Fields: Pelosi Should Resign Over Torture Allegations
BY SAM FIELDS
Nancy Pelosi should resign as Speaker and from the United States Congress.
Her response to questions about Bush torture activities, especially what did she know and when did she know it, are a disgrace.
Her latest defense is that she was briefed on procedures of torture but was never given the who, when, where and how details.
At an earlier time and place she might have said:
“Sure the Gestapo briefed me how Auschwitz and Buchenwald might work but they never told me they actually followed through and I certainly did not know the names of anyone they sent to the gas chambers.
In the days following 9/11, who of us did not have thoughts far beyond water boarding. The question of national character is resolved by the actions of those in power resisting those thoughts. Because in the end we have to live with the world community and more importantly we have to live with ourselves.
I could write a tome on the subject but nothing I could write would sum it up better than a soliloquy by Ernst Janning (Burt Lancaster) in Judgment at Nuremburg, available here.
May 14th, 2009 at 2:13 pm
This is a a highly complicated ethical problem. Neither side of the torture argument should be dismissed easily.
On the one hand we have our long honored human rights principals not to torture combatants. On the other hand, we have armed terrorists, who are not combatants in the intended sense of the word. Rather they are religious extremists who are motivated to violence even to the sacrifice of their own lives in order to kill us. We feel the same duty to survive them that they seem to feel toward killing us. This has been demonstrated by events.
Sometimes it is reasonable to believe that some of the terrorists have information that can help us save thousands of our innocent lives. Some of them will not disclose that information without unorthodox means of interrogation, including torture.
The question becomes shall the US deprive itself of information that we believe terrorists possess, and therefore face added risk to our population, because of human rights rules against torture that were created in the context of how combatants should be treated in captivity?
The rule not to torture was created in the context of conventional warfare — meaning people in uniforms fighting on behalf of their nation at war. The rule was never created with terrorist wars in mind. That scenario likely was never contemplated. Rules that apply to one situation may not in other situations. Every situation deserves and demands it’s own set of rules.
The begs the question whether torture is ever warranted. And that is a highly difficult question to answer. In all cases, rules should generate the greatest good for the greatest number. and I think that torture as an interrogtion means of last resort when dealing with terrorists engaged in a terrorist war needs it’s own set of rules.
Last, the current scenario involving US torture of terrorists is nothing at all like the what took place with Jews in Nazi Germany. The distictions there are many, profound and sharp, and any suggestion to the contrary is inappropriate and factually without merit.
May 14th, 2009 at 4:05 pm
Dear Difficult Question,
1. Is there ever situation where torture is the only way to stop the ticking time bomb? I suppose so. In the movie Independence Day the circumstances of an alien invasion makes it moral to nuke Houston. Your problem is that you believe Dick Cheney when he tells you to trust him that the need was there.
Unfortunately for “WMD†Dick there is no indication that this kind of justification has happened since 9/11. But if such a situation does occur than lets stop the legal parsing and hiding behind rationalization on top of rationalization. The buck stops with the Prez. He should order it and issue Presidential pardons to those who carried out his orders. Then take the political heat which might lead to impeachment and removal from office or it might lead to a parade. Either way the buck stops with the boss and not the employees.
2. Pelosi is trying to have it both ways. She sounds like a weasel. You can be damn sure if it was clear that torture had stopped a second 9/11 she would be leading the water boarding parade.
3. The analogy to the Nazis is not an attempt to see them as equal evils. The comparison comes from frightened people buying into demagoguery that leaes to surrendering their freedom. Listen to the piece and you will see what I am talking about.
May 14th, 2009 at 7:00 pm
Nancy Pelosi is a political whore who never shies away from an opportunity for some political one-upmanship even on the backs of our fighting men and women. Now her tangled web has backed her into a corner. Perhaps she has cooked her goose though Dems control Congress and they have never demonstrated the moral fortitude to punish their own. Anybody remember Uncle Teddy’s late night swim? By the way, I “googled” “Death From Waterboarding” and found none. Personally, I don’t think we go far enough. If we really want to torture these terrorists we would strap them to a gurney and read from Sam Fields’s blogs.
May 15th, 2009 at 2:04 pm
SAM, WHY DO YOU BELIEVE THE C.I.A.? THERE ENTIRE PROFILE IS TO LIE AND COVER UP THEIR MISDEEDS. NANCY PELOSI HAS REFUTED THEIR TESTIMONY SPECIFICALLY. THE C.I.A. IN RETURN HAS ANSWERED WITH NON DENIAL DENIALS. WHAT IS THE REASON FOR YOUR PRE OCCUPATION WITH NAZI’S? THIS ONLY WEAKENS YOUR POINT OF VIEW AND ARGUMENT.
May 17th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
“If we really want to torture these terrorists we would strap them to a gurney and read from Sam Fields’s blogs.”
that was pretty funny. First laugh of the day.