"War on terror" psychologist gets giant no-bid contract

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Salon

Thursday, Oct 14, 2010 14:25 ET
"War on terror" psychologist gets giant no-bid contract
By Mark Benjamin

http://www.salon.com.nyud.net:8090/news/politics/war_room/2010/10/14/army_contract_seligman/md_horiz.jpg

Left: Marty Seligman. A Guantanamo
detainee sits alone inside a fenced area
during his daily outside period, at
Guantanamo Bay U.S. Naval Base,Cuba.

The Army earlier this year steered a $31 million contract to a psychologist whose work formed the psychological underpinnings of the Bush administration's torture program.

The Army awarded the "sole source" contract in February to the University of Pennsylvania for resilience training, or teaching soldiers to better cope with the psychological strain of multiple combat tours. The university's Positive Psychology Center, directed by famed psychologist Martin Seligman, is conducting the resilience training.

Army contracting documents show that nobody else was allowed to bid on the resilience-training contract because "there is only one responsible source due to a unique capability provided, and no other supplies or services will satisfy agency requirements." And yet, Salon was able to identify resilience training experts at other institutions around the country, including the University of Maryland and the Mayo Clinic. In fact, in 2008 the Marine Corps launched a project with UCLA to conduct resilience training for Marines and their families at nine military bases across the United States and in Okinawa, Japan.

Government contracting regulations allow sole-source contracts, but only under very limited conditions, such as when only one company has the ability to do the needed work, according to Trevor Brown, a contracting expert at Ohio State University.



Read more: http://www.salon.com/news/torture/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2010/10/14/army_contract_seligman

[OnyxCollie]

1. K&R. nt

[Solly Mack]

2. k/r

[defendandprotect]

3. Sounds more like brainwashing of soldiers for convenience of US government ....

which is the actual client in this farce!!

[glitch]

9. Torture isn't just hard on the tortured, it's hard on the torturers too.

And anybody witness to it. Nobody wants to be dehumanized. This resilience training sounds like they are trying to make the dehumanization process of creating (and maintaining) torturers more durable and therefore more cost-effective.

How to build a better sociopath.

[JDPriestly]

11. Sounds to my like somebody's silence and cooperation might have been

purchased. Just my opinion, just a guess, but it's a possibility.

[defendandprotect]

13. If you notice, it has a lot to do with "dehumanizing" their expectations in multiple tours....

that is for the benefit of the US government which is abusing them --

as for TORTURE, US TORTURING of prisoners has made it much more likely

that our prisoners will now be TORTURED --

That really make any sense to you???

:eyes:

[glitch]

16. Nope it doesn't make any sense to me.

I hope you didn't think my post was in support of torture and training soldiers to be "resilient" in the face of having to do it.

(sorry if you didn't think that, but there seems to be a lot of misunderstanding on DU lately)

[defendandprotect]

17. My apologies ... I did somewhat wonder ..... Thank you!

Kinda more like I thought you were seeing too bright a side in all of this --

in strengthening our troops to withstand torture!

And thank you for correcting me!!

:)

[glitch]

18. Phew, I'm glad I mentioned it.

Just because I say what I think they are doing doesn't mean I agree with it!
I think I must not write too clearly, I need to be more explicit. On such a big board you can't expect people to automatically know where you are coming from. :hi:

[defendandprotect]

19. And sometimes readers read too quickly -- and don't double-check ....

:)

[Roy Rolling]

4. Well that explains it

That explains why suicides are at an all-time high among US military soldiers....

[Angry Dragon]

5. This stinks

[Blue Owl]

6. $31 million for this hokum?

:mad:

[defendandprotect]

14. We wouldn't want money like that just lying around ... someone might get the idea

to use it to help the homeless or something !!! :eyes: !!!!

Maybe create a few green jobs?

Meanwhile, NOT doing this would interfere with government's corporatizing/militarizing

our colleges and universities!!!

[w4rma]

7. $31 Million to do what? That sounds like hush money. (nt)

[chimpymustgo]

8. Hope and change.

[JDPriestly]

10. Now could you tell me again who the president is?

And why is that those who authorized torture are not being prosecuted?

What is this guy being paid off for? His silence?

[defendandprotect]

15. Evidently the thought of prosecuting those who authorized TORTURE .....

doesn't appeal to the president -- !!!


:eyes: !!!!!


Agree with you JDP!!!

:)

[Hissyspit]

12. Kick nt

[defendandprotect]

20. This guy also did experiments terrorizing caged dogs with electric shocks ...!!!

A psychologist whose research helped shape the CIA's torture program has been granted a $31-million no-bid military contract to provide "resilience training" to US soldiers, Salon.com reports. Martin Seligman is famous for experiments in which he terrorized caged dogs into passivity by subjecting them to random, repeated electric shocks.


----

Didn't check the OP link as to whether that info was mentioned --

picked it up from a Common Dreams article on this subject.

[bobthedrummer]

21. Internal Rifts on Road to Torment-Interviews Offer More Nuanced Look At Roles of CIA Contractors

deep background thread about these professional torturers started by kpete 7-19-09--thank you Judi Lynn for all you do here

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x6101849

[EFerrari]

22. 31 million dollars to a torturing war criminal . Cool. n/t