Terrorist Fear Mongering and Torture
By Larry Johnson on March 8, 2008 at 7:58 PM in Current Affairs
Today’s decision by President Bush to veto the Congressional ban on water boarding and other interrogation techniques that qualify as torture is a sad reminder of how far we have fallen from the heights reached in aftermath of World War Two, when the victorious allies tried Nazis and Japanese for crimes against humanity, which included water boarding. I had six seconds on ABC News tonight to “explain” why Bush is wrong. And who shows up to advocate torture? The intrepid Michael Scheuer, the former CIA analyst who was put in charge of Alec Station and given the task of finding Bin Laden. Needless to say, Michael failed.
Scheuer believes that terrorism represents a unique, unprecedented threat and that we must be prepared to do anything to stop it, including the use of torture. Poor Michael, a victim of inadequate public education. He wants you to believe that Islamic terrorism is a greater, more deadly threat than any other threat the United States has ever faced?
Okay, let’s try some hard facts.
Is the terrorism threat greater than the threat we faced in World War Two? During World War Two we fought the Nazis, the Italian Fascists, and the Japanese. An estimated 61 million people died. Two hundred and ninety five thousand Americans died in the four years America fought. The Nazis were working on a nuclear bomb. The Japanese had active biological weapons research programs underway.
How about the Cold War with the Soviets? If you add up the wars in Korea and Vietnam we are well over 100,000 American fatalities. The Soviets also deployed submarines with nuclear missile launch capability, long range bombers, and inter-continental nuclear ballistic missiles that could reach U.S. cities in less than thirty minutes. Oh yes, almost forgot, the Soviets also had a huge surface naval fleet and funded proxy wars against U.S. interests in South and Central America, Africa, and Asia.
Now we face terrorism. Since less than 10,000 Americans have died in terrorist attacks around the world. Got that? Less than 10,000. No terrorist organization on the face of the earth has an air force, naval fleet, submarine fleet, or armed force capable of striking the United States with anything even approximating 10% of the Soviet capability in their hey day. No terrorist force on the face of the earth has a nuclear arsenal ready to be launched at a moments notice that would destroy all major U.S. cities.
So what in the hell is Michael Scheuer and other fear mongers doing? They are making shit up and using fear as a bludgeon to convince Americans that we should surrender our honor and lose our humanity. I believe terrorism is a threat. And I believe folks like Bin Laden, if left to their own devices would try to do us harm again and would not hesitate to use a nuclear weapon. But that fact does not justify torture. Our fear should not be used as an excuse to act like the tyrants that our nation fought during and after World War Two.
It was Hitler who justified murdering Jews and gypsies because they were perceived as posing a deadly threat to the German homeland. Millions of so-called terrorists died in the gulags of Stalin and Khurschev’s Soviet Union. Mao also put to death millions who were declared to be counter revolutionaries who threatened the future of the Chinese communist nation. Tyrants who use the fear of terrorism to excuse torture and imprisonment without recourse to habeus corpus is not a new phenomena. But now we have crossed a threshold and by our conduct as a nation have aligned ourselves with the likes of Hitler and Stalin. We are not torturing on a scale approaching that achieved by the Germans, the Japanese, or the Soviets–well, at least not yet.
But we are employing methods used by those we condemned in war crimes trials. And we are excusing our conduct because we are protecting the homeland. We will preserve our homeland at any cost. We will do anything to survive. And we will excuse any outrage against a human being as long as we can assure ourselves they are an enemy combatant. And in the process, we become the evil that we once condemned in both word and deed. This is a Bush legacy I cannot wait to erase. But these stains are not easily removed and the scars on our nation’s conscience will linger for years.
So, when you hear folks like Michael Scheuer argue that the threat of terrorism is so great that we must be prepared to torture, at least consider the possibility of challenging them with the facts of history.
Thanks Larry..
You are Right..and the President of the United States should NOT be making a Public issue of this ..
or supporting it as a Policy..
