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On December 09 2014 10:27 oneofthem wrote: well it would be helpful if you look at the figures. i don't think saddam had 1 medical personnel per 1 inmate.
but yes, there are real terrorists, and that's why there are real efforts to stop them.
The brochure you posted there makes it look like a holiday spa, are you serious?
"Some detainees have been provided life
improving care such as receiving prosthetic limbs or having cataracts removed"
How nice of them, I really wish I'd receive my medical treatment from the amazing gitmo healthcare staff!
On December 09 2014 10:27 oneofthem wrote: well it would be helpful if you look at the figures. i don't think saddam had 1 medical personnel per 1 inmate.
but yes, there are real terrorists, and that's why there are real efforts to stop them.
Its funny because thats exactly what Michael moore did in one of his movies. He took iraq war vets to gitmo to get them better medical treatment then they were getting at a va.
So one reason the CIA and DOD embraced torture was in hope of recruiting people to become our spies.
Partly by design, the debate about torture that has already started in advance of tomorrow’s Torture Report release is focused on efficacy, with efficacy defined as obtaining valuable intelligence. Torture apologists say torture provided intelligence that helped to find Osama bin Laden. Torture critics refute this, noting that any intelligence CIA got from those who were tortured either preceded or long post-dated the torture.
Even setting aside my belief that, even if torture “worked” to elicit valuable intelligence, it still wouldn’t justify it, there’s a big problem with pitching the debate in those terms.
As the Senate Armed Services Committee Report on torture (released over 5 years ago, in far less redacted form than tomorrow’s summary will be) makes clear, the Bush regime embraced torture not for “intelligence” but for “exploitation.”
On December 09 2014 10:27 oneofthem wrote: well it would be helpful if you look at the figures. i don't think saddam had 1 medical personnel per 1 inmate.
but yes, there are real terrorists, and that's why there are real efforts to stop them.
As a black American civilian, when faced with the threat of 'jihadists' or the ~1000+ other things more likely to kill us, it's no surprise that 'jihadist's' don't get much consideration. But when it comes to humans not getting treated like humans should be treated, it's a bit easier to make the connection. That's not to say the police/US government are worse than terrorists, but as a black American civilian I can't ignore the statistical fact that I'm far more likely to be killed/injured/abused by a common criminal or the police/federal government than I am a terrorist, or that the most likely causes of premature death/severe injury are the result of legal activities. Nor can I ignore who profits the most from all of the legal sources of death and social destruction nor who suffers the most. It's only through recognizing the world, that we can hope to make it better.
But instead we have commercials where the list of risks are longer and more scary than the problem that some experimental drug is supposed to fix... Meanwhile, we lock people up in prison for possessing natural medicine that actually helps them, without the lethal side effects. We also 'protect the innocent' by maiming and killing 100's of thousands of innocent people all around the world.
Again that's not to say we are worse than the other nations that essentially do the same thing (or worse), but we are uniquely undermined by the 'values we hold so dear'. That is to say, that no other nation seems to act in such fundamental opposition to what they claim gave them their righteousness.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
(Note: it doesn't say all American's)
As much as I am looking forward to the comedy of the 2016 elections, I am also quite sad that the field is going to be so pathetic and the populace so ignorant, that real solutions to real problems probably wont even get mentioned, let alone, enacted.
The CIA "provided inaccurate information to the White House, Congress, the Justice Department, the CIA inspector general, the media and the American public," about the "brutal" interrogation techniques it used on terrorism suspects, a long-held Senate Intelligence Committee report finds.
The report provides the most comprehensive public accounting of the interrogation techniques used by the Central Intelligence Agency after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
It looked at more than six million pages of CIA material over the course of more than three years and it came to two major conclusions: The CIA misrepresented the interrogation techniques it was using at secret prisons abroad and it also overstated the techniques' efficacy. The report details the brutal techniques used on detainees and found that those interrogations led to no useful intelligence.
The report does not use the word torture and it doesn't weigh the legality of the program.
But Sen. Diane Feinstein, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, writes in the report that it is her "personal conclusion that, under any common meaning of the term, CIA detainees were tortured."
The CIA rejects those criticisms, saying the Senate report is wrong.
