Monday, February 8, 2010

Military thug waterboards 4-year-old daughter

Because she couldn't recite the alphabet. Conservatism taken to its logical conclusion, folks.

Support the troops!!

45 comments:

  1. Just tell daddy all the letters he wants to hear and it will all be over!

    This sort of gets back to a point I try to make to people about the military: it is dehumanizing. Many soldiers in various branches of the military are waterboarded as part of basic training. In their minds, they're not doing anything they wouldn't have done to them.

    ReplyDelete
  2. There is a huge difference in waterboarding a war criminal or a terrorist and waterboarding an innocent child who is clearly not a threat to our country and its safety. Your generalized statement regarding waterboarding and its use is absurd. Plus, waterboarding was used to get them to talk after the waterboarding, and not actually during waterboarding. Waterboarding was only used on 3 individuals who posed a threat to our nation. As long as these terrorists hold the cards, and have knowledge of imminent or future attacks against many innocent civilians the military has a duty to stop them from aiding in the harm of innocent civilians.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Teresa: So you support waterboarding Scott Roeder, who has said additional attacks against abortion providers is imminent?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Oh, because Americans are special?

    Actually, I agree Americans are special, but in a totally different way.

    Heil Teresa!

    ReplyDelete
  5. No, because he was charged and convicted of 1st degree murder which is different than terrorism.


    Heil Ginx!

    ReplyDelete
  6. So if someone is deemed an "X," they are no longer a person. They are merely "X," be it a terrorist, enemy combatant, etc.

    A terrorist is a person who uses violence and threats of future violence to further an agenda. Scott Roeder is a terrorist, but because he slipped out of his mom's vagina on US soil, he is afforded special rights which do not entitle him to treatment he would endure had his mother been born in a Palestinian of Afghani slum.

    Waterboarding Scott Roeder would be wrong, I agree with you there. Waterboarding anyone for any reason at any time is wrong.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Actually, even being a US citizen doesn't protect you. Just look at Jose Padilla.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Ah, but Scott Roeder is Christian. Or maybe it's because he's white. Either one.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Did I even give off the impression that Scott Roeder is innocent? Not even in the slightest. He is a sinner. He murdered in cold blood and deserves the punishment he got. He may have thought that he was a Christian, but he wasn't and isn't if he's willing to commit murder.

    Roeder did not kill for political reasons and is not a part of a movement like Jihadism and that's what makes him a murderer instead of a terrorist. He committed the act out of a misguided and screwed up sense of morality. Two wrongs don't make a right.

    ReplyDelete
  10. And yet Scott Roeder threatened additional attacks were imminent upon his arrest. *shrug*

    You do realize Americans cause more deaths of Americans than foreigners, right? I'm not saying distrust your neighbor, but you can't treat non-US citizens as less than human because you have an irrational fear of them.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Actually I have looked at a few articles on Tiller and Scott Roeder and the only thing I can come with is this:
    "As the jury was deliberating in Wichita, Terry said he believed that no matter the outcome of Roeder's trial, more violence was inevitable."

    This wasn't said by Roeder but instead Randall Terry stated it. The statement was stupid, but also very generic.

    ReplyDelete
  12. SE,

    This comments thread has a whiff of nastiness about it.

    What happened to the little girl is utterly reprehensible; no thinking person could ever see this as anything but disgusting. No matter HOW she was abused, her abuse (and the abuse of ANY child) is despicable.

    But I am surprised you went with the headline you did, since it is clear the abusive parent did not waterboard his daughter. He clearly plunged her head into a basin of water -- face first -- or so it is reported in the article to which you linked. There's nothing in the story at all, other than some hasty parallel made by the reporter, that suggests this was a "CIA" interrogation technique. Moreover, it is clear the abusing parent was suffering from some mental episode beyond being a mere soldier: This guy has cracks in all cylinders. And there is nothing in the story that suggests this is anything but a psychotic breakdown of a man. To posit this breakdown has anything to do with military service is obscene, since there is no evidence presented to justify that claim.

