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YellowSunshine -> RE: God speaks to Bush! (7/24/2007 11:51:00 AM)
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The Day the Music Died, playing on radio, fitting... oh i hope not totally fitting. Fire is the Devil's only friend... Satan laughing with delight. WEdoNOT want THIS EVIL to laugh anymore PERIOD!!! http://www.slate.com/id/2170983/nav/tap2/ The Torture Two-StepBush's new torture order and its loopholes.By Phillip Carter Posted Monday, July 23, 2007, at 5:13 PM ET [image]http://img.slate.com/media/1/123125/123087/2156534/2169442/070723_Juris_bushTN.jpg[/image]George W. Bush In an executive order signed and published Friday afternoon, President Bush purported to end the reign of torture. The order clearly forbids "torture" and "cruel, inhuman or degrading" treatment." Except that it all depends on what the definition of torture is. The order does nothing to repudiate earlier interpretations of the Bush administration, which narrowed "torture's" scope to allow coercive interrogation techniques including sleep deprivation, water boarding, and extraordinary rendition, among others. Instead of proscribing torture, it adds yet another layer to the legal regime supporting those earlier policies. And it further opens up new loopholes for creative lawyers in the CIA and Pentagon. The end result is a policy that misses a historic opportunity to correct the excesses of the last six years.Setting the tone for what's to come, President Bush starts by citing two of the most infamous legal documents of the past seven years—the January 2002 memo by then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales describing the Geneva Conventions as "quaint" and "obsolete," and the February 2002 directive declaring that Geneva didn't apply to terror detainees. These memos caricatured the Geneva Conventions as the product of old wars between old states on old-style battlefields, irrelevant in the 21st century. (Funny how so many people in uniform disagreed, including retired Gen. Colin Powell, the Navy general counsel, and all the military's top JAG officers.) Once it was decided that the entire class of detainees at Guantanamo didn't qualify for Geneva's protections, it became far easier for intelligence officials and their lawyers to up the ante with increasingly sadistic interrogation practices. In 2002, Bush lawyers went so far as to argue that interrogators only cross the line if they specifically intend to cause severe pain or suffering, such as organ failure or death. Friday's order rests atop this deeply flawed legal foundation. The order also reaffirms the administration's broad view of the war against al-Qaida, the Taliban, and "associated forces" as a war that is unlimited with respect to time or geography. Al-Qaida fighters captured in Afghanistan may be subject to this order, and so, too, might suspects detained in Chicago or New York. It's not clear what limits apply. The order seems to restrict itself to the famous "ticking bomb" hypothetical, but there's nothing restricting its application to high-ranking al-Qaida operatives. The order does restrict itself to detainees who might know about terrorist attacks against the United States and its armed forces abroad, or about "locating the senior leadership of al Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces." But that, too, is an incredibly broad category, and an interrogator can't know whether or not a suspect falls into it before the interrogation begins. And so this document represents Justice Robert Jackson's proverbial loaded legal weapon, lying ready for use on any detainee connected to America's global war on terror. placeAd2('news/slate','midarticleflex',true)
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