Five and a half years. And that includes time served.
Salim Hamdan could go home in less than six months after a military tribunal gave him a “stunningly lenient” sentence for his conviction on providing material support for terrorism. Hamdan got 66 months instead of the 30 years to life sentence recommended by prosecutors
Okay, so let’s review sentences:
Libby, 30 months – perjury, obstruction of justice and lying to investigators in the probe of the leak of the name of Valerie Plame, a CIA operative who was actually exposed by someone else – and the investigator knew it the whole time he was investigating Libby – and in the course of her double-super-top-extra secret job, actually drove to CIA headquarters to work every day.
Hamdan, 66 months – providing material support to al Qaeda, which has murdered thousands of Americans.
Niiice.
The name of your blog is “Pursuing Holiness.” Given that title, I assume you are a person of faith, perhaps a Christian like myself. When I think about what it means to be a follower of Jesus, it means that I try to discover facts that so I come to well-supported conclusions. To be a follower of Jesus also means being gracious, not snide. As I peruse your blog, it seems that that is not the case. I would suggest you read Jane Mayer’s book, The Dark Side, regarding the way in which torture became a policy of this country. Hamdan was subjected to torture. After reading that book, you might want to read another book, Jesus For President, which suggests how followers of Jesus might think and act Christianly about politics.
Wow, and you got all that from just one post. You’re amazing. You know the sum of what I know about this case, this war, GITMO – all of it! And consequently you’ve been able to divine that my conclusions are not well-supported. Because disagreement with your worldview means my intellect and my faith are lacking. Because sarcasm is a definitive indicator of the non-Christian! (Unlike, say, arrogantly lecturing strangers based on little to no information…) Kathryn, get over yourself. Please. And if I wanted to be snide, I’d suggest you memorize Proverbs 18:6.
If you want to make the case that the treatment Hamden experienced at the hands of the United States was torture by any reasonable standard, please do so. If you want to make the case that in order to qualify as a Christian I have to live up to your standard of behavior, please do so. On second thought, don’t, because based on what I know of you so far, your opinions don’t interest me.
And in the meantime, please peruse actual torture methods that idiot leftists don’t volunteer for at protests and put on YouTube.
And just to clarify – my Proverbs reference is an example of an actual snide remark, unlike the content of my post which wasn’t at all snide. The reference was intended to provide contrast between the two – a post with a wry but rather mild observation about the difference between two sentences relative to the crimes involved, and a nasty, flippant, contemptuous suggestion that you’re a) a fool and b) by your silly statements are proving yourself worthy of physical abuse.
I’m spelling it out because I seriously doubt you’d get it if I didn’t. And that’s not being snide, it’s my honest opinion.
[Added: and now I'll go meditate on Proverbs 15:1...]
Jesus would vote Republican.
Laura – just to clarify, are you saying that so long as we’re not as bad as the people we’re fighting against, then we’re OK? So if Al Qaeda chopped prisoners arms off, we’re OK so long as we only chop hands off?
No, of course you don’t think that, because you more than me think we should hold ourselves to absolute, not relative standards. Consider that before 9/11 few people would have hesitated to call waterboarding torture. Mild torture, perhaps, certainly not up to the standards set by so many others, but torture nonetheless. Even more important, bear in mind that interrogation experts say that it rarely works, and is certainly less effective than traditional methods based on outsmarting and winning over your subject.
So please explain your calculus – what I’m seeing is that we do something that most of us know is wrong, and that makes us less safe in the process, but in return people from other countries can point at the hypocrisy of the shining city on the hill. I’m not seeing the benefit.