    "Conservatism taken to its logical conclusion", or so you say. Well, prove it.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Dear Bill, thanks for commenting.

    Actually, Cork is also a contributor here and he wrote this post, so I'll let him defend it, if he so desires.

    As always, Bill, you are welcome here anytime.

    ReplyDelete
  14. PS.

    Perhaps this comment from one of my old posts (and the article to which I've linked) is what you mean by conservatism's logical end:

    Remember, waterboarding is so torturous, so utterly evil, those who oppose its use water-board themselves in protest. It is also so horrific, so damaging, that journalists get paid to endure it so they can report about its dreadfulness. Clearly you can see how such a thing compromises America's loftiest ideals.

    Peace.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Sorry, SE. My fault. I am not familiar with cork (though I do like to pull a good cork once in a while, and no, I am not talking snowboarding).

    Bliss!

    BG

    ReplyDelete
  16. Cork,

    It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance.

    I've posted here two comments addressed to SE. They were actually meant for you. Apologies.

    Peace.

    BG

    ReplyDelete
  17. The comments moved far beyond the issue that everyone universally agrees was wrong (what happened to the 4 year old). I was mostly responding to Teresa's decision to advocate torture in any circumstance, let alone the policy of prejudice based on nationality.

    Torture is always wrong, and if you disagree... go back to watching "24" and leave the adults alone when they're talking.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Ginx,

    Do you think writing "Heil Teresa" in your second comment to Teresa is how adults talk (as you suggested)?

    I have posted here a fairly challenging question: If waterboarding is ALWAYS torture, how do protesters who waterboard their friends justify that act? If waterboarding is SO bad even newspaper editorial boards denounce it, how come the same editors EMBRACE waterboarding when one of their own is waterboarded in an effort to prove that it is, indeed, torture?

    Also, I have noted with accuracy that the soldier in question who abused his daughter did not waterboard that daughter, thus nullifying the whole reason for this particular Skeptical Eye post and the ensuing outrage. In my house, that's not only how the adults talk, but the children, too.

    Lastly, Teresa made an astute and adult distinction in her first comments in this thread. You essentially created a red-herring: you fallaciously tried to create a parallel where there is none. Teresa also rightly (I believe) observed that your assertion Mr. Roeder believes more anti-abortion violence is imminent was a fabrication, your fabrication.

    Ginx, why do you use a pseudonym? Don't you use that like a border, a hedge of protection? If there is any logical consequence to a set of ideas in this thread, it is to be drawn from your argument that being human trumps any allegiance or identification to a state: In your worldview, there are NO REASONS for borders, physical or legal. An enemy combatant that swears allegiance to a foreign ayatollah and caliphate, deserves the EXACT same legal treatment as a citizen of this country: That citizens of all other states are de facto citizens of this country. Or so you posit.

    But I don't understand then why you are so interested in protecting your own personal borders with a pseudonym. Clearly, you DO believe in borders, in distinctions, in keeping things separate; in maintaining a distinct personal identity.

    ReplyDelete
  19. The U.S. Constitution applies to citizens and civilians (it applies to foreign civilians in US mainly for our protection, in that they must abide by our laws) living within the United States and not foreign born peoples' living elsewhere that just happen to show up in the United States with the intent on attacking the United States and actions that clearly make that apparent. By advocating for the transference or extension of U.S. Constitutional rights to foreign born peoples' and especially terrorists who are citizens and reside in other countries you are in effect promoting U.S. cultural imperialism upon other countries and their citizens. Other countries have their own form of governments and we have ours. The U.S. should not be propagating our government and extending that to other countries and their citizens. U.S. citizens are in fact afforded rights that do not apply to others living in foreign countries or people who just happen to show up on U.S. soil with the intent to harm and kill innocent civilians.

    ReplyDelete
  20. But I am surprised you went with the headline you did, since it is clear the abusive parent did not waterboard his daughter. He clearly plunged her head into a basin of water -- face first -- or so it is reported in the article to which you linked.

