There’s a bit of silver lining in the torture controversy I must mention. A Navy lawyer named Alberto Mora, a Cuban-American, won the Profile in Courage Award for standing up to Rumsfeld and putting a stop to “aggressive interrogations”, i.e., torture, at Guantanamo Bay when this stuff first came up early in the Bush first administration. There was also a Lt. Col. in the Air Force who was commandant of the trainers who used these techniques to train pilots to resist torture by our enemies who also advised against use of these methods and plainly said why: it’s illegal torture and it doesn’t work. Somewhere in the bowels of the FBI is an interrogation team leader who also stood up at Gitmo and withdrew his crew rather than have any part of the torture of detainees. Similarly, the Navy Criminal Interrogation Task Force team at Gitmo was ordered to “stand clear” on request from the CITF force on site. Both the FBI team leader and CITF commander went all the way to Gitmo’s commanding general to object and when the first Gitmo commandant stopped it upon the request of these trained interrogators, Rumsfeld changed commandants and the torture proceeded. Let’s not forget the State Dept. counsel, Zelikow, who sent a memo around to CIA, DOD and the White House telling everyone the OLC memos were full of shit and did not correctly state the law and history of these techniques. Not only does this mean that there are good Americans to be celebrated for their heroism, it also means that everyone who knew what was being ordered knew that it was torture because they had been bluntly told. There’s a special place in hell for Condi Rice, who gave the green light as NSC advisor.
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Category Archives: General
April 24, 2009
Turns out my instinct to hang waterboarders from a tall tree wasn’t so far off the mark. After World War II, at the so-called “Tokyo Trials”, an international military commission tried, convicted and hanged Japanese for the war crime of waterboarding. There are many sources for this information, for example John McCain in November of 2007.
Those who forget history are destined to repeat it.
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April 23, 2009
I’d like to start a lynch mob to hang America’s torture masters from the nearest tall tree, but I’m not sure that’s exactly the right tactic for upholding the rule of law.
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April 20, 2009
TODAY’S THOUGHT
We all live under an implacable, unappealable death sentence with an indeterminate date of execution.
Cosmic Hand of God?
April 10, 2009
The best television reporting on Defense Sec. Gates’ budget plans:
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | M – Th 11p / 10c | |||
| Full Metal Budget | ||||
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April 9, 2009
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HAPPY EASTER
As I often do, I had some passing conversation with a few mature men that drink coffee at the Evil Empire Starbucks today and quite naturally in the passing acquaintence bonhomie of men of a certain age, the question of Easter plans came up. One thing led to another and I mentioned that there were spring and winter festivals all through human civilization, per an earlier post. Of course, one of the men scoffed at the idea and I just had to pile on. Not just that, I said, but Jesus isn’t even the first or nearly the only god worshipped who was believed to have lived, died and been resurrected. If I said that his reply was “Nonsense!” or “Balderdash!”, it would be inaccurate, but for the sake of the sanctity and seriousness of the subject of the divine, I’ll not verbatim repeat his words, but insist that the offered examples encompass the gist of his remarks.
Continue reading
April 6, 2009 (updated)
I had to share this video from The Onion, but BE FORWARNED! AUDIO IS NOT SAFE FOR WORK! NSFW! I felt the use of profanity was appropriate to the subject matter, myself, and was not offended. Moreover, it amused the hell out of me. This one came to me from MindOverMary. Thanks! (I think?)
SPEAKING OF THERE BEING NO END TO IT …
Another James Dobson/Focus on the Family associate doing a sex related perp walk. Read allaboutit.
April 5, 2009
shut up, he explained
Today is palm Sunday and just in my random mind, I wondered if Jesus turned the water at the wedding party into a particular kind of wine. I’m sure it was kosher, but was it Manischewitz?
As many of you know, Easter as the time of the crucifixion is a little bit of a charade that happened due to Roman Empire politics. The people of the Roman Empire had many gods, as you know, and from time before there were records, pre-history in other words, people all over the world had celebrated Spring with big parties. Christmas took the place of winter soltice celebrations, etc., etc. So, in order to smooth the transition of Rome from a pantheist state to a monotheist state, there had to be parties to substitute or the hoi poloi wouldn’t have been willing to make the change. Easter moves, in part, to get the calendar and the moon and the orbit of the planet around the sun to all align with the end of winter and the start of spring. It’s so everyone can know when it’s time to plant. Of course, then you have to throw in Passover, the Jewish holiday that goes back to the enslavement in Egypt and the legends of Moses the liberator and law-giver. Continue reading
April 3, 2009
It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s … WHAT THE HELL?
I don’t know where Andrew Sullivan finds these things, but here’s Superman, India style:
April 2, 2009
Chairman of the Bored
SINATRA SPEAKS!
All hell is breaking loose here! Men came and took the big, soft blue things I slept on in the room with the flickering, talking screen. They took the big metal and wooden desk I hid myself and my pretties under. He says men are coming with loud machines and that when they are done, there will be no cat smells, no cat hairs and the stains of my cat barf will be gone from the carpet. He’s moving other things around. The white post-feline-modernist performance art/installation is now back in the flickering screen room. He says other things are also to be moved. Big things are going on outside — I’ve never seen such fat robins and jays; what made them get such big bellies? He tried to feed me some new food, but I showed him and held fast and wouldn’t eat a bit of it. Maybe now he sees who is in charge. I spent all day yesterday charging out from under things and touching his ankles. Doesn’t he know it was April Fools? Dumb humans.
No wonder cats are in charge.