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Hmmm, didn't a lot of the torture start

Posted By: Sunflower on 2009-04-23
In Reply to: Ummm....(sm) - Just the big bad

after 9-11 which I recall being a horrible terrorist attack? At that time, maybe torture was the right thing to do to find Obama, sorry, I mean Osama.


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Didn't you start this?
Aren't you the original poster?  Who were you trying to speak for?  Maybe you should follow your own advice.  There are plenty of people who didn't see this as a racial cartoon, but you sure had to put it out there. 
Bush signs torture ban but reserves right to torture






Boston.com

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Bush could bypass new torture ban


Waiver right is reserved



WASHINGTON -- When President Bush last week signed the bill outlawing the torture of detainees, he quietly reserved the right to bypass the law under his powers as commander in chief.


After approving the bill last Friday, Bush issued a ''signing statement -- an official document in which a president lays out his interpretation of a new law -- declaring that he will view the interrogation limits in the context of his broader powers to protect national security. This means Bush believes he can waive the restrictions, the White House and legal specialists said.


''The executive branch shall construe [the law] in a manner consistent with the constitutional authority of the President . . . as Commander in Chief, Bush wrote, adding that this approach ''will assist in achieving the shared objective of the Congress and the President . . . of protecting the American people from further terrorist attacks.


Some legal specialists said yesterday that the president's signing statement, which was posted on the White House website but had gone unnoticed over the New Year's weekend, raises serious questions about whether he intends to follow the law.


A senior administration official, who spoke to a Globe reporter about the statement on condition of anonymity because he is not an official spokesman, said the president intended to reserve the right to use harsher methods in special situations involving national security.


''We are not going to ignore this law, the official said, noting that Bush, when signing laws, routinely issues signing statements saying he will construe them consistent with his own constitutional authority. ''We consider it a valid statute. We consider ourselves bound by the prohibition on cruel, unusual, and degrading treatment.


But, the official said, a situation could arise in which Bush may have to waive the law's restrictions to carry out his responsibilities to protect national security. He cited as an example a ''ticking time bomb scenario, in which a detainee is believed to have information that could prevent a planned terrorist attack.


''Of course the president has the obligation to follow this law, [but] he also has the obligation to defend and protect the country as the commander in chief, and he will have to square those two responsibilities in each case, the official added. ''We are not expecting that those two responsibilities will come into conflict, but it's possible that they will.


David Golove, a New York University law professor who specializes in executive power issues, said that the signing statement means that Bush believes he can still authorize harsh interrogation tactics when he sees fit.


''The signing statement is saying 'I will only comply with this law when I want to, and if something arises in the war on terrorism where I think it's important to torture or engage in cruel, inhuman, and degrading conduct, I have the authority to do so and nothing in this law is going to stop me,' he said. ''They don't want to come out and say it directly because it doesn't sound very nice, but it's unmistakable to anyone who has been following what's going on.


Golove and other legal specialists compared the signing statement to Bush's decision, revealed last month, to bypass a 1978 law forbidding domestic wiretapping without a warrant. Bush authorized the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on Americans' international phone calls and e-mails without a court order starting after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.


The president and his aides argued that the Constitution gives the commander in chief the authority to bypass the 1978 law when necessary to protect national security. They also argued that Congress implicitly endorsed that power when it authorized the use of force against the perpetrators of the attacks.


Legal academics and human rights organizations said Bush's signing statement and his stance on the wiretapping law are part of a larger agenda that claims exclusive control of war-related matters for the executive branch and holds that any involvement by Congress or the courts should be minimal.


Vice President Dick Cheney recently told reporters, ''I believe in a strong, robust executive authority, and I think that the world we live in demands it. . . . I would argue that the actions that we've taken are totally appropriate and consistent with the constitutional authority of the president.


Since the 2001 attacks, the administration has also asserted the power to bypass domestic and international laws in deciding how to detain prisoners captured in the Afghanistan war. It also has claimed the power to hold any US citizen Bush designates an ''enemy combatant without charges or access to an attorney.


