Pundits Whitewash Torture

[pberq]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/04/19/pundits-whitewash-torture_n_188756.html

Pundits Whitewash Torture

04/19/09 09:50 PM

On the Sunday morning news programs, several pundits went out of their way to either endorse waterboarding and other techniques endorsed in the torture memos - or to dismiss the idea of holding their authors responsible.

On ABC News' "This Week With George Stephanopoulos," George Will echoed several Bush officials when he criticized the release of the memos, saying "The problem with transparency is that it's transparent for the terrorists as well." Will expressed concern about the cost of letting "the bad guys" know what techniques, such as waterboarding, will be used on them. He went on to add, as noted by HuffPost's Jason Linkins, that "intelligent people of good will" believe the President of the United States can do whatever he wants to "defend the country."

Peggy Noonan went even further, articulating a position that upends George Santayana's famous quote: "Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it."

"Some things in life need to be mysterious," said Noonan, adding, "Sometimes you need to just keep walking."

She also added:

"It's hard for me to look at a great nation issuing these documents and sending them out to the world and thinking, oh, much good will come of that."

(more at link)

[SpiralHawk]

1. REPUBLICON 'family values' - so low, so perverse, so driven by sniveling fear & hate

...so anti-morality, so anti-christian, so anti-American.

Get thee to thy diseased Homeland, Republicon Torture Freaks and Apolgists, and Be Gone from America.

[KansDem]

2. ...said Noonan, adding, "Sometimes you need to just keep walking."

Guess you just have to decide which side of the street, eh, Peggy?

[pberq]

3. The USA has become the terrorists

George Will: "intelligent people of good will" believe the President of the United States can do whatever he wants to "defend the country."

[Senator]

4. K&R

[Hydra]

5. This doesn't scare me

These people get paid to feed us propaganda. They know they'll never end up in the torture chambers as long as they are good little slaves.

What worries me is the SHEER APATHY most people are showing. Obama says it's ok, therefore, it's ok. Someone actually said that to me IRL- my tongue was bleeding buckets...but if someone can accept torture as a legitimate act and necessary because these people tell them so...they're beyond my words.

[pberq]

6. Well put, Hydra

"These people get paid to feed us propaganda"

Sometimes it's hard for even us DUers to remember that fact.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

7. well stated

[Uncle Joe]

8. This is an example of how potent and dangerous mass corporate media hypnotic propaganda can be.

It can stir up illogical fear and hatred as during the run up to the war with Iraq, motivating a nation not to question the validity or need for war, or it can sooth the emotional revulsion against torture by morphing the sadistic reality of the act in to an intellectual exercise, putting the intended victim; the American People to sleep.

That episode of This Week With Stephanopolous was a disgrace, turning the national soul sucking issue of torture and the import of learning from or correcting the mistakes of the past in to a discussion of "What's for breakfast?"

[Uncle Joe]

9. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, pberq.

[TankLV]

10. Well noonan is correct on one thing - not much good will come from releasing the memos & persuing

prosecutions - FOR THE BUSH* REGIME & WAR CRIMINAL REPUKE PARTY!!!

The REPUKE party will be as damaged a moniker as "NAZI"...