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Pelosi. Knew. [Bumped.]

Hi, Activist Left.

By: Moe Lane (Diary)  |  May 8th, 2009 at 02:00 PM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

[UPDATE] You’d think that they thought that none of this would ever come out.

—–

(See also Aaron Gardner’s RedHot on this topic.)

Pelosi knew about the waterboarding.

She knew all along.

According to the memo the very first briefing listed is 9/4/02 with then Rep. Porter Goss & Pelosi. The summary of the briefing says:

“Briefing on EITs including use of EITs on Abu Zubaydah, background on authorities, and a description of the particular EITs that had been employed.”

This directly contradicts Pelosi’s story, that “we were not told that waterboarding or any of these other enhanced interrogation methods were used.“

And here’s the important thing: we knew this already, and so did you. You’ve been lying to the American people about this for six or so years solely because that way you could maybe stop the screaming that was going on in your own head. It didn’t work, but then, it never was going to: you really shouldn’t have tried it in the first place.

So. when you do nothing about this at all – and you won’t; hardcore antiwar activists are fundamentally moral cowards, and everybody knows it - I want you to remember something. Everything that we said about you and your motivations? We know that it was all true, all along; you know that we know; and you’ll never be able to somehow make that knowledge go away. And you so badly want to: because all of this fleeting reflected glory is as nothing to you unless you hear us say “You win.”

And you never, ever will.

But don’t feel too bad. Hey, why don’t you go find a woman or minority that doesn’t agree with you on an ideological point, and verbally assault him or her? It always seems to have cheered you up in the past.

Moe Lane

PS: Long life to you all. A long, long, long life.

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

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  • evanm

    Because so far, all I had read today was the Washington Post:

    The memo, issued by the Director of National Intelligence and the Central Intelligence Agency to Capitol Hill, notes the Pelosi-Goss briefing covered “EITs including the use of EITs on Abu Zubaydah.” EIT is an acronym for enhanced interrogation technique. Zubaydah was one of the earliest valuable al-Qaeda members captured and the first to have the controversial tactic known as water boarding used against him.

    Notice anything missing? That memo sure is conveniently ambiguous if you leave out “and a description of the particular EITs that had been employed,” isn’t it?

    Fortunately, the commenters to the WaPo article picked this up. Unfortunately, nobody reads those.

  • bk

    Pelosi’s argument here is pretty much the exact same thing as Hillary’s argument that when she voted to let Bush invade Iraq she didn’t really think he’d use it to invade Iraq.

  • JadedByPolitics

    I am sure she is but the MSM won’t be giving her a camera to say how Pelosi was part of the WAR machine…..expect the MSM to say nothing, know nothing, see nothing….yeah they are indeed monkeys!

  • Kayla

    Then why didn’t Bush call her out on it? This is what frustrated me about the guy. He let the Dems club him over the head. And that is exactly what they did.

  • alabamared

    . . . is doubly funny b/c by the time they reach the end of that life, their boy Obama will have bankrupted Social Security and Medicare and they will just have to beg on the streets for their meals.

    As a good Christian, I will be sure to give them some food. As a good conservative, I’ll laugh at them while I do it.

  • http://hillbillypolitics.com Steph C

    Her job is done. The evil Bush is no longer in charge and his only usefulness now is being the scapegoat.

    “We have to punish the people because it’s all Bush fault we have to.”

    (Yes, I know that sentence makes no sense, but that’s how they state it, isn’t it?)

  • mbecker908

    I’m NOT Kayla. I don’t even know Kayla.

    And Kayla, you’re absolutely right. He didn’t go after them because he was under his desk in the Oval Office more worried about being nice to them that the fate of the nation.

  • mbecker908

    As a conservative, and I would hope a capitalist, you should be prepared to charge them A LOT for it.

  • http://www.erickerickson.org Erick Erickson

    I think Moe is still on kid duty this morning.

  • Brian Hibbert

    “Yes we had a great description of EIT and we agreed that the use of EIT was not torture, but we didn’t think that them telling us what they were doing meant they were ACTUALLY doing it.”

    Sounds just like, “We voted for the Iraq war, but didn’t think he meant he’d actually go to war.”

    If I remember correctly, they had similar objections to Bush’s first tax cuts. “We know he campaigned on tax cuts, but we didn’t think he actually meant to cut taxes.”

    The Democrats never mean what they say and it’s incomprehensible to them that other people actually value their own word.

  • alabamared

    But making them admit that I am right will be payment enough :-)

  • 10ksnooker

    A media hoard will meet her as she walks in, demanding she resign.

    poof! well that dream was short.

  • http://moelane.com/ Moe Lane

    So I’m getting in a post about the government pamphlet regulating your yard sale.

    No, really.

    Moe Lane

    PS: The answer is, the Democrats cynically used their threatened sedition on the war like a club, and the President had to let them. Fortunately, there’s such a thing as karmic backlash.

  • bk

    Maybe Cindy can break 20% this time.

  • mbecker908

    I’ll partner with Achance. And we’ll get Caleb to film it.

  • gonzo55

    When you have no beliefs, it’s easy to keep quiet about little things like torture until the leadership changes, when you decide it might be good for your career to be against it. What a hack.

  • http://www.letfreedomringblog.com ggross56

    Speaker Pelosi now has major credibility problems.

