Yeah, you're right. I was getting disappointed that it was becoming more spectacle than actually about water boarding; how it's about the process of getting to waterboarding than about the actual issue itself. You're 100% right about the situation and scenario of a "set environment" vs. "actual torture."


FYI, I don't think Hannity will do it. In the clips where he says he talked to a guy who had been waterboarded, you can hear his voice crack a little, and a little bit of fear come into his eyes, because he knows exactly what's going to happen to him.

^Bruti79 I don't feel like we'd be crossing over any moral boundaries by water boarding a volunteer. People are waterboarded in the military in specific training situations and that isn't torture either. Not in the sense that you're using the word, as the interviewee stated 'there is nothing that can simulate the futility involved when you dont know' (paraphrased)

$50 to the sift if he does it. Mostly because I'll be shitting myself with glee.

I'm a pretty lefty Canadian guy. But, this is still glamourizing water boarding. I believe there was a bug at the bottom of the screen that said: "Trivializing Torture"

Even to make a point, or to raise money for charity, or get a personal vendetta; it's still torture, and just shouldn't be done.

>> ^archchef:
When did the US become filled with so many pussies? Seriously, they are enemy combatants why do sissy left wing twats want to give them a room at the Hilton and a spa treatment?


Cause we're better then that. We that aren't ignorant and heartless can empathize and realize that inflicting excessive pointless panic or pain is WRONG. Morally.
Aren't Conservative republicans all about morality and faith and what jesus would do? Did Jesus water-board his enemy combatants?

Think about the hundreds of innocent people picked up of the streets of Iraq or caught in the wrong place.

If you were:

mistaken for an enemy.
profiled cause of your pigment and religion.
detained indefinitely without trial.
and subjected to near drowning multiple times a day.

Wouldn't you want think that's a bit unfair?

If some other country were doing this to Americans. What would your comment be then?
..twat

Again, I question the validity of all these bullshit water-boardings that are going on in the media.

If you have the CHOICE to say when they should STOP doing it to you, then you AREN'T experiencing it the way the detainees at Gitmo are and have no bearing on whether or not it is torture. If Hannity and all the other asshats who are lining up to be water-boarded to make their point want to make their points VALID, then they should be water-boarded like the Gitmo folks are being: repeatedly and with NO FUCKING SAY AS TO WHEN IT STOPS.

Sorry for the profanity, but I'm sick of these damned media fuckheads and their "I'm going to experience something" bullshit which is nothing like the real thing. It's like stupid college students who write their senior thesis on the "experience of being homeless" because they camped out on the street for a few weeks. Yeah, you experienced something, but you were NOT put into the REAL situation and have only a fraction of an idea of what it REALLY feels like to be in that scenario.

Getting these pundits water boarded does nothing to make them change their position or rhetoric. You do realise how easily he could spin the experience, right?

He could easily say that the horrible sensations only confirm his 'belief' that "detainees would be effectively scared to confession, with no actual danger of drowning". Dag is right, the only thing for these guys is to ignore them.

Torturing Hannity only serves to keep torture from extinction.

amen

In reply to this comment by HollywoodBob:
If it's just an interrogation technique than why do the "interrogators" hide their faces? Because it's FUCKING TORTURE YOU SHIT HEADS!

Water boarding simulates the sensation of drowning, probably the most horrific way to die.

As someone who has experienced drowning, watching videos like this make my skin crawl. And reading comments from fuck wits that support that shit make me want to scream.

Understanding your enemy's motivations will do more to prevent attacks than torturing people. But understanding might tarnish your bullshit jingoistic impression of how great it is to be an American!

Ah yes, the "It's for the best interests of our nation" defense Pennypacker, that's original.

Funny how that defense (along with "just following orders") didn't hold up at the Nuremburg trials.

No matter how many ways you ratonalise it, this is torture. Torture is wrong. There is no way to justify it. The fact that you spout on about justification before denial pretty much means your denial is bunk, you're already admitting you're on board with it.

But hey, here's a test. Video yourself getting water boarded WPP to show just how "non-torture" it is. I'm sure you'll last five minutes and the torture... err, nice guy with the bottle of water will make you tea and scones afterwards...

If it's just an interrogation technique than why do the "interrogators" hide their faces? Because it's FUCKING TORTURE YOU SHIT HEADS!

Water boarding simulates the sensation of drowning, probably the most horrific way to die.

