Your friends and mine... ACLU - Wake Up Before You Lose Everything - jer72's Blog - Tehachapi News

Jun 5, 2007 at 06:06 AM : ACLU helps those who...

ACLU helps those who are tortured by Americans. I agree with you, I love them sometimes too. It's not ok to torture people when they are SUSPECTED of being Al Quaida. Are not all people Innocent until proven guilty? I would hate to think if a prisoner from another country says they are being tortured by Americans, that ACLU would ignore him/her. Sometimes I wonder who is the greater evil, we Americans or Al Quaida. We both have tortured and killed thousands of innocent people. A civilized country does not ACT OUT like a third world country. We are supposed to be more intelligent. I don't agree with all that ACLU does, but preventing torture is an admirable thing to do as far as I am concerned.

Good post Jeremy

Jun 5, 2007 at 07:06 AM : It is too bad that...

It is too bad that there is not an ACLU in Iraq. Perhaps the three G.I.'s would not have been executed by those - what are they now called? - insurgents. It seems that in this war on terror only the U.S. is expected to fight by the rules.

Someday even the Pacifists will see that we should trust the terroris when they say that they will kill us when given a chance. I think that we must fight them whenever and where ever we find them.

Jun 5, 2007 at 07:06 AM : Sparks, First this...

Sparks, First this terrorist are not covered by our laws as they are not US citizens, second they are not covered by the Geneva Convention because that are not a uniformed soilder of a nation, and third if it saves hundreds of lives it is worth torturing our enemies. Would you rather torture a few enemy to get save a couple hundred people? I would.

These people are only going to do exactly what Aero said once they see that a group like the ACLU will do for them. They will sue until they bring down every single company in the US to kill our financial well being and then use those funds to attack and kill us. Yeah sounds like a great lawsuit that the ACLU has filed against one of the three big defence contractors of the country.

Jun 5, 2007 at 08:06 AM : The last two...

The last two publicized foiled "attacks" against the US were homegrown efforts, not planned by Al Qaida operatives planted in this country. They were not fueled by a hatred for Dubya, but a somewhat understandable frustration with our country's direction towards Imperialism. Also, the Bush administration deserves little credit for the arrests. Law enforcement in this country continues its course, regardless of who's in the White House.

If you don't like the ACLU & their goals, don't join them. It's not like they're a government agency, folks. I support the ACLU just as I support the NRA - I may not agree with all of the causes they pursue, but I'm glad they are both there to promote & protect the 1st & 2nd amendments of our Constitution.

As far as torture goes, any expert will tell you the best way to deal with an insurgency is to treat the people with dignity & respect. Just ask John McCain, the only Presidential candidate with an intimate knowledge of torture. When fighting an insurgency such as we are experiencing in Iraq, the struggle is over the hearts & minds of the people. If you alienate them with improper treatment, you're just creating more "terrorists" in the future.

Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq has a very detailed section about this issue. Must reading for anyone who wants the truth about how this escapade of ours fell apart practically from the beginning.

Jun 5, 2007 at 12:06 PM : Darlin' aero, you...

Darlin' aero, you left an important word in my statement: "somewhat." I think that should answer your question as to my feelings about terrorism.

As far as your assessment of Iraq, I'll suggest it's you who is twisting the facts to support your view. We had Iraq contained, prior to Dubya forgetting his campaign promise about nation building. As I said in my previous post, you should read Fiasco for an in depth discussion of our containment of Iraq. The author interviewed scores of military personnel who, among other statements about the Iraq war, point out that it was working.

I'll loan you my copy, if you like.

Jun 5, 2007 at 02:06 PM : The pilots interviewed...