  • USNJIMRET

    in the cases of a growing number of people, political and not, I find it increasingly easier to
    As far as I’m concerned, there are many people currently looking to drive this country into some cesspool of third world irrelevancy, and they are doing do knowing full well that their plans can have no other result. At least not for 95% (perhaps more) of the people they swore an oath to protect.
    A long, long, long life?
    It’s been long enough.

  • leftylurker

    I loathe Nancy Pelosi. She’s everything that’s wrong with the left, and I hope, hope, that some of my left leaning friends get mad about this too.

  • Joe_Cor

    He had to let them do it to prevent their sedition? Wasn’t behavior like this already sedition? If he had called them out on it, wouldn’t that have been a far better means of forcing them to get with the program than just pasively surrendering the pr war to them? I don’t get this constant attempt to explain away GWB’s massively destructive passive politics.

  • Aaron Gardner

    I must have mistakenly logged on to Bizarro Red State this morning….;^)

  • http://moelane.com/ Moe Lane

    The Democratic Party threatened to interfere with the war effort on a level not seen since the Copperheads in the American Civil War, and we were simply not prepared for that. Frustrating as all hell, but I don’t blame the victim of an assault for not reacting perfectly to it.

    And you may take the meaning of ‘assault’ in any way that you like. :)

  • rbdwiggins

    Regarding the congressional briefings on enhanced interrogation techniques, the CIA has released the complete roster of attendance.

    Regarding Part II, Rep. Pete Hoekstra, Ranking Member- HPSCI, agrees with me.

    Rep. Hoekstra has reviewed the transcripts of the minutes and has called for their release.

  • Joe_Cor

    and in so doing damaged her’s and the Democrats’ credibility, how would they have retaliated?

  • http://moelane.com/ Moe Lane

    These are the people who threw South Vietnam into the fire and got away with it. They were perfectly capable of doing this, too. And don’t assume that the President would have won that PR battle; it was an unpopular war by 2006. We only escaped national humiliation because the Democrats weren’t sure that he would have lost it, either.

    Again, I know that it’s frustrating. But we’re not the people who have to write the letters and visit the family members wondering why their kids aren’t coming home.

  • Russ Martin

    This woman is pure evil. Of all the dims, I think she is the worst. Its the motivation I need to pray, genuinely and often, for the health of the President and Vice President.

  • rbdwiggins

    that abrogated the constitutional responsibility of the Executive and endangered national security.

    Such as: Releasing the confidential OLC memos for short-term political gain.

  • Kayla

    I don’t know what’s going on with you guys. I’m the only Kayla, but I agree with Joe _ Cor. Still don’t understand Bush acting like a wuss against the Dems and not making his case to the American people. Didn’t he learn anything from Daddy when he did battle with Dukakis? You don’t let your opponent define you, you define them.

  • Aaron Gardner

    He agreed with you and has been saying what you said for as long as I have known him….take it as a compliment…ok maybe not a compliment per se, but at least don’t worry about the thread beyond what you said…..inside baseball kinda.

  • Joe_Cor

    standing between the Dems and defunding the war was Bush allowing them to lie shamelessly? And if he had called them out on it, they would have retaliated by defunding the war? I don’t buy it. If they had had a strong enough hand to defund the war, they would have. I can’t see how their hand could possibly have been strengthened by Bush showing a little backbone and standing up to them. He was strengthening their hand, making it easier for them to defund the war, by not standing up to them.

  • quakenshake

    The AP wire blurb about this was buried on A4 or A6 this morning, I forget which. The headline was something along the lines of “CIA Memos unclear as to what Pelosi knew.”
    In other words, we’re supposed to assume that Nancy Pelosi is inexecusably stupid. Because if she’s not that, she’s a liar.

  • mom2oneson
  • http://nighttwister.blogivists.com NightTwister

    Here’s Nancy Pelosi’s statement (H/T Aaron Gardner):

    We were not ? I repeat ? were not told that waterboarding or any of these other enhanced interrogation methods were used. What they did tell us is that they had . . . the Office of Legal Counsel opinions [and] that they could be used, but not that they would. [emphasis mine]

    Quite frankly it doesn’t matter which EIT was used, Pelosi specifically said she hadn’t been briefed on the actual use of any of them.

  • http://moelane.com/ Moe Lane

    I can only repeat “Yes, Congressional Democrats acted precisely that abominably” so many times. Could you, you know, maybe go yell about them a little? Just for a change? :)

  • djemi

    To me at least, as cheif of staff he needs something to beat Pelosi with, just saying, maybe BO just doesn’t like her and wants rid of her. I’m sure their are plenty other Dems that are more likly to toe BOs line. Most of them rode in on his coat tails.

  • TNJim

    is that they lose their jobs. That will be just fine.

  • The_Gadfly

    but then mbecker and I tend to think along the same lines.

    I don’t know that I agree with Bush’s decision, but then I don’t live in the rarefied air where you have to make those kinds of decisions. Moe’s post about Vietnam is the key element here. Mostly the libs have gotten to write the history on the war they threw away so most people don’t know the real history of the war. The real history is that we won, decisively. Tet was a major disaster everywhere but Walter Kronkite’s broadcast. Within 3 days all points of what was to be a massive assault against the south were completely destroyed and whatever native support the North had been able to generate was dead. From that point on all of the enemy were Northern regulars, Chinese and Soviets. Even so, Nixon still managed to win the war when the strategy was changed from a technocracy fight to one intended to counter an insurgency. But after Nixon won the war, Congress prohibited all funding for the activities that would have deterred the eventual Chinese backed overthrow of the Vietnamese government. A fair number of historians who have recently published books on the war think that had Congress authorized the support, especially the bombing campaigns in the north, that we said would result if the North broke the treaty Kissinger negotiated, that South Vietnam might still be a free country today. That is the depth of treachery the Democrat party has fallen to in our country, and that almost 40 years ago.

