White House: Waterboarding is Legal

February 7, 2008 Uncategorized 14

With all the election news, we’d be remiss not to bring this story to your attention.

Waterboarding is torture; it is against the U.S. Army’s regulations to use this tactic when dealing with a captured enemy.  Our president has said, America doesn’t torture.

Here’s commentary from Keith Olbermann last November:

Daniel Levin should have a statue in his honor in Washington right now.

    Instead, he was forced out as acting assistant attorney general nearly three years ago because he had the guts to do what George Bush couldn’t do in a million years: actually put himself at risk for the sake of his country, for the sake of what is right.

    And they waterboarded him. And he wrote that even though he knew those doing it meant him no harm, and he knew they would rescue him at the instant of the slightest distress, and he knew he would not die – still, with all that reassurance, he could not stop the terror screaming from inside of him, could not quell the horror, could not convince that which is at the core of each of us, the entity who exists behind all the embellishments we strap to ourselves, like purpose and name and family and love, he could not convince his being that he wasn’t drowning.

    Waterboarding, he said, is torture. Legally, it is torture! Practically, it is torture! Ethically, it is torture! And he wrote it down.

    Wrote it down somewhere, where it could be contrasted with the words of this country’s 43rd president: “The United States of America … does not torture.”

The whole commentary is here.  President Bush is on record as saying America doesn’t torture.  A number of humanitarian organizations say waterboaridng is torture.  And the CIA admits we’ve waterboarded.  And the White House says waterboarding is legal.

 

It doesn’t make sense to me either….

14 Comments

  1. I don’t see what the big deal is. It doesn’t quite measure up to “torture” and is an important and valuable tool in the war on terror.

  2. Dan,

    I have always wanted to waterborad a terrorist.

    Can you hang ten off a terrorist being waterboarded?

    Do you need to wax him first?

    If you waterboard a terrorist excessively, will it lead to knobby fknees?

    Where do you hook up the leash?

  3. Ah Captain, would you volunteer to be waterboarded then? Information obtained via torture is not relaible. The big deal Captain? Bush declares America does not torture and the CIA admits it has and then the White House says waterboarding is legal. This is a criminal act being committed in America’s name.

    Dick, we’re Americans. We’re supposed to be better than this.

  4. Dick – When the 1 meg A bomb is planted under your a*s we will see if you would like to learn how to waterboard.

    I hear the surf is up at Gitmo!

  5. Captain and Dick. I know BushCo has skewed your perceptions of reality. You may want to try and remember that we invaded Iraq with the moral high ground of freeing those being oppressed by an individual who tortured his citizens. Our acceptance of torture (even it involves nothing more than planting daisies in the prison courtyard) now makes us no different in the eyes of those who would’ve supported us.

  6. RHackett,

    I don’t give a rats a*s what some of those so called “supporters” think of our minimally aggressive interogation tactics. And they won’t care either when we’ve saved their butts – AGAIN !!

    It is a dangerous world out there. We have to be tough to deal with it.

    Peace (through strength) – out.

  9. Maybe you should drink the Kool-aid anon.

    Sometimes it takes a hard hand to save people. Or maybe we just let Osama or some other terrorist come on over here and give him some flowers and chocolate and ask him real real nice like to just please don’t bomb us or fly planes into our big tall buildings anymore I’m sure he/they would agree give us a big hug and go home.

    Oh I forgot the liberals don’t even believe in spanking right? (not that I spank my child of course I use water torture I hear its the best way)

    Understand not everything is so serious sarcasm is pretty grand!

    And really I’m all about the peace love and kumbai yaya 😉

  10. > Dick – When the 1 meg A bomb is planted under your a*s we will see if you would like to learn how to waterboard.

    Oh yeah, I forgot: the ends *always* justify the means.

  12. Gary – I agree with you that the ends do not always justify the means.

    But when the end game of the bad guys is blow up thousands of people,
    I would say that a little waterboarding is in order.

  13. Tell you what Dick, let’s waterboard your mom and ask her if it was a walk through the park; or how about your kids, or your wife. We prosecuted Axis soliders for waterboarding our POWs in WWII as a war crime. But its OK for us to do now?

  14. Dan – Hell yes, if my mom and wife are suspected terrorists with knowledge of a terror attack – have at it – I will throw on the first bucket !!

    PS: Both Mrs. Cabeza say Hi to you Dan

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