. It is a form of shock and in itself can kill just as shock can kill after an auto accident. When in shock, the victim starts to babble. Nothing coherent, just babbling. The theory is that you might pick out something of the babbling --- a name, a phone number, the secretplans to an a-bomb. In truth it is just babbling and the interrogator gets nothing.
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Posted By: Californiac @ 04/20/2009 1:23:45 PM
Nazis are as Nazis do. Euphemisms and double-speak don't change that...neither does the color of the uniform.
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Posted By: Osama Bin Login @ 04/20/2009 1:03:23 PM
Fact: If you support torture, you are a lousy excuse for an American, and should probably move to a nation more in step with your beliefs. Like Saudi Arabia, China, or North Korea.
It's win-win. We get rid of some Nazis, and you finally don't have to listen to sissy do-gooders.
Don't let the door hit you on the ass.-
Posted By: Horrible Bastard @ 04/20/2009 1:31:49 PM
Don't send them here. We have enough of their type...we keep them in the BNP, where they can wear their armbands and strut about as they like.
Come to think of it, can you take some more in? We may as well try putting all the Nazis in one place.
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