And Larry, your efforts against torture, and those of the people you work with, do make a difference.
I think men like Cheney, and Bush, et al are intimidated by those who speak out against this vile practice.
So it is getting through, and they DO feel the pressure.
Thank you, anyone who supports torture simply does not see clearly, to their own detriment.
Hey Simon,
Off topic, however, I’m poetically obsessing
Eariler today you stated:
Seventies Stevie Wonder music being the equivalent of Keats
I’ve just started reading the Y.B Yeats bio by Joseph Hone and curious about your divergent coupling
Off the top of my head, and I will give it more thought and get back to you ( lucky you — snark) , I see in both men a texture of sensitive, rational, humanistic intellect, and feeling, if you will, that motivates their art, one expressing himself through music, the other rhythm expressed through the written word. In my head, they produce similar music, words being tonal in pronounciation, and sound and intent.
So I see a certain sweet, melancholy human LONGING, or desire, a searching of the human spirit, which seems to be the theme, here lately, expressed by both keats, and wonder, not yet corrupt, or cynical, a certain delicate intricacy, like lace, say, layered artistic patterns. And if I were to take it a step further, I would apply it to the work of the russian abstract artist Filonov, who layered image, piecemeal, still having faith in the goodness of man, contrary to the other painters, of the time.
I dont know, maybe I see some of that again, lately, and that’s a good sign.
And this is absent any reflection of the romanticism of Keat’s time. Or maybe it isn’t.
I’m sorry I can’t give you a more technical or critical analysis, yet, I will compare Keats and Wonder’s work,(meter, rhythm, sound, metaphor, theory) specifically,(I can be compulsive about finding answers) again, I make associations and the people around me go What? but I see it, and I follow it, because it FEELS, SEEMS right, and it’s art, so nothing ventured, nothing gained.
And I guess that’s the function of the artist, to make sense of the chaos, or give form to the chaos, and this being postmodernistic America, or maybe the new humanism, intertexuality is the name of the game. How do all these divergent pieces relate, to make a new whole?
Like quantum physics, you know?
So I might put something musical together around Keats, and 70’s Wonder. Dont’ know what yet, but I’m sure I’ll figure something out.
Also, in this month’s Atlantic, Christopher Hitchen’s reviews a new book on Ezra Pound, (by David Moody), if you’re interested in the modernists.
Yeats is pictured in a photograph included with the article, I suppose I’ll by the book, I love to read about the madness of genius…
Thanks Simon,
After thinking about your Stevie, Keats ref
I saw the poetic link. They are also both wounded in their own right.
Funny because I too have studied the emotional history of the poetic mind as well.For my thesis project in grad school I designed a training manual for educators and therapist on the cognitive and emotional develpoment of highly gifted children, IQ over 150. Most resent the word “gifted”, but make no mistake,all of our most brilliant poets have been highly gifted and alas, at high risk for every single emotional disorder on the block as well as nearly double the rate of suicide.
It is this emtional state of hypersentivity that is the the birth of said art. The ability to correlate the strings of the unrelated and weave them into a cohesive peice of edvidence, be it music, poetry, painting, buildings etc is the final production of these divergent, wildly emotional states of being. We will pass on the grief,rage, isolation, depression and the general state of anxiety that normally sneaks along for the ride in this act of creation for now.
I can not think of a more inappropriate form to discuss such matters and Susan and Larry are probably thinking …WTF?? Talk about OFF TOPIC. Sorry guys
I simply adore Chris H. He never fails to leave me clutching my sides and pissing myself laughing on the floor ( now there’s a poetic image) I disagree with nearly every syllable he utters but refuse to deny, weather I agree with him or not, the sheer audacious
brillance of his given weekly rant.
I’m reading the bio on Yeats simply due to the recent re- reading ( lotta R’s) of one of my fav poems by Audan “In Memory of W.B.Yeats”
In this re-reading I was once again, struck dumb by the twisting, mending and molding… of the final application of each and every metaphor.
So we end where we began. Don’t we always
Till then
Beautifully said Larry.
Jesus Tapdancing Christ, Mickey Mouse News devoted more air time to LJ and Scheuer walking than they did to their talking.
Why did they waste my time with that? [I think everybody should take this sort of thing very personally.]
Tho I must say, LJ is a magnificent walker — much, much better than Scheuer.
Holy shit! Those dead white coeds got more air time.
In case anybody else needs to look up Scheuer — have no idea if the info is reliable, but may be a good starting point summary.
Even Vick’s pitbulls got more time!
Larry, thanks for saying what a lot of us feel.
Great post, thanks Larry.
Jesus Tapdancing Christ
Now THAT is funny
Ditto on the thanks Larry.
What really struck me, beside what a great job you did, was Scheuer looked like he had just been told or was getting ready to tell the biggest joke ever, laughing and grinning like a hyena the whole time…
It made me wonder if he isn’t heavily into S&M or something.
I guess the Republicans are planning on using this as an issue in the GE, only reason I can think of that Bush would even make an issue of this. Dems are weak on terror.
It doesn’t seem real.
How low the self-professed keepers of society’s values have taken the U.S. during the Bush regime.
Our country’s honor is being disgraced.
I started studying The Third Reich and WWII in High School and loved Leon Uris and Herman Wouk and I probably developed a softer spot for Israel than many others on this site.
To imitate Hitler and Stalin is revolting.
Give ‘em hell Larry -
Make them own their shame.
People like Scheuer are trapped by their partisanship to enable bush and his fellow criminals. They should realize the taint won’t go away when bush leaves, that they will be reviled for generations, assuming of course we survive.
We will survive.
But I have to wonder about Scheuer NOT seeing the truth of your statement, not having the eyes to understand what is happening here.
Governments that torture do not survive, does he think the US suddenly dumbed down, that much, in 7 short years?
Weird.
You were not kidding about the 6 seconds…
and the “sad reminder of how far we have fallen”.
I remember to this day Michael Scheuer’s blacked out face on the TV interview when he came out of the closet, prior to a Imerial Hubris…
I would like to see a Charlie Rose type interview where this is given more than drive by sound bites.
I said was interested in the questions but why am I not surprised…I did not hear any asked by the news man.
You still managed to nail it in 6 seconds. Keep at it!
As a therapist I believe, and this may be stating the obvious, that this is “collective fear” being pojected on to our nation, in an effort to alleviate
the feelings of inferiority that these men felt when they got caught (symbolically) with their pants down on 911.
They are also ’shamed based’ because they did not protect our country and are now willing to throw our consitution out the window to regain their procieved lost sense of power … at any cost.
They feel humilailated that the entire world watched as the most powerful country in the world got cold cocked. The end result is regaining this power, through any means necessary to buy an emotional and psychological sense of safty, control and power.
Their anger and fear are now misguided and being acted out on the only people they have available, the guys that got caught. It is more important to
SEND THE MESSAGE to the world that we will do what ever it takes to get the information out of you, than worrying about “human rights”. These people ceased ( in their minds) to become “human” when they struck on 911. In their attempt to defeat the enemy,
they resort to the same reactionary barbaric tactics,
therefore,becoming the men that they fear the most.
And so it goes, and so it goes
But … WTF do I know?
Do excuse all the spelling errors.
Indy - I think you give TOO much credit to their “thinking”.
Mostly they failed due to a lack of compassion and history, believing that the “Presidency” bestowed intelligence and far greater wisdom than we give them credit for. They ignored intel and attention to basic economy with equal stupidity, allowing greedy self serving elements to make policy and judgment calls without regard to 200 Years of America or what is “right” for the “People”.
The Bush Legacy will be a bankrupt economy, shattered military, disgraced foreign policy/image compounded with the greatest shift in power and wealth from the Middle Class to the Corporistias, topped off with the international shame as a nation that tortures war prisoners/civilian detainees in the name of “justice” . . .
