Mitch McConnell on CNN - No Evidence of Abuse, torture, none

[Synnical]

Miles did his best, but his focus seems to be on the Space Program and bitching about highly trained and educated people dropping a bolt while taking a space walk as they are risking their lives rocketing away from Earth in an itsy bitsy shuttle that has only of and off switches to guide them!

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0609/15/ltm.04.html

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R), KENTUCKY: Good morning. Glad to be here.

O'BRIEN: Colin Powell's statement certainly was a bombshell. He said, among other things in a letter released, "The world is beginning to doubt the moral basis of our fight against terrorism."

What do you say to that?


MCCONNELL: What is the goal here? The goal is to continue the detainee interrogation program which we know has saved American lives. We know that.

We also know that we're not mistreating prisoners. There's no evidence whatsoever of that.

So, the question is, how do you continue the detainee interrogation program? The CIA director has said clearly that the Armed Services Committee version of the bill will require him to shut down the program, thereby making Americans less safe.

Everybody in this argument is a good, patriotic American, but the fundamental question is, how do we continue this program that has demonstrably saved lives over the last five years? And we haven't been successfully attacked again in five years. And it's an incredible performance by the administration. I trust them on this issue.

O'BRIEN: But the tactics are debatable. Senator McCain, who, of course, has been there as a former prisoner of war, says this: "In my experience, abuse of prisoners often produces bad intelligence because under torture a person will say anything he thinks his captors want to hear -- whether it's true of false -- if he believes it will relieve his suffering."

Do these techniques really work, sir?

MCCONNELL: Well, you know, I know that Senator McCain knows that none of that has ever happened on our side. There's no evidence whatsoever that anybody has ever been tortured by the U.S., and I'm sure that Senator McCain is not suggesting that because there's no evidence of that.

The real question is, how can we continue the program? And the man in charge of the program says that unless that it would pass this Armed Services Committee version, he will be required to shut the program down. That will make America less safe. Look, this is a...

O'BRIEN: But how do we know...

MCCONNELL: ... the right argument among good people, and at some point we will have to take a vote here and make a decision.


O'BRIEN: But going back to what Colin Powell said...

MCCONNELL: Yes?

O'BRIEN: ... you know, the president has said many times that this is really a war of ideas. And if in waging this war of ideas we compromise our own ideals, do we lose?

MCCONNELL: Well, we're not compromising our own ideals. What the administration is proposing is that we apply the standard in Senator McCain's bill that was just passed last year, which I supported, 90-9 in the Senate, to take the standards that he recommended we use, and use them as the interpretation.

I don't think that's an inadequate standard, and that would allow the Americans to determine the standard rather than some international court of human justice somewhere in Europe. We need to have the U.S. determine what these standards are, not punt that issue over to some international court which may, you know, have an entirely different view of what is inappropriate treatment of prisoners.

O'BRIEN: But in the court of public perception, which is so important in the war against terror, if the perception is out there that the U.S. is skirting the Geneva Conventions, which most of the nations of the world have signed onto, including the U.S., isn't that somehow a loss for the United States, a victory for the terrorists?

MCCONNELL: Gee, you know, the important thing in the war on terror is to win it, and to succeed. And we know we've killed a lot of terrorists, we know we've protected the homeland for the last five years. And if that disturbs some European court somewhere, so be it.

I'm sorry about that. But we can't conform our standards and lower our safety in order to please some European court somewhere.

O'BRIEN: All right. Final thought here.

You're the whip. This is a whip's nightmare with an election coming up. Are you disappointed that you have these disaffected Republicans? And are you a little surprised?

MCCONNELL: Sure. I mean, we -- I'm not surprised. We have been talking about this issue intensely for the last three months. We have been in numbers of negotiations trying to pull everybody together.

Sure, it's disappointing, but somehow we'll resolve this. The country will be safe. And we'll move on.

O'BRIEN: Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell.

Thanks for your time, sir

No torture, none.

A mere start of collected evidence:

The detainees
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1158270614360&call_pageid=970599119419

Gitmo Prisoners Fight for Control of Post-release Fate
http://newstandardnews.net/content/index.cfm/items/3664

TORTURE AT ABU GHRAIB
http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?040510fa_fact

U.S. Torture and Abuse of Detainees
http://hrw.org/campaigns/torture.htm

U.N. cites reliable accounts of U.S. torture

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8327660/


Edit to fix missing attribution to the Senator

[babylonsister]

1. Mitch McConnell, forgetaboutit! It's Mitch!

And he's full of shit, or I just don't agree with him. But FWIW, I think he's full of shit.

[Erika]

2. When Hannity was talking about ripping Saddam's nails off

to get the WMD's, we know what the W and his bushbots we're doing.

[snowbear]

3. Have they brought on a Democrat to dispute him yet?

That's one thing I'll give CNN.. They almost always bring in an opposing view to every interview like that.

Miles O'Brien? What's he doing on at this hour anyway?

You watching a re-run?

[Synnical]

5. The transcript is from Friday Morning n/t

[countmyvote4real]

6. That will be the day Dems get a majority in either house.

Media whores only cater those in power.

[EST]

4. Chouce one-

He's lying out his ass.

Choice two-he really is that stipid, willfully ignorant and insular.

Either way, totally unfit to be in such a position.

[Jack Rabbit]

7. Mitch McConnell is a strange fellow

Talk to him about campaing financing and you'll discover that he doesn't know the difference between free speech on the one hand and bribery and extortion on the other. Of course, this is a very common misconception in Washington, especially among Republicans.

Now we talk to him about this. I assume he knows of the pactice of waterboarding. It os used in those detentiona facilities. So the man who can't distinguish between free speech and bribery also tells us that waterboarding isn't torture.

Don't call the Senate an exclusive club if they let idiots like McConnell and Inhofe in there. What sorry losers they are.