The Rant

Rant Topic of the Month: Interrogation, waterboarding and torture

There is a lot of attention being given to how the CIA and the military gets information from its prisoners. They are calling all of the methods used (which have been used in prior wars) torture, which it is not.

Here's what kills me, the big issue at hand is waterboarding, where you put a washcloth or towel on somebody's face and pour water on them. It makes you think you are drowning, when you are acutally not even close. Does it work, the experts say it does. Should be stop doing it, no we shouldn't.

Waterboarding, sleep depravation, uncomfortable postions, light adjusment, and temperature adjustment are not torture. Hooking up a person to a car battery and electocuting them is torture. Breaking bones is torture. Anything that brings the subject near death before you bring them back, torture. But making somebody think they could die, not torture, and if it makes them sing, it should be used.

Something else that bothers me about this issue, how many of the people that are against it have ever faced the enemy? How many people are out there on the front lines, getting shot at, getting blown up by IEDs on a daily bases? The people that are, need the information attained by the people who were interrogated to stay alive. People back in there safe little houses, all warm at night, going to work everyday listening to the radio, going out during the weekend to have a couple of drinks, with no care in the world are the people who have problems with the interrogations methods used. Well, to those people I say, PISS OFF.

Let the military fight the war, ask questions later. You don't ask Burger King how the hamburger is made, do you? Why ask the military or CIA how it gets it's "hamburger"?

Now, as far as the tapes the CIA destroyed, there is no cover-up in progress. Thats how the military and other government institutions work. When the item at hand is no longer useful, it is kept for a short period of time aferward, then its destroyed.

The tapes the CIA had were not going to be used in a criminal trail. The reason they taped the interrogation in the first place is to review it later to see if they missed anything, see what methods worked on the individual, and to train other interrogators on how to approach the individual. Once all that significance was gone, there was no need for the tapes. They followed protocol, which was probably in place for longer than 20 years, and was not against any law.

There are thousands of left wing nut bags out there that are going to want to make this criminal and hold someone liable...for nothing. They are going to come out, and they already have, and say that because the debate is on-going on waterboarding, that the tapes shouldn't have been destroyed, and were to cover-up the technique. Too bad for them that the tapes were destroyed before the debate was even considered. Those tapes were destroyed long before those running for President ever got a hold of this to make it an issue.

Ok, let me make one thing clear about all of this, torture is wrong. There is a fine line though, and as long as we do not cross it, we are fine, and shouldn't be interferred with. Different methods have been used by our government since its inception to gain information from captured enemy. We have come along way since then and refined our methods, and have been in compliance with the Geneva Convention since IT came along.

In closing, we need to continue interrogations the same way we have been. We have gained a massive amount of intelliegence which has helped our troops in combat and as well as the federal agents in stopping further attacks on the US.

Well, there you have it, my newsest installment of "The Rant". Hope you enjoyed it. Remember, all things said on this page are just my opinion, and I could be wrong.

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