War sucks ass and brings out both the best and worst in people - even Americans - and that is why rules, oversight, and follow-through are so important, so that even in war people live up to their ideals.

But we're not. And Rummy admits wrongdoing. And he's still there.

So the hypocrisy is screaming, and nothing changes.

what has changed is the situation has been exposed and is being condemned and addressed

Perhaps it will really be addressed in a way that has true consequences. We'll see.

But in the meantime, we have 50% of the country who still believe that Bush and his pals are honest, trustworthy leaders, when, in fact, they're not. I cannot for the life of me understand why they are not being held to the high standard they set for themselves in the last campaign.

Remember all that nonsense about "restoring integrity to the White House"? What a joke.

It really is very simple. We keep prisoners secret so that we are able to extract useful intelligence from them. You even stated in your article that some of the known prisoners were high level terrorists. Not only is the method perfectly legal under the geneva convention but it is the right thing to do.

When people such as yourselve whined about the terror warning, the administration handed out the name of a source and it was a failure of our policy. Once we let them know that we held their man in custody we were no longer able to intercept the same amount of intelligence and any terrorists who might be exposed likely moved, changed identity, etc.

I would quote the relevant parts of the Geneva convention here to prove my point but it would be kicking a dead horse. It is clear that most people opposed to this practice are driven more by political hatred than by any desire to know the truth.

The sad but true answer is tha in politics, as in most of life, honesty, trust and integrity are relative and categorical.

You're wrong, RedTard: Army Generals say that the U.S. did contravene the Geneva Conventions:

Mr. Rumsfeld has frequently boasted of the number of Pentagon investigations into the abuse scandal and has maintained that no others are necessary. Yet the senior officer in charge of one of those probes, Gen. Paul J. Kern, told the Senate Armed Services Committee of two major areas that remain unexplored. One is the Army's accommodation of dozens of "ghost prisoners" held by the CIA and deliberately hidden from the International Red Cross in violation of the Geneva Conventions and Army regulations. Mr. Rumsfeld has acknowledged that at least one of those prisoners was held by his personal order -- an order that two former secretaries of defense, James R. Schlesinger and Harold Brown, testified was "not consistent" with international law. A failed investigation

Holding any Iraqi army or even resistance militias who are not terrorists would likely be in violation of the Geneva Conventions. I am not familiar with the circumstances surrounding each of these prisoners so I can't definitively say if it is legal and neither can you. What I can say is that the GC does not apply to terrorists.

Number one they don't wear recognizable insignia. If they did why the fuck would we waste our time at checkpoints and checking our shoes at airports. We would just look at their uniform and arrest them.

Number two they do not follow the laws of war. Unless you consider taking schoolkids hostage and shooting them in the head, slicing peoples heads off, and crashing commercial planes into buidings legal then they do not meet the requirements.


Read the GC Article 4 Section 2 yourself for the exact wording.

I don't agree with abusing or torturing prisoners under any reasonable circumstances. I do believe that if we catch a high level terrorist (think UBL or even a regional leader) we might want to keep it a secret until we can gather all the information from them. Maybe they can lead us to other terrorists or cells before they scatter.

But, RedTard, the Army Generals are familiar with the circumstances and can - and did - "definitively say if it is legal" and they said it was not.

Case closed.

There are higher ranking people in the military that hold the opposite view, that doesn't mean the case is closed.

You haven't provided any logic to support your case you have simply relied on one opinion with which you happen to agree with.

No, the investigating Army generals state facts, not opinions, and having Rumsfeld or Wolfowitz disagree with the facts is meaningless.

I need a link to proof that:

RedTard: There are higher ranking people in the military that hold the opposite view

Keeping "ghost detainees" is a relatively common practice, especially these days, and I don't understand why you are so shocked or appalled.

What is worrying, and I don't think people are aware of this, is that we have made mass sweeps of young Iraqi men---in fact, I believe it was Rumsfeld himself who mentioned during the time of the Abu Gharib scandal that as many as 90% of detainees were not charged or suspected of any crime.

Now, in 1942, we interned the Japanese-Americans. Was it a humane or democratic thing to do? Of course not. But it DID have a point and a purpose, and you cannot deny its effectiveness. But this situation is different. Our success in Iraq REQUIRES above all other things, the support of the majority of the Iraqi people. This mass sweep of young men has been completely counterproductive. If 5 of 1000 men arrested had actually planned to join the insurgency, you can bet that at least 500 will after they are released, not to mention what their brothers and fathers and sons are probably doing right now to seek revenge. And even if it doesn't prompt their families to take up arms, a general discontent with the occupying force---and we are---leads a generally passive compliance with the rebel forces; allowing them to pass without any trouble, etc.

This is infinitely more troublesome, to me. I read an interview with an Iraqi man who said that the main reason there was so much discontent to put it mildly was that they had not seen how their lives had improved. That if we had acted like we cared about them, there would be substantially large support. But that more than a year later many parts of Iraq were still without basic electricity and running water- this was unacceptable he said. He also mentioned the interesting concept that many Americans in all our freedom-spreading fail to recognize: that there is a certain amount of freedom people will give up for stability. As with early communism, there is a certain amount of liberty people will sacrifice for security, and we need to take this into account before we enter a country with a completely different culture from out own. Saddam killed people, yeah. Mostly executions these days though, and no one does public beheadings better than the Saudis! The sad truth is this: The Iraqis didn't like Saddam, I'm not trying to say they did. But I believe it was this man in the interview who said that if the election were held today and Saddam were on the ballot, he would win in a landslide. This isn't scientific or anything, and only represents one educated opinion, but when Iraqi nationals who do NOT support Saddam are saying this, we need to reconsider our approach. That taking 100 men because you know 1 is a bomber will breed more bombers than you had to start with. Of course, you can't just go easy on the insurgents either, because they don't just go away, and they will continue to attack and gain power. It's a near impossible situation, and with the potential of a possibly sectarian civil war looming, I don't know how we're going to get out of this. To quote Bush "It's hard work!"

I hope this works out, hell I hope they find WMD's. Even if it means Four More Years of a guy I never particularly cared for, I think our country as a whole definately needs those weapons to be there, if we want to be able to have the credibility to address Iran, N. Korea, and any other real threats that do arise.

I'm sorry if I got off topic there, but you see my original point about the counterproductivity of our more general prison tactics, aside from these few "ghost detainees."