"Our review indicates that interrogations of detainees on whom EITs were used did produce intelligence that helped thwart attack plans, capture terrorists, and save lives," Brennan said. "The intelligence gained from the program was critical to our understanding of al-Qaida and continues to inform our counterterrorism efforts to this day."
What's in it is so sensitive and controversial that the report's release has sparked public spats between the CIA and Senate lawmakers.
It all came to a dramatic head on the floor of the Senate in March. Feinstein, the Democratic chairwoman of the Senate intelligence panel, accused the CIA of trying to thwart her committee's work by deleting files and later by illegally spying on Senate computers. The CIA — which eventually apologized to the Senate — had accused Feinstein and her committee of improperly removing classified documents from a government network.
Today, the Senate made public a 500-page executive summary of the report, which still remains classified.
Announcing its release, Feinstein said the report found a program that is a "stain on our values and our history." But she said it is important to release this report because it will show the world that "America is big enough to admit when it is wrong."
The release of this report is important, she said, because the U.S. needs to "face an ugly truth and say never again."
To paraphrase Gawker, according to polls Torture is now more popular than American than President Obama and Congress combined, and because most Americans have already moved on from their love of torture to something else -- Ebola, oh wait no, that was solved in the media, what is it now? Immigrants? Math? -- nothing will come of us until the next round of terrorism. Then everyone will whine about how the CIA wasnt allowed to torture enough brown guys to prevent it and the cycle will re-start.
Considering everyone for the most part already knew the CIA went ape shit after 9/11, today I almost feel better about America for actually deciding to officially put it "all" out there.
WASHINGTON -- President George W. Bush marked June 26, 2003, the UN International Day in Support of Victims of Torture, with a strong statement spelling out America's commitment to eliminating the scourge from the earth.
"Torture anywhere is an affront to human dignity everywhere," he said, adding, "The United States is committed to the worldwide elimination of torture, and we are leading this fight by example. I call on all governments to join with the United States and the community of law-abiding nations in prohibiting, investigating, and prosecuting all acts of torture."
Behind the scenes, however, the agency tasked with carrying out the Bush administration's torture program had no idea what the president was talking about.
The international community and human rights advocates cheered the president's forceful statement. But within the CIA, the statement set off a panicked response about the future of its program of secret prisons and so-called "enhanced interrogation."
The following day, after The Washington Post published a front-page article on the U.S. pledge to not torture terrorism suspects, then-CIA Deputy General Counsel John Rizzo called John Bellinger, the legal adviser to the National Security Council, to figure out what it meant for the U.S. government's own torture program. The answer that ultimately came back: Don't worry about it.
The revelation is contained in the Senate Intelligence Committee's report on the CIA's torture program in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
According to the report, released on Tuesday, Rizzo wrote in an email to other senior CIA officers that he had called Bellinger to "express our surprise and concern at some of the statements attributed to the Administration in the piece, particularly the Presidential statement on the UN International Day in Support of Victims of Torture as well as a quote from the Deputy White House Secretary Scott McClellan that all prisoners being held by the USG [U.S. government] are being treated 'humanely.'"
Rizzo noted that Bush's statement did not appear to contain anything "we can't live with," but he still wanted senior CIA leaders to "seek written reaffirmation" from the White House that the CIA's "ongoing practices ... are to continue," the report says.
On July 3, CIA Director George Tenet sent a memorandum to National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice doing just that. He said he sought the reaffirmation because "recent Administration responses to inquiries and resulting media reporting about the Administration's position have created the impression that these [interrogation] techniques are not used by U.S. personnel and are no longer approved as a policy matter."
Days later, Tenet received the approval he sought.
“Vice President Cheney stated and National Security Advisor Rice agreed that the CIA was executing Administration policy in carrying out its interrogation program," the Senate report reads.
On December 10 2014 04:19 DannyJ wrote: Considering everyone for the most part already knew the CIA went ape shit after 9/11, today I almost feel better about America for actually deciding to officially put it "all" out there.
I would wait with that until something actually changes. By the looks of things the CIA is still trying to pretend nothing bad happened instead of actually admitting they majorly fucked up.