And in 2002, the administration drafted a secret legal memo holding that Bush could authorize interrogators to violate antitorture laws when necessary to protect national security. After the memo was leaked to the press, the administration eliminated the language from a subsequent version, but it never repudiated the idea that Bush could authorize officials to ignore a law.


The issue heated up again in January 2005. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales disclosed during his confirmation hearing that the administration believed that antitorture laws and treaties did not restrict interrogators at overseas prisons because the Constitution does not apply abroad.


In response, Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, filed an amendment to a Defense Department bill explicitly saying that that the cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment of detainees in US custody is illegal regardless of where they are held.


McCain's office did not return calls seeking comment yesterday.


The White House tried hard to kill the McCain amendment. Cheney lobbied Congress to exempt the CIA from any interrogation limits, and Bush threatened to veto the bill, arguing that the executive branch has exclusive authority over war policy.


But after veto-proof majorities in both houses of Congress approved it, Bush called a press conference with McCain, praised the measure, and said he would accept it.


Legal specialists said the president's signing statement called into question his comments at the press conference.


''The whole point of the McCain Amendment was to close every loophole, said Marty Lederman, a Georgetown University law professor who served in the Justice Department from 1997 to 2002. ''The president has re-opened the loophole by asserting the constitutional authority to act in violation of the statute where it would assist in the war on terrorism.


Elisa Massimino, Washington director for Human Rights Watch, called Bush's signing statement an ''in-your-face affront to both McCain and to Congress.


''The basic civics lesson that there are three co-equal branches of government that provide checks and balances on each other is being fundamentally rejected by this executive branch, she said.


''Congress is trying to flex its muscle to provide those checks [on detainee abuse], and it's being told through the signing statement that it's impotent. It's quite a radical view. src=http://cache.boston.com/bonzai-fba/File-Based_Image_Resource/dingbat_story_end_icon.gif



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© Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company
 












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And from Mr. Pro-torture
Powell Aide: Torture 'Guidance' from VP
CNN News

Monday 21 November 2005

Former staff chief says Cheney's 'flexibility' helped lead to abuse.
Retired U.S. Army Col. Larry Wilkerson, who served as former Secretary of State Colin Powell's chief of staff, told CNN that the practice of torture may be continuing in U.S.-run facilities.

There's no question in my mind that we did. There's no question in my mind that we may be still doing it, Wilkerson said on CNN's Late Edition.

There's no question in my mind where the philosophical guidance and the flexibility in order to do so originated - in the vice president of the United States' office, he said. His implementer in this case was [Defense Secretary] Donald Rumsfeld and the Defense Department.

At another point in the interview, Wilkerson said the vice president had to cover this in order for it to happen and in order for Secretary Rumsfeld to feel as though he had freedom of action.

Traveling in Latin America earlier this month, President Bush defended U.S. treatment of prisoners, saying flatly, We do not torture. (Full story)

Cheney has lobbied against a measure in Congress that would outlaw cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of prisoners, calling for an exception for the CIA in cases that involve a detainee who may have knowledge of an imminent attack.

The amendment was included in a $491 billion Pentagon spending bill that declared 2006 to be a period of significant transition for Iraq. (Full story)

Proposed by Sen. John McCain, an Arizona Republican who was tortured as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam, the amendment was approved in the Senate last month by a 90-9 vote. It was not included in the House version of the bill.

The White House has said that Bush would likely veto the bill if McCain's language is included, calling the amendment unnecessary and duplicative.

Rumsfeld told ABC's This Week on Sunday that the White House was in negotiations with the Senate over the amendment.

There's a discussion and debate taking place as to what the implications might be and what is supportable and what is not, he told the program. But the fact of the matter is the president from the outset has said that he required that there be humane treatment.

Cheney has come under mounting criticism for his position. Last week, Stansfield Turner, a military veteran who served as director of the CIA during the Carter administration, labeled him the vice president for torture. (Full story)

In a statement responding to Turner's remark, Cheney said his views are reflected in the administration's policy. Our country is at war and our government has an obligation to protect the American people from a brutal enemy that has declared war upon us.

We are aggressively finding terrorists and bringing them to justice and anything we do within this effort is within the law, the statement said, adding that the United States does not torture.