    Wow, what a huge difference.
    /sarcasm

    There's nothing in the story at all, other than some hasty parallel made by the reporter, that suggests this was a "CIA" interrogation technique.

    I never claimed he was doing it for the CIA.

    To posit this breakdown has anything to do with military service is obscene

    Well, I'm positing it anyway. The whole military "mindset" and atmosphere is exactly what encourages this kind of violent/abusive behavior.

    ReplyDelete
  21. It is also so horrific, so damaging, that journalists get paid to endure it so they can report about its dreadfulness.

    A sanitized version of it, yes (when can we expect you to volunteer, btw?).

    Doesn't change the fact that it's torture--one of Pol Pot's favorite forms, in fact.

    ReplyDelete
  22. Dear Cork,

    Let's see if I get this right. Waterboarding, to you, is when a person places the face of another person in a bowl of water. Do I have this right? THAT is what you mean when you refer to waterboarding? Do you mean any form of facial submersion in water is waterboarding? I just want to make sure I get my terms straight.

    Re: CIA

    I never suggested that you thought the abusive father was "doing it for the CIA." Had you read the story to which you linked, you would have learned that the reporter connected the actions of a deranged, mentally-ill father with the CIA interrogation technique formally known as waterboarding. Apparently neither you nor the reporter could see the distinction between holding a child's face in a bowl of water and actual waterboarding.

    I am sorry to bother you with specifics. I was under the impression that precision of language and accuracy of thought were important to folks at this blog.

    I am glad that you admit that what you are positing is obscene. You've no evidence -- NONE -- at your disposal (or you've not yet presented any) that justifies your position.

    RE: Voluntary waterboarding for political and editorial gain

    So you support a "sanitized version" of waterboarding? Interesting. I wonder if Christopher Hitchens enjoyed a sanitized version; his first-hand report suggests otherwise. Maybe the CIA can clean up the process so you won't be so squeamish.

    Thanks for the non-sequitur.

    ReplyDelete
  23. Dear Everybody Else,

    It is worth noting that the picture accompanying the article to which CORK has directed us shows protestors torturing one of their own in order to prove two things. First, they want to prove that waterboarding is torture. Second, they want to prove that they are morally superior to those who torture.

    Seriously, these people are obscene. Their protests are crude political theater, for sure, but such folks represent the essence of spiritual blindness and intellectual torpor.

    Here's how they think:

    We will prove to you that murder is utterly immoral, horrid and debased by murdering this person here, a volunteer. Don't worry. His death will be a sanitized version of really, really BAD murder.

    This is not just pathetic. It's truly sick.

    ReplyDelete
  24. Had you read the story to which you linked, you would have learned that the reporter connected the actions of a deranged, mentally-ill father with the CIA interrogation technique formally known as waterboarding.

    Well duh. That's because it was his own half-assed version of "waterboarding." It says a lot that you're confused on the connection.

    Anything to make them durn sand niggers scream in pain, right Bill?

    Go back to Hannity.com or whatever if you're going to bore us with your rambling.

    ReplyDelete
  25. Dear Cork,

    You're bobbing.

    Your remarks are absurd and puerile. I am surprised you're even allowed to post here. You set a pretty low bar.

    Peace.

    ReplyDelete
  26. Waaah, goose-step back home and cry. I think you've set a low standard for the human race, considering your hard-on for torturing brown people.

    ReplyDelete
  27. CORK,

    You do have a way with words: You write such delicious ironies.

    Thank you.

    ReplyDelete
  28. You holier-than-thou pseudo-sophisticated blather is just..well..blather (I suspect you are stroking a cat and holding a monocle as you type).

    Again, Hannity.com is probably right up your alley. You'll find plenty of others terrified of brown people there.

    ReplyDelete
  29. CORK,

    You have proven yourself utterly irrational. You should really stop posting here.

    Odd. The ONLY person who has mentioned anything about any ethnic group or race in this thread is you. Clearly, YOU have a problem.

    But you can, if you can't help yourself, continue to use the ad hominem fallacy against me. That is your prerogative. But every time you use it, you prove my point.

