U.S. may have waterboarded detainee before getting legal approval.
U.S. may have waterboarded detainee before getting legal approval.
In March 2002, detainee Abu Zubaydah, described as a “first test subject for harsh interrogation techniques,” underwent waterboarding while in U.S. custody. In a hearing today, Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) noted that Zubaydah’s interrogation occurred months before the August 2002 “Bybee memo” approved the interrogation tactics. Salon reports:
But during questioning, Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., pointed out that the abuse of Zubaydah had reportedly begun weeks, if not months, earlier. “Did you offer legal approval of interrogation methods used at that time … prior to August 2002?”
“I have no recollection of doing that at all,” Ashcroft responded. He added that he did not remember anyone else at the Justice Department doing so either. He said later in the hearing that Zubaydah’s interrogation “was done without the opinion that was issued on the first of August.”
“Ashcroft’s testimony at least raises the possibility that the CIA had started abusing Zubaydah before the agency received any legal cover. This might explain why the Bush administration pushed so hard for the torture memos — the torture had already begun,” Alex Koppelman notes.
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Sounds like the phone companies to me. Another law they broke, to be covered by a ruling written long after the fact. That we can’t see Can we impeach them now?
July 17th, 2008 at 10:11 pmThis is getting to be the hard part: When are they lying, and when are they telling the truth?
July 17th, 2008 at 10:11 pm“Ashcroft’s testimony at least raises the possibility that the CIA had started abusing Zubaydah before the agency received any legal cover. This might explain why the Bush administration pushed so hard for the torture memos — the torture had already begun,” Alex Koppelman notes.
Is this really a surprise? What difference does it make anyway? Bush started spying on Americans long before he got “legal cover.” All that happened was that Democrats gave him retroactive approval.
Bush has thumbed his nose at the rule of law, the Constitution and common decency from the begininning of his administration. Is there any sign that he’ll be held accountable?
http://progressiveworldreview.com
July 17th, 2008 at 10:12 pmWatching the hearing for the last hour on C span which questioned Ashcroft about the detainee interrogation I am so sick of watching these damn republicans. They are so disingenous it is sickening.
Couldn’t possibly be that we have become the same version of terrorists that we claim we are fighting? Democracy is all about risk. To be afraid of taking risk by doing the right thing and protecting liberties of all men is not in the domain of these fear mongering republicans. They make me sick.
July 17th, 2008 at 10:22 pmwhen chimpy hit foot on the wh propertty he knew he would continue the bushfia tactics. the wh is run by bushfioso; without laws, no truth, no accountabity and mastered by chimpy.
the united states of chimpy
July 17th, 2008 at 10:23 pmBTW, Call republican Judiciary staff member and ask them if with hearings being brought forward to Judiciary from the House about impeachment that if you could arrange to have a blow job for Bush and Cheney do they think their respective congress member might then take impeachment seriously.
They all hang up on you. They can’t take the heat.
July 17th, 2008 at 10:25 pmYou mean Abu Zubaydah was tortured without the proper permission?!!
Well that changes EVERYTHING!!!
Hoo boy, someone’s going to get grounded for sure!
July 17th, 2008 at 10:28 pmSo are you implying that they would do it first and look for cover afterwards ?
July 17th, 2008 at 10:43 pm5th Estate Says:
You mean Abu Zubaydah was tortured without the proper permission?!!
Well that changes EVERYTHING!!!
Hoo boy, someone’s going to get grounded for sure!
July 17th, 2008 at 10:28 pm
Quick! Someone draft a letter for us to send to the White House, and go ahead and draft a follow-up letter to send when there is no response to the first one!!
July 17th, 2008 at 10:56 pmWho would have thought that we would devolve into a torture nation?
July 17th, 2008 at 10:57 pmThis is making the case easy for the judges at the World Court . . . Bush better read the small print on the Paraguay Ranch Deed . . . .