    Now, the other part of the back story is that tracing the full course of the war, everyone from Eisenhower on knew that not simply the key, but the majority of the funding supporting the North was coming either from the USSR or China. But they chose never to reveal that information for fear of the public reaction.

    Bush combined this historical information with leftist control of the MSM and Dem party (but I repeat myself) and decided not to reveal that information. Maybe like Bob Dole he figured he didn’t need to fight dirty because he was one of the good guys and everyone should know he was one of the good guys. Maybe he made the right decision and Iraq got a slim chance to become a modern nation.

  • TNJim

    She’s been pretty much a strong ally for him in getting his agenda rammed through the house. The porkulus bill was fast-tracked through at her urging giving no one time to read it. She’s set up all these ridiculous rules that discourage or even deny debate and and amendments to bills, especially from Republicans. There may be some hidden, personal reason they don’t like her, but on the surface she’s his best friend.

    Of course, liberals do have a long history of eating their own.

  • The_Gadfly

    It’s why they kill each other so often, sort of like in the Illuminati game where all weird are opposite.

  • djemi

    BO and the Admin had to bring it into the lime light, as their is surly more to come on these CIA memos. And don’t forget the reports about there being a generational difference between members of the national security council. Pelosi is of a different generation than BO.

  • http://moelane.com/ Moe Lane

    You slander them most viciously. :)

  • MacAoidh

    http://www.thehayride.com/2009/05/pelosi-knew-shes-liar-she-should-resign.html

    “Generally speaking I’m a believer that if the other side has an incompetent boob in a position of power making asses of their political apparatus, by all means don’t interfere with said boob destroying that side’s credibility. As such you’ll not hear me scream for the head of Janet Napolitano or Tim Geithner despite their patent lack of fitness for the positions they’re in. In Pelosi’s case, though, the bad behavior has simply gone on too long and it’s too egregious to just score points. For the good of the country, the Democrats need to clean up their own house and get rid of this horrible blot on America’s polity.”

  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    since the Left only understands in short rhyme bursts ;-)

    She did so, of course, knowing the MSM would pull the little tricks (as noted above by several) of leaving a key little word/phrase out so the Left can STILL LIE to themselves she didn’t lie.

  • jimmuy8

    I mean, look: As much Botox and plastic surgery as that woman has had anything short of sharp knives, needles and blood loss is not torture.

  • LibRick

    ……*crickets*……

  • http://impudent.blognation.us/blog kyle8

    Or “Nancy was silent, while Cheney got violent”.

  • http://impudent.blognation.us/blog kyle8

    and she will be wearing a goatee

  • janis

    has an indefinite shelf life due to the inordinate amount of botox contained therein. Matter of fact, if it were a turnip, the sell-by date would probably be sometime in the next century.

    So, ya know, put that thing somewhere where little kids and old folks with weak hearts won’t be shocked by it. Perhaps a closet in the depths of a cellar. With a big lock. And boards nailed over it.

  • David123

    is have a wall-sized photograph of planes crashing into the World Trade Center on the back wall of the White House press room. It would be in the background on TV every time Bush or his press secretary gave an interview or a speech to the nation. It could have the caption “WHY WE FIGHT” printed on it. The White House press corps would have looked at it every day. It would give everybody a visual reminder of why we fight against terrorists and those who sponsor them.

  • janis

    collection of crosses around the door. Keep a hammer and a wooden stake close by, too. And a silver bullet. You can’t be too careful when dealing with grotesques, you know.

  • Finrod

    Weird is the opposite of Straight in Illuminati; it’s Fanatic that is its own opposite.

    However, that does mean when one Fanatic group attacks another Fanatic group to destroy, they get a +4 bonus.

  • TNJim

    plus a Bible. They abhor religion, you know :)

  • David123

    Make Nancy Pelosi an issue in every House race

  • TNJim

    If the CIA memos get traction the O-ministration could quite possibly say “Thanks for the help but under the bus you go.”

  • David123
  • 6eorge Jetson
  • Jingles

    For some of us, we don’t care if Pelosi or Rockefeller or Reid were in the know. If they go down, they go down, and it serves as a lesson for other Democrats who tacitly approve of torture/waterboarding/enhanced interrogation.

    What’s important to us is that we’re actually having this conversation, sunshine being a strong disinfectant. My assertion is that at some point, this info was going to come out, either through leaks or testimony or outright release.

    Now, we can certainly discuss the purpose and value of these techniques, of which I think there is none, and I do think waterboarding is torture, but this discussion can be had later, or now if some wish. And, conceivably, we could go back and forth on who gets the most political advantage, or at least the lowest political disadvantage out of the situation, but that will get us nowhere, and for some of us, it doesn’t matter, because for some of us, this isn’t a political question.

  • Aaron Gardner

    Or do you not subscribe to the 1984 UN Convention that Reagan signed on to?