    Oh, and thanks for the Hannity recommendation. I don't ever watch Hannity, nor do I ever listen to him on the radio, but thanks anyway.

    And since I am a courteous sort, I can't help but return the favor of recommending something you might like. How about this?

    Have a great day.

    PS. Anytime you feel like making a serious attempt at proving any of your sweeping assertions here, let me know. The ill-equipped are always quick to damn, but truly serious thinkers engage with the material.

    ReplyDelete
  30. SE,

    I think I can now safely conclude that the evidence found throughout these comments undeniably supports my initial sentence in this thread:

    "This thread has a whiff of nastiness to it."

    Is this the sort of thing I should always expect at SE? Please, let me know if anyone at Contratimes is similarly rude. All Contratimes guests deserve the very best, and I go out of my way to ensure that they get it. If you have any evidence that proves otherwise, please pass it along to me. I will make every possible effort to make your time at my place as civil, meaningful and engaging as possible.

    Peace to you.

    ReplyDelete
  31. I wonder if Christopher Hitchens enjoyed a sanitized version; his first-hand report suggests otherwise

    Yes, Bill, and Hitchens made the following statement after his experience:

    "Well, then, if waterboarding does not constitute torture, then there is no such thing as torture".

    Why do you disagree with him?

    The following is from an account described here:

    Henri Alleg, a journalist, was tortured in 1957 by French forces in Algeria. He described the ordeal of water torture in his book The Question. Soldiers strapped him over a plank, wrapped his head in cloth and positioned it beneath a running tap. He recalled: "The rag was soaked rapidly. Water flowed everywhere: in my mouth, in my nose, all over my face. But for a while I could still breathe in some small gulps of air. I tried, by contracting my throat, to take in as little water as possible and to resist suffocation by keeping air in my lungs for as long as I could. But I couldn't hold on for more than a few moments. I had the impression of drowning, and a terrible agony, that of death itself, took possession of me. In spite of myself, all the muscles of my body struggled uselessly to save me from suffocation. In spite of myself, the fingers of both my hands shook uncontrollably. 'That's it! He's going to talk,' said a voice.

    Surely reasonable people can agree that there are degrees of torture, as there are of most everything in this world, but because some forms of torture are not as awful as others does not make them any less torture.

    ReplyDelete
  32. Dear SE,

    I don't know if you read the article I wrote about Hitchens' masochistic exploration of torture, but you should realize I've not anywhere said waterboarding is not torture. Let me refine my statement, as I can't possibly know what I've said everywhere and in every context: I have not said I disagree with Mr. Hitchens' assertion waterboarding is torture.

    What I have argued is that Hitchens can't really mean what he says. But wait, let me hone that statement to a sharper point, too.

    Those people who have protested against waterboarding by waterboarding a "volunteer" are disgusting, don't you think? Well, you should. And you should also think disgusting all those editors who loved that Christopher Hitchens' torture could be exploited to prove their point that waterboarding was torture: their despicable petitio principii is an affront to decency, reason and truth. They tacitly approved of Hitchens' torture -- and the torture of others -- so they could EXTRACT information from their subjects. What was that information they tortured out of them? That waterboarding was torture.

    THAT is what BOTHERS ME, and it should bother you, and not just because it is immoral, but because it is hypocrisy at its most base. Such hypocrisy utterly undermines ANY decent case anyone might make against waterboarding as torture.

    To have privileged journalists and professional protestors waterboarding themselves or other people for a brutally circular argument is sick, especially when they seek to profit financially and politically by such revolting behavior.

    A. Waterboarding is torture.
    B. I am waterboarding this volunteer.
    _____________________________________
    C. Therefore waterboarding is torture

    That's just BS.

    ReplyDelete
  33. Bill, thanks for responding. If you do indeed agree that waterboarding is a form of torture then I don't have much of an objection to your other points.


    If waterboarding is SO bad even newspaper editorial boards denounce it, how come the same editors EMBRACE waterboarding when one of their own is waterboarded in an effort to prove that it is, indeed, torture?

