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All this and more - 24 April 2009
Apr. 25th, 2009 12:31 amGood evening to everyone, and we hope your week’s end are going well. At the very top, on Countdown last night, Keith Olbermann declared that he would give $1000 to a soldier family charity for every second that Sean Hannity lasted if he underwent a waterboarding session live (or with multiple networks' cameras present), and would double it when Sean admitted that it was a torture technique. The question now is whether Mr. Hannity keeps his word with such a prize in front of him. I think that Me. Olbermann would be more than happy to part with the cash if he could impart the seriousness of what was going on to Mr. Hannity and others. Considering Mr. Olbermann’s irritation at the Murdoch-owned Fox News Channel, I’m surprised that he didn’t make it a general offer to anyone broadcasting there.
See previous post for RAGE about a news affiliate going straight for sensationalism and fearmongering about lead levels in children’s books. Sticking some heads on pikes (metaphorically) should cure the problem.
Following on an earlier reporting, The Western media may have misreported Jackie Chan's statements about the Chiense people, failing to grasp and appreciate the subtleties and language selection Mr. Chan used to indicate his uncertainty at whether opening the people up full-throttle was a good thing.
Internationally, Pakistani Taliban forces pulled back from Buner, although it was not immediately clear why. The Secretary of State of the United States warned that Taliban expansion could result in their acquisition of a nuclear weapon in Pakistan.
Bombers kill 60 in Iraq, which can’t be helping anyone’s ideas of “secure and stable” to do withdrawals with. Especially if you look at the numbers of violent deaths of Iraqi citizens over the last few years.
Iran's upcoming presidential election has another moderate challenger, who, while not expected to win, hopefully will play spoiler enough to help unseat Mr. Ahmadinejad. Iran also claimed an agreement to build a pipeline between itself and Iraq, where Iraqi crude oil will be sent to Iranian refineries.
Domestically, when immigration raids happen, children are often left in the lurch, with parental custody revoked upon conviction, imprisonment and deportation, leaving the children at the mercy of adoption and foster care.
Congratulations of the raspberry kind to Detroit, Forbes's most dangerous city for this year.
The bird-strike database is open to access for the first time, thanks to the new Secretary of Transportation deciding the data needed to be released into the wild.
In the opinions, ddjango is waiting for evidence to indicate that meaningful change is going to happen with the Obama administration, while presenting his own evidence that it will not.
And more on the issue that’s been getting major play across the newsmedia - torture. Ms. Pelosi indicates that the briefings she and Congress received on the use of torture techniques did not give them the full picture, nor did it give them any opportunity to consult with their own staff about its legality. Mr. Baer excuses the CIA for not objecting to the torture techniques, because they didn't know their historical origins and were being pressured to do something that looked like it would help prevent attacks, against their wishes and belief that the military was much better equipped to handle prisoners of war interrogations.
The WSJ believes leaving the option of prosecutions up to the Attorney General has killed any respect the Republican Party may have had for the President, considering the prosecution of previous administrators to be on par with Latin American countries instead of the United States, and believing the whole thing to be a great political revenge fantasy about to be played out by the left on the right. As if on cue, Mr. Frum declares the only way out is for the President to slam the door on prosecution possibilities, so as to avoid starting a revenge cycle by the next President, confine himself to fact-finding missions, and tell Europe that they can’t prosecute if he declines to do so. In other words, sweep it under the rug, what’s done is done. Vengeance, according to Mr. Galen, is best left to God. So, to recap, “the ends justified the means”, so the President must release the material that says how well these techniques and programs worked, so that the populace can come to that conclusion as well, and Mr. Obama is playing to the left and seeking revenge against the last administration, rather than wanting an inquiry about how many laws were broken, by whom, and who gave the green light for it to go ahead, with the natural consequences of such lawbreaking being prosecution, and the more material he releases, the more he helps our enemies by giving details about potentially extralegal methods used on detainees.
The point, however, and![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
bradhicks makes it eloquently, is this: There is no question about whether prosecutions should happen: The United Nations Convention on Torture, of which the United States is a signatory to, declares that there is only one acceptable legal solution to this evidence - prosecution and trial, of those who committed it, of those who authorized it, of those who have tried to cover it up, then and now, and of those obstructing the process of bringing everyone else to trial. The defendants are entitled to fair trials with unbiased grand juries, and may make their defenses as they like, but they must do so in court, and not across the media. The techniques described in the memos are torture, by both United States and international law, and those responsible for them in any way or assisting others in covering them up or obstructing the process must be brought to trial, no matter how many people it catches nor how long it takes to be done. That is the law, and the facts. It is not “revenge” against a political class, nor can it be debated in the media as a substitute for the courtroom. Try them all, and if needs be, pay the headsman well for very clean cuts.
Not on torture, The WSJ accuses the EPA of playing dirty pool on cap-and-trade, setting things up so that they get to regulate carbon one way or another, regardless of what Congress or the people think, of which Ms. Strassel thinks this latest ploy is one of a series that tries to get around Congressional debate on the matter, for fear that the Congresscritters will squash it, and thus the Demcorats will kill themselves without having Republicans to blame by killing Waxman’s bill.
Mr. Ibrahim thinks the delegates who boycotted the secodn Durban conference should have stayed and fought for human rights, especially in countries that are sitting on the council with atrocious records of their own.
Last out of opinions, Mr. Towery laments the death of the informed populace, bolstered by newspaper reporting, and weeps for the new generation, raised on talking heads, biased television, and crackpots on the Internet, living in a society that prizes and honors ignorance. Think twice about the death knells of the paper, he says - when they go, we lose a lot of information.
