Condaleeza Rice is on a visit to Europe to reassure leaders that nothing dodgy is going on in American prisons that may or may not exist in Romania and may or may not have been moved somewhere in Africa.
If you’ve ever wondered how people get picked up and what happens to them when they get to these mysterious places of extra-legal incarceration, Gummo Trotsky has the answer, and you will also find out what “rendition” means if you pop over for a read.
More people should be apprised of the fact that rendition was inaugurated by Bill Clinton in the mid 1990s. Where were the concerned Democrats – including his own wife – then?
Fair enough CL but this isn’t about Clinton, quite amusing reference BTW considering what I’m watching on SBS right now.
Rice’s comments amount to an admission of a program of some scale. Nuff said. Interesting that when the Bush administration is implicated the right blames Clinton.
Good on ya for sticking to the talking points CL.
Well sorry Phil, but that’s just spin. If Clinton founded the fucking thing, it’s a bit more than a talking point.
And I do not now – nor have I ever – approved of any government’s policy of torture.
I do, however, insist that the word not be cheapened to mean such examples of ‘torture’ as being forced to wear panties on your head.
Finally, terrorists are trained to make accusations of torture – it’s a handbook standard. Instead of…
name
rank and
serial number
we have…
I was tortured,
he flushed my Koran; and
I woz racially profiled.
Ok, but there is no question that torture is taking place and rendition to countries that do torture is happening.
If there is no torture then why the need for rendition?
And intelligence folks are also paid to lie, or at least not tell the truth on things like, oh, I dunno, help me here……….Iraq? WMD?
Would you like some fake eyelashes to go with the lipstick you’re trying to paint on that pig?
CL,
Right now, I don’t give a rat’s arse about who instituted the policy of “rendition” – what matters to me is that it’s wrong, wrong, wrong. End of story.
As for torture – personally, I reckon havig a hosepipe shoved up your bum and then being shipped off to parts uknown in a pair of Kimbies comes close eough to make a lie of Condi’s asurances to EU leaders that the US respects the rights of suspected terrorists.
Iraq? WMD?
Your saying the UN of Kofi Annan was lying about that are you? Fair enough.
I find it disturbing that the two of you are prtending to be concerned about torture but have no interest in the half-decade during which the practice was employed under a Democratic presidency.
Where is the journalistic yearning for the truth? To wit: what did Hillary/Teddie/JFK/Howard Dean etc know and when did they know it? How many people did they torture and kill? As South Africa’s TRC demonstrated, getting at the historical truth of these things is no idle exercise.
Phil asks: “If there is no torture then why the need for rendition?”
I don’t know. Ask Bill Clinton.
My suspicion is that this story only has Get Bush utility and neither of you are all that concerned with the people who had the hosepipe treatment under the First Black and Most Liberal Ever President.
The New Yorker: Outsourcing Torture
Did Clinton have his knob polished though? Indisputably yes.
Cl, why are you defending this shite? The implicit argument you’re making is that everyone who disagrees with what the Bush administration does on torture (NSFW) is a partisan Democrat and thinks it was fine when Clinton did it. Tripe. Republican talking points wash even less over here.
Extraordinary rendition is an abominable, illegal, totalitarian tactic that should be opposed by anyone who cares about protecting the basic liberties democratic societies have fought so long and hard to achieve. It’s so antithetical to every idea the US was founded on, antithetical to our own Common Law and the UNDHR, that I’m amazed people seek to defend it. Clinton, Bush, it doesn’t matter who started it, this is a horrible black stain on the US’s record. It’s such an ugly, disgraceful method it should be stopped even on pragmatism before it drives all democrats away from the US on general principle. What a ghastly abomination.
No worries there, then(Torture ain’t pretty, NSFW).
Yup, if the Republicans were actually doing their job as a useful opposition instead of focusing on the sexual proclivities of two adults we might have heard about it more. However I suspect that they really had no problem with it so no big deal.
I’m not defending anything Leinad.
I could chase up quite a few links of me denouncing torture in both worldwide and Deakin University contexts. What I loathe is the circus fun ‘n’ games vibe that invariably attends the discussion of this matter by political liberals. There’s always more Bush Hatred than there is concern for actual human beings.
The policy was inaugurated by the Clinton administration – oh yes, “on a limited basis” (wink wink). I want to know how many people were tortured under Bill Clinton and I want to know how many leading Democrats knew and approved of this policy.
Why is Clinton’s body count being defended?
Phil, the Republicans were actually concentrating on a President who lied under oath. For an example of comparable triviality, see Scooter Libby. (You know, the bloke who ‘revealad’ the identity of the most well known CIA agent since Felix Lighter).
There is also the classic feminist theory about asymmetry of power being the subtle background to how some men abuse the women in their employ. (A theory itself subjected to rendition during that scandal – it disappeared from all known liberal analysis of the affair).
C.L. – to make my point clear. I’m not saying Bush is the embodiment of all evil. There’s no doubt that extremely questionable practices which deserved condemnation happened under Democrat Presidents. I have little respect for Clinton – except for his exceptional political skills. If this practice started under his administration, then he deservedly stands condemned to the same degree as his successor.
CL – I was plenty anti-american before Bush strode into the WH. But my condition ain’t improved any since then. It’s worsened. Now why is that?
Yes, the US pre-Bush and pre-911 did bad stuff. But they are breaking records now. Hence all the lip. I didn’t pay any especially wicked mind to Bush until he proposed invading Iraq and which then got all those ppl killed. It was the prospect of and then the like reality-A/V of real ppl dying which got my attention.
