It’s all a bunch of reframing, because Hayden and the rest of the defenders know that it doesn’t really matter if we tell the world what we did, because we (claim at least, though there’s no way to be sure) aren’t doing that shit anymore. What’s to prepare for, if we’re not using the tactics?

But by making the debate about that instead of the criminal nature of the tactics, Hayden et al hope to eep their asses out of jail and potentially able to travel the world without having to check on extradition policies.

Seriously, each and every last one of these assholes involved in this coverup needs to be subject to waterboarding and then attached to a lie detector and asked whether or not they still think that waterboarding isn’t torture.

These are the types of psychopathic fucks that would capture small animals as children and then set them on fire for fun.

Fucking douchebags.

That’s about 183 buckets of water too much.

Seriously, this argument is whack. Christopher Hitchen, when he tried to demonstrate how foolish it was to call this torture (and failed), was willing to talk after one try. Does he think the Al Quaida terrorists are such bad asses that they’d go “well, I’d have talked after 190 a month, but 183? that’s child play”.

And remember, that’s *a month*. These guys were there for indefinite detention. Even knowing that you’d be waterboarded a ‘mere’ 183 times a month, would you still be all bravado if you didn’t know if you’d be stuck there a month or ten years?

Dude, I thought you were cool, too.  So why the fuck is SPAIN having to launch investigations and criminal probes?  Stop taking criminal investigations off the table.

We need independent investigations, because violating laws, in a land supposedly ruled by laws, is unacceptable.

Pardonning Nixon led directly to the Iraq Debacle.  Had we cleansed the wound then motherfuckers like Cheney wouldn’t have been around to make Nixon’s crooks look quaint.

——-
We are the United States of America.  We are supposed to be better than this.  We DO NOT TORTURE.  First, b/c it doesn’t work—>a person in agony will say anything to make it stop, whether or not it’s true.  Secondly, when you are known to torture, nothing prevents your enemies from torturing your own captured soldiers.  Thirdly WE ARE BETTER THAN THAT.  We’re supposed to be a civilized nation, not a bunch of barbarian buffoons.  Why the fuck should we do immoral acts that DO NOT GIVE ACTIONABLE INTELLIGENCE?  Selling our souls for NOTHING.

I really don’t give a fuck if John Yoo’s letters say that the men who waterboarded were legally waterboarding.  It was torture, and “just following orders” didn’t fly at Nuremberg.  Civilized soldiers who swear to uphold the Constitution, not just any asinine dictator, SHOULD NEVER TORTURE.  Those are orders you refuse because, as the Constitution says, all men are created equal.  We’re human beings.  Fucking act like it.

we (claim at least, though there’s no way to be sure) aren’t doing that shit anymore.

If it’s ever revealed that we still are using these tactics and Obama is aware of it, he just lost my vote in 2012.  I certainly won’t vote for a wingnut, but I’ll either not vote or vote third party.  I cannot in good conscience support a president, ANY PRESIDENT, who sanctions these tactics.

I have no regrets about voting for Obama and while I am ecstatic that he won, I’m with Olbermann on this matter - while it was good that Obama released the torture memos and pulled back the shroud of secrecy, Obama fucked up by taking prosecution off the table.  He was wrong, and it is one of the few things he’s done that has truly pissed me off.

Soooo….....

I get the Al Quaeda guy in the chair and say, “Guess you’ve been following the news.  I can’t torture you anymore.”  *Pulls revolver and places it against the head of the subject*  “So, we’ll make it easy.  Tell me what I want to know or I’ll kill you.”

or….

“Hamid, don’t believe everything you hear on the news”

Of course you don’t really shoot him, etc.  But this “making us less safe” is pure BS.  There’s a jillion psychological methods to find what you want to know.  Chemical ones too.  Anyone under serious torture will tell you anything you want to here which is utterly useless.

I wish there would be more commissions and investigations into detainee abuse and torture.  That the Obama administration has refused to prosecute Justice Department and CIA officials involved in these crimes is abhorrent. 

It must be uncomfortable to sit around a conference room table at a new job, being known as the guy who thought torture was okay.  What must his neighbors think?  I wouldn’t invite that guy over for a barbecue.

“What we have described for our enemies in the midst of a war are the outer limits that any American would ever go to in terms of interrogating an al Qaeda terrorist.”

Not ANY American, pal.  Just you and your creepy neocon friends (and the freeper brigade).

Is there anyone who still believes the “Ticking Time Bomb” lie?

Or even that torture is in anyway effective?

But them again he’s on Faux News, so I suppose only the whingiest of the whingnuts still believe that Jack Bauer is out there Protecting America™

Caren,
My only quibble with what you wrote is the order for the reasons. The first reason for me, and I would hope for most people, is that torture is an inhuman and inhumane act. Even if it were effective, we shouldn’t take part in it because the ends don’t justify the means and they never will.

One can’t really escape the conclusion that for far too long, government secrecy has been as much to avoid accountability as anything else.

One also hopes that Mr. Hayden is inclined to wear brown pants.

Oh c’mon people!  If it hadn’t been for torture we would never have known that covens of witches were terrorizing Europe.  And look, now we no longer have witches…oh, wait… Well, not those kinds of witches because they aren’t real…okay, lemme try this again…TORTURE MAKES IT SO THE TERRORISTS LOSE!!

Scared, Mr. Hayden?

Keep in mind that Obama has not taken prosecution off the table for those in charge, just the underlings who were following orders.

These guys were there for indefinite detention. Even knowing that you’d be waterboarded a ‘mere’ 183 times a month, would you still be all bravado if you didn’t know if you’d be stuck there a month or ten years?

It sounds to me like the guy didn’t know anything.  He gets waterboarded six times a day and still won’t talk?  Would they have preferred that he make shit up or did they just not care?