The pilots interviewed for the book make a strong case that containment was working. Finding no WMD's makes a strong case that containment was working. Even Bush & Cheney, during the 2000 election, said that they planned to continue the containment strategy. From the book:

Neither Iraq nor terrorism were issues in the 2000 presidential campaign, and in fact were hardly mentioned by the candidates of either party. Everything George W. Bush and Dick Cheney said during the campaign indicated that they thought Bill Clinton had used the military too much in his foreign policy, not too little. They outlined a stance of maintaining the policy of containment while being more selective about the use of force. Bush also argued against using the military in noncombat missions, hitting the issue hard in both debates of the presidential candidates. “He believes in nation building,” Bush said of Democratic candidate Al Gore at their first debate, on October 3, 2000. “I would be very careful about using our troops as nation builders. I believe the role of the military is to fight and win war and therefore prevent war from happening in the first place.” As a result of wanton Clinton administration policies, he added, “I believe we’re overextended in too many places.” [My bolding, to emphasize the irony.]

Bush emphasized this admonition at the next debate. “I don’t think our troops ought to be used for what’s called nation building,” he said on October 11. “I think our troops ought to be used to fight and win war. I think our troops ought to be used to help overthrow a dictator…when it’s in our best interests.”

During the campaign, vice presidential candidate Cheney also defended the decision during the 1991 war to not attack Baghdad. The United States, he said during an interview on NBC’S Meet The Press, should not act as though “we were an imperialist power, willy-nilly moving into capitals in that part of the world, taking down governments.” Cheney appeared to endorse the Clinton administration’s containment policy, saying that “we want to maintain our current posture vis-à-vis Iraq.”

Jun 5, 2007 at 03:06 PM : I'm not one to...

I'm not one to usually yell on message boards, but --

SADDAM HUSSEIN HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH 9/11!

There, I feel a little better...

Saddam was a secular Sunni. Bin Laden is, first & foremost, a religious fanatic. There may have been a few cursory contacts between the organizations of the two men, but there was no colusion between them.

Saddam wanted us (& his people) to believe he still had WMDs. The Iraqi people are hugely invested in "saving face" - this is a major part of the culture. Saddam would look weak in the eyes of others if he were to tuck tail & admit that containment was working. This was his way of holding power.

BTW, the aluminum tubes weren't for nuclear enrichment, either. They were not of sufficient quality for that use. Sorry, aero, no WMDs.

Jun 5, 2007 at 03:06 PM : No, not everyone aero....

No, not everyone aero. If you don't have time to read Fiasco, just read this essay. It shouldn't take too long, & note the date it was written.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0317-03.htm

Still, before the invasion, a few independent U.S. experts did question the Bush administration's interpretations of the intelligence data. Even the CIA's reports on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) contained caveats.

Oddly, the most aggressively skeptical of the war's well-qualified observers was not an intelligence officer at all. He was ex-Marine Maj. Scott Ritter, the former lead inspector for the U.N. Special Commission (UNSCOM) Concealment and Investigations team in Iraq. "There simply is no evidence of a factual nature that sustains the allegation by the Bush administration or British government that Iraq today possesses weapons of mass destruction," Ritter told The Chronicle in late March 2003. He stuck to his guns later, when U.S. officials or troops incorrectly reported finding possible WMD sites early in the conflict.

[...]

Angelo Codevilla, a noted intelligence expert who supported the U.S. invasion of Iraq because he felt Hussein thumbed his nose at the United States, believed it was a mistake to use alleged WMDs to justify the attack. He was not impressed when Powell, in his U.N. speech, played a recording of a cell-phone conversation between Iraqi officials that supposedly exposed their scramble to hide WMD-related work. Codevilla warned The Chronicle at the time: "I'm afraid they (the conversations) are anything but conclusive."

Codevilla, who was with the Hoover Institution at Stanford and now teaches international relations at Boston University, blames the botched intelligence on a long-standing cultural crisis within the CIA.

In the mythology of espionage, colonialism and nation-building, figures such as Britain's T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) deeply loved, understood and participated in the cultures whose secrets they aimed to penetrate.

By contrast, Codevilla complained, "we now have a huge CIA station in Baghdad, and the people there ... don't speak Arabic, they're afraid to walk outside except under escort by soldiers, they're working through translators. We are talking about a basic, fundamental incapacity to get a grip on the situation." He contrasted their isolation with a friend "who used be a CIA officer in Iran ... He was in love with Iran; he wanted to know and feel and touch everything Iranian.''