(as for spelling, check ieSpell - a GREAT free spellimg checker for blogistas . . . )
THANKS for the spell checker…no more Pig Pen typo dust.
All excellent valid points. I will have to find this check ie spell? eh??
“a GREAT free spellimg checker for blogistas”
too funny, check your word … spellimg
I am in terrible need due to deslexia and a bad case of pure old fashioned lazyiess
I may be playing devil’s advocate, but this quote by William Donovan certainly echoes the sentiment held by modern policy makers in the war on terror….
“We face an enemy who believes one of his chief weapons is that none but he will employ terror. But we will turn terror against him….”
Unfortunately, lapses in the American Ideal of fair play and justice have many historical precedents. Let’s hope the next administration can undo some of the damage of the last.
“But we will turn terror against him…”
Even if we do not consider our values of fair play and justice, this idea that we can turn terror against them is just plain wrong. How do you terrorize someone who wants to be a martyr for his cause?
America faces today the same right-wing terrorist threat that our nation faced back in the 1990s, when Bill Clinton was our nation’s president for two terms.
For whatever his other faults might have been, President Bill Clinton and his Democratic administrations never resorted to the outrageous Police State measures of the Bush administration, nor trampled on our Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Rule of Law. To my knowledge, no debate over “torture” was ever heard during Clinton’s years in office. Clinton didn’t demand legislation stripping our nation’s governors of their control over their state’s national guard units during times of “emergency.” Clinton didn’t sign a treaty-less agreement with Canada (reported by Vancouver Sun, three weeks ago) giving Canadian soldiers the go-ahead to cross over into the United States to help out during an “emergency.” Clinton didn’t have anyone in his administration skirt the FISA court to bypass safeguards put into place in an attempt to stop any administration from criminally misusing our intelligence and law-enforcement arms of the executive branch. Clinton didn’t blow the cover of a covert CIA officer, one charged with protecting us from anyone getting their hands on nuclear weapons or other WMD. Clinton didn’t issue “signing statements” the same way the Bush administration has, namely, telling members of Congress to go screw themselves, Bush is not obeying the law he just signed into law, as a whole or in part…essentially nothing more than a “line-item veto” tactic, but called “signing statements.” And from what I remember from the 1990s, the Clinton administrations never pushed “fear” as a public policy. In fact, they appear to have somewhat downplayed the terrorist threat in public, while working feverishly behind the scenes to stop anymore right-wing terrorist attacks, like those that happened in 1993 (the first World Trade Center bombing by al Qaeda) and in 1995 (Timothy McVeigh blowing up the Murrah Office Building in Oklahoma).
So, no matter what else is said about the Clinton years, his administrations were a thousand times more honorable, trustworthy and honest than anything that we’ve seen happening during the Bush Jr. years.
And much of this glaring disparity between the honorable Bill Clinton’s two terms as president and the fear-mongering, malfeasant and outright criminal corruption of Bush’s two terms as president can be attributed to the people brought in by either administration to help coordinate activities of our federal government.
Sure, President Bill Clinton loosely weighted hiring decisions on party affiliation, but, to my knowledge, he didn’t wage an eradication program in the federal bureacracy to drive competent, patriotic Republicans into retirement…which is totally opposite what the worst administration in American history has been doing, with their systematic identification and criminal harassment of anyone (whether Democrat or Republican) who is not sufficiently loyal to the neo-con Republican agenda…that is, they value our Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Rule of Law more than they value kissing Bush’s (or Cheney’s) ass.
So, now we face one of the biggest crises in American history, with the United States being in much worse shape today than when the honorable President Bill Clinton handed over the White House to the psychopathic Bush and the sociopathic Cheney in January 2001.
Oracle, those are excellent points. The fearmongers will say
“ah but that was before 9/11″ but what you write is indicative that they would have responded very differently than the despotic manner in which the current Adm. has. What brings me to one of the points I am so outraged about Obama’s meesage: his constant trashing and rejection of the Clinton Adm. and bundling of it with the Bush Adm. as one of “the same”. I am deeply offended by this. It shows he either doesn’t undersatnd anything or that he is willing to make an immoral argument for political gain. Either way, it is far too much to stomach.