  • rbdwiggins

    This is the same partisan press which made a conscious decision once we invaded Afghanistan and it became abundantly clear we were at war, that they would not show any footage of the burning Towers.

  • Jingles

    There is no mention of waterboarding. Can you direct me to a document related to the 1984 UN Convention that does? (I’m serious, no snark intended)

    http://www2.ohchr.org/english/law/cat.htm

  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    That is a very lame Lefty tactic…. but being sure to take my own advice (a href=”http://www.redstate.com/jlenarddetroit/2009/05/07/be-respectful/”>being respectful I’ll engage briefly….

    Just like Reid: “The War is Lost” wasn’t Political to/for you I’m sure…. How BHO spoke out at every turn against the “Wire-taps” and then voted FOR FISA extension….. GITMO closing, with no plan after countless accusations Bush did things with NO PLAN….. and on and on…..

    There are many Diaries here at RedState that already refute your contentions (START HERE) and I am sorry but I do not have the time to cover that ground again. A simple google search within RedState will yield that information and I invite you, and hope you will, look over the many thoughtful Articles that provide some additional Facts, Quotes, Links, etc, (on top of this one and maybe even some from the same author of the Diary this conversation is taking place in) on this topic and/or the things you brought up (Election Issues recap [with links]).

    Regards from NoMoTown (Liberals, looking to do FOR? America what they’ve DONE TO Detroit)

  • janis

    Much as I would have liked to see him fight back every single time the truth was bent, broken, and buried, he saved his political capital for the greater good–which was the war. I’ll be curious to read his memoirs when he publishes them to see just how much he addresses this issue.

    Wouldn’t it be great if he said exactly what he thought of those who behaved like the traitors they were/are?

  • TNJim

    Add to that the octupling of the deficit and national debt. Well, it may not be 8 times the amount Obama inherited from the previous Congress, but the way things are going it will be soon, and could be by ’10.

    (Yes, I said previous Congress, of ’06, not Bush. He may not have helped matters much, but had he tried harder than he did to reverse the debt and deficit they would have thwarted the effort. They had to make sure the blame was focused on him as much as possible.)

  • Jingles

    We can disagree. I’m not here to change minds, as I doubt that any argument(s) I may make to you would change your mind. I’ll read the links that you provided, but I don’t think they’ll change my mind on the subject either.

    The purpose of my post was to demonstrate that there are those of us who don’t care about the political implications of Pelosi knowing. We’re just relieved that the information is out there for discussion. If she’s exposed as a lying hypocrite, so be it

    As per Obama’s FISA vote, sure I was very disappointed, but who else was I going to vote for? McCain? Perhaps it was akin to your feelings about McCain on Amnesty or Campaign Finance. But I could be wrong.

  • http://impudent.blognation.us/blog kyle8

    Maybe we should call her Octograndmom.

  • Lammo

    unless you have credibility.

    :-)

  • David123

    As Americans, the press should have shown footage of the WTC attack more than they did.

    And if they dared criticize President Bush for reminding Americans of the horror of terrorism, he should have taken them to task for it.

    I’m sure you agree with me that Afganistan and Iraq didn’t happen in a vaccuum – the American people should have been reminded about the cause of the GWOT.

  • David123

    by itself.

    Actually, by having the picture on the wall, every time they criticized him for it, they’d still be drawing attention to the picture.

    And the picture wouldn’t be partisan. It would simply show the horror evil men inflicted on America.

  • TNJim

    :)

  • http://andrightlyso.com/ civil_truth

    We’ve had only a selective release of documents. If you really want an honest discussion, they you need to be insisting on all the documents – which means you’ll have to agree with Cheney and not with Obama on the issue of release. But that should be okay if you really want an honest discussion – rather than a partisan witch hunt.

    Personally, I suspect the Democrats want to send this down to the Bar Associations and let them do the dirty work out of public sight – while they continue to stonewall release of the rest of the documents. But hopefully you won’t let them get away with deep-sixing this public debate if you’re going to be consistent.

  • TNJim

    for now, but give ‘em time and your nickname for her will stick.

  • Aaron Gardner
  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    He stated “or do you not subscribe…” as I believe he is pointing out most on the Left would point to that document. By saying water-boarding isn’t mentioned in the document in regard to “torture” it helps the case (or, doesn’t support your contention against that) water-boarding is NOT torture. Though, I will concede (and I hate to give an inch, as Lefties will stretch it out of context for miles) that done without regard for protecting the Life of the detainee could be torture. It is OUR ENEMIES that would be the ones that would/do not put the safeguards in place that we do to protect the Life (we, however, have strict guidelines as to the manner in which it is conducted, how many times, etc)…

  • Jingles

    But will we really get everything, even if Cheney’s request is fulfilled? What about the 92 destroyed tapes? Redacted information? Missing or classified memos?

    Thinking about it, both Democrats and Republicans have a desire to hide parts or all of this information, because they see it as a political matter that can be won or lost. It would be preferable to get past that point, but it’s unlikely.

    Ultimately, I don’t want to see people go to jail for this. I don’t want Bush on trail. Public rebuke would be just fine for those involved, from either party.

