« previous | MUCK HOME | next »
GOP Senator Floats Compromise Torture Measure
Senate Dems are still pushing a measure that would limit CIA interrogators to methods approved in the Army Field Manual -- this would effectively ban waterboarding and other "enhanced interrogation" techniques.
President Bush and a number of Senate Republicans, including Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), have opposed that measure, saying that it is too restrictive for the CIA, and Bush vetoed the bill after it passed Congress. Now Sen. Kit Bond (R-MO) is floating a compromise, reports the AP:
Rather than prescribe what the intelligence agency is allowed to do in an interrogation, Bond wants to write into law only what the CIA cannot do: force detainees to be naked, perform sexual acts, or pose in a sexual manner; have hoods or sacks placed over their heads or duct tape over their eyes; be beaten, shocked, or burned; threatened with military dogs; exposed to extreme heat or cold; subjected to mock executions; deprived of food, water, or medical care; or waterboarded.
There's no word in the piece of how Dems are reacting to the proposal.
Advertisement
Josh
Zachary
Isn;t th real question how Bush will respond?
He seems hell bent (how appropriate) on legitimizing torture, and any bill that obeys any law but his floating standards of legal convenience will get the heave-ho long before the 111th can be seated.
Under Bush "military code of justice" has become the new American Oxymoron.
May 8, 2008 6:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
People should go back and read OLC Bradburys testimony a month or 2 ago where he denys or hedges on what the definition of Waterboarding is. They will play parsing games to do whatever it is they wish to get away with.
I cannot wait until Bush is no longer covered by any form of immunity by virture of being a Head of State. It was revealed in a hearing the other day that several Countrys are investigating Bush for War Crimes by Prof. Sands. Once Bush steps down, if our new Pres. does not start investigations or appoint Special Prosecutors the Merde will be the fan sooner rather than later.
May 8, 2008 6:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's shocking to me, that Bond, a wing nut in my book, would propose such a bill. To vote against the specifically banded treatments, if the bill gets to the floor, would be very hard for Senators to justify. Of course they'll just attach bilious amendments to kill it! My bad.
May 8, 2008 6:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is an outrage..it is all ready illegal to torture...prosecute on that..instead of trying to make a "new law" that exonerates these jerks!
May 8, 2008 7:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
What has happened to out country when we can openly have discussions like this? WTF is wrong with our pussy elected officials? How did our country go so wrong?
We've pulled out of the International Criminal Court so who knows if there is any recourse - or world accountability - in the making.
Read Orders and Acts and Lies. Oh my!
When are these cowards who are supposed to represent us, you know, We The People, going to do something for this country?
I am disgusted beyond words; the whole world is, too...at US.
May 8, 2008 7:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Under the International Laws any country can go after Bush et al. In a hearing the other day held by Rep. Nadler the whole process was discussed. The hearing has been shown on Cspan a few times since then and can also be watched online. Use the search term "Chairman Nadler" at Cspan Dot Org. and look for the hears. Majorie Cohen, Pres. of the Lawyers Guild lays it all out very clearly.
May 8, 2008 10:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
Is there any doubt that this Admin, or those in the CIA who agreed with this Admin and want to keep to their policies, would find a way to parse these restrictions so that what they did wouldn't be included in this list?
This Admin has throttled every law to the point that it coughs up the tiny, heretofore-nonexistent loophole the Admin wants.
May 8, 2008 7:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
Other than the provable fact that this administration is filled with really evil people, I can't figure any reason for the love affair with torture. I don't see where Bush's buddies make more money as a result of torture. I don't see where ever more backwards supreme court justices get to the court because of torture. I don't see how torture stops gay marriage or abortions. I certainly don't see how torture ensures that during the rapture they all get to fly naked through the sky.
And, of course, torture accomplishes zilch as far as ensuring safety and security of American people is concerned. So, what is the attraction, beyond pure evil?
May 8, 2008 9:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
How about upside down in a sleeping bag, how about 'stress positions', how about watching your family member being 'interrogated', or depriving of air. THe problem with any list like this in the hands of the Bush administration is that he'll call out lawyers to figure out what 'extreme' means or 'waterboarding' and find legalistic ways around it. Prescribe rather than proscribe, its the only way to control the bushies...
May 8, 2008 9:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
Amazing at it may seem, I applaud the republican Sen. from the great state of MO, Kit Bond for this effort, and hope democrats support this bill and provide our intelligence apparatus with necessary guidelines defining what is acceptable practice in gleaning actionable intelligence.
Now if only some senator, or representative would apply the exact same standards to the monstrous shadow intelligence apparatus in the form of the private intelligence industrial complex that has usurped 70% of the intelligence product under and beholden to in the fascist wanton profiteers in the Bush government.
May 8, 2008 10:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ummmm...about 'laws' in general, and this one in particular: when you specifically prescribe particular 'interrogation' practices, de facto you permit ANYTHING not specifically prescribed...
May 9, 2008 9:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
Add electrocuting ones nipples and testicles & the pulling of teeth for reasons other than dental health and I'll accept it.