Anything written by Saddam & his minions goes to prove what I wrote earlier about "saving face." You have to understand the culture of the people you're dealing with.

Jun 5, 2007 at 09:06 PM : Jeremy, Oh so the you...

Jeremy, Oh so the you think the "SUSPECTS" are terrorist???

They were suspected of being Al Quaida, but Jeremy, this still hasn't even been proven yet, and they were still tortured... sounds good to you? Really? That's scary. No wonder you are a Bush supporter. Do you also believe, you have more rights than people from other countries? So if an American was in another country you would say that the other country should not help the American to find the truth either. Correct?

.Aero, Oh, and now I'm on the terrorist's side? Yep, I love war mongers and killers, whether from America or from another country. That's why I am pro Bush and Bin Laden. lol You know I have been trying to stop the madness on both sides, but it appears it will go on and on and on and on for years. We are turning into a third world country. Stupidity Rules!!! I can only hope that in time we all become more civilized.

Jun 6, 2007 at 06:06 AM : Okay Sparks I will...

Okay Sparks I will give you that they are reported as "SUSPECTED" Al Quaide members. So where were they captured? were they shooting at our soldiers? If they were they were still combative against our country so what is the difference then? Sorry but if they wanted to fight us in a combat zone then I guess they should be treated just like the Al Quaida member too.

Yes I do feel I have more rights than people of other countries while in my own country. If I go over seas to many different countries I don't expect to have the same right in the country as I do in the US. I don't go to another country and believe being a US citizen will matter. I would love for the other country to help an American in another country but don't expect it. Just look at China's way of handling Christians that pass out Bibles in China and tell me that you believe you could count on other countries to help you when in there country. In the recent past that question has been answered by the kidnapping of the three US soldiers with the confirmed death of one and the report that Al Quaida saying they killed the other two.

Now here is the funny part of your statement. Sure I have been a Bush supporter for the war. I believe and still do believe we went in for noble reasons and I don't mean the WMD reasons either. I believe that there have been some major mistakes by Bush. First of which was that he kept Clinton's pick for CIA director, but also understand way he could have made the decision too. It also appears that he didn't want to listen to his generals or Rumsfeld towards the end of his appointment. But to think I support him 100% is a laugh. He has done many things that make me wonder where he really sits in the political relm. His support for the immigration bill is so far to the left that he has killed his own base, his lack of border defence is imbeachable as far as I would say and his recent signing of the National Security (NSPD-51) and Homeland Security (HSPD-20) Presidential Directives are very worrisome to me. If you didn't know they give him the power to rule a state of emergency due to the next big hurricaine and take complete control over the government. So how much of a supporter do you think I am?

Want more about the directives? Here you go. http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=56022

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=55825

Also note that this is from a right wing news site and so far no left wing media as post anything about this.

Jun 6, 2007 at 06:06 AM : Here is a new news...

Here is a new news item I just saw about the Al Quaida / Iraq connection.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=56020

Jun 6, 2007 at 09:06 AM : While there are people...

While there are people who instill terror by their actions (like Bush & Cheney), they are not terrorists. Terrorists create terror in a population by design, and this is the definition of a "terrorist" IMHO.

Aero, did you read the essay I linked to? Do you now accept as fact that there were people who weren't convinced by Powell's embarrassing appearance at the UN? If you aren't, then I'd suggest you read more of Scott Ritter's writings. I happened to hear him on the radio just after I posted yesterday, and he was discussing your claim of Iraq sending WMDs to Syria. According to him the idea is ludicrous, and since he's an expert quite familiar with weapons inspections in Iraq I'll take his word over yours. Sorry. Still no WMDs.

Seriously, everyone is entitled to their own opinions on the subject. But, I'd listen to your POV quite a bit more if you'd inform yourself about the facts surrounding the situation, rather than just believing right-wing pundits & publications.

With all due respect.