  • Jingles

    n/t

  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    This Diary is about the SOP and pattern of behavior of the Democrat Party Progressives elite to lie, lie again, and when proof is in front of everyone, lie again, when more proof comes to light, TRY TO CHANGE THE SUBJECT or divert the attention to something else (as you are trying to turn this back to “water-boarding is torture” again).

    you said, in part:
    For some of us, we don?t care if Pelosi or Rockefeller or Reid were in the know.

    so that makes her LYING about it ok? What she knew and when she knew it matters greatly, or should to the Left, as it demonstrates SHE DIDN’T CARE IT WAS TO BE DONE! She is NOT the champion of the cause as much as you want her to be, when it would be inconvenient to do so, but now that she is making a play/ploy to do so (so far after the fact) the lie is ok from her?!?!

  • Jingles

    and will not stretch it. I think there is a lot of room for discussion of the issue, semantics, meaning, what “is” is (sorry to paraphrase Clinton, and he really made a fool of himself in the deposition, which I think is a matter that we can agree on).

  • http://moelane.com/ Moe Lane

    I’m shooting past you, at a bunch of useful idiots. Live by the hysterical accusation, die by the meticulous, CYA record-keeping, that’s what I always say.

    Well, no. To paraphrase Terry Pratchett, I don’t actually say that at all.

  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    which is why I’m happy to continue to discuss (within scope of the point of the Diary)….

    The point you seem to miss in all of this is that NONE of the documents would have needed to be released and aid-and-comfort to the enemy as they laugh at (not with) the Left in this country that insists on attacking those that protect this Nation. If Obama, Reid, Pelosi, and others, would have kept their mouths shut and not insisted on starting this witch-hunt with only partially releasing (to slant) information to their POLITICAL purpose/cause (witch-hunt and scoring quick/cheap political points to/with the Ultra-Left wing Daily-Kooks, HuffPooPoo, Code-Pink [who is now even upset with Obama, etc, folks).

    This whole thing was/is NOTHING BUT POLITICAL to/for the Democrats, which is where you started your contention saying it wasn’t.

  • Jingles

    We, on the left, would prefer if our politicians did not lie to us. But they do. And your politicians do it to you too.

    But what are we (you and me) to do about it? Not to go too off topic, but third parties are pointless and non-participation is not an option. We can try to champion those few honest politicians: For all of my differences with him, Senator Coburn appears to be an honest, well meaning man. On my side, Senator Sanders is an honest guy, and doesn’t hide his true feelings or political philosophy.

    The system’s broke. But how can two virulently opposed political factions fix it? (semi-rhetorical question.)

  • Mike gamecock DeVine
  • Jingles

    If we could get past hysterical accusations. The counterpunch has a tendency to be much more damaging than the initial points scored.

  • Aaron Gardner

    The information is out there…heck I destroyed a couple of trolls(not saying jingles is a troll, just relaying a separate story…although he/she is a Dem Lurker apparently) back in April on this very subject….if Jingles want’s the information he/she can use google and use the :site qualifier set to RedState.com….heck he/she can even put my name in to narrow the search even further.

    you could always provide the links for him if you would like too….;^)

  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    is/was the point, in an attempt to re-write history and her stance at the time for Political pandering/gain now…

    Likewise, I appreciate you (from the Left) providing respectful/thoughtful conversation

    We do have a few minor points/things we agree on and I do appreciate your having a respectful conversation…. Just want to be sure the point being the dishonesty and how the dishonesty wouldn’t even have been necessary if they wouldn’t have tried to Politicize (or introduce) the current process/discussion now. I don’t think there is much else to be said on this now. Again, thanks for being respectful

  • Jingles

    Would be that these techniques (I will eschew the loaded term for the moment) not be used at all. I don’t think that everyone who was using these techniques was doing so for vital or even useful information; there were possibly cases where interrogations were performed on subjects for a sense of revenge or vindication. But I suppose that I can’t be sure. And I don’t know how we could be sure without a review of the documents at hand. And as I said above, I don’t want to prosecute those involved. I just don’t want it to happen again.

    I think that, as a country, we could have avoided the situation by not employing these tactics in the first place, or at least we could have been honest about using them.

    Finally, I agree that there are those Democrats who say this issue as one for political gain. But there are Democrats/Leftists who don’t agree in using the documents for political gain.

  • JadedByPolitics

    really shows the depth of your inhumanity to man. I think that those who cannot see beyond their own selfish needs to be loved by the world ought not be in any position of power not that you have any power but ANYONE who would think for one moment that there is nothing that should be used to make terrorists SPILL THEIR GUTS is intellectually deviod of true humanity and in such really has no place amongst the human population.

    There should be NO LIMITS placed on our CIA, NSA, and military to extract information that will save American lives, otherwise there would be no need for those agencies to exist….we can all just allow the rest of the world to come on in and take us apart. A country that does not defend it citizens to the full force of their being is not a country at all but a bunch of cowardice states jumbled together until they are overtaken!

  • Jingles

    to argue or discuss issues with someone who calls me inhuman. We clearly have different views of what inhumanity means. And I’ll leave it at that.

  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    I don’t mind a Lib-lurker if they stay on point, he/she did start off (IMO) in an attempt to change-subject and/or divert from the point, but has been reasonable. I did point him/her to related RS material in another comment.

    term: Troll-jacking or Troll-jacked thread covered in part at that link.

