- We’re not at war.
- Cite that anyone in Gitmo is al Qaeda? And by “cite” I mean proven in a court of law, not merely "suspected’ by the torturers.
That’s a semantic debate. Al Qaeda has declared war on us. They want to kill us and we want to kill them. Call it whatever you like-- I cal it a war.
First of all, I said “in custody”, not “in Gitmo”. But KSM is at Gitmo now (along with the other guys from the CIA "secret prisons), so there are al Qaeda operatives there.
Some are self-confessed terrorists, therefore the methods used to obtain those confessions were legitimate.
I’m not sure why your trying to obscure the issue, but if you’d like to convince us that Khalid Sheik Mohammed is not al Qaeda, I’m all ears (or eyes, as the case may be).
Al Qaeda isn’t a country. There is no such thing as a war with an amorphous, ambiguously defined “terrorist” group and there is no proof that anyone in Gitmo or any of the secret CIA torture prisons is in aQ in any case.
The proof that any of those guys are aQ is what?
:dubious: Well, it that case, wouldn’t they qualify as POWs ? If they are just criminals, they can’t be at war with us; you seem to be trying to have it both ways.
You have certainly posed the question in terms most advantageous to your position. Can’t blame you for that, I suppose, but damn sure going to point it out. You don’t really expect me to contend that, so I will give the question all it deserves.
Moving right along, the point remains: you presume to decide who can legitimately recieve “alternative interrogation techniques” based on the nature of the detainee. At the same time, you recognize that some of the detainees, as in Abu Ghraib, are not guilty of anything more than being the hapless shlemiel to our brutal shlmozzle.
I have it! We’ll simply make it illegal to torture the innocent detainees! And if they’re self-incriminating statements under “alternative interrogation” are admissible, why, that will simplify things marvelously! Bet we find out they’re all guilty!
Wow, it almost sounds like you don’t know who has the burden of proof.
Can you prove that Justin Timberlake is not al Qaeda?
By the way, even if one guy is aQ, how does that justify torturing all the people that aren’t?
For crying out loud. Once more:
Is it your contention that al Qaeda adheres to the rules of war?
Thank you for proving my assertion that this is a semantic debate. But like I said, you may call it anything you want.
The Congressional 9/11 Commission concluded that he is an al Qaeda Operative and that he was the principle architect of the 9/11 hijackings. Now, of course he’s innocent unilt proven guilty, but that would be true of ObL as well. I’m comfortable saying he is al Qaeda.
You cannot in the same sentence claim that there is no proof he is al Qaeda but that there is proof that the CIA tortured people. Unless, of course, you have two standards for proof: on standard for things that reinforce your politcal positions and another for things that don’t.
It doesn’t. Do you think I said somewhere that it did?
They don’t allow homos in Al Queda. Osama is the only exception.
Almost is right. I said “convince us” not “prove”. As I said earlier, the 9/11 Commission report concluded that he’s al Qaeda. If you want to call him an alleged al Qaeda, that’s fine. But I will expect you then to put “alleged” in front of every assertion you make from here on in.
Now, would you like to discuss those “alleged” incidents of CIA torture? 
Since when is the 9/11 commission a court of law?
The administration had admitted it uses torture. There’s nothing “alleged” about it.
So how do we determine who we are allowed to toryture and who we aren’t? Right now all we have is the tautology that because we captured them they’re combatants.
Cite?
I don’t know. You’d have to ask someone who advocates the use of torture.
BTW, Diogenes, before you list Abu Graib as a cite, let’s keep in mind that we’re discussing the allegation you made about:
So, please prove to us that there are CIA torture prisons. And you will, of course, have a court conviction as your proof, right?
That about half an argument, and half a slur. Of course, you can claim two independent things in a single sentence. It is up to you to prove their dependence, that if one is false the other must be inherently false. You haven’t even attempted to do so.
You cannot then use that to buttess your implication that your rhetorical opponent is dishonest or biased, based entirely on that unsupportable assertion. Or, at least, you shouldn’t.
Pffft. **Diogenes **is demanding a level of proof that he’d never adhere to himself. I called him on it, and I was right in doing so. If we want to argue semantics all day long, then we cannot prove anything except in abstract realms like math and logic. A conviction in court is, therefore, not proof.
As I said, if you want to call KSM an “alleged al Qaeda operative”, that’s fine with me. But then the whole arguement about there being no proven al Qaeda operatives in Gitmo is simply a red herring. No one there has had a trial, so it makes no sense to talk about whether there are or are no al Qaeda operatives there.
Of course, this is all a side issue from the key part of this debate-- captured “alleged” al Qaeda operatives are not POWs. Can we agree on that?
I really think most any juror would infer that there was something to hide if actions had to be moved out of the country and kept secret. And what is the most likely thing to have hidden, especially in view of the push for a post fact ratification of previously used methods?
GW, having shown himself to me to be a tad untrustworthy, doesn’t convince me at all with his claim that all he wants is clarity.
Call me a Bush hater, but I didn’t hate him at all in the beginning. I didn’t have a lot of faith in his competence based on his record. In fact I considered him in no way competent to be president of the US but hoped that he could somehow avoid really screwing up by having a relatively uneventful term. The dislike has resulted from his subseauent activities. In my opinion he is, in the supposed Texas saying, “All hat and no cattle.”
Frankly, John, I’m not at all sure you have established that that is the key question at all.