Cheney vs Obama: What doesn't make sense (Rick Starr | Knoxville News)

[struggle4progress]

... Dick Cheney says waterboarding is a valuable tool, one which has produced "a wealth of intelligence" on plans by Al Qaeda and which has kept America safe. What doesn't make sense? That the last time anyone was waterboarded was in 2002. If the technique is so effective, why did the CIA, or Dick Cheney, or whoever not employ it for the past 7 years? ...

Another question: if it's so darned effective, why was it done to one person 183 times in a single month? Either it works or it doesn't. If it works, you might think that 183 times is about 180 times too many, wouldn't you? ...

There are more than 300 others scattered around the prison system in the US (2/3 international terrorists, 1/3 domestic), but suddenly we can't put terrorists in prison? What's going on here?

You see my confusion? Waterboarding works so well, we haven't used it in years. Not waterboarding people makes the country less safe, except even the people who advocate using it weren't using it. Waterboarding is so effective we have to use it hundreds of times on the same person; why? Because he can't resist it? We can't put terrorists in jail, except we already have terrorists in jail ...

http://blogs.knoxnews.com/knx/columnists/starr/2009/05/cheney-vs-obama-what-doesnt-ma.html

[napoleon_in_rags]

1. There's a lot of things that don't add up. Here's one problem I have:

Okay, so the terror prosecutions we SEE consist of busting 4 dimwits, per the top story on DU.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x5707715
Yet this sting, so easily picked apart as a fraud, was celebrated by the agents involved and politicians alike. Why in the HELL should we trust that the people in Gitmo were convicted on anything more substantial than these joke cases, when they are hidden and given special status for LACK of evidence (that can be revealed without "blowing somebody's cover")? And more directly, how can we take Dick Cheney's arguments seriously when, seeing such universal celebration of a silly case of entrapment as rock solid, they present LESS evidence and agree LESS on these waterboarding cases, as shown by Google News top story?
Intel experts: Dick Cheney was wrong about Bush administration moves
http://www.bostonherald.com/news/us_politics/view/2009_05_24_Intel_experts:_Dick_Cheney_was_wrong_about_Bush_administration_moves/

[struggle4progress]

2. I posted that link because a good political argument can't be more than sentence or two long

Waterboarding works so well, we haven't used it in years

Waterboarding is so effective we have to use it hundreds of times on the same person

Those sentences are brilliant

[napoleon_in_rags]

3. Yes they are!

Its like with math in science, a theory is good when it can be boiled down to something simple and profound, like E=MC^2. I will repeat those sentences often! :)

[bobburgster]

4. Noticed a lack of common sense in this debate.

Your confusion is quite understandable, since none of their arguments justifying waterboarding make sense.

[tom_paine]

5. Bushies learned from the Nazis that propaganda does not have to make sense to be successful.

Goebbels said which is still 100% today, as exemplified by the staggering Bushie successes and the fact that Obama is already turning swiftly rightward on most, if not all, key issues.

Goebbels said that the best Nazi (Bushie) propaganda only requires steady repetition, drowing out any "intellectual" voices pointing out that it makes no sense.

[jasmeel]

6. we can't put em in jail because we tortured them and America

doesn't allow torture so they would get out of jail because our legal system gives people rights...it's really a mind fuck when you try and put any logic to it. Cheney has basically set up a fail-fail system. We keep em in gitmo we disrespect what America stands for, we try em in America w/our legal system they get off because of the way they were treated in Gitmo-and many of them aren't guilty in the first place...absolutely a complete failure!

[MasonJar]

7. Touche'

[Wednesdays]

8. K&R

:kick: