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Back to Torture?

Jeb Bush has again said that (if he is elected president) that there may be occasions when he would authorize the use of brutal interrogation techniques in order to keep the country safe.

This, despite the fact that the 2014 Senate report, which reviewed the CIA records, concluded that the use of torture “enhanced interrogation techniques” failed completely to produce any unique, life-saving intelligence, and that the CIA repeatedly lied about the brutality of what they were doing to prisoners. And a new story that just came out shows that they continue to lie and violate the law to this day.

But Bush thinks it might be a good idea again.

How in the hell can we condemn the ISIS “Theology of Rape“? The US is reacting in horror at an article in the NY Times about how ISIS is interpreting the Quran to justify sex slavery and rape of non-believers, and even using the practice as a recruiting tool. And yet we regularly used rape (including of children, while their parents watched), sodomy, and worse as an “interrogation technique”?

We have completely lost our moral authority, and Jeb Bush thinks it is ok.

I know this is hard to believe, but I would rather have Donald Trump elected president than Jeb Bush. At least Trump occasionally makes me laugh. Bush just makes me ill. He is a complete hypocrite and liar. And the people he surrounds himself with are even worse.

Jeb also recently defended the Iraq war, saying “I’ll tell you, taking out Saddam Hussein turned out to be a pretty good deal.” If you liked the George W Bush presidency, you’ll love his brother. Apparently Jeb does, praising his brother’s war that cost the US $1.7 Trillion, 4,424 American lives, and over 100,000 Iraqi lives, while finding absolutely zero WMD (which was the public justification for the war). “I’m not saying this because I’m a Bush. I’m proud of what he did to create a secure environment for our country.”

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8 Comments

  1. ebdoug wrote:

    He is absolutely delusional. Also, in 2006 it was estimated by the Iraqis that 600,000 were killed so far. Every single day of each year since then the Bushes notch more deaths in Iraq due to their ignorance. Saddam was put in by the US to keep Iraq from invasion and under control. Each of the people killed by US had only one life to live. We took it.
    Religion by itself is hypocritical, that we are better than any other animal on earth. That we have souls and they don’t. Ahimsa.

    Sunday, August 16, 2015 at 4:44 am | Permalink
  2. Ralph wrote:

    Wait, what? We raped children(!) to get to their parents? References please?

    Totally in agreement about JEB. I was led to believe he was the moderate and sensible grownup in the Bush clan, but he is clearly not above groveling to the extreme right in attempting to gain traction and rewrite his brother’s shameful legacy. I can imagine he doesn’t even believe half the stuff that comes out of his own mouth. Hillary and Obama being responsible for the rise of ISIS is the most absurd allegation and revisionist history to date. And surrounding himself with his brother’s former neocon advisers is disturbing, to say the least. I suspect Darth Cheney is also lurking in the shadows somewhere.

    BTW, calling him JEB Bush is a redundancy. JEB = John Ellis Bush. But “JEB Bush for President” sounds apropos for those wanting another Bush fiasco.

    Sunday, August 16, 2015 at 9:09 am | Permalink
  3. Iron Knee wrote:

    “children were raped in front of watching women” — from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Ghraib_torture_and_prisoner_abuse

    See also:

    http://www.salon.com/2004/07/15/hersh_7/

    http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/2008/05/they-torture-children-dont-they.html

    http://www.infowars.com/us-officials-admitted-that-boys-were-sodomized-in-iraq-prison/

    Sunday, August 16, 2015 at 11:06 am | Permalink
  4. Ralph wrote:

    Unreal. We like to imagine us as always being the “good guys”, Abu Ghraib proved otherwise. War dehumanizes everyone.

    Sunday, August 16, 2015 at 2:29 pm | Permalink
  5. John wrote:

    If the United States has only learned one single thing from Israel, that thing is to portray ourselves as victims in order to justify pretty much anything we were going to do anyway. If we learned two things, the second one is to claim that God is on our side.

    God, of course, is claimed to be on the side of anyone who uses the name to justify their violence or cruelty or oppression… giving a slightly different meaning to, “using God’s name in vain.”

    True believers tend to be those willing to die for their beliefs, rather than kill for them. Which is also no help, really… too many people willing to die WHILE killing, which is not the same thing at all.

    Monday, August 17, 2015 at 1:37 pm | Permalink
  6. ebdoug wrote:

    I’m in favor of giving the IS members suicide belt, put them all in a big concrete building and ask them to test them.

    Tuesday, August 18, 2015 at 11:06 am | Permalink
  7. ebdoug wrote:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MKUltra

    MKUltra

    Wednesday, August 19, 2015 at 10:52 am | Permalink
  8. BTN wrote:

    Juhn, I wish it was a case of “using God’s name in vain,” but unfortunately it is more like “using God’s name quite effectively” for their cause(s).

    Thursday, August 20, 2015 at 4:11 pm | Permalink

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  1. Political Irony › Just Another Bush? on Monday, August 31, 2015 at 8:43 am

    […] bad enough that Jeb Bush has said that he still supports the invasion of Iraq and that he might use torture in order to keep the country safe. But talk is cheap. It is his behavior that gives away how corrupt he really […]