Hannity interviews Cheney part 2: Yes, Virginia the ends justify the means…

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Again the interview seemed rather scripted and realistically nothing really new was added to the discourse.
The economy: The dangerous trillion dollars of debt that will be devastating to our country economically. It puts us all in harms way.
Terrorists: Obama has made it more dangerous for us. Cheney's afraid the next terrorist attack will be a nuclear bomb or a biologic agent set in an American city.



Which led us right back to what seems the main Cheney point yet again: The ends justify the means.
Waterboarding isn't torture and besides if only they'd release the other memos that he's aware of... it would prove that the "enhanced interrogation" of the detainees brought helpful results in pertinent information on ongoing terrorism that saved lives. Therefore it was both necessary and a good thing... whether you like it or not.

Obama spoke the other day and left the door open to prosecution of those who ordered the torture and said it was legal to do so. Presidents Nixon, Reagan, and Clinton were held nationally accountable for issues that came up during their terms and probably now Bush will need to answer some pertinent questions also. Cheney would almost certainly be called in if there's actually an investigation, perhaps underneath that exterior he's worried about how that would go.



Cheney was followed on Hannity by Karl Rove. Rove said that we might be setting a precedent that if you disagree with the previous administration you get investigated. Why oh why do people listen to Karl Rove at all? He's a wolf in weasel's clothing.
Seriously Karl do you mean like Bill Clinton? That fiasco was surely unbiased. Let's rewrite more history while we're at it.


We violated the Geneva Conference plain and simple. Whether we got results (and there's conflicting information) doesn't matter, we can't violate human rights and international law that we signed off on.

Hannity stated he would agree to be waterboarded for charity and for the troops' families. Would he really and what does that prove exactly? Would we waterboard suspected domestic terrorists for information? Mass murderers for confessions?
I hear if you're not a witch you drown after being tied up and thrown into the water, but if you manage to somehow to resurface you are a witch and therefore must die anyway. Good luck Sean.


I have to try and catch Michele Bachman and Al Sharpton on the FOX news panel Monday... that ought to be interesting.
I'm beginning to wonder what the true content of the news is lately. It seems that it's just opinion and spin with little fact. Actually it's getting harder to tell fact from fiction on the so called "news" these days. Entertainment and "talk" shows aren't the news.

G'night,

Laura
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Yes, Virginia we do torture... but now what?

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I wanted to catch Dick Cheney on the Hannity Show last night.
We don't have cable (by choice) so I braved the thunderstorm at midnight to visit someone that did.

I thought the "interview" was fairly subdued for Hannity who is always trying to make his "points" through the somewhat loud leading questions he asks.
The whole thing which lasted around 20 or so minutes seemed scripted in it's lack of passion on both parts. I wondered what was going on, since neither of these people usually put me to sleep.
I also found that there is a part two tonight, don't know if it'll be any better.

Cheney stated:
"One of the things that I find a little bit disturbing about this recent disclosure is they put out the legal memos, the memos that the CIA got from the Office of Legal Counsel, but they didn't put out the memos that showed the success of the effort,"
and then he followed with:
"I haven't talked about it, but I know specifically of reports that I read, that I saw, that lay out what we learned through the interrogation process and what the consequences were for the country," Cheney said. "I've now formally asked the CIA to take steps to declassify those memos so we can lay them out there and the American people have a chance to see what we obtained and what we learned and how good the intelligence was."

That was the meat and potatoes of the first part of the interview. Defending torture (or at least his definition of it) as good because it got results...
Perhaps Cheney is right the results should be made public, then we could judge more accurately if Cheney is still redefining or not.
Regardless if there were any results or not... It doesn't let people off for torture.
Should police coerce and beat information and confessions out of their detainees?

