I don't know what is up with Rahm Emmanuel, but he should keep his mouth shut. That would be number 1. Number 2, even if Dick Cheney never sees the inside of a jail cell I want him to go down in our history books as the fascist he is and I want everyone to know and to study what he tried to do to our nation so it never happens again. I am sure ton's of trolls have invaded your posts as usual Joan, but I say let the investigations begin, this isn't whitewater, this isn't Lewinsky, this is a direct violation of our constitution and the 1947 National Security Act and for that alone someone needs to pay.

"@JoeMommaSan ....I'm glad to see you'll make an exception to your no waterboarding rule, when the situation serves you."

YOU said YOU don't believe it's torture. That being the fact, you must be more than willing to PROVE it isn't by actually undergoing the "technique". All you were offered was a (figurative) opportunity to put your body where your mouth is.

"....I'm still waiting for an answer on the question of what to do with these "illegally detained" pillars of the community." But Salonistas have a habit of ignoring inconvenient questions they're unable answer."

I'll answer your stupid-assed question:

"A system of laws, and not of men." -- John Adams. In a democracy we conform to the principles of due process of law, beginning with "innocent unless and until proven otherwise". NONE of the "detainees" -- prisoners -- you mock have been found GUILTY of ANYTHING.

Now answer this question:

From whence did you get a moral superiority so high and refined that it's acceptable for YOU to approve torture, as if it ain't really nothin' -- so long as YOU aren't subjected thereto -- but to CONDEMN others for doing EXACTLY the same?

To defend torture is to defend torturers. Saddam Hussein was a torturer.

"Far better to redirect the conversation to a past event that happened to a handful,"

According to military investigations, over 100 "detainees," none of them found GUILTY of ANYTHING, DIED as direct consequence of torture. The military concluded thoat those deaths were HOMICIDES.

"Only a handful" is acceptable so long as not white, and so long as YOU are not among that "handful".

"rather than address a question relevent to the present......."

A question of you relevant to the present:

Why are you defending, as example, Saddam Hussein for committing the crime of torture?

"There was no torture! . . . . Even Marines use waterboarding for training."

And those MArines, and personnel from other service branches, testified to Congress that waterboarding is without question TORTURE.

There was torture; and it is illegal, always and everywhere, regardless who does it. The US itself set that standard, and voluntarily submitted itself to it.

"A system of laws, and not of (Republican law-illiterates)." -- John Adams.

We don't determine US law by what is "good" for Israel, including the "good" subversions of its own claims to moral supremacy.

Your rationalizations of the depravity of torture as acceptable based upon paranoid delusions point to YOUR need for a psychiatrist.

I'm glad to see that joan remembered that there was an outcry -- by leftists? don't we count? reading her title I had to ask myself why I hadn't "expressed outrage" or, if I had, where I -- and all those outraged --would have or should have expressed it.

certainly I felt outrage. but it seems this information about buies torturing

detAinees was available for a long time before the red cross details in ny York review simply

confirmed it. I expected some action -- on the part of the Obama

administration -- but we soon learned we weren't going to get it. this reticence was

stunningly, frustratingly bewildering. not the first time we had heard that they

were. not going to do the right, the obvious thing. if indeed Rahm

emmanuel is behind it, I believe he will go down in history as the most obstructive figure to freedom, the too-powerful person responsible for the cover-up of some of the most egregious crimes

in u.s history.

"What is torture? Water boarding?"

Waterboarding is without question torture -- as at very least US military personnel who underwent it voluntarily testified to Congress.

THEY have no question on the point. But they pur their oath to support and defend the Constitution and laws, and their country, BEFORE party.

"Clearly, doing permanent, painful harm to someone's body is torture. Is there any record of that?"

The military's investigations have found that over 100 innocent-until-proven-otherwise detainees subjected to torture DIED as consequence. And the military classifies those deaths as HOMICIDES.

MURDER.

"What happens to a person that has been water boarded? Can they walk away (not out of prison) and live a physically unencumbered life?"

How about an unterrorized psychological life?

"It seems to me if any investigation is to take place into anything, the first order of business should be "what is it we are looking for"? The pursuit of 'maybe' or 'gray area' seems to be an effort of little value. Why not have a committee to codify what indeed qualifies as torture?"

Idjit: waterboarding has been classified as torture for at least hundreds of years. Moreover, US troops who used waterboarding in the Philippines during the late 19th century were prosecuted by the US for doing so.

No "committee" is necessary: the standard is the LAW, and the laws prohibiting torture -- in ALL circumsntaces -- also DEFINE torture. In view of the fact that the person one would be torturing is NOT FOUND GUILTY of ANYTHING, one DOES NOT torture them.

Add in the fact that ALL experts on the matter state as fact that torture not only doesn't produce any useful "intelligence," but it is also COUNTERproductive. Unless, on the latter point, one's ACTUAL intent is to TERRORIZE.

Those who defend torture, however disingenuous and weasely their efforts, are defending Saddam Hussein. And defending those who imposed the crime of torture on captured US military personnel.