Why the fuck should we do immoral acts that DO NOT GIVE ACTIONABLE INTELLIGENCE?

Because it helps men with deep-seated masculinity issues FEEL TOUGH AND MANLY!  And that’s what life is all about, you girly-man liberal.

““BECAUSE WE DID LOTS MORE SHIT YOU DON’T EVEN KNOW ABOUT.” Subtle, Hayden, very subtle.”

Subtle like a bulldozer.  What the fuck is wrong with people?

A noble spirit embiggens the smallest man.

Embiggen yourself Gen. Hayden and quit being such a wiener!

This ridiculous meme that we have to be just as bad as the bad guys has been around since at least the Cold War.  I remember my brother telling me admiringly how the Soviets would mutilate enemy spies’ corpses to send a message to those spying on them that they should knock it off.

Of course, the Soviet Union collapsed into a pile of rubble partly under the weight of Afghanistan, so it became difficult to argue that torture and terror tactics worked like a charm for the Soviets because, well, they didn’t.  It didn’t stop the CIA from trying the same failed tactics when they got a chance, though.

I’d take George Tenet’s opinion about compromising intelligence operations a little more seriously if his guys had had even the slightest clue that 9/11 was on its way.  Sorry, but when you miss the biggest terrorist attack in US history, you don’t then get to claim that you’re an expert in preventing them.  You fucked up and now you’re scrambling to CYA since your incompetence has been revealed for the whole world to see.  No wonder they wanted to take some of their aggression out on prisoners—it’s not like the CIA was able to do anything actually useful.

This guy is whining about reports being released? He should be thanking his lucky stars he’s not headed to Leavenworth.

Let’s see. Hayden, Goss, and Tenet were all CIA chiefs while torture was occurring, and Deutch had to be pardoned by Clinton because he kept classified information on his unsecured laptop.

Wow, I can’t believe the White House wasn’t swayed by the overwhelming moral authority.

“Pointing out that I fucked your sister only adds to the acrimony in our marriage.  Sure, it was 183 times in a month, but what if we were both stuck in a blizzard somewhere, and pounding her pussy while she tickled my balls and rammed a dildo up my ass was the only way to keep warm?  Huh?  What then?  DO YOU WANT YOUR HUSBAND AND SISTER TO FREEZE?!?

You know, this is only the beginning, and it’s your incessent whining that’s going to be the problem. ‘Oh, you fucked my sister! Oh, you stole my savings!  Oh, you pushed my mother down the stairs!’ - I don’t think you realise how difficult you’re making it for me.”

You can have a non-criminal government or you can have an empire, but not both. It’s time for us (including the President, but as a politician he will take his cue from the people, one way or the other) to choose. I hope we choose wisely, but I’m not the least bit optimistic.

”...Hayden, who served as former President Bush’s last CIA director from 2006 to 2009, said releasing the memos outlining terror interrogation methods emboldened terrorist groups such as al Qaeda.”

“...you know, Habib, I never thought of putting a stinging bug into a box and locking somebody in it to get them to tell us the information we want.  But then I read those OLC memos.  Allah curse those Americans for being so clever!!!...”

The last time a truly new form of torture was invented was when electricity first came into use.  Everything has been around for decades, except for those tortures that have been around for centuries.

Drowning people and bashing their heads into walls?  OMFG, we can’t let them know our super secret interrogation techniques or they won’t work anymore!...

MikeEss, you’re on the money but you still missed the really good part. He’s afraid of “giving away” the techniques that we’ve already promised not to use anymore. What a maroon.

(Or not, since what he’s REALLY worried about is his own ass. Unfortunately Obama has decided that we need to “move on”.)

That’s true, Steve, but Obama’s not the only person who can investigate. So let’s hit some other pressure points.

“He’s afraid of “giving away” the techniques that we’ve already promised not to use anymore. What a maroon.”

...the food here is terrible!  And the portions are so small!...

That’s true, Steve, but Obama’s not the only person who can investigate. So let’s hit some other pressure points.

Amen. I’m happy to see the campaign to impeach Judge Bybee gathering steam. It’s a start.

Also remember that the FBI pulled back from these interrogations because Mueller was worried that it might put his agents in legal jeopardy. But we shouldn’t go after the CIA agents because they were told it was ok? They should have known it wasn’t, the FBI could figure it out.

Chris Hayes of The Nation tweets:

If a US soldier was captured and water boarded 183 times in one month, something tells me Fox News would say he was tortured.

No doubt.

Jesus Christ, this shit is so fucked up it’s beyond belief. Um, you know what’s put us in more danger? The fact that we tortured people! Abu Zubaydah has diagnosed mental illnesses! We attacked a vulnerable guy! Torture creates more terrorists, for Christ’s sake. How can somebody watch a friend or relative go through this and not feel like their soul has suffered something in the revelation? This is appalling. I am ashamed to read this.

Nacho Daddy, I saved the best for last.

There’s no excuse for what they did in my name.  When people accuse me of Bush Derangement Syndrome, torturing people is just one of many legitimate complaints I can use to show that that fucker deserved impeachment and still deserves trials, convictions, and hanging by the neck until dead.

What do they have on Obama in his 100 days?  He ‘bowed” to a Saudi king?  He cut taxes on 95% of Americans without raising them (yet)?  He continued Bush’s TARP policy?  He’s black?

There’s derangement and then there’s derangement.

These sadistic asswipes have turned people who spend their days plotting to blow up hundreds or thousands of random innocents into, by comparison, the good guys. And for less than nothing.

Six-plus times a day? They were using him for practice, so that they could get the techniques right if they ever captured someone who knew anything useful. KSM was their effing scratch monkey.

And you know what authorizing torture does? It turns you into the kind of cretin that babbles about publishing criminal documents being bad for security.