Out of Power Democrat Senators Side with Terrorist Murderers Against Gonzales, Bush

Attorney general nominee Alberto Gonzales' confirmation hearing this week "may become more contentious because the White House has refused to provide copies of his memos on the questioning of terror suspects." Now, folks, this is serious stuff. I want you to pay even closer attention than you normally do. (story) "Senator Richard Durbin of Illinois, the Senate's #2 Democrat said today, 'We go into the hearing with some knowledge of what has occurred because of press reports or leaks, but without the hard evidence that will either exonerate or implicate Judge Gonzales in this policy.' Durbin and other Democrats plan to question Gonzales on his involvement in the crafting of policies concerning questioning, policies the justice department has backed away from. Still, the issue probably won't be enough to stop Republicans from confirming Gonzales as the first Hispanic attorney general. Republicans have 55 seats in the new Senate. Democrats control 44..." You know when the last time the Democrats controlled 44 or fewer seats in the Senate? It was 1929 or '31, somewhere around in there.

That's how long ago it was their numbers were so few, which is another reason why they are in such panic. A companion story from the UPI yesterday: "The ACLU said Monday it has new questions on torture memos before White House counsel Al Gonzales is confirmed as attorney general. Gonzales is tapped to succeed Ashcroft. Senate confirmation hearings are expected to begin this week. 'The ACLU neither opposes nor supports the nomination.'" Ha! Not exactly accurate. That may be what they say, but that's not exactly accurate. They plan on showing videos of torture, so-called torture, at Abu Ghraib prison during these confirmation hears. There's a great piece on this at National Review by Lee Casey and David Rivkin. Let me read to you part of it: "President Bush's nomination of Judge Alberto Gonzales to succeed John Ashcroft as attorney general will soon come before the Senate for its advice and consent, and there is going to be a battle royal. The Left is marshaling its forces to bloody Gonzales, and clearly hopes to deny him confirmation. The pretext for opposing this superbly qualified appointee will be his role, as White House counsel, in developing the administration's legal position on the classification and treatment of individuals captured in the War on Terror. The stakes in this battle are high:

"At issue may be nothing less than the future of American sovereignty. Ever since the Abu Ghraib prisoner-abuse photographs surfaced nearly a year ago, opponents of the Bush administration's policies in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere have used those images in their ongoing effort to discredit the American legal position on 'detainees.' That position — which correctly denies captured al-Qaeda and Taliban members the rights and privileges granted to honorable prisoners of war under the Geneva Conventions — was outlined by Gonzales, based on legal advice received from the Departments of Justice and State, in a memorandum to the president dated January 25, 2002. Gonzales explained in that memo that the United States is engaged in 'a new kind of war' that is 'not the traditional clash between nations adhering to the laws of war that formed the backdrop' for the Geneva Conventions. This 'new paradigm,' he concluded, 'renders obsolete Geneva's strict limitations on questioning of enemy prisoners and renders quaint some of its provisions requiring that captured enemy be afforded such things as commissary privileges, script (i.e., advances of monthly pay), athletic uniforms, and scientific instruments.'"

Now, "The 'quaint' reference [in Gonzeles' memo] will undoubtedly be brought up over and over again during the judge's Senate hearings. In truth, [he] was being charitable. He could have used far harsher language to describe provisions that, were they applicable to al-Qaeda and the Taliban, would require the United States to provide detainees with amenities such as dormitories, kitchenettes, sports equipment, canteens, and a monthly pay allowance in Swiss francs — all while captured...Americans are routinely butchered. It is hardly surprising that, while the administration preserved the core requirement of humane treatment for detainees captured in the War on Terror, it rejected calls to grant them POW status."

Okay, bottom line: While Americans are being captured and beheaded and tortured, the Senate Democrats are going to take the position during the confirmation hearings of Alberto Gonzales that Al-Qaeda prisoners and Taliban prisoners be treated under the Geneva Conventions where they would be given dormitories, advance pay, kitchenettes, sports equipment, canteens -- as I say "all while captured (or kidnapped) Americans were routinely butchered." Now, "The Geneva POW Convention was one of four treaties negotiated after World War II, with the circumstances of that conflict in mind. It assumed that captured combatants would by and large be young men conscripted into mid-20th-century-type mass armies controlled by nation-states, which themselves were ready and able to comply with the basic rules of war. Neither the treaty's drafters, nor its terms, nor the governments that agreed to it contemplated the development of transnational terror organizations beyond the control of any state, motivated by religious zealotry and capable of delivering massive attacks on the civilian population."