Rumsfeld Denies 'Cabal' Charge

Bush administration officials, including Rumsfeld and military officials, have denied that instances of torture were ever officially condoned. Some personnel accused of torture have been convicted and sentenced for prisoner abuse.

All the instructions I issued required humane treatment, Rumsfeld told ABC. Anything that was done that was not humane has been prosecuted.

But Wilkerson argued last month in a speech that Cheney and Rumsfeld formed a cabal that made decisions that the bureaucracy did not know were being made.

Wilkerson told CNN Sunday he does not know if the president was witting in this or not.

I voted for him twice, he said. I prefer to think that he was not.

Earlier, on the same CNN program, Rumsfeld dismissed as ridiculous the claim that he was involved in a cabal.

Rumsfeld and Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said they had no recollection of Wilkerson having attended meetings with Rumsfeld or Cheney.

In terms of having first-hand information, I just can't imagine that he does, said Rumsfeld. The allegation is ridiculous.

I was in every meeting with the joint chiefs. I was in every meeting with the combatant commanders. I went to the White House multiple times to meet with the National Security Council and with the president of the United States. I have never seen that colonel, added Pace.

They made my point for me, responded Wilkerson. The decisions were not made in the principals' process, in the deputies' process, in the policy coordinating committee process. They were not made in the statutory process.

Wilkerson said his insights came from Powell walking through my door in April or March of 2004 and telling me to get everything I could get my hands on with regard to the detainee abuse issue - ICRC [International Committee of the Red Cross] reporting, memoranda, open-source information and so forth - so that I could build some kind of story, some kind of audit trail so we could understand the chronology and we can understand how it developed.

While he acknowledged having no proof that the United States is torturing detainees, Wilkerson said, I can only assume that, when the vice president of the United States lobbies the Congress on behalf of cruel and unusual punishment and the need to be able to do that in order to get information out of potential terrorists... that it's still going on.

He said U.S. officials should realize they are involved in a war of ideas that cannot be advanced with torture.

In a war of ideas, you cannot damage your own ideas, your own position by seeming to do things that are in contradiction of your values, he said.

Rumsfeld told ABC that the military has overwhelmingly treated people humanely.

The history of the United States military is clear. Torture doesn't work. The military knows that. We want our people treated humanely, he said.

So torture is okay?
Sorry, don't watch TV. Homeland security - horse and pony show.........Our current govt is hiring people left and right, recruiting nonstop to hire people to protect our country. We will get attacked again. Can't blame anyone but the perps for that. It is what Obama will do about it that I am concerned with. Bush promised to get bin laden and invaded Iraq instead. Look at Katrina. Bush could not fix the knot in his own undershorts, let alone run a country. 
Torture is torture
Torture is wrong, no matter where it took place. Do you think God is going to look kindly on anyone torturing another human being...A.K.A. "Playing God"??
Now Mr. Pro-torture is scheduled
Cheney to raise funds for DeLay

The White House is not distancing itself from embattled former U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas), who is facing charges of breaking state campaign finance law.

Vice President Cheney is scheduled to appear at a December 5, Houston fundraiser on DeLay's behalf. Donors are being asked to contribute at least $500, according to an e-mail sent by the Fort Bend (Texas) Republican Party. Shannon Flaherty, DeLay's spokeswoman, confirmed details of the fundraiser.

For five years, Congressman DeLay has served as a key ally to pass the White House's agenda through Congress, and Ronnie Earle's political sideshow isn't going to get in the way of the real business at hand, said Flaherty. This event shows the Democrat strategy of avenging their ballot box losses with smear tactics and lawsuits is not going to work -- Republicans stick by their friends and don't back down from a fight.

DeLay was forced to step down from his leadership position in late September after Earle, the Travis County (Texas) district attorney, charged him with illegally directing corporate donations to Texas candidates. DeLay has asked that his trial be moved from Travis to Fort Bend County.

As of September 30, 2005, DeLay had $1.164 million in his warchest. Former Rep. Nick Lampson (D-Texas) is challenging DeLay for his seat.
Gitmo Torture
This will undoubtably shake some things up. If the detainees' trials cannot proceed because the "enhanced interrogation techniques" authorized by the Bush administration have tainted the process so much that prosecutors cannot proceed in some of their cases, what happens now?


