I am sure our friends here will be demanding an investigation into this leak. I am sure they are shocked, shocked to see that the CIA leaks to the NY Times.

Do you or I really need to know what the CIA is doing with terrorists?
-- If they keep them in secret prisons abroad b/c it would be illegal to do so in the US, and if prisoners' rights and laws of the 'host' country such as speaking to an attorney are being violated, then HELL yes.

I wonder who "leaked" this information to the Post? Its most likely a disgruntled CIA employee.
-- Or one who has common sense. A matter of interpretation, I guess.

Did they not put an entire operation at risk by leaking the story?
-- I think that's what they wanted, but I don't see how lives are at risk,

Is this "outing" OK because its in the publics best interest to know?
-- Yup! that is, not b/c it's in the public's best interest, but it uncovers illegal activity.
[url "http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/01/AR2005110101644.html"]http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/01/AR2005110101644.html[/url][/reply]

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Josef
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By illegal activity, do you refer to the leak or the prisons?

Do you want a prosecutor appointed to track down the source of the leak?

Or one who has common sense. A matter of interpretation, I guess.

Yea common sense. Thats it. Nobody with an axe to grind or anything.



I think that's what they wanted, but I don't see how lives are at risk,

Well lets start by the fact that because of this leak there will be a huge witch hunt in the countries where the prisons are. Every one of the CIA agents will be at risk for being identified. Real covert agents doing real covert work.

Yup! that is, not b/c it's in the public's best interest, but it uncovers illegal activity

No its not illegal which is why the prisons are not on US soil.



I just don't understand why so many people are so concerned with giving terrorists the same rights we enjoy. They are terrorists for crying out loud and would just as soon waste you and your family as look at you. And for what? Because you are not Muslim? Please, they do are not entitled to rights. What did they do to earn them?

Do you want a prosecutor appointed to track down the source of the leak?

Of course he doesn't want a prosecutor to investigate the leak. That may cause a reporter to have to give up their source at the CIA or go to jail.

Post: Do you want a prosecutor appointed to track down the source of the leak?

Of course he doesn't want a prosecutor to investigate the leak. That may cause a reporter to have to give up their source at the CIA or go to jail.

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Listen, dudes: Instead of being snarky, why don't you make an attempt at a real conversation? You have your mind already made up, I guess. Why do you start this thread then? To pound on 'liberals'? I don't get it.

Read the article (it's for free w/ registration). In it, it says that some local laws may be broken in those secret prisons. BTW, I wasn't aware that secret prisons by other countries are legal elsewhere.

As for the prosecutor: If some laws have been broken, sure, go after those guys. If it's under the 'whistle blower' statue (not sure what this would entail - I'm no lawyer), then it's all good, I'd say.

But, can you see the difference between calling scores of journalists and naming an undercover agent by name, or saying, 'there's a country in Eastern Europe where the CIA holds prisoners in a secret facility'. ?

You don't think that's news? Frankly, it scares the crap outta me, particularly in combination with Cheney's/Goss's attempt to exempt CIA operatives from the no-torture law being tossed around in the Senate. I just don't think that's how you win peace. Just because somebody does something out of being 'disgruntled' as you call it (again, others would say critical of a situation, concerned, etc.), doesn't mean the outcome is bad. My 2 cents.

Josef

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Josef
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You've of course forgotten that if the CIA has them in a secret prison and is torturing them, then they must by definition be terrorists, and therefore we can write them out of humanity. Because the CIA never, ever makes mistakes. Or for that matter, ethical lapses. And we as citizens should just assume that they always have our best interests at heart and that it could never happen to us, right? And let's not forget that an enlightened democracy always has to have its own gulag, like, oh, I don't know, the old Soviet Union perhaps?

What did they used to say about the terrorists winning?

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"They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security" - Benjamin Franklin
"Don't you see the rest of the country looks upon New York like we're left-wing, communist, Jewish, homosexual pornographers? I think of us that way sometimes and I live here." - Alvy Singer, "Annie Hall"

Listen, dudes: Instead of being snarky, why don't you make an attempt at a real conversation? You have your mind already made up, I guess. Why do you start this thread then? To pound on 'liberals'? I don't get it.