Another way to look at this is that the Democrats in the Senate, in order to defeat Bush's attorney general nominee are going to take the position that those who blew up the World Trade Center in '93, those who blew up the World Trade Center in 2001, those who have routinely committed acts of torture against Americans at home and abroad including the U.S. are to be treated with kitchenettes, dormitories, canteens and advance pay as Geneva Convention prisoners of war even as they plot further acts of murder against U.S. citizens. That is the position the Democrats in the Senate are going to take. They are going to take the side of Al-Qaeda and Taliban prisoners who they are going to I guess demand have lawyers, be able to have their rights read to them as in Miranda, all the while American soldiers are being kidnapped, tortured, and butchered.

RUSH: All right, stick with me on this for just a few more minutes here, folks. This is crucially important. "[T]he Geneva Conventions do not extend POW protections to captured enemy combatants who do not qualify as 'lawful' or 'privileged belligerents.' At a minimum, this status requires a proper command structure, uniforms, carrying arms openly, and otherwise operating in accordance with the laws of war. Those laws forbid the purposeful targeting of civilians — the preferred tactic of al-Qaeda, the Taliban, and the Iraqi 'insurgents,'" who are really nothing more than terrorists themselves. Now, "the administration's opponents have variously claimed that the Geneva Conventions do apply to such irregular..." Stop and think about this! "[A]dministration opponents have variously claimed that the Geneva Conventions do apply to such irregular unlawful combatants' [as terrorists] — either because such individuals are the 'armed forces' of Afghanistan or because they are 'civilians' — this was not the story 25 years ago. At that time, precisely because the law denies POW status to unlawful combatants, the Left made extraordinary efforts to legitimize the guerrilla tactics favored by 'national liberation movements.'" Twenty-five years ago the left tried to have the Geneva Conventions cover such groups as terrorists, essentially. "The result was the 1977 Protocol I Additional to the Geneva Conventions, a treaty President Reagan rejected and which...does not bind the United States." We are not a signatory to it.

But: "Undeterred by such legal niceties, the administration's critics have continued to demand that effective POW status be granted to captured terrorists or that they be treated like ordinary criminal defendants, entitled to a speedy trial before a civilian court. The critics have also inaccurately accused the United States of 'torture.' This claim is based on the use of 'stress' methods of interrogation, such as isolation, exposure to noise, and standing for up to four hours. This is the genesis of the second accusation against Gonzales: that he commissioned a memorandum, dated August 1, 2002, deliberately defining down the concept of 'torture.' This memo, which was prepared by the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel (OLC), has become more controversial than Gonzales's own memo on the Geneva Conventions. Word on the Washington street is that the opinion was originally demanded by the CIA, which was concerned about its interrogators' facing unfounded criminal charges if coercive questioning methods were employed.

"The memo concludes that torture is unlawful, that any criminal prosecution would require proof of a specific intent to inflict severe pain or suffering, and that the federal statute criminalizing torture cannot, consistent with constitutional separation-of-powers principles, be applied to the president's detention and interrogation of enemy combatants in wartime. This last point is clearly the memo's most controversial, and although the [Justice Department's Office of Legal Council] OLC offers solid legal arguments to support each of its conclusions, they can certainly be honestly debated." Now, again, the details here come from a National Review by Lee Casey and David Rivkin, Jr. When you think about this, here we have as the Gonzales hearings get underway on Thursday, here we have U.S. senators, Democrats, acting as defense counsel for the enemy. They say next to nothing about the atrocities committed against our soldiers by these terrorists: the beheading, the execution of civilians, including Americans, and spend an enormous amount of time demanding due process rights for detainees.

