US Secretary of State Rice defends torture at Google event

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/may2008/rice-m24.shtml

By Bill Van Auken
24 May 2008

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice found herself compelled on Thursday to defend the Bush administration’s use of waterboarding—a potentially fatal method of induced drowning used to break the resistance of detainees—claiming that America was in a “different place” in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, while insisting that the government’s actions were consistent with US law and international treaties.

The backhanded defense of torture by Washington’s chief spokesperson on the world stage came in response to a pointed question from the audience at a “town hall meeting” organized at the headquarters of Google Inc., the Internet search giant, in Mountain View, California.

Rice’s statement, the most extensive she has ever made on the issue of torture, followed the release earlier this week of a Department of Justice Inspector General’s report that included detailed accounts by agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation who objected to sickening forms of torture that were inflicted on detainees at the US prison camp in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. The nature of these so-called “enhanced interrogation techniques” was made clear by the agents, creating what they called a “war crimes file” in which these reports were compiled.

Also included in the report was the revelation that senior Justice Department officials communicated the concerns raised by the FBI agents directly to Rice, who was then Bush’s national security adviser, along with the warning that the brutal practices at Guantánamo were “gravely damaging...the rule of law.”

[rwork]

1. No one ever mentions

That innocent people were tortured.

[Politicalboi]

3. No Way

You mean if you felt you were dying you would say anything to save your life? That would be a lie. Then torture wouldn't be any good. :sarcasm:

[Torn_Scorned_Ignored]

6. ...and most assuredly

still are.

[Peace Patriot]

7. ...and that everyone is innocent until proven guilty.

My theory about the general round-ups (including, for instance, anyone holding a rifle when the U.S. invaded their country) and the detainees purchased from war lords and gangsters, was that this scattershot approach to arrest, torture and indefinite detention without trial was cover for something else. If their goal was to target people on whom they had evidence of terrorist crimes, in order to prevent terrorism, they would not have needed this cover. What were they looking for? My theory: anyone with knowledge of Bush Cartel crimes, for instance, people along the Al Qaeda money trail. It was a means of discovering and eliminating witnesses to their OWN crimes. I think it is also a possibility that the torture system was loaned out to their corporate business partners, including, for instance, the Saudis, for business purposes, and maybe even for "snuff parties" by the urber rich and powerful fuckwads who control the U.S. empire. People who would slaughter 1.2 million innocent men, women and children in Iraq to get their oil--without batting an eye, without the slightest caution or remorse--are capable of anything. In judging what they are capable of doing in secret, we must never forget what they have done, without a glimmer of conscience, in the full light of day.

[magellan]

2. Defending torture

Yeah, that definitely puts America in a "different place" all right. I wish I could say where but it's too dark to see.

[calimary]

5. Yeah, the sad part (well ONE of the sad parts) is that all those frenzied bush-bots who

screech - "but... but... but... 9/11 CHANGED EVERYTHING!!!!!!!!!" - are only admitting the truth: the terrorists won. And they enabled it willingly - even eagerly.

The objective of bin Laden and friends was not just to get US troops off what they considered holy ground in Saudi Arabia, but also to completely disrupt the American way of life - to deal us a body blow and change us from what we were to some monstrous shade of our former selves. And look what's happened in the wake of 9/11? All the civil liberties and privacy protections we don't have anymore, the legal protections (like habeas corpus) we don't have anymore, the blow to our economy - hell, they completely shut down Wall Street for almost a whole week - the way we reacted that has bankrupted us, blown our military and our preparedness to smithereens, and isolated us from the rest of the international community (because our reaction turned us into a rogue nation to be feared and no longer to be trusted). We're broke and alone and paranoid as hell. A LONG tumble from the America that once believed that all we had to fear was fear itself, and whose word was gold.

No, they DON'T hate us for our freedoms, george. Especially since YOU and your partner, Mr. Go Fuck Yourself, made sure all those freedoms got taken away.

BTW - this is something we should be pointing out to ANY mindless bush-supporter who hollers - "but... but... but... 9/11 CHANGED EVERYTHING!!!!!" When they get through burbling, simply say - "well then, you just confirmed it. The terrorists WON. And somehow YOU are completely okay with that."

[gratuitous]

4. And yet we continue to torture

When do we get out of this "different place," Dr. Rice? Is it through that looking glass? If you'd stop admiring your reflection and get out of the way, we'd gladly go through and decide whether you're a war criminal or guilty of crimes against humanity.

[hootinholler]

8. Hey her hands are clean!

See?



-Hoot