More Bush Double Talk on Waterboarding

so what dude, he's fine, got scared, yet survived totally unscathed.

It's not like his fingernails are being pulled off, or his testicles blowtorched. Point is the waterborded will survive, the victims of a bomb WILL NOT.

So you are willing to trade a few minutes of discomfort to one person for the lives of possible thousands of terror bomb victims..... right

Yea...see...

I have this outrageous ideas that the ends don't justify the means. How evil of me.

Yes it is outrageous, It's absolutely absurd, you would rather see countless people die than to have one terrorism suspect have water poured on his face. Un fucking believable

Yea. My ethics are wrong. Love the tolerance from the right!

Then again, I'm just an anti-american moron!! HAR HAR HAR!

See, I have these things called ethical standards. And while I hate seeing people die, I'm not ready to compromise these standards. You know, those standards, such as basic human dignity and rights? Any of this ringing bell? Making any sense? No? Of course not. I wouldn't expect a right-winged, gun-toting, jingoistic bigot to get it. As long as you're in the position of safety and power, we can take those basic human rights and burn them. Who gives a fuck, right? Riiight?

So yea. I'm against torture in its entirety. I think that the ends don't justify the means. I'm of the opinion that torture makes us worse than them. If that makes me evil in your eyes, so be it. You're the one whose so paranoid about a military state? Seems awfully hypocritical of you to give them the ability to torture.

First I do not agree that waterboarding is torture, I am most certainly not a bigot, or even a right winger. But I do agree with your side of the story, in much the same way I feel about the death penalty. If the system was perfect I would never see a problem with executing proven murderers, but the fact is it is not, there have been people in recent history proven innocent after they were executed.

But we're not talking about death here. I think breaking legs, and fingers, cutting body parts off. Impalement, ugh anyway that's what represents torture to me.

You point out my wariness of a police state, it's already here. And it's because of your side of the equasion, it's so easy for you liberals to give give give, when it's someone els' dollars, but I don't want to pay for someone to sit on their ass and make babies while I bust my ass 60 hours a week for what I need. And the government lets me keep some of what I earn, what I spent the majority of my life doing, my time my body my labor. They let me keep some. And at any given time a politician by dipping into my pockets can buy some quick votes from the "less fortunate" Does that make make me more fortunate? NO I make decisions that earn me what I have, I have never recieved a handout in order to get where I am, not by luck, by hard work. And when you tell me I am just more fortunate it trivializes all of my effort.

I believe in personal responsibility not government welfare. It's a sickness that has, does, and will destroy great nations.

So back on track, if you were a federal agent, in possession of an islamic extremist, you have him in custody because someone turned him in believing they have information vital to prevent an attack and save hundreds possibly thousands of lives. How would you get the information?

First I do not agree that waterboarding is torture

So we can go off of the impressions and anecdotes of a few, or we can go off of the data gathered by thousands of researchers...

So back on track, if you were a federal agent, in possession of an islamic extremist, you have him in custody because someone turned him in believing they have information vital to prevent an attack and save hundreds possibly thousands of lives. How would you get the information?

Constitutionally, and ethically.

So we can go off of the impressions and anecdotes of a few, or we can go off of the data gathered by thousands of researchers... Constitutionally, and ethically.

How would you go about getting the information out of them?

First I do not agree that waterboarding is torture, I am most certainly not a bigot, or even a right winger. But I do agree with your side of the story, in much the same way I feel about the death penalty. If the system was perfect I would never see a problem with executing proven murderers, but the fact is it is not, there have been people in recent history proven innocent after they were executed.

Well, the death penalty is another issue altogether. Even for Osama I would not advocate the death penalty.

But we're not talking about death here. I think breaking legs, and fingers, cutting body parts off. Impalement, ugh anyway that's what represents torture to me.

Torture does not necessarily have to leave permanent physical damage. For instance, I would consider rape torture, though it most often does not leave permanent physical damage.

How would you go about getting the information out of them?

I would hire someone more qualified, first of all. Secondly, I would ensure that they tried more conventional means.

I don't see how you can even claim for or against waterboarding when it has not happened to you. It makes you feel like you're going to drown, and what they tell you on FoxNews is the sugar coated version of the story, you and I both know very well that behind closed doors shit is a lot worse than what we're being spoon fed.

I'd like to think we could have better means of extracting "information" than waterboarding.

Now, let's back it up a few steps, what the fuck even is the poing of waterboarding and worrying so greatly about trying to extract information that may even in itself be insignificant. Remember 9/11? Apparently we had been tipped off about it a good year in advance, we knew it was going to happen, and yet we couldn't stop it. There had been detainees and intelligence pointing to an attack on America, they could even get it down to a specific time of the year, and we still couldn't stop it. So how does torturing people that may or may not have had anything to specfically do with it justifying our bitterness that they caught us with our pants around our ankles?... It doesn't

Adrena, in your other chest-thumping thread, you quoted this:

The victimhood syndrome buzzwords — “disenfranchised,” “marginalized” and “voiceless” — don’t resonate with him.

But waterboarding is itself one of these buzzwords, a euphemism created to sugar coat what the process actually is. "Waterboarding" has become such a common word in the past year that it's a cliche to the point where the meaning of the words themselves is lost. It's not waterboarding, it's forced drowning. Using these same buzzwords that you hate is hypocritical, IMO.

Drowing is my greatest fear, honestly, that and being trapped in a burning building. I think if I was being held down be 3-4 officials trying to make me suffocate on water/not being able to breathe I would definately consider that torture, anyone that argues it being tortue is just being fucking oblivious