And what is your solution (besides math equations)?
Let’s get real here: if Dems get “deeply offended” by a Dem criticizing a Dem (softball), you WILL NOT be ready for the GE (hardball), period. You’ll also give confidence to your rival that it’s working, and they’ll home in on it.
Never ever let them see you sweat!
Tiptoe around the infighting, and concentrate on the ISSUES. Must always keep the eye on the issues ball, not the bat of attacks, or you’ll continuely strike out in the court of public opinions!!
Geeze, pull it together guys!
A “thousand times better”
Oracle,
Check out the ‘outrage’ from the Republicans on from the 90′5 during Clinton’s tenure. A stroll back down memory lane.
President wants Senate to hurry with new anti-terrorism laws
July 30, 1996
Web posted at: 8:40 p.m. EDT
WASHINGTON (CNN) — President Clinton urged Congress Tuesday to act swiftly in developing anti-terrorism legislation before its August recess.
But while the president pushed for quick legislation, Republican lawmakers hardened their stance against some of the proposed anti-terrorism measures.
http://www.cnn.com/US/9607/30/clinton.terrorism/
http://www.cnn.com/US/9604/18/anti.terror.bill/index.html
He hired William Cohen, a republican, and a smart one, at that.
Cohen wasn’t stupid, as most of the others, are.
ORACLE..
Thanks..That was worth Consideration..
In the shadows of my mind lingers a fear that whoever ‘wins’ the presidency in 2008 may not take full control of the office without compromise or worse. The many crimes of this administration makes one wonder why there is no effective opposition. The evils that men do are overlooked by feigning ignorance or accusing others of collusion.
What if the enemy in the eyes of Bu$h/Cheney is us?
They’re just not that smart.
Lighten up, really, they’re as dumb as they seem, don’t ever let anyone tell you different.
They’re morons.
This will be the bush legacy.
And with his actions he has put the lives of service men and women in greater danger.
I grew up on secure military bases — because of the sort of work my dad did — he flew over Russia, China and North Korea during the Cold War. We Navy brats figured out what our dads were doing — and that if their planes went down our dads could be tortured. We were also taught that Americans DO NOT torture prisoners — that we were better than the “commies”.
Although I knew what my dad did — I never mentioned this to my husband until the media (NewsWeek and Nightline) revealed the secret flights over Russia, China and North Korea during the Cold War.
At least one plane went down and the military lied about the location — we knew then that if our dad’s planes went down — that they would be written off as well.
Bush is a barbaric ghoul — I can’t imagine what “secrets” the inmates of Getmo might still hold. They’re probably all insane by now.
Thanks Larry, for your insightful commentary about President Bush’s latest stupidity.
Less that than a scared little chicken.
I see men like Yoo and Addington speaking, and they seem so personally traumatized, so out of their heads, I think, wow, you appear dissociated, like it’s not even YOU speaking.
So, I figure the pressure must really be getting to them, same as Bush, and Cheney.
At this point, I think the need to fight FOR torture is borne out of need to avoid future prosecution in the Hague — if they stop torture, they admit to wrongdoing. It’s moldy oldy legal theory, but the men they hire to defend them arent known for intellectual brilliance.
All of their inept thinking shows itself in their inability to even plan a strong defense.
Seeing as how McCain loves him some torture now, and seeing as how McCain is considered an expert on security and shit:
http://www.muckraked.com/wordpress/2008/03/07/turning-the-page-the-man-who-pushed-america-to-war
A bit of a bio about one of McCain’s earliest supporters, Ahmed Chalabi. And the most damning thing about the whole article is that Chalabi just missed being on the plane that crashed the Pentagon on 9/11.
Such good luck he has.
