Follow BeltwayBlips on Twitter
Golly, what a surprise, we tortured
Firedoglake —
... We've known this is a lie, even Bush Administration appointees -- now that the election is behind "them" -- are admitting it: ...
What a surprise!
Rising Hegemon —
George Bush, on more than one occasion has said: "We don't torture." We've known this is a lie, even Bush Administration appointees -- now that the election is behind "them" -- are admitting it: "We tortured [Mohammed al-]Qahtani," said Susan J. Crawford, in her first interview since being named convening authority of military commissions by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates in February 2007. "His treatment met the legal definition of torture. And that's why I did not refer the case" for prosecution. ...
More On Torture
JustOneMinute —
... want to preserve some flexibility. Obama may want to urge Congress to outlaw "humiliating and degrading" treatment of prisoners. But he might also want to carve out an exception for extreme cases, outlining coercive methods, like sleep deprivation, that could be used on specified detainees. To provide political accountability, the president should be required to sign any such orders, share them with the congressional intelligence committees and publicly disclose their number. And the WaPo breaks news with their report that, per a senior Bush official, a prisoner at Guantanamo ...
Guantanamo Military Commissions Trials FUBARed
Daily Kos —
A handful of interesting and appalling developments out of Guantanamo in the last 24 hours absolutely reinforces the need for the incoming Obama administration to act quickly in shutting down Guantanamo and ending the Military Commissions proceedings against detainees, moving their cases into the federal court system. First, the admission from Susan Crawford, convening authority of military commissions, that Mohammed al-Qahtani was tortured at Gitmo: Crawford, 61, said the combination of the interrogation techniques, their duration and the impact ...
Quotes of the day
Hot Air » Top Picks —
... falls below 60 beats a minute and which in extreme cases can lead to heart failure and death. At one point Qahtani’s heart rate dropped to 35 beats per minute, the record shows… “There’s no doubt in my mind he would’ve been on one of those planes had he gained access to the country in August 2001,” Crawford said of Qahtani, who remains detained at Guantanamo. “He’s a muscle hijacker. . . . He’s a very dangerous man. What do you do with him now if you don’t charge him and try him? I would be hesitant to say, ‘Let him go.’” … “I sympathize with the intelligence gatherers in ...
The 43 Appointees Who Helped Make Bush The Worst President Ever
Think Progress —
... . Rumsfeld is also responsible for authorizing the use of torture against terror detainees in U.S. custody; according to a bipartisan Senate report, Rumsfeld “conveyed the message that physical pressures and degradation were ...
U.N. special rapporteur on torture calls on U.S. to prosecute Bush and Rumsfeld.
Think Progress —
... ” for abuses committed at Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib and other military detention center. Just last week, a Bush administration official overseeing Gitmo trials said Rumsfeld approved the torture of one particular detainee. Bush himself said last year that he was ...
U.N. special rapporteur on torture calls on U.S. to prosecute Bush and Rumsfeld.
The Hollywood Liberal —
... ” for abuses committed at Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib and other military detention centers. Just last week, a Bush administration official overseeing Gitmo trials said Rumsfeld approved the torture of one particular detainee. Bush himself said last year that he was ...
The Liberals' Grand Bargain
Antiwar.com Original —
... about torture , and the lawless treatment of the Guantanamo inmates, and on the other hand the prospect of a much wider "war on terrorism" extending not only into ...
Why Stop At Waterboarding?
The Republic of T. —
... If you want something a lot closer to the real thing, you can take a few pages from the interrogation log of Mohamed Al-Qahtani — the detainee whom judge Susan Crawford says we tortured, based on the cumulative effect of the techniques applied in his interrogation. ...
ProPublica: Government Could Destroy Records in Hundreds of Gitmo Cases
Politics on HuffingtonPost.com —
... The government treats any material originating from the prisoners as "presumptively classified," said Gitanjali Gutierrez, an attorney with the Center for Constitutional Rights who represents Mohammed al-Qahtani in his habeas suit. Qahtani is the alleged 20th hijacker, whose military commission charges were dismissed after a top government official concluded he'd been tortured. ...
