Not that something as mundane as "the facts" or "the truth" has ever mattered to the [DELETED] [DELETED] that dominate the Greyhawk commentary board, but here goes:

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Even the military's own Taguba report verified torture and rape at Abu Ghraib.

http://www.agonist.org/annex/taguba.htm

As for Guantanamo, there hasn't been the equivalent of a Taguba report. Information has come out in bits and pieces. You really have to do more to piece it together. The ACLU's archive of government documents released under court order is a good place to start. Even the [DELETED] commentators have used it as primary source data.

http://action.aclu.org/torturefoia/

How did the United States government come to devise and implement a policy of torture and perversion in its conduct of the Iraq War? That was documented by Seymour Hersh, an experienced investigative reporter who, among other things, broke the story of the My Lai massacre.

http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/040524fa_fact

Then there is the question of whether it's necessary or effective to use torture and forced sexual perversion in a fight against cruel fanatics. The United States has faced that question before. The Japanese were notably cruel toward civilians and American POWs; used suicide bombings ("kamikaze" attacks) as a war tactic; and were notably fierce in battle. The U.S. Marine Corps, which suffered the worst of what Japan had to offer between 1942 and 1945, had a policy of treating Japanese POW's with humanity, dignity and cultural respect. This policy paid huge dividends in the form of usable information.

http://mysite.verizon.net/vze6kt7j/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/aamitcsm.pdf

It is a shame that a Senator, such as Durbin could ever state we are like Nazi Germany. Excuse me, what in the hell does he know about Nazi Germany? This country is nothing like Nazi Germany, and I should know my father grew up in Nazi Germany. There is no comparison, and this coming out of the mouth of a US Senator! Just go ahead Senator Durbin and punch us again and give us a black eye. Go ahead and run your [DELETED]mouth to the Media and say we are just as bad as the Russian Gulags. Go ahead and spew this garbage from the safety of your office in DC. What does a civilian[DELETED] Senator know about Gulags, or Nazi Germany when he never had to risk his life for this country? Go ahead and give the media, and Al Jazeera more crap to put in their papers and on TV. Go ahead, you spineless armedchair retard. It is amazing what our own politicans say to get noticed. It totally wrong, and he should not even be a position in our government when you take aim at our troops. What a [DELETED].

Durbin must be getting a great deal of satisfaction on the lauds he has received from Al Jazeera. If I were a resident of the state of Illinois I would be scrambling to find someone of character to run in Durbin's seat for his next election. Course then residents of Washington re-elected Patty Murray who touted the good deeds of Osama Bin Ladin AFTER 911. Guess the left does believe America is the bad country and the Islamic Fascistic countries are to be defended against the horrors of the US Military machine. Heard John Warner of Virginia talk about how there are just as many conservatives out there making over the top statements like Durbins. He called it "over the top"? I call it on the edge of treason!

Unfortunately, Durbin doesn't run for re-election until 2008. The DNC is focused on getting those campign coffers full for the 2006 elections.

Standard political operation. Get some senators in relatively safe seats who are not running in the next election cycle to "Preach to the Faithful" and send in those "Donations for the Cause".

Dean was doing the "Preach to the Faithful" routine, but it was hurting democrats who are up for re-election in 2006.

On the other side of the coin, Senators who are running for re-election in 2006 in unsafe seats move towards the center.

Ooops - Willy didn't read the links...

We needed to see a counterweight to Durbin's "lets cut and run" speech, and we got it in the form of Lt.Gen Conway at today's Pentagon press briefing. He knocked my socks off.

It does alot when we see straight talk and common sense coming from those we have entrusted with our security. There's obviously alot of steel behind the military bearing.

Conway is one reason why (Michelle Maulkin did a write up) the public trusts the military as an institution more than the media, Congress or the church.

Hubs returned home last week after 13 months in Afghanistan. The day after he returned home we had a lightning strike in the yard which blew out a good portion of our appliances and electronic equipment including our satellite dish. Thus, he saw television news this morning for the first time since returning home.

The first story he saw on the news was Gitmo torture. His comment? "If detainees lived and ate like we did over the last year, the civil rights people would have been all over us, they call that torture??? They try to kill us, we treat them like royalty. Do they have any idea of what we are dealing with here? They detonate ied's when there are little kids running along side the convoys, that's what life means to them..NOTHING. We work our a**es off, live like dogs, deal with rpg's and ied's daily, lose friends to ambushes, rebuild a country, supervise elections...and come home to this crap on the news...nice."