And for a bit of history on the run up to WW2, that great bulwark in america’s belief in its own exceptionalism:
http://www.latimes.com/features/books/la-bk-kurlansky9mar09,0,6763134.story
A close reading of Human Smoke might just explain why Israel makes certain that only certain strains of thought are allowable in American political discource and English politics. Israel has a memory of Churchill’s hatred of the jews, and of Rooseveldt’s refusal to aid the jews prior to 1941.
As for the handwringing over Bush’s refusal, too funny for words. The only reason the USA did not bother to torture German troops during ww2 is that we took so few worthwhile prisoners and by the time they were taken, whatever knowledge of offensive plans they might have had were invalidated by the fact that Germany was being handily defeated on both fronts. While the USA lost a quarter of a million troops ( mostly in the Pacific theatre ), the Russians lost eleven million troops and the same number of civilians, 14% of the russian population killed. 1/4 of 1 percent of the American population died.
A close reading of Human Smoke might just explain why Israel makes certain that only certain strains of thought are allowable in American political discource and English politics. Israel has a memory of Churchill’s hatred of the jews, and of
You know, people believe what they want to believe, believe what they want to confirm their own prejudices, to feel important, to appear exclusive.
But in the end, it’s all a load of shit.
Isn’t it?
And god help you if you’re on the wrong end.
This was CK’s, not mine.
I read a review of that book, giving it the first 10 paragraphs before I figured the author has his head up his ass.
It isn’t his belief that’s dangerous, it’s his delusional thought process, his simplistic black/white illogical fallacies, his absolute inability to properly reason and integrate conflicting factors, his inability to understand, must less acknowledge, his own bias, his sheer lack of intellectualism, or stupidity, for lack of a better word.
Baker has a mind like shit soaked toilet paper, and just as fragile.
But you know, the Cheney’s of the world believe that crap, so it’s great dis info.
Right?
It’s such old school 90’s crap, I guess Baker, and his publisher haven’t caught on to the new trends, yet.
Thankfully we have a few voices of reason to debunk the fear-mongering the media constantly bombards us with. Larry Johnson being one of the best. He not only tells us they’re wrong, he tells us they’re fucking wrong. (Some may be offended at times by the language but being the daughter of a Master Sergeant in the United States Army, I am more offended by those that would try to make us a bunch of fearful little cowards than by an expletive here and there.
I watched PBS Now on Friday Night and it was about the Academy Award winning movie Taxi To The Darkside which is about the torture and murder of an innocuous little Afghan cab driver named Dilwar by American soldiers. If you didn’t get a chance to watch it, here’s a link: http://www.pbs.org/now/shows/410/video.html
While the whole interview was enough to nauseate any decent human being I was particularly struck with the defense offered by some of the men involved. i.e. that they were “ordered” to do what they did. I thought that “defense” was dismissed after World War 2 when German soldiers tried to defend their actions by saying there were just following orders. Are we now doing the same? And if we are what does it say about us?
You might notice that the German soldiers who tried to use that defense were on the losing side.
So far the American’s using that defense are not officially on a losing side.
So that’s an okay defense unless we’re losing? And since we get lied to about how well things are going, how will we know when or if we are losing? And if we don’t lose then that’s just hunky dory as a reason to basically torture another human being, an innocent human being at that, to death? What the hell?
The victors determine what was lawful, what was acceptable. Imagine for a moment that Germany had not lost WW2. That the war crimes trials after the war would have featured a bunch of loser Russian Generals and “Bomber” Harris the architect of the Dresden fire bombing and LeMay the architect of the Tokyo fire bombing. All of them would have hung. All of them “were just following orders from their lawful superiors.” Had the Axis won that war: Churchill, Rooseveldt, Stalin, Marshall, et.al. would have been on yardarms instead of on pedestals.
It’s really not that hard to understand, not a “what the hell” idea. It is just reality. The side that accepts the surrender is the side that gets to determine the legalities and the acceptable excuses for common behaviours.
Excellent Larry.
Since less than 10,000 Americans have died in terrorist attacks around the world. Got that?
Did you mean to write “Since 1990″, Larry? I think it’s true, anyway.