These senators have picked up the briefs argued by the ACLU and international leftists and are trying to impose them on our government when we are not a signatory to that aspect of the Geneva Conventions. Now, keep in mind, many are conflating the two. We are talking here about the perpetrators of 9/11, folks. We are talking here about Al-Qaeda and Taliban related groups. We're talking about the people who attacked us on 9/11 and seek to attack us again right here at home. This has nothing to do with Abu Ghraib. That conduct is not authorized anywhere. These senators are trying to link our interrogation and detention of these terrorists with that prison, in a devious and deceitful attempt to sully the president. Now, we got news today and it's not been confirmed that Zarqawi has been arrested. I don't know if this is true or not; it hasn't been confirmed, but I wouldn't be surprised, if it is true, that the left in this country, some Democrat senators will probably say, "The arrest was unlawful," and demand his release, and then they will say, "He can't face the death penalty," because we know the libs don't believe in that. They'll say, "He can't be held indefinitely," because we know he they don't like that, and then they'll demand that he get a U.S.-taxpayer-paid-for lawyer because we know the Supreme Court demands this. This is the position these people are taking against Al-Qaeda and Taliban, people who have attempted and kills Americans. It has nothing to do with Abu Ghraib but they're going to try to make it all about that.

RUSH: I said it right the first time. Let me say it again because many people are confusing the two. What we're talking about here in these confirmation hearings of Alberto Gonzales that start on Thursday, we're talking about the perpetrators of 9/11: Al-Qaeda and Taliban-types, their related groups. We're talking about the people who attacked us on 9/11 and who seek to attack us again right here at home. This has nothing to do with what went on at Abu Ghraib. That conduct isn't authorized anywhere. What the Democrat senators are trying to do is to link our interrogation and detention of the 9/11 and the Al-Qaeda and Taliban terrorists with the Abu Ghraib prison story in what is a devious and deceitful attempt to sully the president. These Gonzales memos have to do, and the justice department memos on torture and interrogation have to do, with the G'itmo, the apprehension and capture of Taliban and Al-Qaeda for their related group prisoners. What these people are going to do is take what happened at Abu Ghraib and defend the prisoners at Abu Ghraib and at the same time mount a defense for Al-Qaeda and Taliban prisoners, acting practically as their defense counsel against the United States and seeking essentially the release of these prisoners so that they are free to commit further acts against the United States.

This is done primarily with one intent: To sully the president, to damage his ability to conduct the war on terror. The thing that we all need to ask, and it's a serious point here: "What is it about liberalism that compels liberals to come to the defense of mass murderers, whether they're home grown murderers or terrorists?" This is a very sick and perverse mentality. The liberals in this country were weak during the Cold War. If we had been governed totally by liberals, the Soviet Union would still exist, as an example. The left in this country always condemns America. They condemned Reagan for standing up to the communists, both in our own hemisphere and the rest of the world. Grenada, Nicaragua. They came to the defense of the Sandinistas there. They were quick to excuse virtually every Soviet action. They haven't changed. They came to the defense of Saddam Hussein. They always come to the defense of Fidel Castro. They came to the defense of Stalin and Lenin. They refused to believe what was going on there because they thought it was all for "The Common Good." They had a tough time criticizing Mao.

In fact, they were fellow travelers with half these groups of people -- and now their descendants, these current Democrats in the Senate are going to try to disruption the confirmation hearings of Alberto Gonzales and at the same time for all the practical purposes and intents act as defense counsel for Al-Qaeda and Taliban prisoners who they claim are being tortured in violation of the Geneva conventions, when we are not a signatory to the protocol of the Geneva Conventions that treats these revolutionary groups and terrorist groups as conventional prisoners of war. Why they would even want to do this is beyond my ability to understand. Why do the Democrats in the Senate not want to get to the bottom of the people who attacked this country and wiped them out? What is it about the Democrats in the Senate that want to essentially make them participate in an effort that will free these people, so that they can again plan and conduct possibly more mayhem against Americans? And remember this: at the same time these hearings are going on, and they start Thursday.

