letdogsvote:

Let me know if I missed any

... is characterized as "persecution" "Bush Derangement Syndrome".

Oh my god! Think of the poor terrorists we're going to use this on!

Cry me a farking river. It's not like local beat cops are going to do this to Joe Potdealer. There is absolutely nothing too good for terrorists. Waterboarding isn't even torture. Torture is having bamboo knives wedged up your fingernails. Waterboarding falls somewhere between sensory deprivation and being slapped by a girl.

Fibber McLiarson: Sabalo: omg_lol: Who gives a crap if laws are passed or decisions are made. america has made a decision that it's a fascist, murdering shiathole, and enough of the world hates you enough now that you can never back down. america invades, tortures and murders, and it doesn't matter what laws are passed to allow or prevent it. Fark america.

We learned it from watching the rest of the world.

Monkey see, monkey do? Well THAT explains it! Thanks.

When a government realizes that it's people are willing to accept torture and evil to accomplish the government's ends, then yes... the governments see, and they do.

My real issue is in people pretending that the U.S. is the first nation to ever do anything evil, or that we're solely responsible. We're responsible for what we've done, surely, but the U.S. isn't the only nation with an out of control government.

In the Bizarro world of Republicans, this bill is proof that "waterboarding" is the cause of "Global Warming".
Bill Number: HR 2082 http://www.votesmart.org/issue_keyvote_detail.php?cs_id=17107

Quote: "Republicans portrayed their support for Bush's veto as a stand against a bill they say is riddled with pork-barrel projects like a National Drug Intelligence Center and a study of the national security implications of global warming."

Good going republicans. In the Bizarro world of the Dems, you've proven you're nuts.

tweekster: Body part souvenirs. (we eventually bothered to do something about that one)

But it was ignored, right? If we did something about it how was it ignored?

/your arguments, they are flawed.

Sum Dum Gai There's actually a pretty high chance of brain damage, lung damage, and death. I mean, the subject is literally drowning, they're breathing a lot of water into the lungs. Waterboarding is worse than just submerging the head because it triggers the gag reflex and you lose the ability to just hold your breath.

If that's true, sounds pretty sick. There has to be an interrogation technique that is NOT torture? Could we like, put non-venomous snakes on them? Or non-venomous tarantulas? If it were tarantulas, I'd talk before they'd even touch me.

Get ready for the childish rants about how both partys are the same.

waterboarding is already banned by the CIA

Shaggy_C: Sigh...we're not a farking empire. We're a Corporatist Aristocracy with international trade agreements.

We're an empire built using the wealth and technology of the modern world. Splitting coont hairs is what you are doing here...

rictorius: that's some pretty fuzzy math you got on you. there

There's three kinds of people in the world: those who can count, and those who can't.

Tommy Moo: Oh my god! Think of the poor terrorists we're going to use this on!

Cry me a farking river. It's not like local beat cops are going to do this to Joe Potdealer. There is absolutely nothing too good for terrorists. Waterboarding isn't even torture. Torture is having bamboo knives wedged up your fingernails. Waterboarding falls somewhere between sensory deprivation and being slapped by a girl.

Just like that camp down in Cuba that they didn't use to detain U.S. citizens without a trial?

A terrorist gets wet. Meh.

cameroncrazy1984: tweekster: Body part souvenirs. (we eventually bothered to do something about that one)

But it was ignored, right? If we did something about it how was it ignored?

/your arguments, they are flawed.

Token gesture. Let me show you them.

It isnt hard to act like you are against something, occasionally yell at someone then be dead silent while everyone ignores the "rule"

It didn't even count as a half hearted attempt at stopping the practice let alone a real commitment.

Hang On Voltaire: waterboarding is already banned by the CIA

Great. What about the other organizations?

zelachang: Good. What else are our interrogators going to do when they need to get that information? American lives depend on this practice people.

2/10

Headso: We're an empire built using the wealth and technology of the modern world. Splitting coont hairs is what you are doing here...