"We tortured [Mohammed al-]Qahtani," said Susan J. Crawford, in her first interview since being named convening authority of military commissions by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates in February 2007. "His treatment met the legal definition of torture. And that's why I did not refer the case" for prosecution.

....

Crawford, 61, said the combination of the interrogation techniques, their duration and the impact on Qahtani's health led to her conclusion. "The techniques they used were all authorized, but the manner in which they applied them was overly aggressive and too persistent. . . . You think of torture, you think of some horrendous physical act done to an individual. This was not any one particular act; this was just a combination of things that had a medical impact on him, that hurt his health. It was abusive and uncalled for. And coercive. Clearly coercive. It was that medical impact that pushed me over the edge" to call it torture, she said.
Torture and Oppression?
What kind of marshmallow life have you been living, my dear? Do you have any idea what some people go through in other parts of the world?

How can we help but laugh at you if you insist on making a fool of yourself?
Religulous torture....(sm)
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The more often Americans go to church, the more likely they are to support the torture of suspected terrorists, according to a new survey.





The Washington Region Religious Campaign Against Torture rallied on Capitol Hill in March 2008.


More than half of people who attend services at least once a week -- 54 percent -- said the use of torture against suspected terrorists is "often" or "sometimes" justified. Only 42 percent of people who "seldom or never" go to services agreed, according the analysis released Wednesday by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.


White evangelical Protestants were the religious group most likely to say torture is often or sometimes justified -- more than six in 10 supported it. People unaffiliated with any religious organization were least likely to back it. Only four in 10 of them did.


The analysis is based on a Pew Research Center survey of 742 American adults conducted April 14-21. It did not include analysis of groups other than white evangelicals, white non-Hispanic Catholics, white mainline Protestants and the religiously unaffiliated, because the sample size was too small. " See results of the survey »


The president of the National Association of Evangelicals, Leith Anderson, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.


The survey asked: "Do you think the use of torture against suspected terrorists in order to gain important information can often be justified, sometimes be justified, rarely be justified, or never be justified?"


Roughly half of all respondents -- 49 percent -- said it is often or sometimes justified. A quarter said it never is.


The religious group most likely to say torture is never justified was Protestant denominations -- such as Episcopalians, Lutherans and Presbyterians -- categorized as "mainline" Protestants, in contrast to evangelicals. Just over three in 10 of them said torture is never justified. A quarter of the religiously unaffiliated said the same, compared with two in 10 white non-Hispanic Catholics and one in eight evangelicals


http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/04/30/religion.torture/index.html#cnnSTCText


Obviously, "torture is torture".
The question is what constitutes torture. In my view, none of the techniques used, under the conditions in which they were used, constitute torture, including waterboarding.

I'd get into the notion of waterboarding as torture if we didn't do it to our own troops by way of training. That, to me, puts the tin hat on any idea that waterboarding constitutes torture.

This idea that interrogation should constitute nothing more severe than a game of "Simon Says" or "Mother May I?" suggests to me that we should bring back the draft and extend it to both sexes. There are too many people in this country who have never had to confront anything in this world more evil than their best friend running off with their boyfriend. They seem to think the world is made of gingerbread, and populated by Sunday School teachers. A stint in the military would open their eyes to reality.
If waterboarding isn't torture...(sm)
then why did we execute Japanese war criminals for waterboarding American POWs after WWII?  Maybe it's just considered torture when done to Americans?  You can't have it both ways. 
Definitely NOT by torture, If I were Obama I would probably know how!...nm
nm
O is not going to engage in torture. He does not
believe in torture.
Bush's and Cheney's way DID NOT WORK.

How can you say that I am naive, maybe you are. Who knows?

Time will tell.

I can only pray, hope and wish that O will be successful in protecting and promoting the United States of America.
No to torture ! This brings only hate and more war! ..nm
nm
NO to torture. YES to tough interrogations!
nm
No, you are wrong. Obama is against torture,
he does not want to go the same path like Bush and Cheney, the wrong path.

