Nope. Not Torture.

[stdreb27]

Originally Posted by uneverno
http:///forum/post/3051071
k, sorry, I'm truly lost now.
I understand the concept of taking an argument to its logical extreme. I thought I was doing the same thing.
The logic train has somehow derailed for both of us. Would you mind re-iterating how and where?
Well, you used a situation of torture, and said it didn't work because of x. I don't really think that is much of an aplicable situation. Mainly because the goals were different. Aquiring actionable data, and torturing people for religious beliefs are 2 different ball games.
So I pointed out that the Islam basically converted people at gun point (or sword point) Using your set of criteria. I don't agree with the statement, just trying to illustrate how that was a poor example.
But then you took it a step further.
hence, my statement.

 

[uneverno]

Originally Posted by stdreb27
http:///forum/post/3051405
Well, you used a situation of torture, and said it didn't work because of x. I don't really think that is much of an aplicable situation. Mainly because the goals were different. Aquiring actionable data, and torturing people for religious beliefs are 2 different ball games.
So I pointed out that the Islam basically converted people at gun point (or sword point) Using your set of criteria. I don't agree with the statement, just trying to illustrate how that was a poor example.
But then you took it a step further.
hence, my statement.
Ah - ok.
Agreed - Islam did exactly that. Christianity did too - about 300 years-ish earlier.
My point was that, while in the short run it may succeed, in the in the long run, torture fails.
If real torture failed to break McCain et. al, how do we expect torture light to break those we keep in Gitmo?
In other words, if torture doesn't work, and waterboarding isn't torture, what are we hoping to accomplish with it?

 

[stdreb27]

Originally Posted by uneverno
http:///forum/post/3051926
Ah - ok.
Agreed - Islam did exactly that. Christianity did too - about 300 years-ish earlier.
My point was that, while in the short run it may succeed, in the in the long run, torture fails.
If real torture failed to break McCain et. al, how do we expect torture light to break those we keep in Gitmo?
In other words, if torture doesn't work, and waterboarding isn't torture, what are we hoping to accomplish with it?
But in these cases with the rougher treatment, it did work.
You've got a former VP saying it did. And a sitting president refusing to release said memo's. There is only one logical conclusion to why he wouldn't...
You aren't talking a conversion, you just want him to break for a short while, you just need some information. The point of the whole thing wasn't rehabilitation, just a momentary period of weakness...

 

[oscardeuce]

I just finished watching the DVD "Last Flight Home". It tells the story of a group of volunteers searching for downed WWII aircraft to find the graves of MIA airmen.
In one of the interviews, a Imperial Japanese Army soldier tells of taking an American Airman out to a field, making him dig his own grave, and beheading him. All the American had to say befroe his death is "this is absurd".
Maybe if we take a hint from history on how to handle extremists, we could have a stable relationship like we currently have with Japan.

 

[veni vidi vici]

Originally Posted by uneverno
http:///forum/post/3051926
If real torture failed to break McCain et. al, how do we expect torture light to break those we keep in Gitmo?
In other words, if torture doesn't work, and waterboarding isn't torture, what are we hoping to accomplish with it?
If im not mistaken McCain and almost all of the POWs at one time or another broke and spilled their guts.
The difference in what we did and the Vietnamese did was we used fear they used physical pain.
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/sto...52-663,00.html

 

[taznut]

wow... i believe the first, and most important, question is how far are we willing to go to get information... i think a good case has been make that the IIT (inhanced interrogation tech.) are torture (and is why they are done at gitmo outside of the US)... are we willing as a country to devalue ourselves and do this??? knowing that it has become propoganda for the extremists to recruit??? you are right when you say IIT were legalized, but lets look at why; the Bush administration picked the people that would approve them and ignored everyone else... i understand that these IIT are not on the same level as most of the other techniques used in the past but does that make it ok???
second, assuming that the US is willing to devalue itself by torturing POWs we have to know whether it works... although Obama hasnt released the documents showing one way of the other (which i agree, makes it look like it may have worked) all the briefings given to congress by the CIA has said that it does not... why would the CIA lie about this, it makes them look bad...
overall, i dont think the ends justify the means.... we are helping them recruit more poeple than we are stopping and we dont even know that the IITs work.. we have priciples that we need to stand on and saying that we are in a time of war should not justify ignoring them...
and why are we really in Iraq??? for the reasons we were told (to stabalize the region) or for the oil??? some of the IIT were used to find a link between alqida (sorry about the spelling) and Iraq (which we now dont think exists)... if we truely are there for reasons other than what we say, how is the US any better than the extremists??? starting war, killing, torture, etc to further our interests???