Sparks, you are right on point & I agree with you. ;)

Jun 6, 2007 at 02:06 PM : So which is it, aero?...

So which is it, aero? Agree to disagree, but then you throw in even more inaccurate information, so am I supposed to just let it go? I'm sorry, but that's just not fair.

So here we go: first, I've never said that it's much worse in Iraq now than before Hussein was overthrown, but a good case can be made in that direction. If you're now saying that we went into Iraq to free the people, I'd point out that there are plenty of countries across the globe that could use the same kind of liberation. Why single out Iraq, if as you say the whole world changed after 9/11.

Second, let's look at what Ritter actually said about WMDs:

"And we knew that while we couldn't account for everything that the Iraqis said they had destroyed, we could only account for ninety to ninety-five percent, we knew that: (a) we had no evidence of a retained capability and, (b) no evidence that Iraq was reconstituting. And furthermore, the C.I.A. knew this. The British intelligence knew this; Israeli intelligence knew this; German intelligence. The whole world knew this. They weren't going to say that Iraq was disarmed, because nobody could say that. But they definitely knew that the Iraqi capability regarding W.M.D. had been reduced to as near to zero as you could bring it and that Iraq represented a threat to no one when it came to weapons of mass destruction."

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/10/21/144258

It's not "at least 10%" as you said. Look, I don't want to belabor the point, but this kind of exaggeration doesn't help the discussion. It reminds me of the right-wing pundits who keep insisting Valerie Plame wasn't covert when in fact, she was. It just makes everything else they say suspect.

Third, if you're horrified by the casuality count of 400,000 dead by Saddam's hands, then how do you feel about the 650,000 Iraqi dead since our invasion of Iraq? Is it fair to lay their bodies at the feet of President Bush, as you have laid the 400,000 at Saddam's? Or how about the estimated 2 million Iraqis who have fled their homes, their country, since our occupation? Two edged sword, isn't it?

Jun 6, 2007 at 03:06 PM : *banjo music in the...

*banjo music in the background*

Dueling websites!

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/10/12/145222

From Les Roberts, one of the researchers conducting the study:

You know, I don't want to sort of stoop to that level and start saying general slurs, but I just want to say that what we did, this cluster survey approach, is the standard way of measuring mortality in very poor countries where the government isn’t very functional or in times of war. And when UNICEF goes out and measures mortality in any developing country, this is what they do. When the U.S. government went at the end of the war in Kosovo or went at the end of the war in Afghanistan and the U.S. government measured the death rate, this is how they did it. And most ironically, the U.S. government has been spending millions of dollars per year, through something called the Smart Initiative, to train NGOs and UN workers to do cluster surveys to measure mortality in times of wars and disasters.

So, I think we used a very standard method. I think our results are couched appropriately in the relative imprecision of [inaudible]. It could conceivably be as few as 400,000 deaths. So we’re upfront about that. We don’t know the exact number. We just know the range, and we’re very, very confident about both the method and the results.

[...] And when we reported this, we didn’t say it was 655,000 deaths. We said it was 655,000 deaths, and we’re 95% sure it’s between about 400,000 and 950,000. And that range of imprecision is capturing that variance between neighborhoods that you described, some places having a lot of violence, and some not. So there is less than a 2 percent chance that the number is well below 400,000. So, you know, it’s not precise. It’s incredibly hard to do this kind of work in times of war, and I think that this is awfully good, given the conditions.

*banjo music fades, end scene*

Jun 7, 2007 at 11:06 PM : The IBC project...

The IBC project compiles it's count from a collection of reporting (news) agencies that must meet narrow requirements:

For a source to be considered acceptable to this project it must comply with the following standards: (1) site updated at least daily; (2) all stories separately archived on the site, with a unique url (see Note 1 below); (3) source widely cited or referenced by other sources; (4) English Language site; (5) fully public (preferably free) web-access.

Also, two of those agencies must report on the same incident before it is counted. It seems to me that this would imply that their count is at least, conservative and at most, a gross underestimation (though maybe not to the tune of 650,000).