Of Tortures and Beatings in Iraq

[dittman]

You really ought to do your research before you speak.

1. in reagans first term the russians shot down a klm flight seymore hersh published a book saying they were on a cia spying mission over russia.(totally disproven)

There was no carpet bombing in Iraq(if there was there would be tens of thousands of civilian casultys. To date an estimated 6,000 civilians have died and that includes terrerist attacks)

Because the europeans didnt have the balls to take care of there own backyeard we were asked to take care of there business. Stupid on our part

The present administration has never said that there was a link between queada or saddam with 9-11 but they have said and are constantly backed up even by the 2 heads of the 9-11 commission that al-queada(sp) and Iraq had a relationship

anybody that would quote mike moore is totally brain dead. he and his agent were told over a year ago that disney could not prticipate in its release and the only time he said anything was when it was about to be released obviously he learned from mel gibson.

and the answer to your last question i am not nor was i a supporter of the war(I have a son-in-law in Iraq) But the reason that is is because i see the same thing that happened in viet Nam.
This is the only thing that viet nam and iraq have in common, and that is i see the media and the politicians beginning to trash the
troops. But in response to your question I still beleave there was and is wmds. What he did to the kurds, and knowing that given a half a chance he would do the same to the U.S Bush never said we were in imminent danger but we must strike before we are.
saddam was evil reincarnated and he had to be taaken out and he was

 

[lenharper]

I have done my research.

Carpet bombing is the wrong term, sorry, but the US has been bombing the shit out of that country for ten years.

We are talking about Iraq and the Europeans never asked for US involvement. Or is that the new reason for the war (replacing your earlier reason(s) death threats on George Bush the elder, presense of WMD etc etc?

Dick Cheney has, on television numerous times, said there is/was a link between Osama and Saddam -- he has since retracted these statements but he did say them. George Bush has said the same thing as well. And he has said it both before and after the reports of the 911 commission were made public.

I have never quoted Michael Moore -- but FYI Moore spoke publically about the content of his current movie as early as the 2002 Oscars.

The media is not trashing the troop. The media has questioned the conduct of a few troops and "independant contractors" ie; mercenaries in the emply of the US government. And I do hope your son in law returns from his tour safely.

 

[dittman]

obviously you know not what you speak of yes mikey may have spoke about his movie a couple of years ago, but the big row started just before the release of his movie and it was instigated by him and his agent and it was to put more butts in the chair disney said that if he could find some other distributor for the movie they would sell the rights to it. Mikey is without a doubt intellectually dishonest.

the europeans asked us to take care of the problem in serbia and bosnia because they didnt have the balls to do it themselves.

Yes dick cheney has talked about the link between osama and saddam but never ever has he said there was a link between them over 9-11. What you are talking about is the preliminary report written by a runaway staff, seized upon by the media and other people that said there never ever was any kind of a link. The heads of the 9-11 commission had to do the sunday talk show circut and refute their own staff.

 

[Makhno]

What is "torture" anyway?

This Won't Hurt Much
Terry Jones
The Guradian U.K.

Wednesday June 16, 2004

For some time now, I've been trying to find out where my son goes after choir practice. He simply refuses to tell me. He says it's no business of mine where he goes after choir practice and it's a free country.

Now it may be a free country, but if people start going just anywhere they like after choir practice, goodness knows whether we'll have a country left to be free. I mean, he might be going to anarchist meetings or Islamic study groups. How do I know?

The thing is, if people don't say where they're going after choir practice, this country is at risk. So I have been applying a certain amount of pressure on my son to tell me where he's going. To begin with I simply put a bag over his head and chained him to a radiator. But did that persuade him? Does the Pope eat kosher?

My wife had the gall to suggest that I might be going a bit too far. So I put a bag over her head and chained her to the radiator. But I still couldn't persuade my son to tell me where he goes after choir practice.

I tried starving him, serving him only cold meals and shaving his facial hair off, keeping him in stress positions, not turning his light off, playing loud music outside his cell door - all the usual stuff that any concerned parent will do to find out where their child is going after choir practice. But it was all to no avail.

I hesitated to gravitate to harsher interrogation methods because, after all, he is my son. Then Donald Rumsfeld came to my rescue.

I read in the New York Times last week that a memo had been prepared for the defence secretary on March 6 2003. It laid down the strictest guidelines as to what is and what is not torture. Because, let's face it, none of us want to actually torture our children, in case the police get to hear about it.

The March 6 memo, prepared for Mr Rumsfeld explained that what may look like torture is not really torture at all. It states that: if someone "knows that severe pain will result from his actions, if causing such harm is not his objective, he lacks the requisite specific intent even though the defendant did not act in good faith".

What this means in understandable English is that if a parent, in his anxiety to know where his son goes after choir practice, does something that will cause severe pain to his son, it is only "torture" if the causing of that severe pain is his objective. If his objective is something else - such as finding out where his son goes after choir practice - then it is not torture.

Mr Rumsfeld's memo goes on: "a defendant" (by which he means a concerned parent) "is guilty of torture only if he acts with the express purpose of inflicting severe pain or suffering on a person within his control".

Couldn't be clearer. If your intention is to extract information, you cannot be accused of torture.

In fact, the report went further. It said, if a parent "has a good-faith belief [that] his actions will not result in prolonged mental harm, he lacks the mental state necessary for his actions to constitute torture". So all you've got to do to avoid accusations of child abuse is to say that you didn't think it would cause any lasting harm to the child. Easy peasy!

I currently have a lot of my son's friends locked up in the garage, and I'm applying electrical charges to their genitals and sexually humiliating them in order to get them to tell me where my son goes after choir practice.

Dick Cheney's counsel, David S Addington, says that's just fine. William J Haynes, the US defence department's general counsel, agrees it's just fine. And so does the US air force general counsel, Mary Walker.

In fact, practically everybody in the US administration seems to think it's just fine, except for the state department lawyer, William H Taft IV, who perversely claims that I might be opening the door to people applying electrical charges to my genitals and sexually humiliating me.

So I'm going to round up all the children in the neighbourhood, chain them and set dogs on them. I might accidentally kill one or two - but I won't have intended to - and perhaps I'll take some photos of my wife standing on the dead bodies, and then I'll show the photos to the other kids, and finally, perhaps, I might get to find out where my son goes after choir practice. After all, I'll only be doing what the US administration has been condoning since 9/11.

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Terry Jones is a writer, film director, actor in Monty Python