'Empire' implies ownership or sovereignty. Corporations are the international entities who own the means of production and associated distribution. Not the US government. Government is merely an enabler.

The Bestest: Totally understand that. The deal though, is this gives carte blanche for the same treatment of our own forces should they be captured. Not saying that other issues aren't more important, but this issue IS important enough to legislate.

I have heard first hand accounts of how captured US soldiers have been treated in Iraq. Waterboarding would have probably been preferred over the methods used because you don't DIE when waterboarded.

Gecko Gingrich: So, you'd be OK with 20000 of the folks in US jails being waterboarded?

How did you come up with that? I'm guessing you used 1% of the 2.3 Million Americans... if so you IGNORED the fact that I said that the American prisoners actually are protected by the Constitution of the US. (Eighth Amendment)

Nice try though.

Y2Jericho:

Look, I understand that you're an idiot and are probably more emotionally invested in Pro Wrestling than the need to maintain a level of ethics and civility in order to protect the future of this nation, but even you can understand why people would be mortified by this vote.

The thing that makes America great is not what we can do but what we choose not to because it violates our elevated standards for responsible and humane behavior.

We didn't salute Hitler when Germany hosted the 1936 olympics while every other other country's athletes meekly fell in line and threw their arm in the air.

You beleive in nothing.

You stand for nothing.

You are a national disgrace.

The figures i ran across say 233 dems in the house and you need 289 to override a veto.

So since the veto didn't get overriden the dumbasses will come to the conclusion that the dems caved to the repubs.

FormlessOne: Remember that this wasn't just a Republican failure - it was a Democratic failure as well.

Well, that's an interesting take on it, considering that a grand total of three Democrats voted "nay". (See the voting breakdown just a few posts above yours)

Hell, here are the totals:

DemocraticYEA 220, NAY 3

RepublicanYEA 5,NAY 185

But you go on with your bad self, poxing both houses, saying that they're all the same.

Wolfinstl: Way to go DEMS, see if I waste another vote on you worthless asshats.

You too. Do your homework before you shoot your mouth off.

I have no problem with our government officials using torture in a situation of desperate need. If they feel it absolutely must be done, just do it. We'll keep records of what you did, your buddies in the CIA won't stop you.

When you're done with your interogation, and we aren't in the dire straights that led you to conclude this was the course of action we needed to take, I want you held to account in front of a full tribunal with absolute public transparency. If a jury of your peers sees fit to clear you, fine, that means from the information you had availible, your interogation was appropriate.

If you kept a naked dude in freezing temperatures for a few hours and got some troop positions and plans out of him, I'm sure your fellow citizens will dismiss your charges. If you had a dog bite an innocent man in the junk until he confessed to being Catherine the Great, you will in turn suffer appropriate consequences.

/Take what you want
//Then pay for it

tweekster: cameroncrazy1984: tweekster: Body part souvenirs. (we eventually bothered to do something about that one)

But it was ignored, right? If we did something about it how was it ignored?

/your arguments, they are flawed.

Token gesture. Let me show you them.

It isnt hard to act like you are against something, occasionally yell at someone then be dead silent while everyone ignores the "rule"

It didn't even count as a half hearted attempt at stopping the practice let alone a real commitment.

But it was completely ignored, you said. At any rate, ignoring international law is never right.

Hang On Voltaire: waterboarding is already banned by the CIA

It is banned by the US Army, not the CIA. Do you ever tell the truth?

tylerdurden217: If your child was kidnapped by someone and you were able to detain a person that knew exactly where you child was would you be concerned about the methods someone used to get that info?

This is more of a case of waterboarding people into admitting that they kidnapped my daughter. Not really helpful if you're trying to find her.



Not me. I'm sure waterboarding sucks bad. I hate the feeling of drowning, but there is worse stuff.

Guess they shouldn't have executed all those Japanese who did it in WWII.

"It could have been worse...they could have been poking them with sticks or something..."

