Posted on 12/07/2005 12:25:06 AM PST by FairOpinion
A ban on cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of foreign terrorism suspects is likely to be included mostly, if not entirely, in a final defense bill, a key House Republican said Tuesday.
Rep. Duncan Hunter of California, who is leading negotiations to iron out differences between the House and Senate versions of the measure, said if the ban or another provision limiting interrogation techniques U.S. troops can use are changed, they won't be drastically watered down.
The White House opposes the provisions and has threatened to veto any bill containing them. But President Bush's national security adviser, Stephen Hadley, has been negotiating with the chief sponsor, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., to find a compromise that would satisfy Bush administration's concerns.
McCain has said he won't back down from his demands that his provisions be kept intact. He has threatened to attach them to every bill the Senate passes until they become law.
The Senate, unlike the House, also included McCain's detainee provisions in its version of a separate bill that provides money for the military. But other lawmakers are in charge of completing that must-pass bill, and the detainee provisions are expected to be the last issues resolved.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Rep. John Murtha of Pennsylvania, the top Democrat on the House Appropriations subcommittee on defense, is supporting McCains legislation. Murtha could prove a powerful ally when House and Senate negotiators meet to reconcile differences in their bills."
http://www.bgnews.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2005/10/05/4344a90d3e862
They want the Marxist media to like them.
Amazing, only the enemies in Congress have a spine
HERE IS THE TEXT of the Senate Amendment, giving full US Constitutional protection to terrorists, even those captured outside the US, and making UN laws into US laws, so our soldiers can be prosecuted by the US.
Note the very ambiguous "degrading" treatment wording.
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?r109:1:./temp/~r109aMbvxG:e911694:
(a) In General.--No individual in the custody or under the physical control of the
[Page: S10909] United States Government, regardless of nationality or physical location, shall be subject to cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment.
(b) Construction.--Nothing in this section shall be construed to impose any geographical limitation on the applicability of the prohibition against cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment under this section.
(c) Limitation on Supersedure.--The provisions of this section shall not be superseded, except by a provision of law enacted after the date of the enactment of this Act which specifically repeals, modifies, or supersedes the provisions of this section.
(d) Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment Defined.--In this section, the term ``cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment'' means the cruel, unusual, and inhumane treatment or punishment prohibited by the Fifth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution of the United States, as defined in the United States Reservations, Declarations and Understandings to the United Nations Convention Against Torture and Other Forms of Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment done at New York, December 10, 1984.
Collective insanity and a wish to be French...or dead.
When it was voted on in the Senate the only NAYS were as follows:
NAYs ---9
Allard (R-CO)
Bond (R-MO)
Coburn (R-OK)
Cochran (R-MS)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Roberts (R-KS)
Sessions (R-AL)
Stevens (R-AK)
The USA does not torture, period. These morons need to confirm judges, cut the budget and quit this jerking around. If they were my employees I'd fire them!
If they leave this in the bill I hope the President vetos it. (please no veto comments - I've heard them all)
The White House couldn't even get them to exempt the CIA, the entire Congress is more worried about the MSM, than the lives of their constituents.
White House and McCain Are Near Deal on Torture Bill (misleading title, the "deal" is that the WH has to give up, because the entire Congress is supporting MCInsane.)
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/07/politics/07mccain.html
The White House has all but abandoned its effort to persuade Senator John McCain to exempt Central Intelligence Agency employees from legislation barring inhumane or degrading treatment of prisoners in American custody. But a top presidential aide continued to negotiate a deal on Tuesday that would offer covert officers some protection from prosecution, administration and Senate officials said.
======
It's far better for thousands of innocent Americans to die, suffer multi-billions of damage, than to hurt a hair on the terrorists cute little heads. (/sarcasm, bitter sarcasm)
Hell, damn, and blast!
I think President Bush gave up on the veto, because the Senate passed it 90-9 and the House will probably pass it with overwhelming majority and they could easily override the President's veto.
It's maddening to watch.
Apparently 9-11 wasn't sufficient to wake people up. We'll have to have a nuke go off in the US, or a major bioterror attack, before they realize that this is WAR and thousands of innocent lives are on one side of the balance, where terrorists are on the other side of the balance.
Unfortunately, the White House has never been able to even find a veto pen.
Republicans are so funny. And so phony.
This is such a moot point b/c when the CIA really wants intel out of people, they don't use torture, they use NLP (google it). Advanced form of hypnosis, zero torture necessary.
This is standard stuff for FBI agents during interrogations, it was developed by the CIA during the Cold War.
In the meantime:
61% of Americans surveyed say torture justified in some cases
http://www.startribune.com/stories/484/5767706.html
Most Americans and a majority of people in Britain, France and South Korea say torturing terrorism suspects is justified at least in rare instances, according to AP-Ipsos polling.
The polling, in the United States and eight of its closest allies, found that in Canada, Mexico and Germany people are divided on whether torture is ever justified. Most people opposed torture under any circumstances in Spain and Italy.
In the United States, 61 percent of those surveyed agreed torture is justified at least on rare occasions. Almost nine in 10 in South Korea and just over half in France and Britain felt that way. Mariella Salvi, who works for a humanitarian organization in Rome, said: "Human beings, as well as their rights, have to be defended, no matter what individuals are suspected of, or charged for."
Unfortunately you're right. Then the Senate and House will pass a joint resolution stating, "We surrender! Please don't hurt us any more! We're soooooo sorry!"
Ah, but that can also be considered "degrading" which is also made illegal by this bill.
Almost ANYTHING can be claimed to be "degrading".
I think then they would have another commission to find out why President Bush wasn't able to prevent it and why it was his fault.
The veto is meaningless because the house and senate would get two thirds of the vote easily overiding the veto.
Once again McPain has acted like the maniac that he is and won't stop until he gets his way.
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