As someone who has experienced drowning, watching videos like this make my skin crawl. And reading comments from fuck wits that support that shit make me want to scream.

Understanding your enemy's motivations will do more to prevent attacks than torturing people. But understanding might tarnish your bullshit jingoistic impression of how great it is to be an American!

Everyone who signed those memos should be subject to the specific techniques described. Every last signature as well as their sons and daughters.

I bet if we show up and tell them they are about to be water-boarded along with their children, they'll change their minds about whether there is long-term psychological and physical effects.

Transferring my comment from the dupe:

I'm not saying torture hasn't happened there. But let me get this guy's story straight. The big confession .. the revelation of torture that lands him on Rachel Maddow ..

A prisoner (alleged terrorist) was ordered several times through an interpreter to stop moving, and he did, but when your partner goes to unlock his cuffs the prisoner lunges at you and you face plant him. That's torture? I'd call that healthy human instinct. Who here wouldn't do that? What would you do? Let the prisoner lunge at you and hope for the best? He had some some scratches and bruises the next day? Well, that's to be expected when you lunge at a guard and get tackled to the ground.

Let's move on to the other "torture". A medic was making his rounds to provide care and feed Ensure to the prisoners who were malnourished. Of course this is a travesty and not in keeping with the usual rusty blade to saw off your head treatment and then the dragging of your dead body through town that our guys get .. but hey .. that's the U.S.A. for ya.

So the medic is trying to feed this ungrateful prick but instead it winds up spilling everywhere because this scumbag won't drink it. So he "struck him one time in the side of face". Wow. Well that is just awful.
Was it wrong? Sure .. but not quite "torture".

Maybe if he was water boarded with Ensure there would be something to talk about.

I'm not saying torture hasn't happened there. But let me get this guy's story straight. The big confession .. the revelation of torture that lands him on Rachel Maddow ..

A prisoner (alleged terrorist) was ordered several times through an interpreter to stop moving, and he did, but when your partner goes to unlock his cuffs the prisoner lunges at you and you face plant him. That's torture? I'd call that healthy human instinct. Who here wouldn't do that? What would you do? Let the prisoner lunge at you and hope for the best? He had some some scratches and bruises the next day? Well, that's to be expected when you lunge at a guard and get tackled to the ground.

Let's move on to the other "torture". A medic was making his rounds to provide care and feed Ensure to the prisoners who were malnourished. Of course this is a travesty and not in keeping with the usual rusty blade to saw off your head treatment and then the dragging of your dead body through town that our guys get .. but hey .. that's the U.S.A. for ya.

So the medic is trying to feed this ungrateful prick but instead it winds up spilling everywhere because this scumbag won't drink it. So he "struck him one time in the side of face". Wow. Well that is just awful.
Was it wrong? Sure .. but not quite "torture".

Maybe if he was water boarded with Ensure there would be something to talk about.

They said the same thing >> ^NetRunner:
Color me an optimist. Here's what I heard:

My general view when it comes to my Attorney General is: he is the people's lawyer -- Eric Holder has been nominated -- his job is to uphold the Constitution, and look out for the interests of the American people;

Color me unconvinced since this is the same thing said about Michael Mukasey when he got the USAG position after Alberto Gonzales.

His nomination was a circus of trying to figure out whether or not he thought water boarding constituted torture.

Introduced policies are far harder to over turn, politically even Obama's charisma couldn't cover a possible situation where someone says that Bush policies could have prevented a future attack. Thus there is a reluctance to dismantle them and accuse anyone retroactively of crimes.

Which only continues the myth of American naive innocence.

I havent read the book, but your interpretation isn't really clear,it isn't really clear that this is a simple analogy



"Harris stated that "[I]f you think it is ever justifiable to drop bombs in an attempt to kill a man like Osama bin Laden (and thereby risk killing and maiming innocent men, women, and children), you should think it may sometimes be justifiable to "water-board" a man like Osama bin Laden."[20] Ultimately, Harris maintains that torture should remain illegal, and that comparing torture with collateral damage does not cause him to see torture as "acceptable." However, he believes that discussion is needed on the coherence of our beliefs regarding the two."


Zizek attacks the very act of discussing torture as a possibility

what is fundamentally wrong with Harris - according to Zizek - is "that we need promises", i.e faith and trust, at least in an interpersonal context

...because nobody in the democrat party believes that water boarding isn't torture?

My question is, in your opinion, why would McCain be more susceptible to the influence of others in his party than Obama?