IGX

The usual FB suspects aren't railing about this because it doesn't seem to fit neatly into "teams." If the report is accurate, by law some people from the last administration need to be prosecuted. But Obama isn't doing it, so he's complicit.

Interesting that we have Cheney going on TV and asserting things that appear at this point to be demonstrably false.

More interesting is how completely incompetent the implementation of the torture regimen was. I think of the CIA as a lot of very smart people running the show. The report paints a very different picture.

Grandpa's Spells wrote:The usual FB suspects aren't railing about this because it doesn't seem to fit neatly into "teams." If the report is accurate, by law some people from the last administration need to be prosecuted. But Obama isn't doing it, so he's complicit.

Interesting that we have Cheney going on TV and asserting things that appear at this point to be demonstrably false.

More interesting is how completely incompetent the implementation of the torture regimen was. I think of the CIA as a lot of very smart people running the show. The report paints a very different picture.

You are clearly a handwringing liberal who lacks the necessary gravitus to dispense with the law in times of war. You need this guy to run things.


I despise Cheney

Did the 'torture' stop six years ago?

Turdacious wrote:Did the 'torture' stop six years ago?

That is a good question. But also an attempt to divert attention.

One thing they definitely started doing was just killing people rather than capture them. Easier to deal with.

nafod wrote:

Turdacious wrote:Did the 'torture' stop six years ago?

That is a good question. But also an attempt to divert attention.

It's a matter of practical politics (i.e. self preservation). What this administration did and approved, and what the Senate Intel Committee knew and approved, are absolutely relevant.

The NYT is doing a pretty comprehensive review of it all if'n you're down with the NYT.

I've known a few "former" CIA people and although they are both extremely, scary intelligent, multi-lingual etc. there's something just slightly off...I can't describe it adequately. Personality, ego...just a little oddness.

Shapecharge wrote: I've known a few "former" CIA people and although they are both extremely, scary intelligent, multi-lingual etc. there's something just slightly off...I can't describe it adequately. Personality, ego...just a little oddness.

Now I'm going to have eliminate you. Death by plastic spoon is not spectacular, but it is painful.

Nappy I wasn't counting you...you just outed yourself. Sorry but you're going to have to use your cyanide capsule now.

Turdacious wrote:

nafod wrote:

Turdacious wrote:Did the 'torture' stop six years ago?

That is a good question. But also an attempt to divert attention.

It's a matter of practical politics (i.e. self preservation). What this administration did and approved, and what the Senate Intel Committee knew and approved, are absolutely relevant.

People were still being rendered to a prison in Mogadishu.

Interesting interview with Glenn Greenwald

Yeah, what’s striking to me about the lying is just how clearly it shows that the CIA in many ways is operating outside the system of democratic accountability. It’d be wrong to say it’s like the CIA runs the country, since there’s a bunch of stuff they don’t really care about besides intelligence and so forth, but it certainly looks like they don’t really answer to anyone.

The CIA cares about a lot more than just intelligence. They care a lot about private contracts (because so many of their colleagues work at those very lucrative private contracting jobs where a lot of them hope to go when they leave the CIA); they care about militarism and the assertion of force in the world (they run the drone program); they do all kinds of military activities beyond just the gather of intelligence. But you’re obviously right that the CIA exists beyond democratic accountability — and has for decades.

If I had to identify one key point from Tuesday, the thing that bothered me most about the narrative: Yes, the CIA goes off on its own and does things that political officials don’t know about; and yes, they mislead and lie to the committees that oversee them; and they do all these horrible things, the details of which are sometimes unknown to the political branches — but that’s how Washington wants it.

They’ve always wanted it that way. That’s what the CIA does. The CIA does the dirty work of the political branches of Washington and when they get caught, publicly, the ritual is that official Washington pretends that it was just these rogue CIA officers doing this without anyone’s knowledge or approval. It’s exactly what happened in the Iran-Contra scandal, which was ordered at the highest levels of the White House by President Reagan … but when they got caught, they said: Oh, it was Oliver North and these rogue CIA officers who were doing this without our knowledge!

That’s just the ritual Washington engages in; the CIA is kind of like their wild pit bull that they purposely let off leash. They don’t want to see the mauling but they know that it’s happening, and pretend they don’t know. And when it gets reported, they pretend that they’re horrified.

nafod wrote:

Grandpa's Spells wrote:The usual FB suspects aren't railing about this because it doesn't seem to fit neatly into "teams." If the report is accurate, by law some people from the last administration need to be prosecuted. But Obama isn't doing it, so he's complicit.