He wants to compromise and negotiate. He started already with Iran and Netanyahu. He snubbed Natanyahu and told him that Natanyahu has to accept and agree to a 2-state solution or there will most probably be war.

O is very, very smart and I pray to God that he will stay strong and prevail when even certain Americans wish him failure.
It proves the extent of the torture that was used...(sm)
as well as shows the public exactly what the last admin did.  It puts in front of the public (in particular republicans who would be against prosecuting the Bush admin) the facts.  I honestly think the main point of showing pics is to gain public support for the prosecution of the last admin.  I think dems are kind of fighting the battle before it gets there to make prosecution easier......but that's just my opinion.
yes, I agree, the torture was extreme, we just
got a 'glimpse' of it. But this is not the right time to expose it when the US troops are still in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Torture memos update
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/#31378360
They call "sleep deprivation" torture. Then I have
nm
torture,-if waterboarding can save thousands of
nm
We do not purposely kill, cut off heads, torture.
nm
Still not torture. Poilcemen TAZER our own citizens.
Heck, the 'resource officers' at my kid's high school tazed a kid for spitting in the commons area.

Maybe we should just taze the terrorists. I'll bet they'll talk then. When they start sh!tting themselves and going into convulsions, I'll bet they'll cough up whatever info they have.

Plus, it'll save on the Gitmo water bill, and I think we're ALL for that.

It must be hard for you to accept that even the DEMS voted to keep Gitmo going.

Hey, maybe the terrorits could all live at YOUR house. You guys seem to have a lot in common.
I hope that O will not have to torture wrong confessions out
of Muslim prisoners. He has a different strategy, talking, negotiating, compromising, CHANGE and WISDOM.
This thread started with waterboarding, torture or not?
Everybody is FREE to post one's opinion.

I NEVER STARTED being rude, maybe I REACTED rude.

The one who starts is the guilty one, even with insulting language. I dislike it immensely when people run out of ideas to defend their stance, the personal attacks, taken out of the blue, set in, like
'take your meds' or 'take your Xanax', or 'chill out.'

This puts them immediately into the loser position.

Or they become all of a sudden 'Grammar Nazis', because they run out of choices to prove their points, whereas these are mostly just TYPOS.

Or do you follow the Christian rule:

'If somebody slaps you on your right cheek, offer him also your left cheek.'

I NEVER understood this weird suggestion.
Torture memos update/correction...(sm)

First, please note that I never said that pics would be released in the OP, only redacted portions of the memos. (Presumably testimonies of the prisoners)  The previous thread about this turned into a debate about releasing pics, and I erroneously didn't catch and correct that.  My bad.


Update:


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/#31334053


 


is it right to torture a prisoner to prove that he is innocent?..sm
More prisoners are tortured to death or drippled for life because they do not have anything to confess.
You can't spell or pick a winner; it's torture, not tortue
Keep chomping those sour grapes.
Sorry, JTBB, other countries use worse torture than what was stated here.

They starve, cut off fingers, hands, pull nails out, burn private parts, and decapitate prisoners in other countries.  Why do you call other people with their comments "nimrods?"


If you want to torture to stop, why don't you go to those countries and fight against their torture? No...you'd rather call the American people nimrods. What is it with you? You used to have thoughtful posts, but now all you do is spew hate for Americans that do not support your views.


You are becoming anti-American IMHO and its sad that you could let the present government blind you to everything. You're either a socialist, facist, or a communist without announcing it up front. You have absolutely made me furious with your one-sided posts since the election. I try not to read them, but sometimes I do get a good laugh at your outrageous statements.


 


Lets talk about the torture of our soldiers by our enemies
Electrocution, beatings, broken bones, etc, etc, oh and their favorite of all times....beheadings.

The witch hunt should end here. What happened, happened. It's done and your god is in their now. I may have not liked what went on in the last administration (reason why I voted them out), but there is no reason to burn Bush/Cheney at the stake. What the other side does is 100 times worse.
Hmmm
Is funny, doing transcription, since 1982, but in the last 15 years, feel like one of those slaves you speak about...all work, no pay...???
Hmmm. sm
Lots of creepy things went on back then.  Someone from this board e-mailed me several times threatening me.  Yes, they sure did.  What does it accomplish writing a post like this. I know the former owner. She is a good person and an honest one.  It's cowardly to write this when you know she can't respond.  It's funny, I tried to post this originally and it said I was using a word not allowed here and that word was her name.  If you want to post in a forum that is going to be this regimented, more power to you.
Hmmm.

