TruthIsAll
06-20-2009, 04:30 PM
Rumsfeld said the torture was the fault of a "few bad apples" at Abu Ghraib.
WaPo writer Dan Froomkin said it was pure BS.
Then Obama repeated the Rumsfeld lie.
Dan is one of the very few honest journalists out there.
Is that why he is out of a job?
Obama has made two remarkable statements.
1)he used the "few bad apples" line a few weeks back. A lie.
2)In his Cairo speech he said that it was FACT that al Qaeda did 9/11.
It's NOT a FACT. Tell it to the 9/11 widows.
Is this the "change" we voted for?
It makes me sick.
http://www.openleft.com/diary/13377/obamas-rollback-on-a-few-bad-apples
Obama's Roll-Back On "A Few Bad Apples"
by: Paul Rosenberg
Sun May 17, 2009 at 14:00
One part of Obama's justification in withholding the promised release of additional photos showing abuse of prisoners was the revival of the "few bad apples" defense, which, as noted in my previous diary, xxxxx, was thoroughly devastated by Dan Fromkin. Here's his full treatment:
Then there was the the-bad-apples-have-been-dealt-with excuse. This one, to me, is the most troubling.
Obama said the incidents pictured in the photographs "were investigated -- and, I might add, investigated long before I took office -- and, where appropriate, sanctions have been applied....[T]his is not a situation in which the Pentagon has concealed or sought to justify inappropriate action. Rather, it has gone through the appropriate and regular processes. And the individuals who were involved have been identified, and appropriate actions have been taken."
But this suggests that Obama has bought into the false Bush-administration narrative that the abuses of detainees were isolated acts, rather than part of an endemic system of abuse implicitly sanctioned at the highest levels of government. The Bushian view has been widely discredited -- and for Obama to endorse it suggests a fundamental misunderstanding of the past.
more....
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2008/12/12/BL2008121201873_pf.html
Pack of Liars
By Dan Froomkin
Special to washingtonpost.com
Friday, December 12, 2008; 12:48 PM
Yesterday's bipartisan Senate report on the abuse of detainees in U.S. custody at Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and elsewhere doesn't just lay out a clear line of responsibility starting with President Bush, it also exposes the administration's repeated explanation for what happened as a pack of lies.
"The abuse of detainees in U.S. custody cannot simply be attributed to the actions of 'a few bad apples' acting on their own," the report finds. "The fact is that senior officials in the United States government solicited information on how to use aggressive techniques, redefined the law to create the appearance of their legality, and authorized their use against detainees. Those efforts damaged our ability to collect accurate intelligence that could save lives, strengthened the hand of our enemies, and compromised our moral authority."
The report notes that in early 2002, not long after the Defense Department legal counsel's office started exploring the application of the sorts of abhorrent practices later documented at Abu Ghraib, Bush signed a memo exempting war-on-terror detainees from the Geneva Conventions. "[T]he decision to replace well established military doctrine, i.e., legal compliance with the Geneva Conventions, with a policy subject to interpretation, impacted the treatment of detainees in U.S. custody," the report states.
And the report concludes: "The abuse of detainees at Abu Ghraib in late 2003 was not simply the result of a few soldiers acting on their own. Interrogation techniques such as stripping detainees of their clothes, placing them in stress positions, and using military working dogs to intimidate them appeared in Iraq only after they had been approved for use in Afghanistan and at [Guantanamo]. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's December 2, 2002 authorization of aggressive interrogation techniques and subsequent interrogation policies and plans approved by senior military and civilian officials conveyed the message that physical pressures and degradation were appropriate treatment for detainees in U.S. military custody. What followed was an erosion in standards dictating that detainees be treated humanely."
In a statement, Committee Chairman Sen. Carl Levin voiced his contempt for what was essentially an administration cover-up: "Attempts by senior officials to portray [the bad apples scenario] to be the case while shrugging off any responsibility for abuses are both unconscionable and false. Our investigation is an effort to set the record straight on this chapter in our history that has so damaged both America's standing and our security. America needs to own up to its mistakes so that we can rebuild some of the good will that we have lost."
As examples of false statements, Levin offered: "In May 2004, just after the pictures from Abu Ghraib became public, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz said that the abuses depicted were simply the result of a few 'bad apples' and that those responsible for abuse would be held accountable. More than seven months later, then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Asked about accountability for detainee abuses, Gonzales said 'we care very much about finding out what happened and holding people accountable.' Neither of those two statements was true."
But Levin could have gone much higher. Bush himself repeatedly and sanctimoniously blamed Abu Ghraib on a small number of low-level perpetrators, even while trying to get credit for what he insisted was a transparent system that held those who were responsible accountable.
Bush, on May 24, 2004, described what happened at Abu Ghraib as "disgraceful conduct by a few American troops who dishonored our country and disregarded our values."
....
In a May 18, 2004, interview, Bush told an Iraqi journalist: "I want to know the truth, too. . . . [Y]ou've just got to know that I'm interested in the truth, as well, just like you're interested in the truth."
And by April 6, 2006, after seven soldiers had been convicted, Bush made it clear that his quest was over: "I'm proud to report that the people who made that decision are being brought to justice, and there was a full investigation over why something like that could have happened."
By contrast, yesterday's Senate report suggests that those responsible for the abuse have emphatically not been brought to justice, and that there's more investigating to be done. Among the issues still to be addressed: the CIA interrogation program, which even more overtly included techniques commonly considered to be torture, such as waterboarding. There's also the obvious question that comes to mind after considering the sequence of events: How are these not war crimes?
