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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: carranza2 who wrote (131585)	5/5/2004 3:26:22 PM
From: Neocon	Respond to of 281500

The precisely correct response.

To: carranza2 who wrote (131585)	5/5/2004 3:49:38 PM
From: cnyndwllr	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 281500

Carranza2, do you have to get hit by a Mack truck before you figure out that it might sting a little. Do you have to tell your wife she's gaining weight before you realize you'll likely regret that? Do you have to yell "fire" in a crowd before you recognize that people might panic? No? Then why is it that you find other things "unknowable" in the Rumsfeldian sense. For instance you say that with respect to the question of how far up the ladder the knowledge of the fact that some of our forces were using physical or mental torture went, you: "have no idea what the investigations will show, or what the answers to your questions will be, or to what extent the upper levels of the military and/or government authorities knew or condoned what was taking place.....though you appear to have a few predispositions in that regard." But let's not give up so easily, after all we must have been given the ability to think for some reason. Let's try this logical exercise: I'm the Secretary or Defense or the head of Armed Forces in Iraq. It's critical for me to have reliable intelligence information. I get almost immediate intelligence reports attributed to captured terrorists, insurgents and radicals that are interrogated by people under my command. I'll probably want to know that the reports are reliable and actionable. I'll probably wonder why these tough, stubborn adversaries are suddenly providing helpful information. I'll probably even ask and find out. Or maybe I won't ask because I don't want to find out. But I'm not stupid and I know that somehow, someone has found ways to break down the natural resistance to be a traitor that most combatants and terrorists have. And I'm smart enough to know that the only ways to do that quickly are through mental, physical or chemical torture. Do you think I can add 2+2 and get 4? Yes, I have some "predispositions." So should you. Keep your wits about you and don't fall into the neocon trap of throwing up your hands and hiding behind the darkness of the brain-sapping "unknowable."