Then he turned off the tv and walked away. I can't even begin to imagine what he must be feeling right now, but I sure as heck know how it makes me feel, it makes me sick.

I've known for a long time that some will believe the worst of our military no matter what the reality is. I've also known that many don't care at all how their words affect those actually in the military if they can score political points against the administration. But knowing it, and seeing written across the face someone you love..especially someone who has given so much..I can't even describe it.

Nevermind, I'm shutting up now..if people haven't gotten it by now, they never will, and they obviously don't care to. Scoring those points must be MUCH more important to them and quite honestly, I pity them.

It's ok though, my husband will go on defending them no matter how many times they spit in his face. It's his job, he does it well and he does it with honor.

Makes me wonder if some people even know what the word "honor" means.

Tink, a grunts wife

It's comments like yours, Tink, that make me support the release of the rest of the photos from Abu Ghraib. Maybe then the wingnuts in this country will stop denying that American personnel tortured people. You take the bad with the good, but you people seem to require nothing but rah-rah adulation. You act as if Americans are gods who can do no wrong.

Tell your husband thanks for his service, but also tell him that he came home to a free country and that part of our freedom is hearing bad news. If he can't understand that, then maybe he doesn't grasp what he was fighting for to begin with.

I guess the FBI is also a leftist hate-America organization, too.

http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/10462815.htm

Excerpt:

The FBI launched its own investigations of many abuse complaints in Iraq. A June 25 memo from an FBI agent to Director Robert Mueller, which was also released Monday, said individuals "were engaged in a cover-up of abuses." The individuals' names were blacked out.

The agent included a report from an unnamed witness of "numerous physical abuse incidents of Iraqi civilians" including "strangulation, beatings, placement of lit cigarettes into the detainees' ear openings and unauthorized interrogations."

Since the scandal broke in April, White House and Justice Department officials said they would produce new legal guidelines for interrogation techniques from Afghanistan to Iraq to Guantanamo.

But that hasn't happened, and Justice Department officials say the guidelines have been delayed.

"Congressmen who willfully take actions during wartime that damage morale and undermine the military are saboteurs and should be arrested, exiled or hanged"
- Abe Lincoln

We needed to see a counterweight to Durbin's "lets cut and run" speech, and we got it in the form of Lt.Gen Conway at today's Pentagon press briefing. He knocked my socks off.

At no point in his speech did Durbin advocate withdrawing from Iraq or even closing Gitmo. Once again, Jordan, you have done what rightwingnuts specialize in doing: You lied.

http://talkleft.com/Gitmofloorstatement061405.pdf

If he can't understand that, then maybe he doesn't grasp what he was fighting for to begin with.

No Willie, it's you who have no idea what he was fighting for, and you doesn't seem to have any clue at all what is happening over there...

At no time did I nor anyone else claim that all military personel are infallible, as I have stated many times before, they are human, with all the same failings as any other human being on this earth. However, when what they have accomplished is virtually ignored and the failings of a few when hundreds of thousands have served, is the main focus every day all day ...you tell me what is skewed.

No one asks for "rah rah adulation", they only ask that the truth be told about what they have accomplished. Take the bad with the good? No problem. How about the media report 1/1,000th of the good that takes place on a daily basis?

There are atrocities in every war. They are NOT the norm. When atrocities do take place there is no one is more angry than those who serve. Why? Because it reflects upon them, it reflects upon their honor, it makes their job more difficult, more dangerous.

Yes, he did come home to a free country, something that he, as one of "you people" is very aware of. At no time has anyone I know requested "rah rah adulation" for the jobs that they do. They only ask that that the whole truth be told about what they do. Like you said, the good with the bad..too bad so many ignore the good, focus on the bad, and paint with such a broad brush.

But you go ahead Willie, make your snarky comments as you sit at your keyboard. God gave you that right, my husband and hundreds of thousands of others will continue to protect it.

Have a good day ;)

Old Soldier: Careful. If you diss Willysnout's Wisdom you'll be labeled a "wingnut" or worse.