The same people who are beheading civilians in Iraq, who are kidnapping and capturing American prisoners and butchering them, the same people, are going to be defended against the United States by Democrats in the Senate as they attempt to nail Alberto Gonzales as the architect of the policy that allows the detainment and the questioning of these prisoners, all as a means of getting to George W. Bush -- and don't forget this. Before the election I reminded you this Abu Ghraib stuff was gonna be used by, if they didn't win the election, the liberals were going to use this to try to impeach Bush or to besmirch Bush or to damage Bush, and if they do follow through on this news that we've heard, they're going to play videos of Abu Ghraib torture scenes during the confirmation hearings, I guarantee you that my prediction was right. I have no doubt about it, very little question about it whatsoever. But I'm appalled, my friends. Even I, who can no longer be surprised at the depths to which the American left will descend, even I am appalled at their apparent willingness to act essentially as defense counsel on the floor of the U.S. Senate for Al-Qaeda and Taliban prisoners -- and there's no other way to put it.

Do we need to repeat the history here on 9/11, on all the other terrorist attacks against this nation both at home and abroad? We're conducting a war on terror -- finally. We were in the midst of this war, but we weren't participating. We were simply taking the attacks and considering them "nuisances," as John Kerry said, or random attacks and just hoping that it wouldn't happen in any greater numbers that it was, a couple hundred dead there, 300 dead there. We can tolerate that, but not 3,000 in one day. That compelled to us action, and in the midst of the action we're now taking, Democrats in the Senate -- and not just Democrats in the Senate; Democrats everywhere. The left in this country have decided that their purpose is to undermine that effort, wherever it takes place: Iraq, Afghanistan, or the confirmation of Alberto Gonzales. We're going to be following this very carefully because this is something that the Democrats are gonna shoot themselves in the foot and they may, while aiming at the feet, accidentally hit a little higher. They may actually do themselves some great damage here because the American people have no sympathy for Al-Qaeda or Taliban prisoners, and they certainly don't want American senators acting as their defense counsel.

The American people have been fed up with the left soft-on-crime attitude for the longest time. The last straw will be the American left exercising its soft-on-crime stance as it seeks to defend the rights of TERRORISTS -- not "prisoners of war," terrorists -- who have attacked and killed Americans on our own soil, all part of an effort to delay the confirmation or deny the confirmation of Alberto Gonzales as attorney general. Now, there are other political aspects to this. They're afraid that Gonzales, if confirmed, then might become a future nominee to the Supreme Court. He would then -- he already will be, is, the first Hispanic nominee to be attorney general, if confirmed. He would thus be the first Hispanic, and they're looking at the politics of that, and then if they don't fight him here and he does get nominated for the Supreme Court down the line, they have to fight him then so they're trying to lay the groundwork for denying him a seat on the Supreme Court, and that is pure politics. I'll tell you something about Gonzales. He's not a conservative. The dirty little secret is that Alberto Gonzales is not a down-the-line conservative as you and I are, but he is loyal to George W. Bush, and, as such, he can't be allowed positions of authority or power. So that's what's at stake for the Democrats here -- and they still don't get it, they do not understand what it is about them that turns people off. Nancy Pelosi was on the Today Show. Grab audio sound bite #8. We've got one more Nancy Pelosi. She was on the Today Show today. Jamie Gangel was talking to her, and asked her this question: "Do you think the Democrats are out of touch with what Americans want?"

PELOSI: We may have to communicate our message better, if that's what you mean by "out of touch." But I know that the agenda, our new partnership for America's future, the agenda of the Democrats is the agenda of the American people.

RUSH: Oh, really, Ms. Pelosi? Well, we'll just see come this Thursday when your Democrats in the Senate start after the destruction of Alberto Gonzales, as they take up the defense of prisoners who are Al-Qaeda and Taliban members, who butcher Americans, kill Americans, and plot to do it again, right on our own soil. As you Democrats attempt to take up their cause and defend them, we'll find out just how your agenda is the agenda of the American people. More accurately, you will find out, Ms. Pelosi. They still don't think their message is getting out. After all of this they still don't understand that their real problem is their message has gotten out, and it has gotten out because there is a new media that has properly identified these people because they do operate in camouflage; they operate with masks on. They know they can't afford to be who they really are, so they act and say things to make them appear to be otherwise. They don't even like the term liberal, but they've been properly ID'd now. So they continue to step in it, folks, big, big time, and we'll see another huge evidentiary patch of this starting Thursday with these confirmation hearings of Gonzales.