 

[taznut]

and if the IITs dont work are we willing to go farther??? which would take us into torture territory no matter how hard we tried to justify other wise???

 

[veni vidi vici]

Originally Posted by taznut
http:///forum/post/3053507
wow... i believe the first, and most important, question is how far are we willing to go to get information... i think a good case has been make that the IIT (inhanced interrogation tech.) are torture (and is why they are done at gitmo outside of the US)... are we willing as a country to devalue ourselves and do this??? knowing that it has become propoganda for the extremists to recruit??? you are right when you say IIT were legalized, but lets look at why; the Bush administration picked the people that would approve them and ignored everyone else... i understand that these IIT are not on the same level as most of the other techniques used in the past but does that make it ok???
second, assuming that the US is willing to devalue itself by torturing POWs we have to know whether it works... although Obama hasnt released the documents showing one way of the other (which i agree, makes it look like it may have worked) all the briefings given to congress by the CIA has said that it does not... why would the CIA lie about this, it makes them look bad...
overall, i dont think the ends justify the means.... we are helping them recruit more poeple than we are stopping and we dont even know that the IITs work.. we have priciples that we need to stand on and saying that we are in a time of war should not justify ignoring them...
and why are we really in Iraq??? for the reasons we were told (to stabalize the region) or for the oil??? some of the IIT were used to find a link between alqida (sorry about the spelling) and Iraq (which we now dont think exists)... if we truely are there for reasons other than what we say, how is the US any better than the extremists??? starting war, killing, torture, etc to further our interests???
Here is my thought on the whole issue.I have mixed feeling on torture even though i do not believe enhanced interrogation is torture .
I think it was a huge mistake to ever let this be debated in the public and it should have remained a classified issue.
Haveing said that i dont believe enhanced interrogation should be standard operating procedure and only used in extreme cases. I believe the Bush Admin used it appropriately.

 

[veni vidi vici]

Originally Posted by taznut
http:///forum/post/3053508
and if the IITs dont work are we willing to go farther??? which would take us into torture territory no matter how hard we tried to justify other wise???
As far a terrorist that kill Americans ...Yes.
Whats the difference in convicting him and then putting him /her to death.If your going to put him to death you might as well get info while doing so.Give him/her a option tell us what we want to know and serve life or die a slow death and tell us anyway.

 

[bang guy]

Torturing captives as US policy endangers our troops, is unreliable, and is against what this country is all about.

 

[veni vidi vici]

Originally Posted by Bang Guy
http:///forum/post/3053511
Torturing captives as US policy endangers our troops, is unreliable, and is against what this country is all about.
Like i said before,this should have never been brought out into the public.Who ever leaked it was a idiot.

 

[stdreb27]

Originally Posted by taznut
http:///forum/post/3053507
knowing that it has become propoganda for the extremists to recruit????
By that same token, why vote for a democrat, knowing what he will say will be used as propaganda for the extreemist already recruited and trained and debating on whether he should blow himself up or kill himself flying an airplane into our building?
All he has to do is listen to murtha calling our troops rapists, kerry saying our troops run around raping and pillaging, or harry reid standing up and saying the war in iraq is lost...
Originally Posted by taznut
http:///forum/post/3053507
second, assuming that the US is willing to devalue itself by torturing POWs we have to know whether it works... although Obama hasnt released the documents showing one way of the other (which i agree, makes it look like it may have worked) all the briefings given to congress by the CIA has said that it does not... why would the CIA lie about this, it makes them look bad...
Unless you're the POTUS or the veep there is no way you can actually know that...
Originally Posted by taznut
http:///forum/post/3053507
overall, i dont think the ends justify the means.... we are helping them recruit more poeple than we are stopping and we dont even know that the IITs work.. we have priciples that we need to stand on and saying that we are in a time of war should not justify ignoring them...
We have done great evil. Holding someone upside down and pouring water on him. By discussing putting someone in a box and dropping a bug on him. You are right. The torture we have done over the past few years while bush was in office, absolutely caused those 19 nuts to fly into the WTC. Blow up the USS Cole, plant a bomb in the WTC in the late 80's. They can after all see into the future.
Originally Posted by taznut
http:///forum/post/3053507
and why are we really in Iraq??? for the reasons we were told (to stabalize the region) or for the oil??? some of the IIT were used to find a link between alqida (sorry about the spelling) and Iraq (which we now dont think exists)... if we truely are there for reasons other than what we say, how is the US any better than the extremists??? starting war, killing, torture, etc to further our interests???
Lets think for a second, oh yes here it is, I see where it is now, in the 60's Nixon gassed a buncha blacks, and kept them locked up where they were raped and really tortured. Then they filled up all these mass graves with dead democrats, because they didn't agree with him. Oh and here is the part with Regan offered people's families who go into a foreign country and blow themselves up in malls and movie theaters money as incentive.
you're soo right, I'd never thought of it that way...

