There, now I have that phrase copied on my clipboard. Can anyone tell me how to keep it there? I'll sure I'll need it again...

I can't be alone in being totally sick of how these so-called decent people can prattle on about how effective a particular kind of torture is or is not. If you took their story at face value that should be an argument against allowing it to used. Yet somehow that has become their most potent argument for it. Not only un-American, but idiots as well.

"rendering unavoidable the conclusion that such falsehood-spreading behavior on behalf of the government is what they are eager to do."

Eager to do because that's what they're paid to do. Fucking propagandists. They'd suck Cheney's cock for a living if it paid better.

Glenn wrote:

Indeed, one could write volumes about the myths and falsehoods that are regularly "reported" when establishment media reporters uncritically repeat as fact what anonymous government officials tell them to say.

I submit that not only were the outright lies documented in the current article an excellent example of media-perpetrated myth, but that the allegation that KSM was the "mastermind" of 9/11, an allegation that has yet to be demonstrated with one scintilla of hard evidence - any evidence, really. And the fact is, he can't be tried in a court of law, so everything he allegedly said is inadmissable.

How convenient.

It's not much of a leap anymore, folks. I have jumped over bigger puddles in high heels.

Call a spade a spade: these charlatans were lying and they knew they were lying. The fact that they were lying to cover up war crimes makes them accomplices after the fact. It also explains why they're so hysterical about the idea of prosecution for the torturers: their role might be exposed and they might be held responsible.

Janet Cook was fired for making up a story about a drug-addicted kid (one that didn't exist) in the Washington Post. The idea that these hucksters might be punished for their own lies has them wetting their pants and bringing up the ultimate bogeyman: The Left (AKA -Dirty Fucking Hippies).

I think Presstitutes would be more appropriate. After all, prostitution (of sexual favors) is an old and honored profession.

Is there a point at which there is some means of accountability for what these people say? I mean if Dan Rather had just said that anonymous sources had confirmed that Bush skipped out of the last two years of his service in the TANG, he'd still be anchoring CBS news.

They played the media--and the media in turn played the public--like a five dollar Sears Silvertone guitar.

This story illustrates the depressingly familiar pattern of one false story being picked up from one questionable source, and then being repeated so endlessly that it acquires the veneer of "fact," and worse, is used to discredit skeptics, so no alternative can gain attention. Clearly the lack of journalistic independence is one cause, but another is that pretty much every major news outlet engages in the kind of "rip and read" news reporting once confined to small-market radio stations.

The ease with which such horseshit is sold makes the job of a Dick Cheney (or Brian Ross) so much easier.... only one phone call is required to, say, start a war, out a CIA agent, or bring back the Inquisition. Emaciated newspapers, breathless TV networks, simply cough up whatever garbage is easiest; so much the better if it offers a dramatic narrative. There simply no longer is any sense of journalism as pursuit of truth rather than money.

Overpaid shills like Brian Ross are both cause and symptom of the demise of a free press, and they care not a whit about it, except as it might affect ratings, and the government is thus spared the annoying task of spreading its own propaganda, with the added verisimilitude that comes from its lies being told by "independent" sources.

Who needs Pravda when you have ABC News?

...the terrorists were on 9/11.

Before I'm rushed off to Bagram without any constitutional rights, allow me to explain how the 9/11 was a victory for the terrorists:

1) As a result of 9/11, I can, as an American citizen, be legally spied on. Then, if the legal wiretaps reveal me to be "anti-American," I can be kidnapped off the street & flown to Bagram. There I will have no constitutional rights as a "prisoner of war."

2) The 9/11 terrorists caused America to descend into such hedious debates & beliefs as "Is tortute wrong?" & "Torture keeps us safe." And "Waterboarding is okay as long as doctors are present." Not to mention the crap discussed in GG's article today.

3) After 9/11, America birthed a breed of lawyer who can make shit up on the fly. And such lawyers, after 9/11, were actually taken seriously.

4) After 9/11, the American traditional media was allowed to publish & speak right wing propaganda & pass it off as "news." GG's current article speaks to that.

That's just 4 off the top of my head (I could go on forever if so inclined).

To sum up: After 9/11, it became legal to spy on American citizens; constitutional rights were abolished; torture was not only suddenly accepted as a pro-patriotic activity, America now boasts scores of torture apologists; High government lawyers can now write pro-torture law without suffering any consequences; the American traditional media questions none of this. In fact, they usually label those who do not go along with the aforementioned as "un-patriotic."

Sounds like a resounding victory for the terrorists to me.

They (the terrorists) have successfully played on American fears & hysterial to the point they have destroyed America from within.

My problem here is that the fact that KSM was waterboarded dozens of times does not actually disprove that he "broke" after 2.5 minutes the first time.

I think the people doing the waterboarding were seriously twisted people, sadists even and it wouldn't surprise me that they just kept going even after he broke, to "really" break him. They were in their own sick twisted world, and all the sane people who might have put the brakes on (like the FBI) had already fled the scene. What was left was the sick fucks who could do this to a person. What limits would they obey? Why stop if you're enjoying your work?

Also, the SASC report gives many indications that Zubaydah was already compliant and cooperative but the administration was not satisfied with the info he provided and they just "knew" that there was more if CIA pressed hard enough. Hence the torture. It might have been the same with KSM. He could have been telling all he knew or could invent after that first 2.5 minutes, but his interrogators just didn't believe him, or thought there was more.

Finally, Cheney et al are so upset that Obama released the memos, at least partly because they think that America's enemies now know the limits of America's brutality, and maybe this comforts them or something. I think Cheney's sort want America to be known as a brutal, tyrannical torturing regime. For neo-cons everything is playground politics - fear and respect. So it wouldn't shock me also that people selected for waterboarding would be given way more waterboarding than was needed even to break their wills, just to make a point, on the expectation that the stories would eventually make their way into the world. You don't spread terror to your enemies by stopping half way in cheney's line of thinking.

Anyway, much speculation from relatively few facts, but I just don't think we can conclude the 2.5 minutes anecdote is false from the fact of ongoing excessive waterboarding on KSM afterward. It's still a bullshit rationalization of atrocity, which wouldn't alter my opinion on the necessity of proseuction one whit, but it may be factually true.