  • Mike gamecock DeVine

    just having some fun at Vermont’s expense, Oh… this could be allergic reaction to maple syrup…

    I usually just say

    google it

    I also find this ironic based on earlier atl dem examination…

  • gonzo55

    Is there not room in the conservative movement for both those who believe in torturing detainees and those who don’t? I don’t think waterboarding is torture either, and I think it’s pretty clear that it saved lives. Would elevating ETIs to full-on torture necessarily be worth the cost and hassle in terms of its additional returns? Since we’re not demagogues like the other side I think we should at least experiment with different techniques and look for a “sweet spot” which inflicts maximial pain at minimal hassle to the interrogator.

  • Aaron Gardner

    and I think you know that.

  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    ONLY 3 people have we water-boarded, unless you intend to go off into the hypothetical that we have done it to more people and the Government is lying about the number!?!?! Again, covered many times here and my mentioning that until I was almost Liberal (uh… BLUE) in the Face ;-) — It was done to ONLY THREE PEOPLE! — should come up in some of those Diaries via the RS Diaries search link I had in my first response to you.

    So, I think I am done with this discussion otherwise it is Troll-jacked off into the minutia of other related material to the point of the Diary — SHE LIED, she got called on it, the MSM still attempted to cover for her, she is now fudging, more proof comes out, you guys all then attempt to change the subject and/or bring back the “water-boarding is torture” meme.

    But again, I do Thank you for dropping the “torture” line and now looking at it from the true standpoint of the merit of that particular EIT…. though it belongs in the Diaries specifically discussing along the “water-boarding is just an EIT and NOT torture” lines.

  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    I don’t think 99.9% of Americans would agree to real torture, which is why water-boarding as an EIT being a viable and WORKING method to get information is so important. No need to stoop to pulling out finger/toe nails, breaking bones, beheading the next POW over, and/or whatever REAL torture methods (that our enemies would have no issue with).

    Which is why the Left has to distort the issue and insist on returning to the “water-boarding is torture” lines…. It is hard to hold our Emotion when so many died on 9/11 and are dying fighting the enemy the Left refuses to acknowledge (all the PC re-definitions they want to use now). I think you probably meant something short of the words you choose being able to be construed as.

  • rbdwiggins

    I’m going to write a book. I want people to be able to understand what it was like in the Oval Office when I had to make some of the tough decisions that I was called upon to make.

    History tends to take a little time for people to remember what happened and to have an objective accounting of what took place, and I would like to be a part of making that real history of this administration come to life.

    President Obama may have inherited the war in Iraq, but he has assumed full and complete ownership of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Heaven help us all, because his current policy regarding national security is steering the Pakistan government toward total collapse.

    President Obama had better be prepared to do whatever it takes to protect Pakistan’s nuclear weapons from the extremists.

    India will not give President Obama a second chance.

  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    that I thought I was providing – comment title: I believe you just reinforced his point” – was it correct? Which is below this actual comment because of the way the thread replies indent/subroutine…

  • http://impudent.blognation.us/blog kyle8

    I would just let them starve and maybe spit on them as I pass by.

    But then again, I am a mean bastard.

  • JadedByPolitics

    because our enemy would just chop off the head of our soldier….but being the country we are we used waterboarding something we use on our own soldiers and we still get tools who want to complain about that so I say to those people that they go on over to the Middle East and report back how they are treated and when the day comes that they return with their head in tact and little water up their nose then they can sit in judgement of our tactics until that time they can sit down and whine and cry at their computers because tough men/women stand at the ready to ensure their right to do so!

    I think those who live in their tidy little lives with their small problems who enjoy the fruits of their labor and yet call out our military our former President and all of the Presidents men who kept us safe for 7 years are so completely devoid of human emotion as to be ignored!

  • JadedByPolitics

    …

  • Doc Holliday

    We are living in the richest nation in history because of the work and fighting of others. Today we have a general populace that can’t fathom that their cushy lives were cut out of the wilderness and protected by warriors and scientists pushing past the limits of imagination.

    Now we are living in luxury and seem to have completely lost any sense of reality. Any adversity is “the worst ever”, any desire for victory “lacks nuance”. The people who protest waterboarding yet apologize for head chopping and building collapsing are the result of societal decadence.

    We now have two parties that keep moving farther to the left. The reason for this is the Federal Leviathan, the NEA, and institutionalized anti-American beliefs in the media and entertainment. We have failed to pass on American values to the next generation, we broke the chain that began centuries ago.

  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    that I am hoping that we can avoid this getting inflammatory when it has otherwise been a respectful conversation…. Perhaps you choose the words purposefully over-the-top (IMO), but not by alot, to emphasis your point. You are always a rational/reasonable/responsible debater wherever I see you and just want to make sure someone doesn’t see it and come along and LOSE THEIR MIND over the comment and turn this into a Flame-fest.

    This is NOT a call-out of you, and I think you realize that (but am saying so now explicitly for everyone to see/understand, so it doesn’t go off into the Emotional tangents (which, again, can be hard not to be Emotional and be calm with these topics when friends, family, neighbors, have and will die as a result of the things relating to these discussions).

    Your sig-line is very appropriate in relation to this discussion, well somewhat an aside, but if we were actually killing these folks on the battle-field they would not be here for Obama to release into our midst (again, best left for the other Diaries that address that directly though). We, obviously, want to capture some HVI’s that have information – and we MUST be able to use some extra-ordinary methods (above asking them politely, which is ridiculously about all the Leftists would expect us to do) in order to obtain critical information that can save lives. Again, we (with water-boarding) do NOT go anywhere near what our enemies would do and AS THIS IS EFFECTIVE we do not need to go beyond that point. Should it at some point become necessary to go beyond that with some Al-Qaeda or Taliban member, well you know I would allow for additional (well controlled and well considered) methods. But, again, best for Diaries that specifically discuss that directly.