May 9, 2008 9:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think this is just one of those changes in reality that is meant to keep us off balance. IE; Instead of maintaining that we as a people are against torture, this is the kind of torture that we are against. Get it?
footsore
May 9, 2008 10:32 AM | Reply | Permalink
A little bit of torture is no better than a lot of torture. Torture is wrong, it is un-American (or it used to be and should be), and most important, it is illegal both by American law and international law. I don't see how that can be hard to understand.
The fictional "ticking bomb" scenario doesn't exist, never has existed and never will exist. Even if it did exist, as one could argue that it did, when the Saudis were here learning to fly jumbo jets, the inability to torture was not the problem. And, there is no chance that it ever would be the problem.
Just as the leaders in Nazi Germany were degenerate and evil people, those leaders here who approved torture were the same.
May 10, 2008 10:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
If you like Kukuki theatre where various porcelin masks are moved in front of the actors face....JUST WATCH AND LEARN HOW WORTHLESS THE DEMOCRATS ARE.
I can testify about the following:
--Facts memorialized in my 47 page US DOJ OIG/FBI OPR Complaint;
--FACTS in my South Dakota Bd of Med Examiners complaints alleging that two Sioux Falls, SD, doctors CHAD CARDA and JENNIFER BURGER both "joined a conspiracy to violate Title 18 USC SECTIONS 241, 242, 1512, 1513 with unindicted coconspirators that include FBI DIRECTOR ROBERT SWAN MUELLER, III, WHO ORDERED SIOUX FALLS FBI COUNTER INTEL PUNK STEVEN PLUTA to OBSTRUCT JUSTICE and "threaten my doctors" to induce their compliance with "hiding my x-rays" showing the NSA MIND CONTROL RFID VERICHIP that was involuntarily inserted in my skull.
This chip was used to TORTURE A SEN JUD COMM WITNESS NAMED THOMAS S. BEAN who previously, contacted Senator Grassley with a ten page memo that mentioned the DASCHLE CAMPAIGN WIRETAPPING USING CALEA INTERFACE WIRETAPS....THREE SOUTH DAKOTA MURDERS OF KNOWN ASSOCIATES....RCMP WARRANT FOR FBI AGENT TERRY NELSON'S DRUG PIPELINE INTO GOP GOV MARC RACICOT'S MONTANA....RACICOT'S LAUNDERING OF DRUG MONEY INTO GOP CAMPAIGNS....AND MURDERS BY FBI HITMAN MIKE CHUCKIE PETERS.
No interest....from the Dems....or lively debate on whether TORTURE CAN BE USED TO STIFLE AND MISDIRECT THE FILING OF A CIVIL SUIT AND MOTION FOR INJUNCTIVE RELIEF IN FED JUDGE PEIRSOL'S SIOUX FALLS COURTROOM?
NO DEBATE ON whether the FBI can illegally seize x-rays showing the chip when...the seizure WAS NOT PURSUANT TO FACILITATING AN OPEN INVESTIGATIVE FILE?
STEALING MY DEMONSTRATIVE EVIDENCE FROM MY MEDICAL FILE...without a signed waiver...in violation of THE FED HIPPA LAWS....and...no comment from Dems questioning Mukasy about "how and why their is no investigation of these violations of Title 18 USC SECTIONS 241, 242, 1512, 1513?
NO COMMENT FROM DEMS on MINNEAPOLIS FBI COLLUDING WITH DOD'S CIFA to "monitor an FBI cooperating witness" in his home with pin hole spy cameras...while DOD was TORTURING DR. MARK GORDON WITH A DIRECTED ENERGY WEAPON that was previously used to MURDER MARK'S BROTHER, RICH GORDON (SD US SEN TOM DASCHLE'S EX CHIEF OF STAFF).
NO COMMENT FROM WAXMAN about my testimony?
LEAHY had all this and.............did nothing?
Kubuki theatre...when Leahy pretends to be outraged that the Writ of Habeas Corpus is dead, when Leahy "could have put an admin hold" on the War Commissions Act to use as leverage to make sure the statute EXPLICITLY STATES THAT US CITIZENS CANNOT BE TORTURED, COERCED, STALKED, ASSAULTED, AND MONITORED WITH A PIN HOLE SPY CAMERA IN THEIR HOMES?
May 10, 2008 1:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
Apparently this would be legal: as described as in an ancient Greek novel called "Lucius, or the Ass," a gang of robbers decides to punished an escaped prisoner by sewing her into the carcass of a dead donkey with just her head sticking out, then leaving her to starve while the donkey rots in the hot sun and she's devoured alive by vultures.
Plenty of hot sun and dead donkeys in Iraq -- this is one goddamned enhanced interrogation technique!
May 12, 2008 3:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
The fact that Kit Bond still has any credibility whatsoever on the issue of torture speaks poorly of the American people.
Senator Bond was one of the Nine Reprehensible Republican Senators who voted against the McCain Anti-Torture Amendment on October 5, 2005. Bond should be chased from the public forum in shame, whenever he opens his mouth about torture.
May 13, 2008 7:57 PM | Reply | Permalink