…the memos cite various legal precedents for the definition of torture. They are particularly fond of Mehinovic v. Vuckovic, which involved “a course of conduct that included severe beatings to the genitals, head, and other parts of the body with metal pipes and various other items; removal of teeth with pliers; kicking in the face and ribs; breaking of bones and ribs and dislocation of fingers; cutting a figure into the victim’s forehead; hanging the victim and beating him; extreme limitations of food and water; and subjection to games of ‘Russian Roulette’.” (p. 24; the details of this case are repeated on four separate occasions in this memo alone, like an incantation.)
Isn’t it strange, then, that not a single one of the cases in which the United States has prosecuted people for waterboarding turns up in these memos? You’d think they might be apposite. Oddly enough, though, Steven Bradbury didn’t think to include them.
Who could possibly give a crap about the "rights" of terrorist scumbags like Abu Zubahdah and Khalid Shaikh Mohammed? Their "rights" would not have been infringed if they had gotten a 9mm slug through their skulls the day they were captured. Excuse me for not being surprised that, having mercifully allowed Abu and Khalid to continue breathing, the CIA doesn't treat these vermin like guests for Sunday dinner.
If I were president — and remember, this is merely a hypothetical — the CIA would have taken Abu and Khalid to the Texas State Fair, where they would have been strapped tightly to a telephone poll. Tickets would be sold at $20 each for one whack at 'em with an aluminum baseball bat.
Everybody would get their turn, one whack at a time, until there was nothing left of Abu and Khalid except a bloody stain. The $20 per ticket is a nominal fee. The real money would be in the pay-per-view royalties. But remember: This is merely a hypothetical.
"You shouldn’t have told me that. I’ve been a risk-taker all my life," – Sen. John McCain, upon being told that Palin would be a "high risk, high reward" pick.
Some graphic video from Geneva, as the Iranian president continues his denunciation of Israel's existence. The usual boilerplate:
"As was the case after World War II, armies occupied other territories and people were transferred from territories. In reality, under the pretext of compensating for the evil done in the name of xenophobia, they in fact set up the most violent xenophobes, in Palestine… The Security Council made it possible for that illegitimate government to be set up. For 60 years, this government was supported by the world. Many Western countries say they are fighting racism; but in fact support it with occupation, bombings and crimes such as those committed in Gaza. These countries support the criminals."
Perhaps, depressingly, the news was not the protest:
Calls from the balcony were heard throughout the speech. Still, the majority of the delegates greeted the Iranian president with a round of applause.
I was wondering how the pro-torture right would respond to the newest revelation that the torture technique designed to facilitate the instant “truth” from suspects within 20 seconds was nonetheless used on Zubaydah 83 times. Let us recall that a huge amount of information had already been retrieved from Zubaydah using the legal interrogation methods that the US relied upon for two centuries before Bush and Cheney. Most CIA agents were convinced he was not as high up as Bush had said publicly and did not believe he had anything more to tell. In the end, they were right:
[T]he harsher handling produced no breakthroughs, according to one former intelligence official with direct knowledge of the case. Instead, watching his torment caused great distress to his captors, the official said. Even for those who believed that brutal treatment could produce results, the official said, “seeing these depths of human misery and degradation has a traumatic effect.”
No nuclear ticking time bomb. Just an absence of usable intelligence. So they tortured and tortured, before ordering up transparently bad faith legal memos to provide retroactive legal cover. Most of the major voices on the bloggy right are currently silent, which is their last-ditch defense when their “we do not torture” bluff is called. But some are opining:
What are the benefits of such a disclosure? Transparency for Al Qaeda? There are no benefits for American national security, which is the primary Constitutional charge assigned to the President. Military and intelligence personnel will be frozen, knowing that any decision — at headquarters or in the field — could be politicized by left-wing radicals bent on destroying America. The inevitable results: lawsuits; politicization of defense and intelligence activities; and — I am sorry to say — additional catastrophic attacks on America.
Notice that the blogger actually does not know the presidential oath which is about defending the constitution of the United States, a task made impossible when the commander-in-chief is secretly authorizing illegal war crimes and covering them up.
But watching as Bush-defenders have to keep defending, even as they abandon every previous position they held, until they are telling us to ignore acts that in any other country by any other government would have the US invoking Geneva and the UN Convention, is to watch how democracies die.
Watching one human being under the waterboard is grueling. Watching that individual with nothing more to say be waterboarded 83 times in one month must have been grotesque, demanding a level of sadism or callousness we usually see only in authoritarian or totalitarian regimes. And the process of torture was so grotesque, in fact, that John Rizzo, physically destroyed all the taped evidence. But, as Peggy Noonan insists,
“Sometimes you need to just keep walking.”
The next time an American is tortured by a foreign regime, remember those words.
High on my list would be finding out more about the circumstances under which a member of Congress ended up having her phone conversations recorded by the NSA. The article suggests it was a by-the-books wiretap — part of a highly-classified probe of Israeli agents in the US, which led to the indictments of two AIPAC employees — and not one of the 'warrantless' ones. But we've seen so much funny business on that front that I'm not sure that's enough information.
"After gay marriage, the most religiously committed Americans will be effectively marginalized as a public force—because they cannot act or support the idea that gay unions are marriages. Such people will, if we lose the marriage debate, be treated the way we treat bigots who oppose interracial marriage. Imagine: All it will take to make, say, a judicial nominee unconfirmable will be to establish that they are indeed Catholic," – Maggie Gallagher, NRO.
Where does one begin in Jeff Stein's scoop in CQ? Is it more of a scandal that the Bushies were wire-tapping Harman and then were in a position to blackmail her if she didn't provide public support for … their warrantless wire-tapping? Or is it just another day at the office for AIPAC:
Rep. Jane Harman … was overheard on an NSA wiretap telling a suspected Israeli agent that she would lobby the Justice Department to reduce espionage-related charges against two officials of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, the most powerful pro-Israel organization in Washington. Harman was recorded saying she would “waddle into” the AIPAC case “if you think it’ll make a difference,” according to two former senior national security officials familiar with the NSA transcript.
In exchange for Harman’s help, the sources said, the suspected Israeli agent pledged to help lobby Nancy Pelosi , D-Calif., then-House minority leader, to appoint Harman chair of the Intelligence Committee after the 2006 elections, which the Democrats were heavily favored to win. Seemingly wary of what she had just agreed to, according to an official who read the NSA transcript, Harman hung up after saying, “This conversation doesn’t exist.”
A suspected Israeli agent able to deliver AIPAC and AIPAC able to deliver Pelosi? Take it away, professor Walt!
The Dish 