Bush Torture Memos - Page 3

On April 17 2009 09:34 Tyrant wrote:
I never understood American politics in regard to torture. If someone aimed to harm my homeland and I were in charge of protecting it, the mother fuckers bent on destruction would be lucky to look as good as the guy shackled to the bed from the movie seven when I got done with him.

I think war is terrible, but trying to combat guerrilla tactics with politically correct punitive measures is futile. The only thing you will accomplish is letting them know that there really are no consequences for aggression against said land and perpetuate the conflict.

On April 17 2009 10:17 Chef wrote:

I think the idea is when you KNOW the person has information and is dangerous. Not that you want him to admit he's dangerous. The distinction is made because if you torture someone you're not sure has information, they'll just invent information. The idea is that if someone does have the information, they won't lie (although I have no idea if that belief is accurate).

On April 17 2009 10:13 micronesia wrote:
Being afraid of some insects isn't all that irrational....

Even most of you who are like 'who cares' would be scared shitless in many insect-related situations.

On April 17 2009 10:12 Kwark wrote:

Phobia. An irrational fear.

On April 17 2009 10:27 ShoCkeyy wrote:


What if it wasn't a phobia. It was like Red fire ants or something of the sort? You know scorpions....

On April 17 2009 10:23 IntoTheWow wrote:


Yeah and since all this is subjective and there's no trial I could kidnap any immigrant in the airport that "looks dangerous", say that he's a threat to my country and torture.

On April 17 2009 10:37 Chef wrote:

I'm sorry if it sounded like I was implying I agree with the practice. I make no judgement on it because I do not have enough information, and neither do you or the general media.

It's really more of an opinion based in whether you believe in the individual, or you believe in the collective, if we're to believe the limited information we've been given. If you believe in the individual, you say that no one should ever have their rights infringed by the government, no matter what the cost. If you believe in the collective, you might think "If 100 people are captured without trial, 99 of them are innocent, but 1 of them would have lead to the murder of over 100 people, then it's immediately worth it."

Personally, I believe in the individual because I've been raised in a culture which celebrates the individual, and I don't really care if I get murdered by terrorists or not. But at the same time, because I'm white, and was born in Canada, I know it's just about impossible to be captured by CSIS and sent to some country to be tortured. In that respect, I don't really care what happens to some strangers, and it saves the lives of other strangers so strictly speaking numbers, it seems more moral to go with the result that protects the most people.

On April 17 2009 10:47 latent wrote:
In Obama's defense, the guy has to make *some* exceptions to maintain broad bipartisan support. Otherwise he risks isolating himself completely and incurring the wrath of a very dedicated opposition constituency.

Yeah and since all this is subjective and there's no trial I could kidnap any immigrant in the airport that "looks dangerous", say that he's a threat to my country and torture.

On April 17 2009 10:29 micronesia wrote:

Then that wouldn't be a mental torture; it would be a physical one. They could cut to the chase and just start punching the guy/gal in the face.

On April 17 2009 10:58 Tyrant wrote:


I'm not talking about arbitrarily picking people up off the street. I'm glad you took a few words I said and made a scenario that is way off base and something that no sane person would do. I'm a measure twice cut once kind of guy meaning that I think the most important factor in war is intel. Nothing would be done without extensive / reliable recon.

I think torture is perfectly acceptable when you know that they know something that you need to know in order to prevent something terrible from happening. This isn't something for gut feelings or hunches or pulling names out of an address book or like you said randomly pulling people off the street.

On April 17 2009 09:33 Jibba wrote:

It seems like it took more effort for you to create that link than it did for me to Google and paste it.

On April 17 2009 11:00 ShoCkeyy wrote:


But how would they know their phobia in the first place?

On April 17 2009 10:58 Tyrant wrote:


I'm not talking about arbitrarily picking people up off the street. I'm glad you took a few words I said and made a scenario that is way off base and something that no sane person would do. I'm a measure twice cut once kind of guy meaning that I think the most important factor in war is intel. Nothing would be done without extensive / reliable recon.

I think torture is perfectly acceptable when you know that they know something that you need to know in order to prevent something terrible from happening. This isn't something for gut feelings or hunches or pulling names out of an address book or like you said randomly pulling people off the street.

On April 17 2009 11:12 micronesia wrote:

Er, I don't understand what you are getting at.

On April 17 2009 11:15 IntoTheWow wrote:


I do not know a lot about American law, but doesn't this shit all over the Bill of Rights? lol

On April 17 2009 10:48 IntoTheWow wrote:


You don't but then you write 2 more paragraphs? I'm confused.

If I'm not to have an opinion why are we even discussing this matter.



No it's not lol. People are not apples or bananas, you can't do counting them as if you were inside a grocery store picking rot ones, just not to ruin a box. We have come a long way since that I would like to believe. Tortures are not to be used, that's why countries do this big fancy meetings and sign papers, to come to an agreenment in topics, such as this one.



Non sequitur.