    That and other things you said seemed to me to strongly imply that you didn't think waterboarding was much of an ordeal to go through if someone was willing to undergo it voluntarily. I'm certainly glad you've clarified your position.

    A. Waterboarding is torture.
    B. I am waterboarding this volunteer.
    _____________________________________
    C. Therefore waterboarding is torture

    That's just BS.


    Perhaps, Bill. But perhaps no one would have bothered engaging in such demonstrations to show it was torture had not the Bush Administration and its apologists so adamantly denied that it was torture.

    In 2008 Bush vetoed a bill to ban the practice, which, you must agree, was a veto meant to allow the U.S. government to torture people. We're you in favor of or opposed to that veto by President Bush?

    Now that we've settled the question of whether or not it's torture, maybe the issue is really if we believe our government should be allowed to torture some people for the "greater good".

    ReplyDelete
  34. So, your for the greater good with regards to terrorists and their so-called rights but not for the greater good when it comes to saving innocents.

    Thanks for standing up for the Muslim Jihadist who wants to kill us while saying screw the innocent civilians by taking away important techniques that can indeed be used to prevent future attacks.

    ReplyDelete
  35. Thanks for standing up for the Muslim Jihadist who wants to kill us while saying screw the innocent civilians by taking away important techniques that can indeed be used to prevent future attacks.

    Teresa, why would a Muslim "Jihadist" want to kill us? Perhaps it has something to do with our arrogant foreign interventionism and empire building? Ron Paul was the only 2008 Republican Presidential candidate who told the truth about the consequences of U.S. foreign policy. It's called blowback.

    ReplyDelete
  36. Thanks for showing just how anti-American you are...

    We could have halted operations years ago and Muslim Jihadists would still be coming after us today because they want to have a Caliphate and don't want to share the world with the rest of us but in fact conquer and destroy the rest of us.

    Osama Bin Laden started having Jihadist leanings even before the Russians went into Afghanistan.

    Stop living or wishing in a utopian dream land that has never and will never exist.

    I choose to live in reality and be pro-American instead of looking out for our enemies so-called rights.

    ReplyDelete
  37. Teresa, the Patriotic Ron Paul, believer in Constitutional government and traditional conservatism, is "anti-American"?

    The U.S. is in worldwide fight to the death with Islam?

    Now, who is it again that's living in reality?

    ReplyDelete
  38. I am very much living in reality.

    Ron Paul has gone off the deep end. His son Rand is more rational.

    I never said Ron Paul was Anti-American. Stop putting words in my mouth.

    Yea, and you believing that Islam is a religion of peace is living in reality. NOT. Islam is far from a religion of peace.

    ReplyDelete
  39. I never said Ron Paul was Anti-American. Stop putting words in my mouth.

    Teresa, come now, your charge of "anti-Americanism" came right after what I said about blowback. And what I stated is exactly what Ron Paul believes, as the video surely indicates.

    Yea, and you believing that Islam is a religion of peace is living in reality.

    And where have I EVER said Islam is a "religion of peace"? Please stop putting words in my mouth!

    ReplyDelete
  40. Than stop making strong implications with your words that you believe that Isam is a religion of peace.

    You do simply want us to do nothing and wait for the next attack instead of going after terrorists and stopping them in their own countries.

    ReplyDelete
  41. Than stop making strong implications with your words that you believe that Isam is a religion of peace.

    My words imply no such thing.

    You do simply want us to do nothing and wait for the next attack instead of going after terrorists and stopping them in their own countries.

    The best way to prevent future attacks is to start minding our own business.

    ReplyDelete
  42. By saying this "The best way to prevent future attacks is to start minding our own business."

    You do in fact imply that you want us to do nothing and wait for the next attack instead of going after terrorists and stopping them in their own countries.

    ReplyDelete

If the post you are commenting on is more than 30 days old, your comment will have to await approval before being published. Rest assured, however, that as long as it is not spam, it will be published in due time.

Related Posts with Thumbnails