Interesting that we have Cheney going on TV and asserting things that appear at this point to be demonstrably false.

More interesting is how completely incompetent the implementation of the torture regimen was. I think of the CIA as a lot of very smart people running the show. The report paints a very different picture.

You are clearly a handwringing liberal who lacks the necessary gravitus to dispense with the law in times of war. You need this guy to run things.


I despise Cheney

That's good snark and probably pretty accurate in that whether it's the 'usual FB suspects' as SPELLS says or people at large, the level of 'who gives a fuck?' isn't all that high because most Americans are a little more than calloused about 'torturing terrorists', given they're constantly seeing Americans and Brits on their knees being readied for execution. The Obama does seem to be really fucking good at just blowing people away, which is 'cleaner' as odd as it sounds, than detaining and torturing. Report or no report, none of us here will likely know just how truly effective any of it was or wasn't....perhaps when we're old and gray, maybe.

Slightly off-topic, but the books by ex-CIA guy Robert Baer about his work in the Middle East are all interesting reads.

There's very little new under the sun. A lot less self loathing in high places now though:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the ... _blog.html

And remember:

People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.

The view is different from Fort Living Room. I'm not suggesting that their methods are perfect, but I do know that a lot of the alternatives they protect us from are terrifying.

Turdacious wrote: And remember:
[quote I'm not suggesting that their methods are perfect, but I do know that a lot of the alternatives they protect us from are terrifying.

Right. And right or wrong, I just think that for 'we, the people' to think we're going to know exactly what's what in a matter like this is all kinds of unrealistic and none of it's all that new.

The CIA report kinda rode out flat I think in part do to the fact that literally everyone expects the CIA to be operating outside the lines.

I think it's a cop out (and also somewhat unknowable) to say we sleep well because they operate this way, but it certainly gives no one with a brain pause that this is how shit gets done. Once again, the great "problem" is not that they do it, it's that we lie to ourselves about it.

Blaidd Drwg wrote:TOnce again, the great "problem" is not that they do it, it's that we lie to ourselves about it.

And even people 'with a brain' are collectively steered into what they *should* be getting into an uproar over. This one doesn't have any sizzle behind it. No one in the NBA wears "I can't breathe t-shirts" with a pic of terrorists being waterboarded.

"War is cruelty. There is no use trying to reform it. The crueler it is, the sooner it will be over." -William Tecumseh Sherman

The Venerable Bogatir X wrote:. No one in the NBA wears "I can't breathe t-shirts" with a pic of terrorists being waterboarded.

OHSNAP! You're goin on the twitterz yo!

Fat Cat wrote:"War is cruelty. There is no use trying to reform it. The crueler it is, the sooner it will be over." -William Tecumseh Sherman

Have you checked out Dan Carlin's podcast?

There's an excellent one on this theme called Logical Insanity.

http://www.dancarlin.com/product/hardco ... -insanity/

I haven't and can't right now, what's the relevance?

Fat Cat wrote:I haven't and can't right now, what's the relevance?

It's long..He explores in depth the thinking behind the Sherman quote and how that plays out in the decision to drop the bomb in japan. A lot of it is just conversational context re: the fire bombings that preceded that decision. The idea that for war to be humane it must be short and for it to be short it must be brutal is a theme throughout a lot of his work. But..I'm biased, I like his style of narration.

Interesting. My opinion: anyone who objects to brutality, murder, torture, rape, plunder, etc. should totally abstain from warfare, because war is shorthand for all of the above. It has always been so, and always will be. The idea that it can be otherwise is the puerile domain of women and children.

Another factor-- the 'torture' we use is far more humane that the torture used in other places, or the torture used in the past.

Turdacious wrote:Another factor-- the 'torture' we use is far more humane that the torture used in other places, or the torture used in the past.

Humane torture? I want you to make a conscious effort to not be an idiot.

Fat Cat wrote:Interesting. My opinion: anyone who objects to brutality, murder, torture, rape, plunder, etc. should totally abstain from warfare, because war is shorthand for all of the above. It has always been so, and always will be. The idea that it can be otherwise is the puerile domain of women and children.

True.

Though I think it's fair to argue it is best to totally abstain, until it's time to not abstain.

I think most rational people, when it comes right down to it, would buy Darf's Total War Method(™), we just differ on when it is time to implement it.

Fat Cat wrote:

Turdacious wrote:Another factor-- the 'torture' we use is far more humane that the torture used in other places, or the torture used in the past.

Humane torture? I want you to make a conscious effort to not be an idiot.

Not all torture is created equal.