Thank you for taking the time to respond to my comments, Laura. You might be interested in this book by Tony Campolo, Red Letter Christians: A Citizen’s Guide to Faith and Politics
http://www.amazon.com/Red-Letter-Christians-Citizens-Politics/dp/0830745297/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1218202376&sr=1-1
And this blog is great!
http://blog.beliefnet.com/godspolitics/
I think Laura was suggesting that, by comparing the situation to the way our enemies treat us, we can get some perspective on the matter. The idea that we should try military enemies in civilian American courts is ridiculous. The third branch of government was not designed to fight wars. We’re talking about LAWYERS here. I hang out in court frequently, and I have witnessed the ultra-slow processes that make such a dream impossible. The utopian hippies need to get their heads out of the clouds and look at reality, for once. We are doing what is natural. We are fighting the enemy. And we are doing it as humanely as feasible…If we do make any mistakes, so be it. It’s war.
And calling waterboarding “torture” is highly questionable because it primarily invokes fear, not pain, and because it leaves no lasting physical damage to the subject. It’s more comparable to lying to the subject (saying you have proof of his guilt) than to torturing him. And as far as I know, the guy this article is talking about was not waterboarded.
Paul, first you suggest that absolute standards are a desirable thing. Then you define torture by consensus.
“Rarely” works = sometimes does work. I’m all in favor of the comfy chair, actually. And it seems McDonald’s fries got a good deal of info out of Hamdan. But when necessary, I’m very much in favor of waterboarding. Here’s why:
35 seconds of fear and discomfort to someone we have reason to believe is a dangerous enemy. “A number” – maybe dozens – of attacks disrupted and many innocent lives saved – not just from the immediate attack being prevented but the prospective attackers captured or killed. Easy decision, and I believe the correct moral one, given the information at hand – even though sometimes it will prove after the fact to be incorrect or ineffective. This is a tool we need at our disposal, and by its very nature not one we can use too frequently or it will lose its effectiveness.
And here’s a link for you, Kathryn:
Social Justice, For The Glory of Government
and have this one too, while you’re at it:
Judging Christians By Their Politics
So many non-intellectual Christians feel that hard-core conservatism must be bad — because it lacks compromise and moderation. But the truth is not moderate!
My sister likes Tony Campolo. (Unfortunately, she is a non-intellectual hippie-Christian). But in my humble opinion, Campolo is just another liberal theologian trying to distort the truth to meld with his modern feel-good politics.
Laura, yes I define torture relatively, but then I’m not a Christian. If you are I had understood that you would think some things are wrong and others are right, and being able to find something worse wouldn’t turn a wrong into a right.
And yes, they do sometimes work. The point is that it’s very difficult to judge whether it will work until you’ve tried it on somebody, at which point it’s too late. So it might get us more info from 1 person, but less from 10 others we also tried it on. That’s a net loss that makes us less safe.
Drew, I’m puzzled how waterboarding is apparently so effective when it inflicts no pain or physical damage. I’m sure Al Qaida brief their members on this technique, so if they know that it’s not going to harm them, why would it be vaguely successful? The reason is that it bypasses reason and strikes at your primitive brain – it overwhelms your rationality and removes your humanity. That sounds a lot like torture to me. At the very least I think we’d both agree that it’s extremely cruel, and I happily concede I’m poorly equipped to judge just how cruel something has to be before it tips into torture.
Wow, where to start… ? You evidently have some kind of caricature of Christianity in mind to which you expect me to adhere.
I DO think some things are wrong and others are right. Further, I think some things are wrong for the individual but okay for the state to do because the bible clearly delineates differing areas of responsibility and duties between the two. And even further, some things are wrong because of your motive or timing. For example, I’m perfectly willing to kill an intruder in my house to protect my family, and own guns which will assist me in performing that act. However, after an attack has taken place, if I see the criminal out on the street later, while I would like to see the death penalty carried out, it’s not within my purview to do it because it’s no longer self defense. But the state may, if it chooses. Yes, some things are wrong, and some are right. But you seem to think my faith requires that I hold a very superficial, unthinking standard. It does not. Likewise, I think we can all agree that war is a Very Bad Thing and during wars, great evil occurs. Yet CS Lewis easily puts the kibosh on pure pacificism:
Life is messy. The bible provides us with clear instructions on some things and broad principles on others, and God provides us with the Holy Spirit to guide us as well. My position is entirely consistent with biblical Christianity.
