NYT Blasts BUSH On Torture

[kpete]

Editorial
On Torture and American Values

Published: October 7, 2007

Once upon a time, it was the United States that urged all nations to obey the letter and the spirit of international treaties and protect human rights and liberties. American leaders denounced secret prisons where people were held without charges, tortured and killed. And the people in much of the world, if not their governments, respected the United States for its values.

The Bush administration has dishonored that history and squandered that respect. As an article on this newspaper’s front page last week laid out in disturbing detail, President Bush and his aides have not only condoned torture and abuse at secret prisons, but they have conducted a systematic campaign to mislead Congress, the American people and the world about those policies.

After the attacks of 9/11, Mr. Bush authorized the creation of extralegal detention camps where Central Intelligence Agency operatives were told to extract information from prisoners who were captured and held in secret. Some of their methods — simulated drownings, extreme ranges of heat and cold, prolonged stress positions and isolation — had been classified as torture for decades by civilized nations. The administration clearly knew this; the C.I.A. modeled its techniques on the dungeons of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the Soviet Union.

The White House could never acknowledge that. So its lawyers concocted documents that redefined “torture” to neatly exclude the things American jailers were doing and hid the papers from Congress and the American people. Under Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, Mr. Bush’s loyal enabler, the Justice Department even declared that those acts did not violate the lower standard of “cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.”

more at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/07/opinion/07sun1.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&oref=slogin

[livvy]

1. Sing it loud, long, and often! knr

NOT IN MY NAME!

[SalmonChantedEvening]

4. Singing it with you livvy! NOT IN MY NAME!!

:hi: :hug:

[mod mom]

2. We can never regain respect in the world community w/o confronting this w justice.

[madokie]

3. pitchfork and torches at the ready

should be our battle cry as our congress critters scuttle away like the cockroaches that they have proven themselves to be. sad, huh

[emanymton]

5. Keep In Mind, It Does Not End On 20 January 2009 ...

.
The people in office in Washington DC are 'smarter than the average bear, booboo' as one great philosopher once said. So I pose the following for your consideration.

How do the criminals currently holding down fort plan to quiet the riot after January 2009? What do you think the people working for Bush and Cheney are thinking?

(I am realist enough to understand Bush and Cheney will never face justice for their actions. This just is not going to happen. Though I can fantasize about rendering your president and vice president to the International Court Of Justice in The Hague (Netherlands) for trial as war criminals and re-establishing the rule of law within USA.)

But think about it. As Bush and Cheney waltz into the sunset with their blood-soaked ill gotten gains, laughing at the rest of us, those who helped them to get away with their crimes are going to be feeling rather exposed. Don't you think?

The incoming administration will not have to be willing to take the heat and protect the underlings left behind. The underlings will watch as the bosses leave the office. Now what? The laws are quite clear. Giving an unlawful order is against the law. And oh so many orders have been illegal.

And Congress is in the hands of the opposition political party. Now is the time to be planning for more investigations of the criminal activity and malfeasance. As example, Gonzales has shrub's protection. Hurrah. When shrub walks out the door for the last time and Gonzales will be on his own.

Like so many more underlings, no one will be there to protect them anymore. Maybe this is the time to be trying to make deals with the legal system for protection in exchange for higher ups. (Maybe F Thompson can play a scene in 'Law And Order.') The legal system will be coming for the lower order crooks. About the only way so many little fish n Washington can be protected to keep their mouths shut, is to cancel the November 2008 elections. I mean shrub cannot give blanket presidential pardons (can he?).

And if shrub does pardon himself and Cheney et al, they can be rendered to the Haag for war crimes!!

[dicknbush]

6. My suggestion for recovering respect for America in one easy step...

On January 20th 2009 on the steps of the capital as the world is watching the new president of the United States as his/her first act is to order the arrest of George w Bush and Dick Cheney for crimes against humanity and they are both underimoniously dragged off the podium in hand cuffs for the biggest perp march in the history of law enforcement! In an instat the world will see that a new boss in in town and that in fact we are a nation of laws and we will not in the long run tollerate this type of behaviour ever. It may take some time but we will fix things and in the end it is better to do it without violence.

[emanymton]

7. Oh For Such A Scene. Yes, I'd Be Willing To Accept The Consequences!

[gratuitous]

8. Yes, this lawless administration could never acknowledge their actions

Surprisingly, so many in the major media identified with this lawlessness, including folks at the New York Times. And they didn't feel particularly compelled to look at this lawlessness too closely. In fact, they went the extra, unnecessary mile to join in the howls of denigration of the responsible people who questioned the extralegal detention camps, the warrantless wiretaps, and all the rest of it. Remember that, Timesmen? Or is there a convenient hole in your collective memory?

How strange to see all the objections, dismissed back in the day as the loony rantings of conspiracy theorists, come to pass exactly as we saw it happening in real time. If anyone at the Times had a soul, it would have to give them pause, don't you think, to publish an editorial like this without betraying the slightest hint of their own collusion?

So, O hallowed New York Times, paper of record, will you finally, at long last, evince the slightest bit of skepticism for administration pronouncements of its innocence when you have such a lengthy record of evasion, double-dealing and sophistry? Or will you continue to just print whatever these bandits say knowing full well they're probably lying?

[applegrove]

9. Glad they put values in the title.