I wonder when the People are going to wake up to the demise of public service i.e. the facet has been turned off in favor of what is politically correct for the empowerment of the Neocons. The Bush Administration continues with its agenda of privatization driven by secrecy. All I have heard is that torture does not work in most cases - that, more than likely, the tortured will give up what he thinks his captors want to hear or, when the insane are tortured, jibberish. We know the difference between intelligence interpreted for that which is politically correct e.g. the NIE for Iraq in 2003 versus what is correct in terms of public service e.g. the NIE for Iran in 2007. The Bush Administration remains on course - privatization and secrecy - over and over again. Last week, illegal arms dealer Victor Bout was arrested in Thailand. Public service dictates a rapid extradiction to the US. Privatization and secrecy has him in a Russian closet - which will prevail?
Dear, dear me, Larry. What a way to treat me after I took pains to prominently display your brilliant analytic talents on page 55 of my new book. Here I am trying to show the world what an insightful analyst you are, and you just keep abusing me. Oh well, I will not criticise you if you keep up the abuse. You are very wise to do so if it diverts your readers’ attention from your own analytic work and record.
Respectfully,
M.F.Scheuer
Falls Church, Va.
Thank you scheuermf@aol.com. Howver, save the “respectfully” silliness. You don’t mean it and I certainly respect nothing about you, at all.
Fortunately most people have caught on to the fact that you are a bullshit artist. Remember, I know many of your former colleagues who tell me you were known as “Charlie Manson” out at CIA because you surrounded yourself with female analysts who had no experience on Islamic or Arabic affairs. A smart person would have sought out such folks. But no, not you.
I’ll be happy to put my analytical record up against your pathetic work any day, any time. You accuse John O’Neill and Richard Clarke of being responsible for 9-11. At least I realize that Saudis, not Americans, were piloting the planes that struck us on 9-11.
And I’m glad you are joining forces with the likes of the Wall Street Journal and Max Boot to criticize my 2001 op-ed. As with everything in your analytical career, you cannot even summarize my points correctly. Typical of you, though. I understand why you conveniently ignore the absolute pathetic failure you were when you actually had the job of finding Bin Laden. No wonder your bosses at CIA officials consigned you to the library. They finally recognized you were way over your head and not competent for the task.
Mr.Scheuer:
this is not about you. This is about what is best for this country.
is how
what matters to you the most? Not the substantive policy discussion?
If I were a terrorist!
http://www.hillbillyreport.com/blog/2008/03/if-i-was-a-terr.html
Well done, Larry. Keep piling on the abuse!!! After all, it’s all you are good at or for.
Respectfully,
M.F. Scheuer
Falls Churc, VA
OK, if you’re that Michael Scheuer, why do you support torture, and do you understand the greater ramifications of implementing torture as policy, in regard to the future stability of the United States government?
A man who supports torture complaining about abuse…
You cannot defend?
OK, I read Larry’s post, questions answered.
Michael, Michael, Michael. “respectfully,” you remain a clueless laughingstock. In your insulated world stating facts constitutes abuse. You and I both know you were never considered a top notch analyst in the Eur Division, where you started your career. You sought refuge in the Counter Terrorism Center. Why you were ever allowed any authority in that shop is an indictment of CIA management. Unfortunately, you proved through your actions that you were not up to the challenge.
It is not surprising, given that you were on the case, that Osama Bin Laden is still walking around a free man. You have never quite caught on that it is important to be good at something as opposed to being a failure at everything. Oops, wait. You are talented at being inept. Well congrats on that.
Michael Scheuer, From a citizen; a question or two if I might,
1) Why do you believe torture is legal, moral or even required?
2) What were you reading during your time at the library?
3)Have you read “Blackwater” by Jeremy Scahill and if so, what is your opinion of BlackwaterUSA and do you have any business relationships with them?
What is wrong with the library, or female analysts, btw?
Scheuer problems seem to be his own.