July 17th, 2008 at 11:01 pmHeehaw, you just gotta love “Bush Democracy”! Let freedom reign! Woohoo!
I guess he missed that day in 5th grade Civics class when they talked about the United States Constitution.
Vote Smart in 2008. No more dumbass Presidents. Ever.
July 17th, 2008 at 11:36 pmAs a staunch progressive , all I can say is “frankly my dear I don’t give a damn”about waterboarding a bunch of terrorists.
July 17th, 2008 at 11:41 pmU.S. may have waterboarded detainee before getting legal approval.
There cannot possibly legal approval for torture, since it is against international law, no matter what the Bush administration and their loyalists would have us believe.
In my opinion, a more suitable headline would be “US waterboarded detainee before distorting the law to make it appear legal”
July 17th, 2008 at 11:44 pmThe ones that didn’t survive are at the ‘Black Sites’. How many does it take to make a ‘mass’? So maybe they had the 20th hijacker, tortured him, and still couldn’t prevent 9/11. They were wiretapping before 9/11 too, right?
July 17th, 2008 at 11:50 pmIn any event, the fact that the Bush administration pushed to hard to get legal cover, however flimsy, indicates that they knew what they were doing was wrong.
Moreover, this is not the first time they’ve broken the law, then scrambled to find a legal justification for their actions. They followed the same modus operandi with their illegal wiretaps.
Come to think of it, even the invasion of Iraq was carried in the same way: Shoot now, find an excuse later.
July 18th, 2008 at 12:22 amTanqueray shows up, once again, to show the reichwingers’ absolute moral bankruptcy.
Using terrorists & beheaders as a standard and excuse for the Bush administration’s (mis)behavior? Pathetic.
Not to mention that Nick Berg’s horrible death doesn’t justify the Bush administration’s torture of a mentally ill person, their lies denying that fact, portraying the man as a “top operative” of AlQaeda.
July 18th, 2008 at 12:33 amThis nation will not recover for decades, if ever, what slight moral ground it had before the Cheney admin reduced the employees of We the People to the basest human actors. Stalin, Torquemada, Hirohito, and, yes, Prescott Bush’s business partners in the Third Reich have a fit doppelganger in Dick “Dick” Cheney.
Forget for a moment the immorality, inhumaneness and illegality of it all. What’s really galling is that any slight exposure to history will reveal how counterproductive physical coercion is. Even Napolean, not exactly a humanitarian, said in a letter to one of his generals that the “barbarous custom of whipping men suspected of having important secrets to reveal must be abolished. It has always been recognized that this method of interrogation, by putting men to the torture, is useless.” Dig that - “It has always been recognized.” That’s in the 18th century. My, how far we’ve come.
Utter stupidity, high arrogance, venal corruption and remorseless death - what a legacy these abominations in the Cheney coven have left to us. Trust me, we as a people and a nation shall pay for this. Thanks, Bush voters.
July 18th, 2008 at 12:57 amI’ll agree that mooslims are mentally ill, however I don’t agree that it excuses their savage behavior.
Like shock and awe?
“Savage” is such a subjective term, don’t you think?
July 18th, 2008 at 1:05 amTanqueray,
You unabashed idiot. Abu Zubaydah, the person the Bush administration had tortured, was mentally ill. It has nothing to do with his religion. Had you clicked on the bloody link you would have found that out.
And that still doesn’t justify the Bush administration’s freewheeling use of to torture, and/or their lying about it.
It takes an absolutely morally bankrupt person to defend the torture of an innocent, and the Bush administration’s lies about him being a “high-ranking operative”.
Unless, of course, you are trying to tell me you actually like being lied to.
July 18th, 2008 at 1:09 amThe CIA tortured terrorist suspects without legal approval?
No one could have predicted!
#78 in a series…
July 18th, 2008 at 1:11 amGregor! Tanqueray has spoken the magic words that absolve him, and every conservative and neoconservative of ANY blame, responsibility or accountability:
“…it’s just the way it is, and you can’t deny it.”