Tommy Moo: Waterboarding isn't even torture... Waterboarding falls somewhere between sensory deprivation and being slapped by a girl.

...and you're an authority on this how?

tylerdurden217: If your child was kidnapped by someone and you were able to detain a person that knew exactly where you child was would you be concerned about the methods someone used to get that info?

Yes. Assume that we don't have an unlimited time to find the child - that we're talking the usual Jack Bauer 24-hour scenario, right?

So, you start your torture session, and the guy breaks and says that your child is on Mount Rushmore, stuffed up Washington's nose. It's 8 hours away, however, so do you stop and go look there, or send someone and keep torturing, just in case? Of course, you keep going.
So now you may have the correct information, but you can't verify it for 8 hours.

Another five minutes of torture, and he breaks again and says, "oh, god, please stop! Your kid is in my windowless van with "free candy" painted on the side and it's parked in Death Valley!" Well, that's another 8 hours away. Send another person to check, and keep torturing.

After another five minutes, he says, "please stop! The truth is that he's tied to that tree you can drive through in the Redwood forest in Northern California! This time it's the truth!" But that's also 8 hours away.

At some point, you either run out of people to send, in which case, do you start pulling them back to check new places the guy mentions, or do you ignore the later places that he now insists are the truth?

You have gained absolutely zero useful information, and have wasted a lot of time. Personally, I'd rather negotiate, find the kid, and then punish. But that's because I like effective things.

An tSaoi On a side note, I used to think the Bush/Hitler comparisons were too strong and way too stupid. Not anymore.

Yep. Any day now, he's going to massively and aggressively assault cities across Europe killing men, women and child, march his troops all over every country he can reach, and setup internment camps for the Jews where he'll begin to exterminate them with slow and painful deaths. I guess I can see how waterboarding compares to that.

tylerdurden217: If your child was kidnapped by someone and you were able to detain a person that knew exactly where you child was would you be concerned about the methods someone used to get that info?

Yes, let's set policy to hypothetical tv scenarios

/oops, we already did, didn't we

So Republicans think it's ok to 'defend' the Constitution using torture...the same Constitution with the prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment?
That's got to take some serious mental gymnastics

tylerdurden217: I have heard first hand accounts of how captured US soldiers have been treated in Iraq. Waterboarding would have probably been preferred over the methods used because you don't DIE when waterboarded.

Here's the difference. Terrorists? Yeah, they didn't agree to the Geneva Conventions. We did. We are better than they are.

Guess it's time to roll this baby out again...

tylerdurden217:
The military might capture someone who knows something that could pose a danger to innocent people. That person may not tell when asked nicely or when any of the 19 methods are used. If extreme measures are required WHY do people have a problem with that?


Because torture leads to bad intel. If someone is bringing you pain you will tell them whatever they want to hear to ease such pain. Time and resources will be spent on ferreting out the truth from the lies and by then your intel has expired.

And this opens up the door to other countries torturing our military. Or course this administration had done nothing to convey any sense of respect for the men and women that fight for us. This administration simply uses them as weapons and throws them away if politically convenient.

Torture is inefficient and disrespectful to our military. At least that is an argument you could propose, and I think it is a very good one, and one worthy of debate.

barjockey: A terrorist gets wet. Meh.

Shut up, barjockey, you cock.

Theaetetus: joethorne.:
"Put down the cross and read again. I'm looking for arguments against the practice that aren't "it's wrong!". You know, logic?"

No, you're really not. Because I gave you two and you completely ignored them, didn't respond, skipped right over. You only responded to the arguments that were based on "it's wrong".
In other words, you're really just trolling, under the disguise of "wanting to have an honest discussion".

He sure disappeared fast. Guess I was right on the money.

cameroncrazy1984: tylerdurden217: I have heard first hand accounts of how captured US soldiers have been treated in Iraq. Waterboarding would have probably been preferred over the methods used because you don't DIE when waterboarded.

Here's the difference. Terrorists? Yeah, they didn't agree to the Geneva Conventions. We did. We are better than they are.