Cheney gathered up the stormclouds outside the house and sent them towards the rest of the country. It will be of course be Obama's fault if we have problems now because he's weakened our country... This is 100% Cheney no doubt about that.
Let's just rewrite history: Bush greatest president ever. Obama evil in 95 days...
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Jon Stewart weighs in on torture:
The same night the Daily Show was of course more animated. He started out with a segment that was funny while addressing serious material about our torturing prisoners.
"No one is upset about the fact that America tortures, they're just upset that they now know about it." He referred to the Obama suporters like Chris Mattnews as the "Yes, we can McChange a hope" crowd. Watch the segment it's relevant satire.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	M - Th 11p / 10c
We Don't Torture
thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Economic Crisis Political Humor

Geneva Convention:
There seems to be enough banter about the definition of torture going on.
Is waterboarding torture? Of course it is.
Should we have done it? Not if we honor the Geneva Convention which we were a major part in.

We cannot change US laws or international laws by blatently ignoring them or redefining torture.
We cannot criticize and call for sanctions of others because of their disregard for such law and not seem hypocritically sanctimonious to the world.

It is sad to see our country willing to:
1) engage in torture and then try to redefine torture and international law.
2) let our engagement in torture go without prosecution and no accountability.
3) be willing to have the whole world see us as the "do as I say but not as I do" nation.

Obama said:we won't prosecute the lowly folk that engaged in torture because they were ordered to by higher ups... now it seems we won't prosecute the higher ups because we are "looking towards the future" not the past. What?


The president has the power to pardon those convicted of the crime of torture... but does he have the power to derail any investigation and criminal prosecution of those involved? Is that even legal?
I seem to remember president Clinton being impeached by congress and a special prosecutor (and Ken Starr was indeed "special") for lying about a blow job. You were willing to tear the country apart over that gleefully, but not over real crime against humanity?
Where exactly are our ethics and morals these days?

Law should not become a laughing stock.
We put young people in jail for smoking pot.
We talk of harsher illegal immigration laws.
But we allow torture to take place and then ignore the laws for prosecution?

How do we expect any of our own nations detainees abroad to be treated when charged with crimes if we pick and choose how we treat those we detained without regard to their human rights?

Way to go Obama/Biden, Way to go Cheney/Bush, I expected a big difference on this one.
I temporarily forgot my working definition of Politician: One who speaks with a forked tongue out of both sides of the mouth.
Most sadly disappointed.
There should be a special prosecutor and committee to look into how the torture happened and on what US authority was it carried out. It's that simple. Obama should stay out of it until the truth is known. If people are convicted then perhaps Obama in his infinite wisdom can convert their sentence or pardon those involved.

I know reading and education isn't necessarily the vogue these days... it apparently makes you either a liberal, cosmopolitan or even worse an "elitist" but please go to the library (they keep books there) or google the Geneva Convention there are summaries and read the damn thing.

I'm wondering if the same folk that are seeking to redefine "torture" are the ones that redefined "informed" to read "elitist?" Oh you betcha.

Does anyone care?

A very tired Laura

Obama bows to Saudi King Abdullah... Big deal or not?

So much fuss over whether a bow was a bow or not... and if it was indeed a bow then how horrible that was. Subservient, bad mistake, etc.
Looked like it was indeed a bow from the video and perhaps Obama shouldn't have appeared to bow (whether they call it a bow or not.) It doesn't seem like this is an earth shattering mistake. Bush had the foreign leader faux pas down cold, one of the few things he was good at.

But, tonight I was over someone's house while they had Fox's O'Reilly Factor on the tv and he was on a tear about how this was not a good thing and then read multiple e-mails where folk were complaining about the bow. The show was followed by Hannity which was even more vehement about the message it sends to the Saudis. Seems to me that as long as we crave big vehicles and gasoline that runs like water they all ready have us by the bal wallets anyway.

Now I can handle listening to Billy O sometimes but Hannity is a bit much. (I think Hannity is the definition of that American arrogance vs the insidious anti-Americanism Obama spoke about in Europe.) Interesting how dramatic all the right wingers have become: Beck, Limbaugh, O'Reilly, Hannity et al. Pure drama queens, er, kings of course. And they criticize liberals.
Amusing. Not much tolerance there.

