McCain: Anyone Who Says Waterboarding Works is a Liar

[Deleted]

Waterboarding is not torture. There are times you might need to do something you might regret to get information out of someone. If there are lives on the line I say do whatever it takes to save those lives. I will not consider what you did to torture. Torture is leaving a mother without a son, a husband without a wife/wife without a husband, a brother without a sister, etc just because you didn't want to inflict a little discomfort or a little pain on someone in a misguided attempt to take the "moral high ground".

waterboarding is torture.

And no there is never any reason to use torture, because it does not fucking work.,

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Whatever floats your boat.

Won't try and argue with you. Terrorists, as stated before, will never receive any sympathy from me. They are past redemption.

So if in an interrogation, we get info? Cool. If not? Sucks to be the one interrogated.

and you have just put yourself on the same level as the terrorists, you are equally pathetic in my opinion and i hold you in the same contempt I hold them

[Deleted]

Bullshit. It's one thing to be against torture or waterboarding but to imply we do things worse than terrorists when it comes to torture is just a fucking lie.

Dunno, your typical terrorist torture tends to be pretty medieval and often serves as a death sentence (ie you die within a few hours/days).

On the other hand the US keeps torture victims alive for years in some cases, and isn't above reviving you if it goes a bit to far.

I mean lets compare getting your head chopped off with a knife or burning to death vs a year of regular waterboarding. A few hours of agony vs a year of constant near death experiences.

Sure in terms of physical pain the terrorist probably win out, but in terms of suffering?

[Ravenblade]

Nietzsche's Aphorism #146 is fitting as always.

[Kaganfindel]

"Off-topic." Cute.

Also, punishment doesn't need to be humane if the ones you are punishing are less than humans, which is exactly what terrorists are. (And I mean ALL terrorists, before somebody goes "u haet brown peeple")

We are not talking about typical combatants (such as soldiers of another nation), we are talking about the scum of the planet. Those who disregard any conventional rules of modern engagement and murder and rape. IF we were at war with another actual nation, then yes, I would want more civil treatment towards them.

So interrogation techniques, whether for information gaining or whatever, I support.

Since they're not given due process, you can't logically assert that all detainees are terrorists.

Even if we could, you're justifying disregarding the rules of modern engagement based on their alleged willingness to . . . disregard the rules of modern engagement. If their interrogators torture them, then those interrogators share the same inhuman status as their prisoners. so you want suspected monsters to be placed in the care of confirmed monsters, and you want those confirmed monsters to be paid out of my tax dollars.

No fucking thanks.

[RaoBurning]

So considering someone like say a convicted child molester as sub-human is bad?

Uh, yes. How is it not bad? Criminal, sure. Easy pesay. Filth in human clothing, not so much. Even the Nazi's got due process under the law.

[warzerotwo]

Categorizing someone as subhuman is the first step towards justifying subhuman behavior.

[TITAN308]

Uh, yes. How is it not bad? Criminal, sure. Easy pesay. Filth in human clothing, not so much. Even the Nazi's got due process under the law.

How about Charles Manson? Timothy McVeigh? Child traffickers? People who abuse the elderly and let them rot in bed?

Sounds kind of naive to me to think that real life monsters don't exist.

I'm perfectly OK with sub-human labeling on an individual level.

Life is not my little pony friendship is magic.

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Categorizing someone as subhuman is the first step towards justifying subhuman behavior.

To quote a movie, tell that to the peoples who's job it is to clean up little kid parts after someone has raped and cut them up.

I have no doubt in my mind the majority of MMO-C will never be exposed to real world grit outside of their little bubble.

We are talking about monsters that make cold calculated decisions, not some guy who got in a car accident and roasted a family of 5 in their SUV after failing to maintain his lane.

[ringpriest]

How about Charles Manson? Timothy McVeigh? Child traffickers? People who abuse the elderly and let them rot in bed?

Sounds kind of naive to me to think that real life monsters don't exist.

Of course real life monsters exist - they are (among other things) the people who pointlessly authorize, engage in, or support torture, while telling themselves "it for for national security reasons", "it wasn't really torture", and "I'm a patriot".

[RaoBurning]

How about Charles Manson? Timothy McVeigh? Child traffickers? People who abuse the elderly and let them rot in bed?

Sounds kind of naive to me to think that real life monsters don't exist.

I'm perfectly OK with sub-human labeling on an individual level.

Life is not my little pony friendship is magic.