You can’t deny HIS reality, so that’s the end of THAT discussion.
Oy.
July 18th, 2008 at 1:14 amWhy even if they immigrate to this country, who are we to condemn their beliefs?
~Tanqueray
Oh, so that is your problem tonight. You’ve had one too many beers.
You see, that post is barfly’s, not mine. Pay attention.
July 18th, 2008 at 1:28 am… in 1947, the United States charged a Japanese officer, Yukio Asano, with war crimes for carrying out another form of waterboarding on a U.S. civilian. The subject was strapped on a stretcher that was tilted so that his feet were in the air and head near the floor, and small amounts of water were poured over his face, leaving him gasping for air until he agreed to talk.
Maybe he doesn’t know how to google.
July 18th, 2008 at 1:41 amThere is no excuse for our own savage behavior.
July 18th, 2008 at 1:46 amNow isn`t that special, getting permission to do some thing illegal like waterboarding, who`d a thunk it………
July 18th, 2008 at 2:11 amOne simple question. Is torture ever justified? HINT: the answers obtained cannot justify the methods of questioning.
To Tanq and his ilk… do you you disagree with the founding fathers that sacrificing liberty for security is not good? If not then you are against the very principles that this country was founded on. If so please get out now..
July 18th, 2008 at 2:24 amwatching the hearing now on http://www.c-span.org/ …. Ashcroft claims he’s a Christian…
speechless
July 18th, 2008 at 2:33 amAnd what excuse would Al Gore use against the jews when Rran allows the materials needed by muslim terroists to create a dirty bombs on U.S. soil
July 18th, 2008 at 4:18 amsorry; Iran
July 18th, 2008 at 4:19 amLets not forget the Nazi’s were in alliance with the Muslims to kill as many jews as possible during W.W.2
July 18th, 2008 at 4:21 amdesert66IQ,
Could you please ask your question again, preferably using English this time instead of your first language, you know, gibberish?
Thanks.
July 18th, 2008 at 4:22 amI admit up front that This administration ran by this president was not at all swift especially when it comes to war profiteering for the oil companies excuberant quarterly profits by consumer fruade of (hi-)jacking up the prices at the fuel pumps and than say “will its OPEC rising the prices at 143 dollars per barrel.But you have to admit despite the legal questioning of how terrorists being detained by what authorities over seas that not one has been beheaded because of our (Christian) beliefs.
July 18th, 2008 at 4:38 amHey Paul please do you think that Bush was the first president who spied on his own people, check your history bud!
July 18th, 2008 at 4:43 amI have to laugh about people who cares more about terroritsts being mistreated in these detention facilies than the innocent they victimise just because they do not see the same as they do or because they use a religion to justify murder but unlike their victims at least they still have their heads on thier shoulders or not have a bullet in the back of their head after being interogtaed. hey you know something maybe if Clinton did something about the terrorists that first asttacked the World Trade Center in ‘93 or the attack of U.S.S. COLE or even the bombing attacks of U.S. Embassies in Africa instead putting his energy chasing after any skirt with a whole in between its legs. Bush would not have been doing his job that was left to him doing now!
July 18th, 2008 at 4:55 amDespite if you are a Republican or Democrate and how we all complain of what kind of leaders we pick to lead this country. We have no body to blame but ourselves, meaning that why do we let the upper crust of the elite society pick for us when we should do the picking. In other words why do we not start( regardless of what political affiliation you are)pick for ourselves (the average blue collar middle class worker) in who we want not who they want. Reagardless of education.
July 18th, 2008 at 5:07 amI mean if it takes a four year degree to screw up this country the way it is now with the economy and its people so in discontent of the career politician, socialite elite.
Than just think what an average person can not due than and just could possible accomplish in what they could not do. Than I am all for voting for that guy or gale who is flipping burgers at McDonalds than.