That would be awful.

Willy -- you are just so factually wrong you belong with the lunatics who thought Clinton murdered Vince Foster or that Bush blew up the WTC Twin Towers.

1. All abuses in Abu Graib took place during the night shift. Nothing improper as far as conduct by Army personnel occurred during the other shifts. Rape in a crowded, poorly staffed prison? Yes I'm sure. Happens in Pelican Bay too.

2. Gitmo? WTF? The WORST thing that happened was an Al Qaeda prisoner jumped a guard and knocked out a tooth, the guard beat the Al Qaeda guy with a radio on the head. Given that two Al Qaeda prisoners had stabbed another guard in the eye and permanently crippled him in another attack before 9/11 I'll say the Al Qaeda creep had it coming. Female guards having sperm thrown at them by the Al Qaeda creeps marked them up with pens and said it was blood. WTF?

Seymour Hersh? He waits for stuff to come to him, over the transom, and has been living off the My Lai story (which came to him) for years. He admits he's a CIA conduit and often just reports the raw BS his sources tell him. In the New Yorker his stuff is fact checked up the wazoo and solid, the rest of his stuff is wild ass allegations of which 99% is someone's political backstabbing career agenda and the other 1% some marginal truth. The real heroes of My Lai were the Army scouts who put down their helicopter between the surviving villagers and Calley's out of control unit to save lives at the risk of their own. It sure as hell wasn't Seymour Hersh.

3. The EU Human Rights Commission has ruled that the UK may use: hooding, sleep deprivation, "stress positions," isolation, loud music, "intimidation," and air conditioning to question IRA terrorists. What we are doing is in line with published EU guidelines for terrorists.

4. Most Army and Marine units in WWII did not take prisoners of the Japanese. Among other charming things they booby trapped prisoners in suicide bombs, pretended to surrender then attacked, killed Medics deliberately, booby trapped dead Americans. Out of 120,000 Japanese troops on Okinawa less than 5,000 were taken prisoner. Only a few hundred were taken prisoner on Iwo.

I guess Willy what you are saying is that you are OK with dead Americans, perhaps thousands of them, as long as we don't ever offend any hardened Jihadi terrorists like say Khalid Sheik Mohammed or Mohammed al-Qhattani, the architect and operational go-between of 9/11 respectively. If it were me I'd cheerfully waterboard both of them until they die if it meant one American life saved, but I guess you love our enemies more than you love the lives of Americans. That's OK, most Democrats really do hate America. See: Howard Dean, Dick Durbin, Ward Churchill. Three of a Kind.

There are atrocities in every war. They are NOT the norm. When atrocities do take place there is no one is more angry than those who serve. Why? Because it reflects upon them, it reflects upon their honor, it makes their job more difficult, more dangerous.

The White House and the U.S. military have had to be dragged kicking and screaming into admitting anything that happened. It's not surprising, seeing as how your Liar-in-Chief has sent 1,700+ people to their deaths and 12,000+ to be wounded -- and then hidden away like a terrible family secret -- for absolutely nothing at all.

The Taguba report was a pretty good investigation, but it was strictly limited to the events at the prison. It did not assign any responsibility to the people who actually ordered the "Copper Green" torture and perversion program. And the trials themselves? Wrist slaps all around, and even then only for the enlisted people.

If that's the military version of "honor," it ain't much.

God gave you that right, my husband and hundreds of thousands of others will continue to protect it.

They're not doing one single thing to protect that right in Iraq. In fact, all that war has done is create more terrorists thanks to the morally corrupt and idiotic "Copper Green" torture and perversion program ordered at the highest levels of our government.

All abuses in Abu Graib took place during the night shift. Nothing improper as far as conduct by Army personnel occurred during the other shifts. Rape in a crowded, poorly staffed prison? Yes I'm sure. Happens in Pelican Bay too.

At Pelican Bay or any other civilian prison, the rapists aren't generally the guards and they aren't working under orders to rape the inmates.

Out of 120,000 Japanese troops on Okinawa less than 5,000 were taken prisoner. Only a few hundred were taken prisoner on Iwo.

And when the prisoners were taken, they weren't tortured or forced to engage in sexual perversion. The USMC of the 1940s apparently had some moral standards.