    As far as Emotion… There are some folks I certainly cannot discuss this with… Out there in Public if they were to try and provoke me with their BS I would probably find it hard not to oblige and kick the living ……. well, you know…. Don’t want that figuratively (verbally) happening here.

    Moe may well chime in and expand the scope of his Diary?!?! For now it is still about the Left lying and un-necessarily so because it wouldn’t have ever been an issue if they hadn’t started the Witch-hunt and Information (only partial, of course) dump.

    Anyway…. Take Care!

  • Aaron Gardner

    because the definition of torture was defined by the 84 UN Convention rather clearly and since we are bound by that, as it is a part of a larger treaty, we all, conservatives and leftists alike, should use it as our guide as to what is or is not torture. In doing so anyone with the ability to read would see that to call waterboarding, as conducted by the U.S., torture is to re-write the definition of torture.

    As far as to link or not to link…RedState is full of material for those who choose to read it.

  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    Liberals are often only driven by Emotion…. I always say that a Liberal is wired wrong. Their Eyes and Ears are wired directly to their Knees! No filter between the return feed from their Knees to their Mouth, either! I’m sure you get the reason/reference. They are Act First, Think Later – which always leads to countless unintended consequences. All “Feel-Good” that I rant and rave, but never solve anything, is what most (I’ll say “most” and give some a break) Lefties are about.

  • mbecker908

    You missed the tags.

    I’ve burned up a ton of bandwidth over the last year criticizing GWB for hiding under his desk for the last five years. My response to your comment was a snarky reference to Erick and Moe that you were not a Becker sock puppet.

    And as I noted above, you are right on target.

  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    I read it as you intended, he/she read it (by filtering out the “NOT” word IMO) another way that was more convenient for him/her to continue diverting attention from the main point of the Diary.

    For anyone looking on, here again is the link: RedState water-boarding Diaries.

  • http://www.suvstrategery.blogspot.com SoFiMil

    My understanding is that Sen. Rockerfeller and Rep. Harman did at some point object to the EITs after being briefed. Angle stated/implied that no Democrat objected. Rockerfeller and Harman were wrong to complain, but let the record show they did so. No other Democrat did, however.

    I expect more from Fox.

  • clifwest

    Nancy Pelosi is not worth the trouble she is causing. If she cared an iota about America she would realize that she is hurting our nation by causing a fruitless waste of time debating what she knew, admit she knew all along and allow us to move on to what is really important to us right now, survival. The Liberals have played the gotcha game for eight straight years and the Conservatives have every right to reciprocate, but what is to be gained by all of this? The economy and national security should be foremost on our minds and global warming, political infighting, power grabs and who is top dog can and should be relegated to the back burner. When we get our major problems fixed, then we can quibble over who did what to whom and when, if any of that really matters anyway. Personally, I think most of the hot air causing global warming comes from politicians and no one will ever be able to shut them up because that is all they know how to do. I would like to have the entire Congress and the Administration on a construction job for a week so they could actually find out what truly hard work is. I would love to put Nancy in the kitchen of any restaurant and see if she can wash dishes by hand for eight hours a day, for a week, without her makeup, which must be applied with a trowel. When politicians say they know what the average American is going through, they are the ones who are lying.

  • 6eorge Jetson

  • fotophun

    this is what make me SO angry!!!
    If Bush had sat around like Clinton, and more American lives were lost..they would have asked for Bush’s head
    they tried every excuse to take him down..
    how dumb can they be, look how their Obama is taking us down now
    I say all of them need to go, just them being in office is TORTURING me daily!!
    especially THE ONE

  • novimir

    Here is the link to actual declassified document:

    http://www.politico.com/static/PPM119_090507_eitbriefings.html.

    This is the CIA re-enacting their behavior during the Valerie Plame affair, with a different administration.

    For anyone who believes that the consistent one topic entries which mention EIT and/or waterboarding is the actual full and accurate list of topics I have some great property in the Inland Empire to sell you at 2006 prices.

    This is the CIA pursuing their own agenda to protect themselves when in fact they don’t need to.

    Given that the only other attendee in the Pelosi meeting was Porter Goss (later CIA director) we are left with a modified he said/she said.

    My question to the readers is “Does anyone know if there is an actual transcript or recording of each meeting?” because I can’t discern the truth from the unclassified document and absolutely find unconvincing. Just curious to know if some day we may actually be able to tell who is being truthful.

  • itrytobenice

    But then I believe what the Bible says, if a man won’t work, he shouldn’t eat.

    I will enjoy helping them learn how to load square bales in the loft of a barn in July. :)

  • mbecker908

    You’re not nice at all.

  • citadelsdaughter

    Nancy Pelosi may be subject to legal prosecution if a court determines that she was an accessory after the fact to torture. The contradictions and “He said- She said” reports coming out of Washington make it clear that the fact finding powers of our legal system will be the ultimate setting for these allegations. Criminality is not Politics and Politics only confuse the legal issues.

  • mbecker908

    no one was tortured. And unfortunately she can’t be charged with perjury because she didn’t make any statements under oath. And stupidity isn’t a crime, of course if it was, we could sweep DC clean in a day.