Point taken and my apologies. I did come across as being "snarky" whatever that is;) I really do want to know what people think about this. I feel we must have a paradigm shift in dealing with the this new world of terrorism. The enemy of today does not fight under the flag of a sovereign government wearing an easily identified uniform. We have had this discussion before about whether or not they should be afforded Geneva Convention rights. It is admittedly a gray area but given the way the terrorists operate I am in favor of erring on the side of denying rights as opposed to granting them.

Okay, from the perspective of a former member of the military here is my take on this. It occurs to me that even though I have only been around for some 40+ years, for the past 100-years or so, during times of war or military action, the one thing that has consistently set the US apart from the 'bad guys' is our refusal to compromise on moral high ground. Despite the oppositions actions during WWII, Korea, Vietnam, and Desert Storm, the US did not (for the most part) ever mistreat opposition forces once they were captured. Without pointing fingers or naming names as has become so popular these days, I can not say that this is necessarily true under the current administration and leaves me to wonder at what point did we give up our stake to the moral high ground?

More importantly, for what ever reason - lets say a unified military aliance amoung several middle and far eastern countries that do not care for the US - there may come a time when we find that we are not the toughest kids on the block. I would hate to see how this plays out should such situation arise and our soldiers and/or citizens find themselves under lock and key of a foreign power. So with that in mind, are secret prisons and prsioner abuse scandals really the kinds of global precedents we want to be setting forth for other countries with less refined moral distinctions?

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¯\_(ツ)_/¯

When were the trials held that determined that these people are terrorists? I must have missed them on Court TV. I mean, you said they are terrorists, so they must have been convicted somewhere, right? You didn't mean to say that the government *thinks* they are terrorists, and therefore can do just as they please with them? This is circular logic: they are terrorists, therefore they don't deserve due process; they don't deserve due process because they are terrorists.

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"Go yell at an M&M"

I am in favor of erring on the side of denying rights as opposed to granting them.

That's a pretty sad quote. So you don't see a problem with the CIA rounding up people in the streets, taking them to some "secret" prison and torturing "information" out of them? What if after all of this they find out they got the wrong person? What do we say "Woops, sorry we thought you were a terrorist so you didn't have any rights?"

America should be better than this. Wasn't one of the reasons for the Iraq war because Saddam was a brutal dictator who arrested and tortured people with no trial? With these prisons aren't we guilty of the same?

However, I'm not surprised that these exist and I'd bet it is much more prevelant than most people would think. Sad really, we are supposed to be about freedom and respect for all. What happened to innocent until proven guilty? I know these people more than likely aren't American citizens, but that shouldn't change how we treat them.

"The enemy of today does not fight under the flag of a sovereign government wearing an easily identified uniform."

So how can we be sure that the only residents of these secret prisons are terrorist and not just Akbar from the gas station?

If the prisons need to be secret there is something sinister going on....Why are they secret?

Thanks, ATG.

I think it makes more sense than not to afford these prisoners the benefit of the doubt (at least as it appears to them).
-- Human decency: do we really want to stoop to levels this low?
-- Diplomacy: Say there's a small percentage of those prisoners who are not guilty. If only a fraction of those people have some credibility at home when they get back, do we want them to say, 'they tortured me', or 'I was wrongly imprisoned but treated humanely'. The difference, IMO, is huge.
-- Best I can tell, confessions obtained under duress and torture often are grossly incorrect. Also as far as I know, in the long run 'soft' interviewing tactics are more successful in obtaining good results than 'hard' ones.

But the overriding thing for ME is that these prisoners are still people, and no human being, how cruel (or innocent they may be), deserves to be treated this way. If they're guilty, lock 'em up and throw away the key. But if some hotheaded kid throws a rock at some US soldiers b/c they kicked down his front door in error, ends up in Abu Ghraib, and ends up in such a world of hurt because of it, that just ain't right. They can't do it in the US - OK, let's do it in [insert your country] where torture is condoned. I don't see how that's right.