WaPo writer Dan Froomkin said it was pure BS.
Then Obama repeated the Rumsfeld lie.
Dan is one of the very few honest journalists out there.
Is that why he is out of a job?
Obama has made two remarkable statements.
1)he used the "few bad apples" line a few weeks back. A lie.
2)In his Cairo speech he said that it was FACT that al Qaeda did 9/11.
It's NOT a FACT. Tell it to the 9/11 widows.
Is this the "change" we voted for?
It makes me sick.
http://www.openleft.com/diary/13377/obamas-rollback-on-a-few-bad-apples
Obama's Roll-Back On "A Few Bad Apples"
by: Paul Rosenberg
Sun May 17, 2009 at 14:00
One part of Obama's justification in withholding the promised release of additional photos showing abuse of prisoners was the revival of the "few bad apples" defense, which, as noted in my previous diary, xxxxx, was thoroughly devastated by Dan Fromkin. Here's his full treatment:
Then there was the the-bad-apples-have-been-dealt-with excuse. This one, to me, is the most troubling.
Obama said the incidents pictured in the photographs "were investigated -- and, I might add, investigated long before I took office -- and, where appropriate, sanctions have been applied....[T]his is not a situation in which the Pentagon has concealed or sought to justify inappropriate action. Rather, it has gone through the appropriate and regular processes. And the individuals who were involved have been identified, and appropriate actions have been taken."
But this suggests that Obama has bought into the false Bush-administration narrative that the abuses of detainees were isolated acts, rather than part of an endemic system of abuse implicitly sanctioned at the highest levels of government. The Bushian view has been widely discredited -- and for Obama to endorse it suggests a fundamental misunderstanding of the past.
more....
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2008/12/12/BL2008121201873_pf.html
Pack of Liars
By Dan Froomkin
Special to washingtonpost.com
Friday, December 12, 2008; 12:48 PM
Yesterday's bipartisan Senate report on the abuse of detainees in U.S. custody at Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and elsewhere doesn't just lay out a clear line of responsibility starting with President Bush, it also exposes the administration's repeated explanation for what happened as a pack of lies.
"The abuse of detainees in U.S. custody cannot simply be attributed to the actions of 'a few bad apples' acting on their own," the report finds. "The fact is that senior officials in the United States government solicited information on how to use aggressive techniques, redefined the law to create the appearance of their legality, and authorized their use against detainees. Those efforts damaged our ability to collect accurate intelligence that could save lives, strengthened the hand of our enemies, and compromised our moral authority."
The report notes that in early 2002, not long after the Defense Department legal counsel's office started exploring the application of the sorts of abhorrent practices later documented at Abu Ghraib, Bush signed a memo exempting war-on-terror detainees from the Geneva Conventions. "[T]he decision to replace well established military doctrine, i.e., legal compliance with the Geneva Conventions, with a policy subject to interpretation, impacted the treatment of detainees in U.S. custody," the report states.
And the report concludes: "The abuse of detainees at Abu Ghraib in late 2003 was not simply the result of a few soldiers acting on their own. Interrogation techniques such as stripping detainees of their clothes, placing them in stress positions, and using military working dogs to intimidate them appeared in Iraq only after they had been approved for use in Afghanistan and at [Guantanamo]. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's December 2, 2002 authorization of aggressive interrogation techniques and subsequent interrogation policies and plans approved by senior military and civilian officials conveyed the message that physical pressures and degradation were appropriate treatment for detainees in U.S. military custody. What followed was an erosion in standards dictating that detainees be treated humanely."
In a statement, Committee Chairman Sen. Carl Levin voiced his contempt for what was essentially an administration cover-up: "Attempts by senior officials to portray [the bad apples scenario] to be the case while shrugging off any responsibility for abuses are both unconscionable and false. Our investigation is an effort to set the record straight on this chapter in our history that has so damaged both America's standing and our security. America needs to own up to its mistakes so that we can rebuild some of the good will that we have lost."
As examples of false statements, Levin offered: "In May 2004, just after the pictures from Abu Ghraib became public, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz said that the abuses depicted were simply the result of a few 'bad apples' and that those responsible for abuse would be held accountable. More than seven months later, then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Asked about accountability for detainee abuses, Gonzales said 'we care very much about finding out what happened and holding people accountable.' Neither of those two statements was true."
But Levin could have gone much higher. Bush himself repeatedly and sanctimoniously blamed Abu Ghraib on a small number of low-level perpetrators, even while trying to get credit for what he insisted was a transparent system that held those who were responsible accountable.
Bush, on May 24, 2004, described what happened at Abu Ghraib as "disgraceful conduct by a few American troops who dishonored our country and disregarded our values."
....
In a May 18, 2004, interview, Bush told an Iraqi journalist: "I want to know the truth, too. . . . [Y]ou've just got to know that I'm interested in the truth, as well, just like you're interested in the truth."
And by April 6, 2006, after seven soldiers had been convicted, Bush made it clear that his quest was over: "I'm proud to report that the people who made that decision are being brought to justice, and there was a full investigation over why something like that could have happened."
By contrast, yesterday's Senate report suggests that those responsible for the abuse have emphatically not been brought to justice, and that there's more investigating to be done. Among the issues still to be addressed: the CIA interrogation program, which even more overtly included techniques commonly considered to be torture, such as waterboarding. There's also the obvious question that comes to mind after considering the sequence of events: How are these not war crimes?