"What is it about liberalism that compels liberals to come to the defense of mass murderers, whether they're home grown murderers or terrorists?"

The Maha damn near belted all this out in one breath. Really impressive...

PELOSI: No, I don't. I think Democrats are exactly in touch.

The gift that keeps on giving...

This is garbage. The legal use of torture is fully contradictory to American and expecially conservative values. We cannot become terrorists to defeat them.

If several government agents feel that it is necessary to break the law and torture a suspect to find a ticking bomb, sobeit. The courts and history will judge their actions.

But the United States of America should never allow any practice that is universally viewed as torture to be legal.

Those of you who think otherwise are myopic, foolish and lack true conservative values.

"But the United States of America should never allow any practice that is universally viewed as torture to be legal. "

We should not allow a 'practice' of anything WE agree is sadistic and unnecessary torture.

The rest of the peaceful, we are the world' community; who with their self-congratulatory, 'collective visions of humanitiy'; and despite the horrific realities that their 'world family members' suffer. . .nonetheless, sleep well. And that, keeps me awake.

These 'we are the world' dreamers. . .dream through the nightmares of tortured histories. . .where torture was/IS routine; and death imposed upon unfortunate citizens by their own governments is the norm. . .

Whether by starvation. . .execution; whether they are enslaved or slaughtered or just buried alive. . the suffering of this world family. . .of innocent human beings does not disturb their dreaming 'sisters and brothers'. . ..

This torture of a community is okay.

I would ask, just who is in greater jeopardy of becoming the enemy; the person who recognizes the evil of imposed pain and suffering; or the person who does not care who suffers or how; as long as it does not wake him up.

Humiliation, abasement, and embarrasment are NOT torture.

Torture is watching the greatest, most God-fearing nation on this planet rive itself over insignificant minutiae.

Torture is deprivation, AND physical abuse.

Torture is being held powerless while your loved ones are abused and killed.

Torture is what the Spanish Inquisition did. To (by most measure) INNOCENT (by enlightened standards) people.

What the "irregulars" of Iraq and Afghanistan are subject to doesn't even qualify as "mistreatment", let alone torture.

Did either of you follow the manner in which the Germans handled their recent torture situation?

The Police chief of Frankfurt was in the worst of all situtations. He thought that the life of a kidnapped boy was dependent upon finding out where he was from the suspect they had in custody. The clock was ticking and the chief decided to threaten (just threaten) the man with physical pain.

For this he was brought before the court and found guilty. However, he received a suspended sentence.

Torture is a slippery slope and the Germans know that better than anyone else. This case shows how it can be both the proper decision in a given circumstance, but remain illegal.

This is the way it should be in the US as well. Only an excpetion and never the rule. Always prosecuted, but only selectively punished.

You sirs, I am afraid are beginning to slide.

By the way, the boy was already dead. Here is a link, which is unfortunately only in German. http://www.nzz.ch/2004/12/20/al/page-newzzE2YI6V2Y-12.html
Maybe another Freeper has an English link.

"This case shows how it can be both the proper decision in a given circumstance, but remain illegal."

I ask only for 'fair and balanced'. . balanced by the goals desired/needed; balanced with a respect towards one's own humanity which does not preclude that prisoners deserve the better of everyting much less the 'best' of everything. Or that they should be feeling secure in the knowledge that nothing will be expected from them; while they can expect everything from their captors.

Is the 'Idea' of torture; always prohibited? Illegal? Or just some 'ideas'. . ..

A Liberal idea of unfair torture is taking the prayer rug from the cell of the Islamic terrorist. . .is the threat of the same; a torture as well. . .

Whatever; I do not want these people who can so easily ignore pain and suffering of innocent people; but cannot tolerate the idea of discomforting a terrorist. I would threaten them. And I would take their 'prayer rug' and their Koran, in a heartbeat - and give them what a good hotel offers. . .

Prohibiting such is not fair or balanced thinking; and frankly do not think world's Leftist are capable of such. . .and when it comes to more serious issues of pain and suffering; be it the torture of innocents by their own Governments; or the torture of those who tortured the innocent. . .there is no reason to trust the judgment of this world community..

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