I guess Willy what you are saying is that you are OK with dead Americans

No, I'd say it's the [DELETED] of America who revel in the deaths of Americans. You've now wasted 1,700+ U.S. lives and have caused more than 12,000 to be wounded for your [DELETED]president's war that was begun on a series of phony pretexts. And I suppose it's off-limits to mention the fact that we've now killed more Iraqi children than all of the U.S. civilians who died on 9/11.

Oops, I forgot that we kill Iraq kids to win their parents' hearts and minds. And just in case that doesn't work, we grab them off the street, throw them in jail and sodomize them with chemical lights. Nice work. I feel much safer now.

Details on "Copper Green" can be found here, not that the [DELETED] will ever want to consider something as mundane as the truth:

http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/040524fa_fact

One more thing. Greyhawk, I dare you to ban me. I EXPECT the [DELETED] to be censors, so you might as well. I started out here with civility, but after being called every name in the book by the [DELETED] on this website I'm giving it right back. I know your type: Can dish it out but can't take it.

So make my day. Do a political cleansing so you can restore your echo chamber to its pristine post-truth condition.

Willy,
The reason you are not banned from this site is because we believe in free speech, regardless what you spew. Although I do demand it stay PG, that goes for everyone.

But mainly we leave you on this site to show how ridicules the left has become.

Your kind are making it easy for 2008

Aw, Mrs. G. If you don't ban him he'll lose street cred with his buddies! You meanie!

Willy spewed:
"The White House and the U.S. military have had to be dragged kicking and screaming into admitting anything that happened."

Except they released info on it to the media months before the pictures were smeared all over the place. Oh gosh, did Willysnout just lie again? Surprise, surprise.

"It" being Abu Ghraib, that is. PIMF.

So you're telling me, that with all the active, reserve, and National Guard personnel from Il that have put time in Iraq, there is not one qualified veteran who's nearing their 20, with combat scars, a clean record, and a desire 'to serve' who can not make a commitment tomarrow to declare that he is running for the Senator's seat? The enemy has provided an opportunity which exploited, he can not recover from.
Karl Rove is not on top of the game. Sad.

The thing [DELETED] like Willy and Kos seem unable to comprehend is that they're equating the exception with the rule. Torture was the rule for the Nazis, the Soviets, and the Baathists. It was official policy, and as a rule far more brutal than the occasional discomforts that happened at Gitmo or Abu Ghraib.

Don't ban willy, much better for his insanity and stupidity to be displayed here for all to marvel at.

Oh, and Willy citing Seymour "I am not the least bit objective and I'm proud to announce it!!" Hersh doesn't exactly add credibility to your case.

The thing [DELETED] like Willy and Kos seem unable to comprehend is that they're equating the exception with the rule. Torture was the rule for the Nazis, the Soviets, and the Baathists. It was official policy, and as a rule far more brutal than the occasional discomforts that happened at Gitmo or Abu Ghraib.

Torture has been (we're not sure if it is still) official U.S. policy in this war. The refusal of the [DELETED] to acknowledge this does not change the fact.

Oh, and Willy citing Seymour "I am not the least bit objective and I'm proud to announce it!!" Hersh doesn't exactly add credibility to your case.

Anyone who reads The New Yorker's archive of Iraq stories with an open mind with realize that Hersh's reporting has been spot-on from the very beginning. The problem for rightwingnuts is that they'll only believe that which confirms their preconceptions, i.e., the output of [DELETED]News, [DELETED] Daily and the cult-owned Washington Times.

By the way, so you know, I started off as a supporter of the Iraq invasion. That's because I was dumb enough to believe Colin Powell's speech to the United Nations. After the Vietnam experience, I didn't think the United States government would concoct another Gulf of Tokin resolution. Believing anyone from the Bush regime was my BIG mistake. I didn't turn around and oppose the war until after the evidence was in and throughly aired, i.e., until it had been proven that your president lied about WMD and Hussein-terror links.

I still support the people on the ground today. I don't support torture and perversion and never will, but I hope they can perform their mission (whatever it is, because I'm not really sure anymore) and come home. Soon.

"Torture has been (we're not sure if it is still) official U.S. policy in this war."

[DELETED].

[DELETED].

[DELETED]. You refuse to look at the facts because you are afraid of them.