Totally agree... if you want to show the world that your way is better, then lead by example!

OneBrightMonkey: Y2Jericho:

Look, I understand that you're an idiot and are probably more emotionally invested in Pro Wrestling than the need to maintain a level of ethics and civility in order to protect the future of this nation, but even you can understand why people would be mortified by this vote.

The thing that makes America great is not what we can do but what we choose not to because it violates our elevated standards for responsible and humane behavior.

We didn't salute Hitler when Germany hosted the 1936 olympics while every other other country's athletes meekly fell in line and threw their arm in the air.

Yet, we didn't intervene in the European front until 5 years later.

Jamrock: furiousxgeorge: In my opinion, there is nothing wrong with using torture on terrorists. The problem is we have no way to be sure people in our custody are not innocent. I would rather the United States be attacked again than be a country that uses torture on the innocent.

That is exactly why we should allow waterboarding and all other interogation techniques that are essentiel for national security. These techniques allow US authorities to determine once and for all who knows nothing and who has intel on terror activities. How can this be used for wrong?

I've seen news reporters be waterboarded, it didn't look that bad. What President Bush should do is go on national television get waterboarded. The he'll show those liberal pussies once and for all that this really isnt a big deal. I went through worse shiat in Marine Core training. Democrats need to quit being pussies and fighting for the rights of terrorists while fighting against the rights of law-abiding citizens

It's Marine "Corps", I wasn't in it but I know how to spell it. I figure you should if you really spent a few years in it and it was written everywhere you looked.

cameroncrazy1984: But it was completely ignored, you said. At any rate, ignoring international law is never right.

And yet I never said it was right.

I said it is an extremely common occurrence and international law is completely ignored (I probably should have said 99% ignored just to cover the token gesture prosecutions of the winning side)
I noticed you completely ignored the other two tactics that were also a very common occurrence and hardly if at all ever prosecuted.

Sabalo: Fibber McLiarson: Sabalo: omg_lol: Who gives a crap if laws are passed or decisions are made. america has made a decision that it's a fascist, murdering shiathole, and enough of the world hates you enough now that you can never back down. america invades, tortures and murders, and it doesn't matter what laws are passed to allow or prevent it. Fark america.

We learned it from watching the rest of the world.

Monkey see, monkey do? Well THAT explains it! Thanks.

When a government realizes that it's people are willing to accept torture and evil to accomplish the government's ends, then yes... the governments see, and they do.

My real issue is in people pretending that the U.S. is the first nation to ever do anything evil, or that we're solely responsible. We're responsible for what we've done, surely, but the U.S. isn't the only nation with an out of control government.

So what 'we're' really guilty of is hypocrisy, then? You know, by waving our constitution around as the best thing since sliced bread and all that jazz. Blowing the whole 'shot heard 'round the world' thing out of proportion every chance we get. A new nation with unique ideals. Meh...we're just following what came before. Nice.

The_Shoggoth: Just out of curiosity, how is this a bonus? Assuming one isn't just a sadist who likes torturing people, that is.

- It isn't going to deter further terrorists and, in fact, may provoke them.

They're already provoked. They're pissed because fundy Islam isn't the go-to civilization of choice on this planet. "They hate our freedoms" is just the shorthand soundbite version of this concept, simplified so the mouth-breathing masses can understand it. Anything else the Islamikazes throw out is just an afterthought justification.

- It will completely ruin a resource who might actually have further information to give.

Not if you keep torturing them. Not if they're unwilling to give information because they don't think they'll be tortured for it.

- It will mentally damage the person performing the torture.

So does being a jailer. Somebody has to do it. But somehow, I think your "concern" for the torturer is an afterthought justification.

What is the upside of a single torture, let alone two?

What did I just say? When you write a paper for school, do you use only one source? More info to compare = better info.

tweekster: And yet I never said it was right.

I said it is an extremely common occurrence

You have yet to give all these myriad examples of how common it is.