The Democrats have suddenly developed a keen sense of morality. John Edwards has been banned from making a speech at the democratic convention for having an affair and lying about it.


In his place Bill Clinton will be speaking.


What am I missing????


Hmmm
TALENTED - -   Oh, my where this conversation has led.
hmmm
Can I get back to you on that Katie?
Hmmm...sm

And Rep. Broun really thinks congress, the senate, the supreme court and any other government branches I forgot would let this happen? People would not protest?  Does he (and you, OP) really believe America has become that weak? Never underestimate Americans, my friends.


HMMM...

GR said, "I would wager a bet that if we were back in the 50s and 60s people wouldn't be hiding behind the smoke screen of birth certificates, Ayers, abortion, gay marriage, etc."


You are right, back then they would not have elected Obama. 


Hmmm......(sm)

Team Bush plans to party on






Jan 3, 2005 | Elisabeth Bumiller of the New York Times paid a recent visit to the Washington headquarters of President Bush's inaugural committee, where 450 paid staff members have been busy planning concerts, balls and other events for the three-day swearing-in extravaganza.


The Bush camp has been taking some heat for the estimated $40 million it will raise and spend on the big party; such criticism seemed especially apt before the White House upped its initial paltry sum of $15 million for tsunami relief to $35 million, and then again later to a more worthy $350 million. (Though there are still plenty of ways to measure even the latter as modest at best.) Others had already taken note of what the $40 million could buy for some of the woefully underfunded U.S. troops in Iraq.


Nonetheless, Bush's legion of party planners were ready to defend their cause. Gordon C. James, a deputy director of inaugural events, pointed out that a presidential inaugural has never been canceled, even during world wars. He double-checked the history books to make sure: "The celebrations went on," he told Bumiller, "that's the lesson we learned."


Technically speaking, James is correct, though according to this recent AP piece, at the height of World War II in 1945, Franklin D. Roosevelt "opted for a low-key inauguration to mark the start of his fourth term, with a simple swearing-in ceremony, a brief speech from the South Portico of the White House to a small crowd and a modest luncheon."


Meanwhile, another "senior inaugural official," who according to Bumiller "asked not to be identified," called the unflattering comparisons regarding the $40 million a "political shot." The official added that "people are not going to demand the cancellation of the Rose Bowl parade or the Oscars."


http://dir.salon.com/politics/war_room/2005/01/03/party_on/index.html


Hmmm......(sm)

Clinton won't be acting on her own accord.  She'll be acting on behalf of the Obama administration.  So, while she might not like the approach Obama has, she'll just have to suck it up and go with it.  I think it would be in HER best interest to go with Obama on this one instead of going renegade, especially if she is still considering running for president in the future.  If she does go renegade, the democratic party will eat her alive, especially considering Obama's popularity, something I'm sure she's well aware of.


I personally liked the pick of Clinton for SOS.  Actually there really weren't that many differences between her and Obama on most issues.  The differences they did have were just emphasized because they were running against each other.  That's what candidates do -- point out differences between themselves and thier opponents.


Hmmm......(sm)

Clinton won't be acting on her own accord.  She'll be acting on behalf of the Obama administration.  So, while she might not like the approach Obama has, she'll just have to suck it up and go with it.  I think it would be in HER best interest to go with Obama on this one instead of going renegade, especially if she is still considering running for president in the future.  If she does go renegade, the democratic party will eat her alive, especially considering Obama's popularity, something I'm sure she's well aware of.


I personally liked the pick of Clinton for SOS.  Actually there really weren't that many differences between her and Obama on most issues.  The differences they did have were just emphasized because they were running against each other.  That's what candidates do -- point out differences between themselves and thier opponents.