  • http://www.suvstrategery.blogspot.com SoFiMil

    Waterboarding gets all the press, but what about the other EITs?

    If Rockerfeller, Harmen, and those who rose to object for political purposes well after-the-fact, including Pelosi, solely objected to waterboarding, I would this this indicates they did not believe the use of catepillars, sleep deprivation, etc., is considered torture.

  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    NO, you did not say it was, but the Democrats keep repeating the lie. It has been discussed at length in other RedState Diaries and is why they (Democrats) are now ex-post-facto trying to rewrite history in that regard and/or just infer it for the great-unwashed that will soak it up. None of the EIT’s are torture – PERIOD! Those Leftists know they have to repeat the meme to pander to the Code-Pink clowns because they are getting upset with Obama over FISA, Military Tribunals, and countless other Flip-flops of his in regard to their positions (and O’s campaign positions, er, campaign LIES)

  • http://deweyfromdetroit.com deweyfromdetroit

    We have so effectively parsed and deconstructed reality that half the country no longer knows what torture is.

    The bottom line – slapping someone: not torture. Panties on the head: not torture. Caterpillars in your cell: not torture. Loud music? People pay to have their brain bombarded with a wall of sound. Walling: sounds scary, but not torture. Water boarding, while decidedly unpleasant: not torture in the real world sense of the term.

    The inability to differentiate between actual torture and what used to be known as ?the third degree? is either the result of our culture?s embrace of relativity and/or an extension of the moronic ?zero-tolerance? policy blithely adopted by schools and other organizations towards alcohol, drugs and weapons.

    Zero-tolerance programs require zero judgment. Here any transgression of a policy, law, or regulation is unacceptable and will be dealt with identically, whether a major or minor transgression and regardless of extenuating circumstances. Bureaucrats love this idiotic policy because it makes their life easy, and they feel noble at the same time.

    Not being able to differentiate between extremely unpleasant interrogations and torture is axiomatic of a hyperbolic culture that relies on cut and dried guidelines of politically correct thinking and speaking to navigate through all levels of social discourse.

    The elite left has determined what qualifies as torture, and they have a zero-tolerance for anything that falls within their definition. No extenuating circumstances ? such as 14th century barbarians at the gate who want to kill us, or Justice department opinions that disagree with theirs? will change their minds. They?re better than that.

    Hypocrites.

  • http://www.suvstrategery.blogspot.com SoFiMil

    As you mentioned, and to clarify, I also believe none of the EITs, including waterboarding, are even close to torture. My poor grammar and spelling in my previous post is probably partly to blame.

    Even for the sake of argument, I?ll never concede that waterboarding is torture; however, I would like to see the MSM ask each and every Democrat if they consider caterpillars and sleep deprivation as detailed in the released interrogation memos to be torture. Further, if Rockefeller, Harman, (and Pelosi) ?only? objected to waterboarding, but were also briefed on non waterboarding EITs, there *may* be some fallout from the Soros crowd. MoveOn.org certainly won?t embrace conservatives, but maybe they?ll eat their own.

    I know the Democrats in Congress would try to slither out of the question, but I have to believe that most Americans who get their news from sound-bites and believe waterboarding is torture would also insist that the use of caterpillars and sleep deprivation is definitely not torture. We?ll never win-over the hate-America crowd, but there are a lot of moderates out there who just don?t know any better, believe waterboarding is torture, and can be won-over in time.

    Thanks for the link. Until today, I always searched Google with (e.g.,) “www. redstate.com” and ?[keyword]? which was never that productive. Those days are now over! Adding in ?site: [colon]? (as you did) refines the search perfectly. Where were you the last few years when I needed your help with various research projects?

  • http://www.suvstrategery.blogspot.com SoFiMil

    As you mentioned, and to clarify, I also believe none of the EITs, including waterboarding, are even close to torture. My poor grammar and spelling in my previous post is probably partly to blame.

    Even for the sake of argument, I?ll never concede that waterboarding is torture; however, I would like to see the MSM ask each and every Democrat if they consider caterpillars and sleep deprivation as detailed in the released interrogation memos to be torture. Further, if Rockefeller, Harman, (and Pelosi) ?only? objected to waterboarding, but were also briefed on non waterboarding EITs, there *may* be some fallout from the Soros crowd. MoveOn.org certainly won?t embrace conservatives, but maybe they?ll eat their own.

    I know the Democrats in Congress would try to slither out of the question, but I have to believe that most Americans who get their news from sound-bites and believe waterboarding is torture would also insist that the use of caterpillars and sleep deprivation is definitely not torture. We?ll never win-over the hate-America crowd, but there are a lot of moderates out there who just don?t know any better, believe waterboarding is torture, and can be won-over in time.

    Thanks for the link. Until today, I always searched Google with (e.g.,) ?www. redstate.com? and ?[keyword]? which was never that productive. Those days are now over! Adding in ?site: [colon]? (as you did) refines the search perfectly. Where were you the last few years when I needed your help with various research projects?

  • http://www.ssce.net/Web-Articles/Web-articles-indexed-authors.html#authors-l JLenardDetroit

    I do believe someone could read it the other way (as covered: here) and we do NOT want to word things in ways that the Left can quote out of context. Thanks for the follow-up to insure no ambiguity.

  • http://www.suvstrategery.blogspot.com SoFiMil

    Thanks. And thanks for the reminder.