Santorum: McCain doesn't understand interrogation

[Hoss]

Wow.  Something about open mouth and insert foot should apply here.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_bin_laden_torture_republicans

[nathanm]

Do these people just need us to torture to make themselves feel more virile or something?

[Hoss]

Do these people just need us to torture to make themselves feel more virile or something?

Wasn't so much that for me, as it was the irony of the statement, considering Sen. McCain was a POW for 5 friggin' years.  Santorum's a tool.

[nathanm]

Wasn't so much that for me, as it was the irony of the statement, considering Sen. McCain was a POW for 5 friggin' years.  Santorum's a tool.

Santorum is santorum. I would not suggest looking that up on urban dictionary at work.

[Teatownclown]

Now that's a great lesson, Nate.

http://www.spreadingsantorum.com/index2.html

Thanks!

[Conan71]

What's interesting is Paneta is attributed as saying waterboarding did not result in the information leading to OBL's whereabouts, yet former AG Mukasey says it most certainly did.

Someone's lying out their arse.

[we vs us]

What's interesting is Paneta is attributed as saying waterboarding did not result in the information leading to OBL's whereabouts, yet former AG Mukasey says it most certainly did.

Someone's lying out their arse.

I'm betting the truth lies somewhere in between.  Can we assume we got actionable intel from waterboarding in the last 7 years?  Yes, almost definitely. Did we get a lot of trash intel, too?  Almost definitely.  Is anything we got during a waterboarding session admissible in court?  Absolutely not. 

Allowing for the possibility that we got good info from waterboarding doesn't concede the point that it is still torture, still morally wrong, and still produces information with a very high signal to noise ratio. 

[we vs us]

Also:  Santorum's a moron.

[Conan71]

I'm betting the truth lies somewhere in between.  Can we assume we got actionable intel from waterboarding in the last 7 years?  Yes, almost definitely. Did we get a lot of trash intel, too?  Almost definitely.  Is anything we got during a waterboarding session admissible in court?  Absolutely not. 

Allowing for the possibility that we got good info from waterboarding doesn't concede the point that it is still torture, still morally wrong, and still produces information with a very high signal to noise ratio. 

But it was quite admissible in the court of double tap.

Santorum is yet one more in a long line of egotistical partisans I wish we would hear no more from.  CBS morning news was going on about troubles in the Gingrich campaign due to his problem with oral diarrhea.  

Trump is out, Romney or Huckabee will likely be the only two standing closer to the primaries.  I believe I heard something about Bachman possibly announcing soon.  She will get blown out quickly as well by the mainstreamers.

[we vs us]

But it was quite admissible in the court of double tap.

It was, and so you get the doubleedged swordness of it: we can torture our way to being able to deploy an assassination squad, but we can't torture our way into a legitimate conviction in court.  I don't disagree with how we took out Bin laden, but this whole thing can't be about simply killing the adversary. There's a huge chunk that has to be a moral victory, and in that, the waterboarding was a total loss.

Re: the Republican field . . . it's getting bad, quick.  Soooo many lightweights and/or compromised also-rans.  The problem is that the GOP is so ideological split.  The Old Guard will put its (still considerable) heft behind a centrist like Romney or Pawlenty, while the Tea Party is casting about for someone who's angry enough to represent them.  I really don't think there is one candidate out there who can straddle that fence -- especially when the Tea Party is starting to really become so explicitly anti-establishment. 

[Red Arrow]

Trump is out, Romney or Huckabee will likely be the only two standing closer to the primaries.

Huckabee announced last night (I believe) that he is out too.

[Red Arrow]

Re: the Republican field . . . it's getting bad, quick.  Soooo many lightweights and/or compromised also-rans.  The problem is that the GOP is so ideological split.  The Old Guard will put its (still considerable) heft behind a centrist like Romney or Pawlenty, while the Tea Party is casting about for someone who's angry enough to represent them.  I really don't think there is one candidate out there who can straddle that fence -- especially when the Tea Party is starting to really become so explicitly anti-establishment. 

Obama should be a shoe-in.  So why aren't you celebrating, or are you?

[Hoss]

Obama should be a shoe-in.  So why aren't you celebrating, or are you?

Likely because there were many that said Hillary would be a shoe-in as well.  It's still well early to tell.

[Red Arrow]

Likely because there were many that said Hillary would be a shoe-in as well.  It's still well early to tell.

The near certainty of any Democrat (or at least not a Republican) should have you guys jumping in the aisles for joy.

[Conan71]

It was, and so you get the doubleedged swordness of it: we can torture our way to being able to deploy an assassination squad, but we can't torture our way into a legitimate conviction in court.  I don't disagree with how we took out Bin laden, but this whole thing can't be about simply killing the adversary. There's a huge chunk that has to be a moral victory, and in that, the waterboarding was a total loss.

Re: the Republican field . . . it's getting bad, quick.  Soooo many lightweights and/or compromised also-rans.  The problem is that the GOP is so ideological split.  The Old Guard will put its (still considerable) heft behind a centrist like Romney or Pawlenty, while the Tea Party is casting about for someone who's angry enough to represent them.  I really don't think there is one candidate out there who can straddle that fence -- especially when the Tea Party is starting to really become so explicitly anti-establishment. 

You don't convict the man responsible for the deaths of thousands in court.  If the information was, in fact, gained via waterboarding or pushing bamboo shoots under someone's fingernails, it resulted in a moral victory and a huge morale booster.

I'm starting to warm to Pawlenty a little as I hear sound bites from him.  Romney's biggest problem is going to be having to sell himself around Romneycare and I don't think he can do it.  There's too many on the Tea Party spectrum of the GOP who won't let him get away with that.

Huckabee out?  Were there bones rattling in his closet?  Affair, toe-tapping in the airport, diddling underage boys?