Posts filed under ‘Torture’
Imagine Being Tortured Every Day for Nine Years
Today marks the 31st anniversary of the massacre at Syria’s infamous Tadmor Prison. In 1980, hundreds of political prisoners were killed there after a failed assassination attempt on then-president Hafez al-Assad. Following the massacre, the prison was used as a tool of fear to quell opposition to the regime. And many of its prisoners were university students.
Tadmor is closed now, but the prison’s dark legacy lives on in the memories of those who survived the brutal torture there.
One of these survivors is Chicagoan Bara Sarraj. In 1984, Bara was a college student in Damascus when he was arrested and taken to Tadmor, where he was tortured almost daily for the next nine years. Now a transplant immunologist at Northwestern University’s School of Medicine, Bara recently sat down and wrote about his time in the prison. He’s posted his memoir online in Arabic, and has graciously shared his story with us.
Listen to Dr. Sarraj’s story here.
Sorry Wingers, Bush Wasn’t Instrumental in the Death of bin Laden
Adam Sewer over at ThePlumLine eviscerates the Republican argument that torture and Bush’s “policies” were at the heart of the capture and killing of Osama bin Laden (emphasis added):
What is notable however, is that the major distinction between Obama and Bush that has formed the basis of GOP criticism of Obama — the President’s rejection of torture — has proven so decisively wrongheaded. Conservatives attempting to attribute successfully killing bin Laden to torture are merely attempting to take credit for what President Bush pointedly failed to do. Far from yielding the necessary intelligence, the two al Qaeda suspects who were waterboarded pointedly resisted identifying the courier whose activities lead to the U.S. discovering Osama bin Laden’s whereabouts. The pro-torture argument ignores the obvious — that if torture was so effective, bin Laden would have been dead long ago. Bin Laden was found through years of painstaking intelligence gathering, not through the barbarous methods supported by many Bush apologists.
One cannot discount how shattering the Obama administration’s killing of Bin Laden has been to the self-image of conservatives who have convinced themselves of that the fight against al Qaeda hinges not just on torture, but on how many times the president says the word “terrorism,” or on Obama’s refusal to engage in juvenile expressions of American toughness.
While we’re far from the moment where terrorism ceases to be a threat, what torture apologists fear most now is a future in which al Qaeda is destroyed without the U.S. embracing the war-on-terror “dark side” that’s become central to their identity. Indeed, having rejected torture, Obama has nevertheless lead the country to its greatest victory in the fight against al Qaeda.
The part I highlighted is the elephant in the room. If torture was/is so effective, why wasn’t bin Laden killed or captured years ago? Too bad the “liberal media” isn’t asking that of the parade of former Bush people who’ve been on teevee for the last week selling their line of bull.
Somebody Waterboarded Donald Rumsfeld
Looks like Donald Rumsfeld got a dressing down by GOP spinmeisters for telling the truth:
AP
Rumsfeld on Monday:
“The United States Department of Defense did not do waterboarding for interrogation purposes to anyone. It is true that some information that came from normal interrogation approaches at Guantanamo did lead to information that was beneficial in this instance. But it was not harsh treatment and it was not waterboarding.”
Rumsfeld today:
I’m told there was some confusion today on some programs…suggesting that I indicated that no one who was waterboarded at Guantanamo provided any information on this. That’s just not true. What I said was no one was waterboarded at Guantanamo by the U.S. military…Three people were waterboarded by the CIA…and then later brought to Guantanamo. In fact, as you point out, the information that came from those individuals was critically important.“
What’s going on here is that Republicans are trying to lay a historical foundation — albeit inaccurate — so the Bush administration’s illegal use of torture harsh interrogation is thought of as something that lead directly to the capture and death of Osama bin Laden, thus justifying it.