All kinds of ex-CIA heads and agents have fired back at the biased, incomplete report. No interviews, for one. The Hill has some of the criticism and a website of angered agents. The biggest point of contention seems to be how much useful intelligence was gained and how fast the more brutal techniques were employed.
On December 10 2014 07:24 Danglars wrote: All kinds of ex-CIA heads and agents have fired back at the biased, incomplete report. No interviews, for one. The Hill has some of the criticism and a website of angered agents. The biggest point of contention seems to be how much useful intelligence was gained and how fast the more brutal techniques were employed.
Thats weird. People who are now in the line of sight of the Justice department as perjurers and torturers would like to defend themselves. But Danglers is right, they should be given their time in court. What are they, a random black guy or something?
On December 10 2014 07:24 Danglars wrote: All kinds of ex-CIA heads and agents have fired back at the biased, incomplete report. No interviews, for one. The Hill has some of the criticism and a website of angered agents. The biggest point of contention seems to be how much useful intelligence was gained and how fast the more brutal techniques were employed.
'They were employed' is the only bit of it that im interested in. I don't care how useful it was or wasn't. The fact that is happened at all is what matters. I'm sure (almost) every dictator, murderer, horror doctor, whatever that has done terrible crimes thought their reason was valid and worth the cost.
Our standards and morals are whats sets us above the "evil men" and no amount of justification will stop us from being just as bad when we do these things.
On December 10 2014 07:24 Danglars wrote: All kinds of ex-CIA heads and agents have fired back at the biased, incomplete report. No interviews, for one. The Hill has some of the criticism and a website of angered agents. The biggest point of contention seems to be how much useful intelligence was gained and how fast the more brutal techniques were employed.
Yeah, John McCain is such an evil American basher, screw his biased speech!
The report, the declassified executive summary of a larger classified study prepared by the Senate Intelligence Committee, has raised questions about what the president knew and what the C.I.A. told him about an interrogation program that has tarred the United States as a nation that tortures. The emails, memos, reports and other documents examined by the Senate committee collectively portray a White House that approved the brutal questioning of suspects but was kept in the dark about many aspects of the program, including whether it really worked.
Still, the report does not fully answer the question of what Mr. Bush or his advisers knew, in part because the committee did not interview them and instead relied on internal documents or transcripts of interviews conducted by the C.I.A.'s own inspector general. In the days leading up to the release of the report, Mr. Bush and other veterans of his administration have disputed the notion that they were misled.
1) CIA's torture teams lied to the President of the United States. 2) The report is based on internal CIA documents and CIA's internal investigation. No wonder the CIA hacked the committees computers.
On December 10 2014 07:44 Sub40APM wrote: 1) CIA's torture teams lied to the President of the United States.
I'm pretty sure this is a feature of the system and not a bug. Just telling politicians as little as they need to know is a very solid way to hold nobody responsible if something goes south.
In late 2005, Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI) proposed an independent commission to investigate U.S. interrogation policies, which prompted interest within the CIA in destroying videotapes of its interrogations. Although Levin's amendment failed on Nov. 8 of that year and the committee was not yet aware that the tapes existed, the CIA went ahead and destroyed them one day later anyway.
The report, the declassified executive summary of a larger classified study prepared by the Senate Intelligence Committee, has raised questions about what the president knew and what the C.I.A. told him about an interrogation program that has tarred the United States as a nation that tortures. The emails, memos, reports and other documents examined by the Senate committee collectively portray a White House that approved the brutal questioning of suspects but was kept in the dark about many aspects of the program, including whether it really worked.
Still, the report does not fully answer the question of what Mr. Bush or his advisers knew, in part because the committee did not interview them and instead relied on internal documents or transcripts of interviews conducted by the C.I.A.'s own inspector general. In the days leading up to the release of the report, Mr. Bush and other veterans of his administration have disputed the notion that they were misled.
1) CIA's torture teams lied to the President of the United States. 2) The report is based on internal CIA documents and CIA's internal investigation. No wonder the CIA hacked the committees computers.
As for your 2nd point, I found this piece from a post from Stealthblue a oddly funny one :
The CIA — which eventually apologized to the Senate — had accused Feinstein and her committee of improperly removing classified documents from a government network.
'You were not suppose to see that we lied to people, that was private'
EPT