And the dog and pony show continues. Will anything be done about this? NO!!! Why not? Because Nancy Pelosi, Jay Rockefeller and Jane Harmon KNEW!!!! They will not go after this administration because they are as guilty of this crime as the administration is.
Nice to be the ones breaking the laws and making new ones to cover your asses. I don’t even know why they are holding these hearings. NOTHING WILL EVER BE DONE TO THESE PEOPLE!!! THERE WILL BE NO JUSTICE. They’ve all gotten away with it.
Nancy Pelosi calls Bush a failure. Well she knuckled under to this great failure. What does that make her. They should all rot in hell together.
July 18th, 2008 at 6:26 amWhat a disappointment to be confronted by an idiot, this one calling itself desert_stars66, 1st thing in the morning. What makes a person whose misuse of the language and it’s customs points to an uneducated, scared moron who comes to TP seeking an outlet for itself by posting illogical bullcrap.
I need more coffee.
July 18th, 2008 at 6:31 am“desert_stars66 Says:
“Lets not forget the Nazi’s were in alliance with the Muslims to kill as many jews as possible during W.W.2″
How can we “forget” something that is historically untrue? Apparently, tardboy missed the unit on the Holocaust that day in home skool.
July 18th, 2008 at 6:34 amIn March 2002, detainee Abu Zubaydah, described as a “first test subject for harsh interrogation techniques,” underwent waterboarding while in U.S. custody.
Only this crappy president and equally garbage administration , would ever think of using human beings as potential guinea pigs ; any question that Chimpy’s grandfather indeed was influenced by the Nazis as well as doing business with them ?
July 18th, 2008 at 7:35 am“truth”er21,
The link you gave makes a very important distinction which you and your like-minded ilk are ignoring:
“The Nazis and the Muslim extremists (not all Muslim people by any means) have very common ideologies and common enemies.” (emphasis in original)
The Nazis were looking to get the support of the extremists. It is FALSE to suggest that all Muslims wanted to eradicate the Jews. You should stop lumping all Muslims in with the extremists. You wouldn’t claim that all Christians are just like the KKK, would you? Same kind of thinking.
July 18th, 2008 at 8:02 amtruther21 Says:
——————————————————————————–
MC and Bozo: Perhaps you should try reading up on the Nazi and Muslim connection. You can start here: http://www.themiddleeastnow.com/musnazi.html
July 18th, 2008 at 7:53 am
Another reputable and incorruptible link/source , provided by one of our resident trolls ; what , no link to the National Enquirer on-line ?
What the hell does any “Muslim connection” have to do with this thread ?
July 18th, 2008 at 8:04 amGood point, MCMetal, it has nothing to do with it.
The trolls live in a word where violence justifies mroe violence. (One might even suspect they would be happy with the idea of “An eye for an eye”, also known as the Code of Hammurabi.) At any rate, they do not view all humans equally, deciding that some humans are “better” than others, and that the “better” ones are justified in vanquishing the “lesser” ones. They are by no means examples of Humanity’s finest (but who among us is?) Still, I prefer to think that enlightened people no longer think so primitively.
July 18th, 2008 at 8:13 amWayne A. Schneider Says:
——————————————————————————–
Good point, MCMetal, it has nothing to do with it.
The trolls live in a word where violence justifies mroe violence. (One might even suspect they would be happy with the idea of “An eye for an eye”, also known as the Code of Hammurabi.) At any rate, they do not view all humans equally, deciding that some humans are “better” than others, and that the “better” ones are justified in vanquishing the “lesser” ones. They are by no means examples of Humanity’s finest (but who among us is?) Still, I prefer to think that enlightened people no longer think so primitively.
July 18th, 2008 at 8:13 am
They are simply following the “lead” provided by this garbage president and administration , who truly believe they themselves to be “real Americans” and “real patriots” , and that the ends justifies their means ; that whatever they do , be it torture or arbitrary killing of others , is not only justifiable , but truly necessary and warranted , because they’re “good” and they are fighting “evil”.