I was thinking it wasn’t necessarily a greater awareness of Arabic culture, it’s a lack of sensitivity, period.
Those people fuck up no matter where you put them, they just can’t read.
“Scheuer believes that terrorism represents a unique, unprecedented threat and that we must be prepared to do anything to stop it, including the use of torture.”
In a certain way, this is correct, but not in the way Scheuer thinks.
The real threat of terrorism is the loss of reason, common sense and fair justice; which we are still on track for losing, unless we wake up. That’s why it’s called terrorism. The object is to terrorize a large number by surprise attacks on a small number. Those in authority positions on the receiving side are just as capable of leveraging fear as the attackers.
Meanwhile, the actual real threats are the things we already know, like car crashes and inadequate health care; the same usual suspects.
It is entirely conceivable that the terrorist threat is manufactured out of whole cloth by a consortium of insiders from the Bildenburger group, Isreal’s Mossad, and cells within the CIA, FBI, Secrat Soivce, and the Air Force.
Bin Laden’s family has made billions from this war on terrorism. Why is it difficult to imagine that Al Queada could very well be a straw man invented by Bin Laden? He could have recruited Saudi nationalists easily, may even have set the bomb at the Marine barracks and financed the USS Cole attack. But most of the other stuff could easily have been inside jobs. Especially the attacks on 9/11.
How much money are we talking about? A trillion dollars, so far. Three trillion if you count the money missing from the Defense Department since 2000.
Well, no.
Viciously oppressed people have legitimate gripes, when the Saudis, or Saddam torture, abuse, fail to educate or better their people, the people WILL FIGHT BACK.
But you know, why put more guns in their hands, guns they are incapable of using, as opposed to working out new policy? Where does this type of war lead, it doesn’t seem to be working out too well for those who would encourage it.(Like the sauds and the wahabists, say, where does this leave oil, and the American economy? They don’t think of that, only profit, and they answer each concern with a specious solution, enough to allow them to fool themselves into continuing. (You know, the illogical kingdom of kook. Didn’t Cheney try to declare himself King, last year, sometime?).
Do men like Auchi do the things they do to make a little profit, to try to gain control, to implement their own political philosophy because they’re crazy with fear, are Americans running illegal wars in the manner of Afghanistan, or Iran Contra? Those people fucked up, big time, Oliver North is not my idea of, um, smart. I mean, he’s kinda dumb, right? And if we know corruption will rot the Chinese government, what does it say about ours?
And why nurture those avenues, through men like Auchi, say, paths to cheap Chinese guns, the Chinese with a legitimate grip against the US (and Russia too), all part of a larger asymmetric war, China, of whom Mao’s daughter thought flooding America with cheap guns would hasten the American death?
You know?
Kinda stupid, isn’t it?
All these differing factors, and they wanna torture?
Cheney, and Bush, and Obama are part of the problem, Clinton isn’t.
gripe, not grip, which brings up a whole new vision, doesn’t it?
heh.
“It is entirely conceivable that the terrorist threat is manufactured out of whole cloth by a consortium of insiders from the Bildenburger group, Isreal’s Mossad, and cells within the CIA, FBI, Secrat Soivce, and the Air Force.”
I bitch about how bone stupid the citizens are but I just love America: All of us really are vastly more stupid than one of us. It is endlessly entertaining, albeit lethal.
Black UN Helicopters are equipped to read the bar code stickers on the reverse side of Montana highway sign are used to guide the UN to come in and take away our guns. Could anyone have topped that howler?
Guess again Quarterenos,
In 1962 Senator Tom Kuchel (R-Ca) stood up in the Senate and reported that 10% of his mail for months was concerned with verifying rumors that
The hits just keep on coming.
Still not a sign of gratefulness for my having made your analytic brilliance immortal on acid-free paper? Oh well, I guess your Mom never taught you any manners, and, as always, you just cannot help those who will not help themselves. So that’s all from me, best of luck in all your future politically motivated and evidence-free ranting.
Respectfully,
M.F. Scheuer
Falls Church, VA