I understand that Colin Powell is "confused"

[serryjw]

by Tony Snow on KO. What is he confused about...some re-writing of international law that Bushit &co want to do?

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. Oh, just the Geneva Conventions.

Something Powell, as a former Secretary of State, National Security Advisor and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, wouldn't know nearly as much about as Tony Snow does. Powell would rather that Bush didn't "clarify" the Geneva Conventions to allow the U.S. to torture people in secret prisons, and Tony Snowjob decided that meant he was "confused."

[joemurphy]

2. Tony says Colin's confused because Colin thinks that the

Bush administration wants to re-write Common Article 3 of the Geneva Convention which outlaws "torture". Not so, says Tony. The trouble with the Geneva Convention is that it doesn't define "torture" specifically enough for the Bush administration. The Bush Administration just wants a little clarity.
(Of course, the fact that the Geneva Convention's been around since the mid-1940s and has 60 years of interpretative history still hasn't alieviated all the uncertainty, says Tony.) So, therefore, the Bush Administration wants to get concrete by really defining what is and what isn't "torture"

It wants to do this by adopting the the McCain Amendment's definitions for "torture" and making those definitions the operative ones for the Geneva Convention -- or so says Tony. The fact that the McCain Amendment has only been law for around a year and has no pragmatic history to provide guidance as to ITS definition of "torture", of course, suits the Bush administration just fine.

The McCain murkiness will thus serve to clarify the Geneva Convention's present murkiness.

The result is an amendment to the Geneva Convention by means of the adoption of a new interpretation for its language outlawing "torture". That, Tony reasons, isn't really an amendment to the Geneva Convention because not a word of the Geneva Convention is being changed. So that's why Colin's confused.

See? All clear now? No longer confused?

[serryjw]

4. What part is ambiguous?

Part I : General provisions
ARTICLE 3
In the case of armed conflict not of an international character occurring in the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties, each Party to the conflict shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, the following provisions:

(1) Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed ' hors de combat ' by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria.
To this end, the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons:

(a) violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;

(b) taking of hostages;

(c) outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment;

(d) the passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court, affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.

(2) The wounded and sick shall be collected and cared for.

An impartial humanitarian body, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, may offer its services to the Parties to the conflict.
The Parties to the conflict should further endeavour to bring into force, by means of special agreements, all or part of the other provisions of the present Convention.
The application of the preceding provisions shall not affect the legal status of the Parties to the conflict.

[joemurphy]

7. "Outrages to human dignity"

See, is making them wear articles of women's clothing; making them stand for hours in one position; depriving them of sleep; threatening them with dogs; making them pose in nude pictures with sacks over their heads an "outrage to human dignity"?

Inquiring minds in the Bush Administration would like to know where you draw the line. They need better definitions.

[CarlVK]

3. Collin's a willing fool.

No one will forget that pathetic vial waving spectacle at the UN prior to the criminal US invasion. He basically screwed the pooch with that one.

[Clarkie1]

5. He was lied to. He's proven today he still has some integrity. nt

[Mz Pip]

6. To little too late

IMHO. If he'd stood up years ago I would have given him a lot of credit. Now that he's out of the loop the word confused seems appropriate. What has changed in the past 4 years.

It was clear then. It's clear now. If he still doesn't get it enough to come out kicking and screaming, then he is confused.

Mz Pip
:dem:

[PurityOfEssence]

9. No more than the slightest wisp of it at best

This man sold his soul to the monarchic maniacs who run the executive branch today. Yes, he refused to echo the bogus nuclear intimations in his infamous UN speech, even though it was barely more than a week after Junior's State of the Union Address with the despicable 16 words, but he was a dutiful stooge with lie after lie. He knew the buildings shown weren't engaged in WMD work. He knew that virtually everything he said was at best a distortion, yet he soldiered on.

They used him because of his perceived rectitude, and he happily went along with it. His tragedy is a pathetic one. What he's doing now even he doesn't really understand. If he wants to exonerate himself, he'd have to admit endless culpability. He won't.

This guy is simply not very smart; his circuitry is quite limited. Beyond that, he values loyalty above anything, yet doesn't hold his handlers accountable to the same loyalty.

He has no integrity. He has cowardice dressed up as propriety.

Don't praise this man; he was an apologist for My Lai. He can stand there with his stoic set jaw and speak with measured certitude, but he's an enabler. He's also a fool: he and McCain still think they can be embraced by the forces of privilege who use them to no end.

Go away, Colin. Go far, far away. Know, though, that you've shamed yourself, ruined your nation and vast swaths of the world, and didn't even get paid for your calumny.

His redemption can only be purchased with extreme actions that illuminate his collusion; he'll never do this. Do not praise this man.

He's a pathetic functionary caught in his own dishonesties and jettisoned by those who used him after he'd served their purposes. He is a tasteless and unamusing joke.

[Joe Bacon]

8. I could care less about that liar

Powell's whole career was built on one lie after another.

He lied about My Lai

He lied about Iran Contra

He lied about Contra Cocaine

He lied about his role in rigging Florida

He lied to the whole world at the United Nations

His legacy is that he is the second most incompetent asshole to "serve" as Secretary of State.