My gut response is, "no shit." Of course terrible, awful people exist. That they exist isn't a reason to act like them. I understand that in the heat of the moment a person might act against one of these types of people in a most gleefully violent manner. That doesn't mean it's okay to base policy around that type of reaction.

[Mihalik]

Hard men are doing hard things so we can sleep comfortable in our beds at night.

This has nothing to do with fantasies or wishful thinking, but just reality.

Whoa cowboy! Hold your horses.

This is not some crappy episode of 24, and Jack Bauer is fictional.

We know torture doesn't work and is horseshit because experts on torture and interrogation say it so. So do people who have actually been tortured. Like McCain.

Furthermore, the Rule of Law is not something that only exists when it's convenient. If anything the ability to stick to your principles and identity in times of extreme crisis is what sets apart good from bad. The people who wrote the Constitution and the Bill of Rights didn't add a "Ignore When Inconvenient" clause to either.

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Sure.

Sorry, but I have utterly 0 desire to change my stance on this. I don't give a damn what happens to terrorists.

I feel like a broken record.

Rule of law. Rule of law. Rule of law. Rule of law. Rule of law. Rule of law. Rule of law. Rule of law.

Neither the Bill of Rights, The Constitution, nor the Geneva Convention has a "Ignore when you don't care or when it's inconvenient" clause.

Laws apply equally to everyone, at all times.

[warzerotwo]

To quote a movie, tell that to the peoples who's job it is to clean up little kid parts after someone has raped and cut them up.

Blah blah blah emotional appeals don't waste my time with that bullshit. Life's not a Dirty Harry movie.

[ringpriest]

I feel like a broken record.

Rule of law. Rule of law. Rule of law. Rule of law. Rule of law. Rule of law. Rule of law. Rule of law.

Neither the Bill of Rights, The Constitution, nor the Geneva Convention has a "Ignore when you don't care or when it's inconvenient" clause.

Laws apply equally to everyone, at all times.

Not in the 21st Century United States (which is one of the huge reasons why I think its doomed) - just ask a corporate executives in mortgage industry who broke the law while continuing to pocket millions, ask government officials who deliberately leak classified information to the benefit of their party, ask the telco executives who spied on the whole country and got a free pass, ask the torturers who the government declined to prosecute, ask the poor minority young adults who have their lives destroyed for committing the very same crimes that our last three presidents publicly admit to, ask the bank executives who launder billions of dollars for drug-dealers and terrorists, ask a muslim subject to surveillance and harassment for his religion, ask anyone who's escaped serious charges by hiring a high-priced lawyer.

Justice in the US isn't blind, nor even pretending to be - she's swapped out her blindfold for name-brand designer shades, and the scales move when you put cash on them.

[TITAN308]

Blah blah blah emotional appeals don't waste my time with that bullshit. Life's not a Dirty Harry movie.

Blah Blah Blah the only dead bodies I will see are in the video games I play.

[Noradin]

Blah Blah Blah the only dead bodies I will see are in the video games I play.

You sound like you want to see them in reality.

[TITAN308]

You sound like you want to see them in reality.

Yes. That is totally why I said that.

[Noradin]

Yes. That is totally why I said that.

Well you do argue in favour of destroying more people in real life and for no good reason.
Even if they had the information you want, torturing them destroys that intelligence.

[breadisfunny]

Sure.

Sorry, but I have utterly 0 desire to change my stance on this. I don't give a damn what happens to terrorists.

so your just as evil as them opposing the rule of law.

[TITAN308]

Well you do argue in favour of killing more people in real life.

lol wat /12345

[brimdog]

Pols can say what they want. The senate can vote on what they want.

Black Ops are real and they are doing all kinds of shit we have no idea about. I would even go as far as to say the President of the USA has no idea the extent of these things.

Hard men are doing hard things so we can sleep comfortable in our beds at night.

This has nothing to do with fantasies or wishful thinking, but just reality.

this all holds water; too bad logic like this flies over the heads of the pedantic.

[sarahtasher]

I will just add here that, yeah, ''hard men'' tried to use the torture in Algeria. The hardest men of the French Army, the parachutists. (paratroopers).

Surprisingly, extensive formation in combat does not actually qualify you to interrogate prisonners in an useful manner. (Otherwise said, the idea that ''elite commando special forces that are hated by the bureaucrats of Washington, etc...'' are good at interrogation is ludicruous)