This is a beautiful and great country (I say that as a legal immigrant and I hope you don't discard my opinion because of it), but I think of this human rights/POW issue (separate from the war on terror) as a real stain on US history.

Josef

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Josef
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dude, but that post doesn't help at all. McCain sponsored the anti-POW abuse law, above after all.

I think this issue is too important to let your own arguments be undermined by cheap shots.

'Republicans' is not the same as' Administration', just as liberal is not the same as 'Democrat'.

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Josef
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You seem bent on baiting people this morning, and while you appeared to retract your initial reply to me, I'm in the mood to reply, if for no reason than there were a couple of slow pitches in there.

You seem to live in a world of absolute moral and informational certainty. That must be nice. People in secret CIA installations, with no oversight by other bodies, must by definition be terrorists. How do we know? Because they say so. Then it must be. Why bother with trials and all of that? If the CIA and ATG say they are terrorists, then death to all who oppose us!

As for my "disgusting" comparison to the Soviet-era gulag, let's see? The Soviets routinely imprisoned and tortured "enemies of the state" in a network of secret prisons without trial or anything remotely resembling due process. And who knows, maybe a few them were actual seditionists or conspirators, so I guess that makes the whole gulag justifiable, eh? Is this comparison that amazing, or is that you just can't wrap your mind around any behavior that compares us to the evil empire?

Let's use a firm example, shall we? One of the Administration "triumphs" has been the arrest of Jose Padilla, a US citizen, allegedly for planning a dirty bomb attack. If you actually look at the facts here, he was apparently arrested for nothing more than looking at some drawings at the internet and maybe talking some. He had no conceivable way of accessing radioactive material, and as a low level gangster type, could not be seen to. If he could, we would've had bigger problems by now from more sophisticated enemies. Yet he's been held indefinitely, without a plan for prosecution, or any habeas corpus, as far as I can tell. What do you call that? If that's the basis of their accusation, we can pretty much lock up half the 12-year olds in this country for googling atomic bomb plans on the Internet.

As other have pointed out, we are supposed to be better than this. This is why we were admired around the world, this ability to raise ourselves above the fray and willingness to air our own dirty laundry in public in order to make sure the embarrassment and scrutiny would never let it get dirty again. And that we would never imbue a small number of people with the ability to yank people off the street, never to be heard from again, like the feared secret police of many of the countries we claim as "tyrannical".

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"They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security" - Benjamin Franklin
"Don't you see the rest of the country looks upon New York like we're left-wing, communist, Jewish, homosexual pornographers? I think of us that way sometimes and I live here." - Alvy Singer, "Annie Hall"

At the federal level, the Republicans have supported almost everything that the administration wants to do, almost 100%. Lots of Dems did, too. The Republicans control the Congress, and have completely abdicated their oversight responsibilities. The polls indicate that 3/4 of rank and file Republicans STILL support this administration. And, you almost never hear anything from a Republican critical of the administration. These people should be outraged by this administration in so many ways, that I don't even know where to begin - but they're not, because they put their party before their country.

The fact is, there is a "culture of fear" being cultivated that would make our forefathers turn on their graves. Terrorism is a real threat - and is likely to always be so - and the administration is living off of our endless fears, while doing little to nothing to minimize the likelihood of another attack (actually, the Bush administration is making it worse). Until that changes, I stand by my comments.

By the way, McCain is my Senator, and to see him at Bush's side in the wake of what Bush did to him in 2000 is sickening. Is it necessary for his continued politcal survival and '08 prospects for him to kiss ass like that? Perhaps. Is it honorable? No way.

That's a pretty sad quote. So you don't see a problem with the CIA rounding up people in the streets, taking them to some "secret" prison and torturing "information" out of them? What if after all of this they find out they got the wrong person? What do we say "Woops, sorry we thought you were a terrorist so you didn't have any rights?"

America should be better than this. Wasn't one of the reasons for the Iraq war because Saddam was a brutal dictator who arrested and tortured people with no trial? With these prisons aren't we guilty of the same?

