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Politics : View from the Center and Left
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From: Dale Baker12/2/2005 3:02:13 AM
  Read Replies (1) of 542647
 
Worth reposting here:

To: Jeff Hayden who wrote (5235) 12/2/2005 1:28:48 AM
From: steve kammerer of 5237

I think we are all missing to point on torture discussion or "the end justifying the means" arguments.

The premises of the discussion always is that the person we have in custody knows something or is guilty. Then we get carried away with arguments like "wouldn't you torture someone to find out where the atom bomb is hidden in NYC and save millions of lives?

Most of the prisoners we took in Afghanistan and brought to Cuba were innocent of actions or planning actions against the United States. Many of them were turned in by neighbors for local personal arguments having NOTHING to do with the US or the Taliban.

One of the members of Kiwanis who was born in Italy and was 16 years old when Italy fell in WWII. He remembers one of his neighbors being accused by another of having collaborated with the Germans. The guy was hauled off and shot. Sergio said that the man had been having an affair with the other guys wife. The man used the system to settle a private vendetta.

In the middle east we have so little understanding of the people and language that we depend on tips for catching people to interrogate.

Before we come up with all the dramatic reasons why we should torture people we should come up with ways in which to be at least 95% certain that the person has knowledge or is guilty.

Until that happens, the rest is dealing with hypotheticals and is destroying our credibility in the world.
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