I hadn’t heard of special rendition till this year. So it was pretty hard to be up in arms about it during the Lewinsky era. (But yes I know you were trying to get the msg out.)
By the way I don’t reckon you give a rats about the recently deceased man we were all banging on about last week. You’re just anti-Lee.
I think that’s quite unfair to C.L., wbb, please take my word for it.
There is an exellent article on torture and rendition by the USA called “What have we lost” in the November 2005 edition of Harpers Magazine. It is very lenghty and goes into great detail, I strongly recommend reading it.
I agree with CL: Clinton was just as bad a US imperialist as Bush.
Happy now?
CL, I agree that people in general (not just lefties) have a huge blind spot when it comes to Clinton and his numerous crimes and screw ups (I ain’t talking about blowjobs here). In general his record is crammed with gay-bashing (the DOMA), massive welfare cuts in an atmosphere of unbridled prosperity, refusal to sign the Land Mine Ban Treaty, total inaction on heathcare, blithe disregard for the environment (reopening the Alaska reserve, scuttling the Kyoto treaty). He has the excuse of a Republican majority in congress after 1994, but that doesn’t explain his advocacy of many of their policies.
But most people just point to the fact he lied about a blowjob, as if that was somehow more important than his wag-the-dog bombing of a Sudanese pharmaceutical factory. Phil pointed out above that the reason hardly anyone knows about Clinton creating rendition is that so much of the print, oxygen, attention Clinton gets, even in retrospect revolves around the Starr investigations and the batshit rumours and muckracking that characterised all of the asshole’s second term.
Enough of Clinton. He started rendition, and under Bush it’s gone from the Cheka to the NKVD – bad to much, much worse.
THat’s not necessarily true either. The opposite may well have been the case, as this WSJ article points out:
There’s every possibility the Clinton modus operandi led to more actual torture. So I repeat: what did the Dem bigwigs (who are still around) know and when did they know it? How many people did they torture and how many did they kill?
‘Rendition’ long predates Clinton. It worked very well for Mossad when they used it to bring a bunch of ex-Nazis to trial in the 1960s, and good on them for it.
There was a court full of impartial judges waiting at the end, you see.
Actual torture as distinct from torture-lite eh, CL. Or the usual rough handling, as reported in the WaPo article:
The first night he said he was kicked and beaten and warned by an interrogator: “You are here in a country where no one knows about you, in a country where there is no law. If you die, we will bury you, and no one will know.”
A rope, too, as I recall. I hope the Duke’s not getting all relativistic on his values.
My response, obviously, was to Liam of the Green Berets, not Gummo.
Actual torture as distinct from torture-lite eh, CL.
Well yes, actually.
Clintonian jumper leads in Egypt=torture.
Koran in the commode in Gitmo=not torture.
I’m amused by how grouchy everyone gets when Clinton’s policy is discussed. But, then, it’s not really about the victims is it?
It’s about Getting George McWhipWieldingOberMonkeyFuror Bush!
Clintonian jumper leads in Egypt=torture.
Koran in the commode in Gitmo=not torture.
IÄôm amused by how grouchy everyone gets when ClintonÄôs policy is discussed. But, then, itÄôs not really about the victims is it?
Nice substitution of examples there, CL, – so what are you going to call a Bushite kicking and beating in an Afghan prison?
Little as you might believe this (and whether you do or not is a matter of complete indifference to me) any grouchiness I might be experiencing at the moment isn’t at your mention of the Clinton policy; it’s at your very obvious attempt to avoid the issue. So, Clinton was worse – how does this justify the actions of the current administration. When that doesn’t walk you swithc to the old “sorry sport, but you can’t call this torture – the electrode/testicle ratio is too low” line, with the help of a Bush friendly anti-European op-edder in the WSJ. For another view of the “European” position see this article: http://www.theage.com.au/news/world/italy-furious-over-cia-terror-kidnap/2005/12/06/1133829595923.html
Next I suppose you’ll move on to your perrenial complaint that people aren’t “engaging” with you. Tough shit, as far as I’m concerned. I’ll engage when you come up with something resembling a principled and reasoned defence of “rendition”. Till then, you can shove it.
I’d call a “Bushite” doing what you suggest a criminal. Which – EARTH TO GUMMO – is why I am, and always have been, opposed to the drift towards rehabilitating physical coercion at all levels of law enforcement.
So, Clinton was worse – how does this justify the actions of the current administration.
It doesn’t and I haven’t said it does. I’ve said that if we are really concerned about this – especially with the left so enthusiastic about war-criminals and other miscellaneous indictments – we should be subjecting Clinton-era political figures to scrutiny.
This observation has been interpreted as “OH, SO YOU SUPPORT TORTURE”!!!!
What I’m hearing is this: sure, Bubba “streamlined” people to a bloody pulp but lets move on and forget about that. After all, this is about GEORGE W. BUSH and the evil neo-cons!
Finally, I suggest you take with an olive-sized grain of salt the “we’re shocked, SHOCKED” reaction of the Italians about CIA operations in their country. I don’t believe you’re that naive.
By the way, actual torture (as opposed to being spattered with fake menstrual blood) has been in the news a lot in the last 24 hours. Specifically, the torture conducted by Saddam Hussein. Which, of course, leftist bloggers aren’t interested in.
No GIs involved.