However, I'm not surprised that these exist and I'd bet it is much more prevelant than most people would think. Sad really, we are supposed to be about freedom and respect for all. What happened to innocent until proven guilty? I know these people more than likely aren't American citizens, but that shouldn't change how we treat them.



Look I am NOT in favor of torturing anybody and not saying a prisoner should not be treated humanely. There are varying opinions on what is considered torture and what is considered hard tactics. Some of the tactics I have read about, in my opinion, do not constitute abuse. I am not going to rehash the whole Abu Grahib thing and hope you do not either. I do think we need to continue the moral highground as it relates to how we handle prisoners/detainees. That being said I am just not willing to give them the same rights to out legal system you and I enjoy. Call me naive but I am not an interrorgator and neither are you and at some point you have to be willing to let the experts do their job.

My only reaction to this is that I am surprised people are surprised. I mean, I didn't even think they were trying to keep it secret.

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Tom Demerly
The Tri Shop.com

So, then if we aren't torturing them and we are treating them humanely then what is the purpose of keeping the prison secret from everyone? I actually wish you hadn't even brought up Abu Grahib as that horse has been beaten way too far. Hopefully, no one else brings it up.

How are we going to keep the "moral highground" if we maintain secret prisons? It's just not possible. People are ALWAYS going to assume that if the prison is secret that something is going on there that shouldn't be.

Of course these people don't enjoy the same rights as American citizens, but that doesn't mean we should be able to pick anyone up off the street and hold them in perpetuity.

And I am no expert on interrogation, but that still doesn't mean that because I don't know anything about it that I think torture and most abuse should be considered acceptable because "you have to be willing to let the experts do their job".

If you don't support torture what's your take on the admin's request to exempt the CIA from the new Torture legislation?

Tyrius --

The only reason I can think of for having secret prisons is to keep both the identities of the prisoners and the fact of their capture secret. My limited understanding of some of the terrorist cells is that they communicate covertly often with little face to face or real-time communication. Thus, if it is publicized that cell y or terrorist x has been captured, our guys can no longer pose as them and work to capture or infiltrate the organization further.

I have no problem with keeping the locations of the prisons and the prisoners secret from the masses, however, there needs to be some accountability. Saddam's location was always kept secret, however, there were oversight organizations that were able to visit and ensure that everything was on the up and up. I don't have a problem with that.

However, if these prisons "just don't exist" outside of the CIA then as we have already seen there is a lot of potential for major problems. Particularly if the CIA is exempt from torture regulations.

I think keeping the location and names of prisoners secret from most everyone in the world is fine, however, there needs to be a group/organization/whatever that has access to ensure that the CIA is acting on the up and up.

I have no problem with keeping the locations of the prisons and the prisoners secret from the masses, however, there needs to be some accountability. Saddam's location was always kept secret, however, there were oversight organizations that were able to visit and ensure that everything was on the up and up. I don't have a problem with that.

However, if these prisons "just don't exist" outside of the CIA then as we have already seen there is a lot of potential for major problems. Particularly if the CIA is exempt from torture regulations.

I think keeping the location and names of prisoners secret from most everyone in the world is fine, however, there needs to be a group/organization/whatever that has access to ensure that the CIA is acting on the up and up.



I agree with you. I think the problem is who will it be? I don't trust Amnesty International or any of the other so called human rights agencies. Its a catch 22. We need the checks and balances but agreeing who will do it will be difficult.

Ummmmm dude, screw the operation. The CIA is stealing money from the taxpayer and misleading Congress, not to mention that little torture thing.

Screw the operation, they are putting the damn Constitution at risk. We are a nation of laws, some people seem to have forgotten that. First Libby, Rove, and Cheney, aid and abet the enemy by releasing the name of a covert CIA agent during time of war (that used to be called treason, not perjury) now the CIA is misleading Congress and operating torture chambers on foreign soil funded by your tax dollars.

Remember this is the same CIA that told us the existence of WMDs was a "slam dunk"....and you think its OK for them to make arbitrary decisions to pick people up off the street and torture them????

So much for bringing integrity back to the White House.

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"A society is defined not only by what it creates, but by what it refuses to destroy."
John Sawhill