Jane Hamsher Harassed and Detained by Military Brass at Quantico
Jane Hamsher is with David House who is trying to visit Pvt. Bradley Manning at Quantico today while carrying a petition with 42,000 signatures requesting humane treatment for Manning. The military isn’t making it easy at all and detained Jane and David for two hours. We’re publishing her tweets as well as David House’s tweets here as a post in case you haven’t been able to follow them on Twitter @JaneHamsher and @DavidMHouse.
More on the concern for Bradley Manning here.
Hillary Clinton – the U.S. Crushes Citizen Activism Too
Hillary Clinton chastised several countries — the usual suspects today for “crushing” their citizens’ activism:
Intolerant governments across the globe are “slowly crushing” activist and advocacy groups that play an essential role in the development of democracy, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Saturday.
She cited a broad range of countries where “the walls are closing in” on civic organizations such as unions, religious groups, rights advocates and other nongovernmental organizations that press for social change and shine a light on governments’ shortcomings.
Among those she named were Zimbabwe, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Cuba, Egypt, Iran, Venezuela, China and Russia.
Meanwhile, this report was released three days ago: Rise in Political Spying Across United States.
More context:
August, 2008 — Denver, Colorado — Democratic convention: Police Force Back DNC Protesters.
September, 2008 — St. Paul, Minnesota — Republican convention: Police Prepare for More Protests.
Hillary Clinton is playing the typical Washington game here — not only with the global community but with the citizens of the United States. It’s called something like pretend you’re better than everyone else. Well we aren’t Hillary — everyone knows it — and it’s time to fess up.
The United States is “slowly crushing” its citizen activists too. Yes, we’re joining the likes of Zimbabwe, the Congo and Ethiopia and the “walls are closing in” here as well.
So please. Cut the holier than thou crap.
Waterboarding Isn’t Waterboarding When We Do It
This study, released in April and conducted by four Harvard University students, is stunning and incredibly revealing as to how the “liberal media” sold its soul (and the soul of the country) while covered for George W. Bush:
The current debate over waterboarding has spawned hundreds of newspaper articles in the last two years alone. However, waterboarding has been the subject of press attention for over a century. Examining the four newspapers with the highest daily circulation in the country, we found a significant and sudden shift in how newspapers characterized waterboarding. From the early 1930s until the modern story broke in 2004, the newspapers that covered waterboarding almost uniformly called the practice torture or implied it was torture: The New York Times characterized it thus in 81.5% (44 of 54) of articles on the subject and The Los Angeles Times did so in 96.3% of articles (26 of 27). By contrast, from 2002‐2008, the studied newspapers almost never referred to waterboarding as torture. The New York Times called waterboarding torture or implied it was torture in just 2 of 143 articles (1.4%). The Los Angeles Times did so in 4.8% of articles (3 of 63). The Wall Street Journal characterized the practice as torture in just 1 of 63 articles (1.6%). USA Today never called waterboarding torture or implied it was torture. In addition, the newspapers are much more likely to call waterboarding torture if a country other than the United States is the perpetrator. In The New York Times, 85.8% of articles (28 of 33) that dealt with a country other than the United States using waterboarding called it torture or implied it was torture while only 7.69% (16 of 208) did so when the United States was responsible. The Los Angeles Times characterized the practice as torture in 91.3% of articles (21 of 23) when another country was the violator, but in only 11.4% of articles (9 of 79) when the United States was the perpetrator.
Read the whole thing — Torture at Times: Waterboarding in the Media — (it’s a pdf file) here.
A Moment of “Unspeakable National Shame”
From Jonathan Turley:
Dick Cheney came out this weekend in an interview with ABC’s Jonathan Karl to proclaim “I was a big supporter of waterboarding.” It is an astonishing public admission since waterboarding is not just illegal but a war crime. It is akin to the Vice President saying that he supported bank robbery or murder-for-hire as a public policy.
The ability of Cheney to openly brag about his taste for torture is the direct result of President Barack Obama blocking any investigation or prosecution of war crimes. For political reasons, Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder have refused to carry out our clear obligations under international law to prosecute for such waterboarding.
[...]