In technology, toys that use your mind to control them, coming to stores near you, which is how the real progressw will get made on them, anyway, bionic penguins that can swim and fly, a fluorescent puppy born to the world, new material that changes color quickly when exposed to light, looking for intelligent life by spotting the things it leaves behind, which might help us with peering in at the center of the universe to see what's there.
Also, wolf spiders can survive being drowned by going comatose, and people are still going forward on research into making cloned humans implant, hoping for successes.
Last for tonight, once again, Blackle, using Google with a black color scheme so as to save energy.
See previous post for RAGE about a news affiliate going straight for sensationalism and fearmongering about lead levels in children’s books. Sticking some heads on pikes (metaphorically) should cure the problem.
Following on an earlier reporting, The Western media may have misreported Jackie Chan's statements about the Chiense people, failing to grasp and appreciate the subtleties and language selection Mr. Chan used to indicate his uncertainty at whether opening the people up full-throttle was a good thing.
Internationally, Pakistani Taliban forces pulled back from Buner, although it was not immediately clear why. The Secretary of State of the United States warned that Taliban expansion could result in their acquisition of a nuclear weapon in Pakistan.
Bombers kill 60 in Iraq, which can’t be helping anyone’s ideas of “secure and stable” to do withdrawals with. Especially if you look at the numbers of violent deaths of Iraqi citizens over the last few years.
Iran's upcoming presidential election has another moderate challenger, who, while not expected to win, hopefully will play spoiler enough to help unseat Mr. Ahmadinejad. Iran also claimed an agreement to build a pipeline between itself and Iraq, where Iraqi crude oil will be sent to Iranian refineries.
Domestically, when immigration raids happen, children are often left in the lurch, with parental custody revoked upon conviction, imprisonment and deportation, leaving the children at the mercy of adoption and foster care.
Congratulations of the raspberry kind to Detroit, Forbes's most dangerous city for this year.
The bird-strike database is open to access for the first time, thanks to the new Secretary of Transportation deciding the data needed to be released into the wild.
In the opinions, ddjango is waiting for evidence to indicate that meaningful change is going to happen with the Obama administration, while presenting his own evidence that it will not.
And more on the issue that’s been getting major play across the newsmedia - torture. Ms. Pelosi indicates that the briefings she and Congress received on the use of torture techniques did not give them the full picture, nor did it give them any opportunity to consult with their own staff about its legality. Mr. Baer excuses the CIA for not objecting to the torture techniques, because they didn't know their historical origins and were being pressured to do something that looked like it would help prevent attacks, against their wishes and belief that the military was much better equipped to handle prisoners of war interrogations.
The WSJ believes leaving the option of prosecutions up to the Attorney General has killed any respect the Republican Party may have had for the President, considering the prosecution of previous administrators to be on par with Latin American countries instead of the United States, and believing the whole thing to be a great political revenge fantasy about to be played out by the left on the right. As if on cue, Mr. Frum declares the only way out is for the President to slam the door on prosecution possibilities, so as to avoid starting a revenge cycle by the next President, confine himself to fact-finding missions, and tell Europe that they can’t prosecute if he declines to do so. In other words, sweep it under the rug, what’s done is done. Vengeance, according to Mr. Galen, is best left to God. So, to recap, “the ends justified the means”, so the President must release the material that says how well these techniques and programs worked, so that the populace can come to that conclusion as well, and Mr. Obama is playing to the left and seeking revenge against the last administration, rather than wanting an inquiry about how many laws were broken, by whom, and who gave the green light for it to go ahead, with the natural consequences of such lawbreaking being prosecution, and the more material he releases, the more he helps our enemies by giving details about potentially extralegal methods used on detainees.
The point, however, and
bradhicks makes it eloquently, is this: There is no question about whether prosecutions should happen: The United Nations Convention on Torture, of which the United States is a signatory to, declares that there is only one acceptable legal solution to this evidence - prosecution and trial, of those who committed it, of those who authorized it, of those who have tried to cover it up, then and now, and of those obstructing the process of bringing everyone else to trial. The defendants are entitled to fair trials with unbiased grand juries, and may make their defenses as they like, but they must do so in court, and not across the media. The techniques described in the memos are torture, by both United States and international law, and those responsible for them in any way or assisting others in covering them up or obstructing the process must be brought to trial, no matter how many people it catches nor how long it takes to be done. That is the law, and the facts. It is not “revenge” against a political class, nor can it be debated in the media as a substitute for the courtroom. Try them all, and if needs be, pay the headsman well for very clean cuts.Not on torture, The WSJ accuses the EPA of playing dirty pool on cap-and-trade, setting things up so that they get to regulate carbon one way or another, regardless of what Congress or the people think, of which Ms. Strassel thinks this latest ploy is one of a series that tries to get around Congressional debate on the matter, for fear that the Congresscritters will squash it, and thus the Demcorats will kill themselves without having Republicans to blame by killing Waxman’s bill.
Mr. Ibrahim thinks the delegates who boycotted the secodn Durban conference should have stayed and fought for human rights, especially in countries that are sitting on the council with atrocious records of their own.
Last out of opinions, Mr. Towery laments the death of the informed populace, bolstered by newspaper reporting, and weeps for the new generation, raised on talking heads, biased television, and crackpots on the Internet, living in a society that prizes and honors ignorance. Think twice about the death knells of the paper, he says - when they go, we lose a lot of information.
In technology, toys that use your mind to control them, coming to stores near you, which is how the real progressw will get made on them, anyway, bionic penguins that can swim and fly, a fluorescent puppy born to the world, new material that changes color quickly when exposed to light, looking for intelligent life by spotting the things it leaves behind, which might help us with peering in at the center of the universe to see what's there.
Also, wolf spiders can survive being drowned by going comatose, and people are still going forward on research into making cloned humans implant, hoping for successes.
Last for tonight, once again, Blackle, using Google with a black color scheme so as to save energy.