Here is the list of Congressmen who voted to make America a country that condones torture. All but three are Republicans.

Aderholt
Akin
Alexander
Bachmann
Bachus
Barrett (SC)
Barton (TX)
Biggert
Bilbray
Bilirakis
Bishop (UT)
Blackburn
Blunt
Boehner
Bonner
Bono Mack
Boozman
Boustany
Brady (TX)
Broun (GA)
Brown (SC)
Brown-Waite, Ginny
Buchanan
Burgess
Burton (IN)
Buyer
Calvert
Camp (MI)
Campbell (CA)
Cannon
Cantor
Carter
Castle
Chabot
Cole (OK)
Conaway
Crenshaw
Cubin
Culberson
Davis, David
Davis, Tom
Deal (GA)
Diaz-Balart, L.
Diaz-Balart, M.
Doolittle
Drake
Dreier
Duncan
Ehlers
Emerson
English (PA)
Everett
Fallin
Feeney
Ferguson
Flake
Forbes
Fortenberry
Fossella
Foxx
Franks (AZ)
Frelinghuysen
Gallegly
Garrett (NJ)
Gerlach
Gingrey
Gohmert
Goode
Goodlatte
Granger
Graves
Hall (TX)
Hastings (WA)
Hayes
Heller
Hensarling
Herger
Hobson
Hoekstra
Hulshof
Hunter
Inglis (SC)
Issa
Johnson, Sam
Jones (NC)
Jordan
Keller
King (IA)
King (NY)
Kingston
Kirk
Kline (MN)
Knollenberg
Kucinich
Kuhl (NY)
LaHood
Lamborn
Latham
LaTourette
Latta
Lewis (CA)
Lewis (KY)
Linder
LoBiondo
Lucas
Lungren, Daniel E.
Mack
Manzullo
Marchant
Marshall
McCarthy (CA)
McCaul (TX)
McCotter
McCrery
McHenry
McHugh
McKeon
McMorris Rodgers
Mica
Miller (FL)
Miller (MI)
Miller, Gary
Moran (KS)
Murphy, Tim
Musgrave
Myrick
Neugebauer
Nunes
Pearce
Pence
Peterson (PA)
Petri
Pickering
Pitts
Platts
Poe
Porter
Price (GA)
Putnam
Ramstad
Regula
Rehberg
Reichert
Renzi
Reynolds
Rogers (AL)
Rogers (KY)
Rogers (MI)
Rohrabacher
Roskam
Royce
Ryan (WI)
Sali
Saxton
Schmidt
Sensenbrenner
Sessions
Shadegg
Shays
Shimkus
Shuster
Simpson
Smith (NE)
Smith (TX)
Souder
Stearns
Sullivan
Terry
Thornberry
Tiahrt
Tiberi
Turner
Upton
Walberg
Walden (OR)
Walsh (NY)
Wamp
Waters
Weldon (FL)
Weller
Westmoreland
Whitfield (KY)
Wilson (NM)
Wilson (SC)
Wittman (VA)
Wolf
Young (AK)
Young (FL)

UnkleKrakker: So Republicans think it's ok to 'defend' the Constitution using torture...the same Constitution with the prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment?
That's got to take some serious mental gymnastics

You want mental gymnastics? Scalia says that torture doesn't violate Amendment 8 'cause that one bars "cruel and unusual punishment", and because torture's for the purpose of extracting information, not punishing, it's not barred. As long as we don't convict anyone, we can do anything we want, no matter how cruel or unusual.

We are better than they are.

In essence... THIS.

Sometimes taking the moral and ethical high ground can be a disadvantage, but it is well worth it.

I've said that I'd suffer 100 9/11s if it was the price of freedom, and I stand by it.

I'm so smart cause i have the secret knowledge that both partys are the same.

A Tout Le Monde: It's Marine "Corps", I wasn't in it but I know how to spell it. I figure you should if you really spent a few years in it and it was written everywhere you looked.

Who ever heard of a marine that could spell (or read)