Hmmm......(sm)

Rember all that talk before the inauguration about how many people would be there?  Remember all the people on this board who said it would be a crime fest?  Check this out:



Inaugural Weekend Crime Levels Low, So Far




We already had a sense that the crime stats were much lower than usual this weekend, and the Examiner reported today that the long, four-day weekend -- at least up until to this point -- has been quite successful in terms of crime prevention. The U.S. Park Police say they have not made any Inauguration-related arrests as of this morning, and MPD spokesperson Traci Hughes told the paper that for the D.C. police, "it's pretty quiet." Obviously, a full evaluation of the weekend can't be accurately completed without factoring in today's activities and tonight's parties to come, but signs so far point to the significant police preparations panning out (even if they're the officers aren't good with directions).


http://dcist.com/2009/01/inaugural_crime_levels_low_so_far_k.php


How about this?


"Zero. There have been no inaugural-related arrest[s] reported by any of our law enforcement partners today," the Secret Service said, as of 5 p.m. ET.  [That was on Jan 20]


http://abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/Inauguration/story?id=6683899&page=1


Hmmm......(sm)

I wonder....does your church have nonprofit status?  Tax exempt?  And yet sooo involved in politics.   Exactly how legal was that?


Thanks for the concern, but as I've said numerous times, the fate of the general public does not need to be regulated by an institution that only represents the beliefs of christians. 


Hmmm......(sm)
"equality shouldnt be just about race or religion but about everyone having the right to the same things in life".... unless you're gay, not christian or an immigrant no doubt.
hmmm....

Since when has there ever been an intelligent conversation on here?  This is a place where a bunch of women sit at home with nothing to do.  These women aren't out in the real world on a daily basis.  Seriously?  Hoping for intelligent conversation?  Ok, I got popcorn, I'll wait!


Hmmm...
Maybe a more appropriate name would be the Whackpublican Party! That would cover all of their bases from airport bathrooms, to male prostitutes, to back rooms in the Capitol Building. It makes perfect sense!

ROFLMAO!
Hmmm......(sm)

Probably just like I'm tired of hearing about the petty complaints about Obama....


Spending:  Bush did plenty of spending with no protest whatsoever from pub Senators.  Now they are all having a fit about spending all the sudden.  Keep in mind that we had a deficit during all this spending.  What's the difference in Bush spending and Obama spending?  Bush spending included a rubber stamped check for 2 wars, one of which was unnecessary, and he didn't even count the cost of those wars in the budget.  This is all money lost -- as in we don't see any results other than deaths from this.  Obama spending is more of an investment....infrastructure, new energy sources..etc..etc..  We will see a return from this.  Funny how pubs were more than happy to give up money for a unjust war, but when it comes to something like providing unemployment to US citizens they are all up in arms.


Pork:  I think there is good pork and bad pork.  Why do you think we have representatives from each state in Washington if not to ensure help to their respective states?  Granted, a lot of the pork that is on the news is ridiculous, and no I'm not happy about some of the pork that Obama has signed. 


Crooks:  We all know there are crooked politicians on both sides.  I haven't given Blago a free ride.  That should tell you something.  However, I don't happen to believe that Obama is in the "crooked" category. 


Could Obama be doing a better job?  Maybe.  Do I agree with everything he does?  No.  But, do I think he's doing a good job overall?  Yes, especially when it comes to foreign affairs. 


It's not like he has the easiest job in the world.  And yes, he is having to "fix" a lot of messes from the Bush admin as well as from the Clinton admin, which only makes his job harder.  So, given the circumstances, I think he's doing an excellent job.


Hmmm, since Cheney is
perhaps Fitzgerald could use electrodes on Scooter (a grown man with that name should be a crime in itself..LOL), Rove and Cheney himself and see how he likes information extracted in this manner.
Above was in reply to Hmmm (nm)
z
So which is it, tax breaks under 250, under 200, or under 150, hmmm???

 


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJvkRFKGgGw


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAEE1_IUycs


 


 


Hmmm...it lost, get over it. One day
it will pass, but until then this is what the people of the state of California want. Be a big girl and stop whining already. You can't always have your way, sometimes it takes a while; be patient until then.
Maybe that is why 911happened? hmmm
Maybe Clinton should have had a secret assassination team to take out Osama! Just maybe?