 

[taznut]

Originally Posted by Bang Guy
http:///forum/post/3053511
Torturing captives as US policy endangers our troops, is unreliable, and is against what this country is all about.
thank you bang... this is my point... it doesnt matter whether it works or not, it is against what this country is about...
i love all this debate of how going against our countries values is the only way to protect ourselves... and the fact that sooooo many people agree with this is insane, IMO...
Like i said before,this should have never been brought out into the public.Who ever leaked it was a idiot.
i am currently reading "Speaking Freely: the trials of the first amendment" by Floyd Abrams
This argument is the same one used to prevent the NY times from publishing the Pentagon papers and was shot down in the Supreme court even though most of the Judges agreed that they could do harm to the country... by pushing this, not only are you ok with allowing this country to torture people but lets through the first amendment out them window with it..

 

[uneverno]

So, not torture by decree of degree.
Is it cruel and/or unusual?
The reason I ask is that the cases we know about have taken place off shore, which leads me to believe that those who engaged in the practice were, with malice aforethought, willing to risk a violation of the Geneva Convention, but not of the Constitution.
As for differences in degree, would it then be fair to characterize real child or spousal abuse as only that which leaves marks or broken bones?

 

[veni vidi vici]

Originally Posted by taznut
http:///forum/post/3053726
Like i said before,this should have never been brought out into the public.Who ever leaked it was a idiot.
i am currently reading "Speaking Freely: the trials of the first amendment" by Floyd Abrams
This argument is the same one used to prevent the NY times from publishing the Pentagon papers and was shot down in the Supreme court even though most of the Judges agreed that they could do harm to the country... by pushing this, not only are you ok with allowing this country to torture people but lets through the first amendment out them window with it..
You have the first amendment and keeping information secret mixed together.These are 2 different subjects.
Do you believe the American public need to know all our countries security secrets?
I also dont think Enhanced Interrogation is torture either .

 

[uneverno]

Originally Posted by Veni Vidi Vici
http:///forum/post/3053830
Do you believe the American public need to know all our countries security secrets?
I do, and the Freedom of Information Act would seem to concur.
I had a hand in the decisions made through my tax dollar support. I have a right to decide what I want those dollars to be spent on.

 

[stdreb27]

Originally Posted by taznut
http:///forum/post/3053726
thank you bang... this is my point... it doesnt matter whether it works or not, it is against what this country is about...
i love all this debate of how going against our countries values is the only way to protect ourselves... and the fact that sooooo many people agree with this is insane, IMO...
So accepting your "non-insane" premise that water boarding is torture, does that mean when the Navy water boards navy seals, we are torturing our own soldiers? And where the hell were you to stand up for the people fighting for our freedom? That we "just as bad as the terrorists" were torturing?
2nd against what this country is about, lets try nationalization of the Auto industry, and something our country is really about.

 

[uneverno]

Originally Posted by stdreb27
http:///forum/post/3053855
does that mean when the Navy water boards navy seals, we are torturing our own soldiers?
Of course not. Is there no difference between training and enacting?
Perhaps what we should be training our troops for is beheading.
Oh - wait. That might be conterproductive.
Silly argument.

 

[veni vidi vici]

Originally Posted by uneverno
http:///forum/post/3053848
I do, and the Freedom of Information Act would seem to concur.
I had a hand in the decisions made through my tax dollar support. I have a right to decide what I want those dollars to be spent on.
I disagree,you do not have the right to know all that goes on behind the scenes at the cost of security for this country nor do you need to know.Or should we start telling our enemys what our intentions are in advance from now on?

 

[oscardeuce]

Originally Posted by uneverno
http:///forum/post/3053848
I do, and the Freedom of Information Act would seem to concur.
I had a hand in the decisions made through my tax dollar support. I have a right to decide what I want those dollars to be spent on.
Where do I sign up to allocate my tax dollars?
Let's see... defense 100%