It's all balderdash... if you go back and research (yes, research) you will find that Obama certainly isn't the first American President to bow to the Saudis or to hold hands with them either. The known ties between the Bush family and the Saudis wasn't a problem then? Maybe it's all a figment of that left wing liberal media conspiracy? Or is it the Right wing conspiracy?
AAAAaaaarrrrrggggghhhhhhhhhhh!!!

Interesting how angry the "take back our country" faction is in this country. We freely elected a new president in a democratic election (like we keep telling the rest of the world they should do) and because they lost and are pissed off about it we get this nonsense at every turn. Plenty people were upset with many of the things Bush did and downright despised him, even when Gore won the popular vote and lost the nonsense in Florida, I don't remember everyone buying guns and talking about wanting the President of the United States of America's policies to fail and taking the country back.
Taking the country back to what? Where? How? Sounds a trite treasonous, eh?
Incredibly sore losers it would seem on a relatively large scale.
Children that can't play nice in the sandbox. Grow up.

Those of you that said they would leave if Bush won last time and those of you that said they would leave if Obama won: I bet you're all still here.


I'm upset about some things Obama has said or done but so far he's not doing that bad a job. Were you all expecting miracles?
And if you were what about US Politicians in general made you expect any such wondrous things from either side? Self serving hypocrites on both sides of the fence.

Coleman step down. You've lost. Even Gore gave up.
Both you and Franken are annoying... but you have lost.
Get over yourselves. Puhleeze.

G'night,

Laura
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Sarah Main Street and Joe the Six Pack just won't go away.

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When McCain chose Sarah Palin for his running mate and then ultimately they lost the election, many gave a sigh of relief.
I didn't. I kept saying she's not going to go away, the conservative right will co-opt the republicans again, they will run Palin again. We haven't seen the last of her.

No I was told, let them run her, we'd love that, let them run her again, the democrats will easily win again if they do.
The Republican party must change with the times in order to win and they don't want to.

However, I disagree. Although Obama won by approximately 10,000,000 votes in the popular vote, which does seem like a lot for a presidential election and he slammed them in electoral votes 365 to 173, a damn strong showing, there is one thing everyone keeps forgetting. The race in many of the states was close, very close. They could have swung a different way and then the results would have been quite different.

Remember that Al Gore won the popular vote, not by a lot, but he did indeed win it. He lost the electoral vote 266 to 271.

Many states though they mostly vote red or blue aren't really that big a majority... they are close in elections.
2012 will be a bloodbath if we're not careful. If you thought 2008 was divisive and nasty just wait.
We're seeing the differences in politics now in this fight over the stimulus plan.
Anyone else have the sensation of drowning in the sea while the powers that be fight over the life savers on the deck where we aren't allowed? Bipartisanship my ass foot.

Yes, I thought Obama was naive thinking he could get a thoughtful majority of republicans, but I was hoping I was wrong.
I wasn't. Which by the way makes me feel like crap, I wanted to be wrong.

And what do you think of the first "African-American" RNC chairman?
Remember when the news folk were babbling about how Obama might not be black enough to get the black vote out for him?
Or that he could be too black for the white folk?
Well the republican party found Mr. Michael Steele... Yes, they could use a token black leader at this point in time (yes, I'm cynical) but where did they find him? Good God even Sean Hannity seems to like him.
He sounds more like Bush and Cheney than McCain did which I find disturbing.
The more I read about him and listen to him the more I realize moderate republicans either don't exist or are letting this conservative, hard line, right wing people speak for them.

Steele compared stem cell research to Nazi experiments during the Holocaust. Are you GD serious?
Sigh, yes, I'm afraid they are.
So dig in and enjoy the downslide, I'm afraid it might be closer than any of them care.
Sick of all the politics as usual. They both regularly blow it and are steeped in pure unadulterated hypocrisy.

Grab a shovel folks it's really starting to stink and we're mostly on our own...
Do I qualify for money if I'm the CEO of my household?
Yea, didn't think so...

G'night,

Laura

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