But that is NOT what I have done. First, I reject waterboarding being defined as torture. The word torture is purposely being so dumbed down as to be almost meaningless. You want torture? How about being forced to hear Susan Estrich reading Maureen Dowd columns? Or strapped in, Clockwork Orange style, and made to watch Michael Moore films? Any unpleasant forced activity is now being called torture, just like the word ironic now apparently means any unusual or coincidental event.
Second, YOUR argument is that I’m saying because al Qaeda does worse things then waterboarding is okay. Not mine. Although I do compare and contrast what we do versus what al Qaeda does in order to illustrate how ridiculously we have dumbed down the word torture in this country for political reasons.
That’s purely speculative. You’re just making those numbers up, because no objective, scientific study has been published which shows how effective waterboarding actually is. Anecdotes have been published by both sides. So your “net loss that makes us less safe,” has no basis; it’s just your opinion. Further, you seem to imply that I want every detainee waterboarded. Which is odd because in #8 I specifically said I’m in favor of the comfy chair technique and noted with approval that McDonald’s french fries were used successfully to extract info from Hamdan.
I’m also guessing that you suffer the same misperception about interrogators that you do about Christians. The truth is that interrogators are careful – as they should be – to use the minimum force they must to get the most information. Go read Stashiu’s interviews at Patterico’s – you’ll find them enlightening and chock full of behind the scenes info of what goes on at GTMO including the dreaded comfy chair. But if, in their considered, educated judgment, they feel that waterboarding is necessary in order to get information, then I want them to have that option at their disposal.
First, I presume by ‘both sides’ you mean the professional interrogators as one side, but I’m not clear who the other side are – can you explain further please?
I ‘suffer’ misperceptions about neither interrogators nor Christians. I know that good interrogators are deeply smart people, and in fact are often very compassionate people, who nevertheless see the need to deal with unpleasant situations for the greater good. That’s why I’m so impressed by the number of them that say that torture is a bad idea, and that waterboarding is torture.
As to my misperceptions about Christians. I said that I thought Christians thought that some things are right and some are wrong, and that just because you can find a greater wrong doesn’t make your lesser wrong a right. I’m sorry if that is wrong – can you tell me whether it’s that you don’t think some things are wrong or right, or that if someone is doing something worse than you it makes what you’re doing right?
Finally on the dumbing down of torture. The example you quote of waterboarding has the person tortured giving up after 45 seconds. The video of seen of Christopher Hitchens (I’m not a great fan of his, in case you wondered) showed him lasting for about 15 seconds, even though he knew he could stop it whenever he wanted, and that nothing bad was going to happen. I am utterly at a loss how else to describe something that people can’t stand for more than a minute except as torture. But please, tell me, what else can a human not abide for a minute that you wouldn’t consider torture?
I spent some time explaining that in detail already in #12 including examples. What part seems unclear? Are you using “wrong” interchangeably with “sin?” If after that long comment I’m still not clear enough for you to comprehend, I evidently need to do a post.
The reason I brought up al Qaeda’s torture was to provide contrast between ACTUAL torture, which they perform, and harsh interrogations, which we perform. Waterboarding is not torture. Having a woman threaten to touch your crotch is not torture, no matter what your cultural mores are. Lots of things are uncomfortable, even painful, but are not torture. I’m perplexed why that seems to be a hard concept. How about scratching nails on a chalkboard, which nearly incapacitates a roomful of people? They instinctively curl up in as close as they can get to the fetal position, clap their hands on their ears to stop the offensive noise, flinch, groan, and beg the offender to stop. Is that torture, in your view?
There are people I literally can’t stand to be around. I actually feel nauseated and will vomit if I’m in their presence too long – that’s how strong of an emotional reaction their visible existence generates in me. Are they torturing me?