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Oh, and about Cheney's claim regarding confidential documents?

Cheney Edges Away From Claim That CIA Docs Will Prove Torture Worked

There’s a very revealing moment buried in  an interview that Dick Cheney gave to Fox News last night that really gives away his game plan on torture.

Specifically: Cheney seemed to edge away from the claim that the documents he’s asking the CIA to declassify will prove unequivocally that torture worked.

The key moment came when his interviewer said: “You want some documents declassified having to do with waterboarding.” Cheney replied:

“Yes, but the way I would describe them is they have to do with the detainee program, the interrogation program. It’s not just waterboarding. It’s the interrogation program that we used for high-value detainees. There were two reports done that summarize what we learned from that program, and I think they provide a balanced view.”

Bear with me here, because this is crucial. Cheney is carefully saying that the documents summarize what we learned from the overall interrogation program. Torture, of course, was only a component of that program. So he’s clearly saying that the docs summarize what was learned from a program that included non-torture techniques, too.

Here’s why this is important. It dovetails precisely with what Senator Carl Levin, who has also seen these docs, says about them. Levin claims the docs don’t do anything to “connect acquisition of valuable intelligence to the use of the abusive techniques.”

Link.

This fits what others have said regarding these particular documents.  Further, it supports the claims of other interrogators who claimed the major pieces of information were obtained through traditional means, not torture.

Last edited by bratboy (2009-06-03 8:03 am)

But see the following links if you're serious about this:

http://washingtontimes.com/news/2009/may/04/lawye...

and

http://www.nationaljournal.com/njmagazine/or_2009...

bratboy wrote:

Oh, and just a quick reminder of the truly stellar company you find yourself in, res:

Torture "is basically subject to perception," CIA counter-terrorism lawyer Jonathan Fredman told military and intelligence officials at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, prison in 2002, meeting minutes said. "If the detainee dies, you're doing it wrong."

Link.

John Yoo, the deputy assistant attorney-general, drafted a memo stating that physical torture “must be equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death”.

Link.

Really stand-up individuals.  Be proud!

Gnarly links, dude....

I'm guessing that the National Journal link is this one. And the Washington Times article is probably this one. But I need better search tools to score the putative matches.

Justice lawyers sought interrogation limits
The attorneys were overruled after arguing the tactics were wrong   updated 10:40 a.m. CT, Sun., June 7, 2009

WASHINGTON (AP) - Senior Justice Department lawyers in 2005 sought to limit tough interrogation tactics against terror suspects, but were overruled.

James Comey, then the No. 2 official at the Justice Department, tried to convince Attorney General Alberto Gonzales that some of the tactics were wrong and would eventually damage the reputation of the department.

The New York Times reported Comey sent an e-mail at the time describing his efforts to curtail the use and combination of the tactics that critics call torture.

"I told him the people who were applying pressure now would not be there when the (expletive) hit the fan," Comey wrote in an e-mail obtained by the Times. "It would be Alberto Gonzales in the bull's-eye. I told him it was my job to protect the department and the AG. and that I could not agree to this because it was wrong."

Argued the tactics were wrong
A person familiar with Comey's concerns, speaking on condition of anonymity, told The Associated Press that Comey sought to put limits on the use of the interrogation tactics because he argued they were wrong on moral and ethical grounds, and they didn't work.

Gee. It sounds from his account, that the interrogators were behaving exactly like the Gestapo and NKVD (KGB) in extracting information and confessions to further their political goals.

False confessions are rewarded, anything else is punished. Anyone ever heard of Skinner's Black Box behavioral modification experiements?

Skinner effectively laid the ground work for the theoretical underpinnings of "brain-washing"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operant_conditioning