BUSH: "DAMN RIGHT" -Torture Was ALL About "Revenge"

[kpete]

On the policy of torturing captured Al Qaeda suspects, Bush writes that he refused to approve two techniques requested by the Central Intelligence Agency but gave the O.K. to waterboarding. George Tenet, the C.I.A. director, asked permission to use waterboarding on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the operational mastermind behind September 11th. “I thought about my meeting with Danny Pearl’s widow, who was pregnant with his son when he was murdered,” Bush writes. (Pearl, the Wall Street Journal reporter, was reportedly beheaded by K.S.M.) “I thought about the 2,973 people stolen from their families by al Qaeda on 9/11. And I thought about my duty to protect the country from another act of terror. ‘Damn right,’ I said.” By Bush’s own account, revenge was among his chief motives in sanctioning torture. “I had asked the most senior legal officers in the U.S. government to review the interrogation methods, and they had assured me they did not constitute torture.” The President had been told what he wanted to hear by loyal subordinates, but, his memoirs make clear, he did not consider the moral and practical consequences of authorizing what most people who were not senior legal officers in the Bush Administration would describe as torture. One crucial consequence—the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib—receives a single page (most of which is about Bush’s reasons for not firing Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld).

Read more http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2010/11/29/101129crbo_books_packer#ixzz16JvV8yEW

[madmax]

1. What more does this man have to say out of his

own mouth that will bring him before Justice. :wtf:

[laughingliberal]

8. Now, now. Just keep looking forward. nt

[SixString]

15. Like this guy.

[madmax]

19. I'm going to need an increase in blood pressure meds. nt

[The Backlash Cometh]

9. Hitler is rolling over in his grave.

Agog, he is, thinking, who knew that acting like a stupid frat boy would have gotten me off the hook?

[madmax]

20. It's hard to defend America when shit like this

just keeps on going and going and going. Like the damn Engergizer rabbit gone crazy.

[HardWorkingDem]

2. Then does that not make him an even bigger liar (if that is even possible)...

My goodness, where are all the probing journalists? Why has there not been a question of the difference between "revenge" and "getting valuable information" of that ticking time bomb.

Amazing.

[Cirque du So-What]

3. To the narcissist

satisfying his sick sense of revenge is more important than conducting interrogations that actually obtain useful information. The fact that the US was made LESS safe due to counterproductive torture is completely lost on this sociopath.

[City Lights]

4. Sick mutha.

If I ruled the US, Dubya and Dick would spend the rest of their miserable lives in solitary.

[glitch]

6. I'd make them share a cell. nt

[City Lights]

7. Ooooo, I like the way you think.

:evilgrin:

[Angry Dragon]

16. Then my dear you would have my vote

[burnsei sensei]

5. A word or two about revenge:

1. It's irrational.
2. It's a powerful feature of the culture of the Middle East, Hindu Kush, you know where we've been fighting.
3. It's not justice.
4. It's criminal, uncivilized.
Thank you GW Bush, for making us resemble the people we are fighting.
For making the War on Terror the longest damn war this country will ever fight.

[Mnemosyne]

10. Confessed war criminal, George W. Bush, bragging of his crimes, walks freely in our country n/t

[MadMaddie]

11. Okay he has admitted to committing a crime in his book

He gives his motivation...

Seriously if this does not point out the difference between the powerful and the rest of us I don't know what does. The Ends do not justify the means.

[tabasco]

12. Placing our soldiers at risk not a concern to little frat boy cheerleader.

If he is not prosecuted, there will never be justice in this country.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

13. Damn right I authorized the torture of Iraqi women and children

who had absolutely nothing to do with the issue at hand. This is how I managed to aggrandize myself, this is how I made it into the history books, this is how I displayed my ignorance and disrespect for the rule of law.

[delightfulstar]

14. And people actually VOTED for him?

It's an insult to the American people that this "man" walks free. So treating prisoners (no matter how vile) in a inhumane, degrading manner is okay in his book? Just goes to show how low he would stoop to cover his own behind, and to hell with everyone else. Á chacun son mauvais goût, and suffice to say, he is a pretty tasteless piece of work, indeed. I'm sure glad he's not in a position to impose it upon us anymore. Now that he's admitted what he's reponsible for, why not hold him accountable?

[toddwv]

17. If it was done as an act of retaliation, that makes it a form of terror.

So the US is still the world's largest state sponsor of terrorism and people like Bush will continue to be elected into office on a wave of jingoistic deceit and euphoria.

[TheWatcher]

18. Pretty soon he will admit that he masturbated to the Torture Photos, and he will be swiftly given

The Medal Of Freedom.

What has become of our country?

Have We No Sense Of Right And Wrong?

Have We No Rule Of Law?

Have We No Courage?

Have We No Sense Of Morality?

Have We No Dignity?

Have We No Principles?

And At Long Last.....

HAVE WE NO SENSE OF DECENCY?