Cheney’s statement should be a moment of unspeakable national shame.
Amen.
American Soldier Waterboards His 4-Year-Old Daughter
Joshua Tabor, a soldier at a base in Tacoma, Washington, flew into a rage after his daughter was unable to recite her ABC’s:
A U.S. soldier has been accused of ‘waterboarding’ his four-year-old daughter because she couldn’t recite the alphabet.
Joshua Tabor admitted to police that he used the CIA torture technique because he was so angry.
As his daughter ‘squirmed’ to get away, Tabor said he submerged her face – upwards – three or four times until the water was lapping around her forehead and jawline.
Tabor, 27, admitted to investigators that his daughter was terrified of water and he had deliberately chosen the punishment.
Shades of Josef Mengele
A new report suggests that CIA doctors “experimented“ on detainees.
Propaganda is an Insidious, Subtle Thing
Example: Keith Olbermann aired a segment tonight about Attorney General Eric Holder’s decision to appoint a special prosecutor (that’s another post) to investigate Bush-era CIA interrogations torture. One of the detainees who figures prominently in the investigation and who figured prominently in Olbermann’s segment was Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. You’ve seen his picture a thousand times. That’s the picture Olbermann used.
He’s a monster, right?
But I remember seeing this picture of Mohammed years ago:
It’s notable that our media — even the “liberals” amongst us – continue to portray people like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in the worst light possible.
The U.S. Isn’t the Light in the Darkness Anymore
There was a time when people who were tortured held out some hope that the torture would be exposed and the United States would step in and stop it. Not anymore.
We not only let ourselves down when we condoned torture, but we let people around the world down. They have no one to turn to now.
Turning Back the Police State
The Supreme Court ruled today that it is illegal to strip search a 13 year old. Hallelujah! A classmate falsely accused the poor kid of “having the equivalent of two Advils” her possession.
What I wonder is how and why this made it all the way to the Supreme Court in the first place.
Red State Commenter: Killing George Tiller Was the “Ethical Thing to Do”
Red State is one of the most popular conservative websites. The comment was made on this thread: BREAKING: Kansas Abortionist Shot, Killed at Church.
Here’s a screen shot:
Our legal system “steal[s] the oxygen from moral vigilantism”? This is what we’re up against folks.
More Photos of the Barbarism That Took Place in Iraq
More of the photos that President Obama doesn’t want the world to see. (Warning: They’re graphic.)
One gets the impression that nobody was in charge over there. Or, that the people who were, were monsters.
Waterboarding is Like Surfing
It’s like “Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys.”
That would be Erich “Mancow” Muller’s impression of waterboarding — per his appearance on Countdown tonight — before he experienced it first-hand and came to see it as torture.
Gah.
Mark Penn Should Go to Work for Fox News
“Democratic strategist” Mark Penn, a former adviser to President Bill Clinton and the guy who is widely credited with driving Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign over a cliff, penned an op-ed for today’s Politicio in which he said that Nancy Pelosi has “caused a split within Democratic ranks at a time when party unity is essential.” Needless to say, Republicans have gotta be lovin’ that!
Thanks Mark. You should go to work for Fox “News.” They love “Democratic strategists” like you — “strategists” who do more to help Republicans than Democrats.
It’s No Secret That the CIA Lies
The wingers are having a fake hissy fit over Nancy Pelosi’s assertion that the CIA “mislead” her when it briefed congress about the torture techniques it was using during the Bush administration. They claim she’s being disrespectful and unpatriotic but their outrage can only be sustained if the “liberal media” and the American people forget the CIA’s relatively recent history of “misleading” government officials, which is out there, in plain sight.
Torture
The “liberal media” has taken us on a circuitous journey from this: George W. Bush, November 7, 2005: “We do not torture.” To this: Joe Scarborough this morning: “If you have any evidence that [torture] is not effective, let me know right now!”
Again, the issue isn’t whether torture works. The issue is whether the Bush administration interrogated people using methods that were against both national and international law. Period.