I have never seen or heard of a more warped or insane group perception ………
July 18th, 2008 at 8:20 amtruther21 Says:
MC and Bozo: Perhaps you should try reading up on the Nazi and Muslim connection. You can start here: http://www.themiddleeastnow.com/musnazi.html
July 18th, 2008 at 7:53 am
______
So? That’s nothing compared to the Nazi/Bush connection:
July 18th, 2008 at 8:23 amSo, hussein toasterhead,
By the trolls’ “logic”, The Nazis were supporting the Muslim extremists, and Bush’s family was supporting the Nazis, so Bush’s family has been supporting the Muslim extremists for more than sixty years now. I get it.
July 18th, 2008 at 8:29 amThat must be why they institute policies that help to further the goals of the Muslim Extremists(tm) by creating so many recruiting opportunities and by looking the other way back in 2001.
Face it, trolls, the Bush Admin and Al Queada are working towards the same goal: permanent war for perpetual profit.
And the cowardly trolls are too scared to not believe the lies.
July 18th, 2008 at 8:40 amYeah right. “Legal cover” for TORTURE!!! TORTURE!!!
July 18th, 2008 at 9:04 amTanqueray Says
July 18th, 2008 at 12:21 am
Gee, I wonder if the ragheads that beheaded Nick Berg checked with their Attorney General first?
_________________________________________________________
Um…you DO realize that this waterboarding occurred almost two years BEFORE Nick Berg was beheaded, don’t you? The “we’ve looked into our crystal ball and have seen that in a couple of years some other middle eastern guys are going to behead somebody — therefore we are completely justified in what we’re doing now” rationale just doesn’t hold up. Try something else.
July 18th, 2008 at 9:13 amFirst of all I want to say I understand.
July 18th, 2008 at 9:22 am“Liberalism is a Disease” and some many you are infected badly.
Bush spied to keep your sorry backs alive.
Did Al-Qaeda get permission before they beheaded American’s
Did they get permission to hang the burned bodies from bridges while their limbs were falling off. Too bad so of jerks were those soldiers. But then again you would be crying and calling for your mommies!! The stupid party, That’s “democraps” who voted the current do nothing congress at 9% approval will vote more crap in and watch our country vanish.
Gas was $2.00 Botox Nancy takes over, $5.00 great change. Their over-site committee watched as the banks raped everyone and they took loans below market price and said screw everyone else. That’s right like Bush who screwed this war up because of his leadership, The Democraps have done far worse and will do much more if they win. Liberals only care about themselves and no one else. They think lying and cheating on the friends and wives is ok. They will screw their friends just to get ahead. Barak, don’t attack my wife… You send her out to talk your No policy to all that could help this country and she is fair game. He won’t debate McCain in Town Hall. He lied there. He won’t appear on Fox’s O’Reilly said he would but lies again. Hillary has more Balls then he does.
Barak’s Change, just look up “Jim Jones 1978″ or if that’s to much for you, just think Jimmy Carter in a wet suit.
I’m out of here.
Geez, the troll turds this early in the morning have already given me a headache.
July 18th, 2008 at 9:55 amWhatever happened to the use of paragraphs, or do trolls think dumping a bunch of garbage in one idiotic paragraph is really impressive.
Someone should tell cleer voice the right wingers are pros whenit comes to lying and cheating.
tony and guidedog lido
By the reasoning of truthers21’s sources the catholic Vichy French, the Catholic Italians and the Irish Catholics were and must therefore still be, ideologically bound to the Nazis; ergo Catholics are fundamentally Nazis and a threat to everyone else.
These sources totally ignore the geo-politics of the time.
Much of the Arab, and that is to say the Muslim, world was under colonial control, especially British control and especially in the Middle East.
As Germany was challenging Britain at the time and making an impressive show of it, politically ambitious Arabs/Muslims courted Hitler with a view to getting rid of British rule and for Palestine in particular, preventing the creation of Israel in Palestinian lands by the Zionist movement which had some powerful representation in the British administration.
If the Muslims and the Nazis were so damned close why didn’t the Moroccans or the Algerians rise up fight the British when the North African campaign was established in 1942? Why didn’t the Nazis supply them to do so? After-all, Germany was winning and the Vichy were in technically in control of France’s colonies. Libya was controlled by the Mussolinis fascist forces. Britain made no progress in North Africa for a year. Yet NONE of the Arab/Mulsim nations fought, or were invited to fight, with the Germans—despite their supposedly deep-seated ideological commonalities. Why? Because the Germans didn’t want them to and the Arabs/Muslims had the sense let their supposedly ideological brethren do the work that might serve their political—NOT ideological—ambitions.
These screeds that truther provides are highly selective ideologically motivated efforts to promote the idea that Islam is the same as Nazism, that Muslims are inherently Nazis and that the Muslim religion and its members present the same global threat to western (and therefore Christian) interests as did the Nazis and the fascists.
With all the oil money Muslim nations have acquired by now they should be building-up large militaries to take on the West—especially as the US and NATO are stretched so thin.
Why aren’t the Muslims, these “Islamofascists” seizing this golden opportunity to establish a global Caliphate by force of arms to impress their fundamental ideology on the rest of the world? Because “the Muslims” aren’t interested in doing that. Only handful of psychos (found in every group of humans) dream such dreams and try to act upon them. And in poetic symmetry, only psychotics supposedly on the opposite side of the ideological spectrum convince themselves of that same dream.
It’s the ignorant, “lizard-brained” extremists who see the world in absolute and diametrically opposite terms that actually share a common ideology and it is their willful ignorance of that simple fact and their desire to act upon their extreme beliefs by whatever means that maintains a closed-loop of self fulfilling justification for their never ending violent tendencies and ambitions.
July 18th, 2008 at 10:09 amclearvoice: Bush spied to keep your sorry backs alive.
Given that the NSA wiretapping program was initiated by Bush about three months BEFORE the 9-11 attacks, how did it keep the victims of those attacks “alive”?
It didn’t, did it?
So as the purpose of the wiretapping was to keep us diseased liberals alive, for it to have succeed the roughly 3,000 who died must have all been conservatives and Republicans.
Frankly I find that a bit weird…I mean why would Bush save liberals but let conservatives and Republicans die such horrible deaths?
You might want to reconsider your political allegiances, clearvoice.
You might also want to, in the infamous words of a staunch placard-bearing Bush supporter ( which might well be you now I come to think of it ), “Get a Brain, Morans!”
Or you could just STFU.
July 18th, 2008 at 10:21 amdesert_stars66 said:
Hey Paul please do you think that Bush was the first president who spied on his own people, check your history bud!
And this somehow makes it OK?
When it was discovered that intelligence abuses had occurred (the Church Committee), the original FISA law was written to prevent future abuses. Bush completely ignored this law and spied on Americans anyway. That is the history.
http://progressiveworldreview.com
July 18th, 2008 at 11:00 amclearvoice:
July 18th, 2008 at 11:14 amWhy the drop and run without even taking the time to wipe? Are you scared?
“U.S. may have waterboarded detainee before getting legal approval.”
This is, at least, poorly constructed. Since torture is illegal, PERIOD, getting LEGAL APPROVAL is IMPOSSIBLE. No law of the USA, before or after PATRIOT LAW says that it’s legal to torture. Check the letter of the law.
July 18th, 2008 at 11:41 amI wish Nadler would start asking these bozo’s how they would defend their position during a trial at The Hauge for crimes against humanity. It’s clear no one in the U.S. will be prosecuted by US.
July 18th, 2008 at 1:07 pmWar Crimes Tribunal!
July 19th, 2008 at 5:22 pm