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May 22, 2009

'Mancow' Muller Waterboarded - Lasts 6 Seconds

Ranting “conservative” talk show host Erich “Mancow” Muller decided he would prove that waterboarding isn’t torture by undergoing the interrogation method himself.
It didn’t turn out the way he expected: Mancow Waterboarded, Admits It’s Torture.
Listeners had the chance to decide whether Mancow himself or his co-host, Chicago radio personality Pat Cassidy, would undergo the interrogation method during the broadcast.  The voters ultimately decided Mancow would be the one donning the soaked towel and shackles, and at about 8:40 a.m., he entered a small storage room next to his studio that was compared to a “dungeon” by Cassidy.
 
“The average person can take this for 14 seconds,” Marine Sergeant Clay South answered, adding, “He’s going to wiggle, he’s going to scream, he’s going to wish he never did this.”
 
With a Chicago Fire Department paramedic on hand,  Mancow was placed on a 7-foot long table, his legs were elevated, and his feet were tied up.  
 
Turns out the stunt wasn’t so funny. Witnesses said Muller thrashed on the table, and even instantly threw the toy cow he was holding as his emergency tool to signify when he wanted the experiment to stop. He only lasted 6 or 7 seconds.
 
“It is way worse than I thought it would be, and that’s no joke,”Mancow said, likening it to a time when he nearly drowned as a child.  “It is such an odd feeling to have water poured down your nose with your head back...It was instantaneous...and I don’t want to say this: absolutely torture.”
 
“I wanted to prove it wasn’t torture,” Mancow said.  “They cut off our heads, we put water on their face...I got voted to do this but I really thought ‘I’m going to laugh this off.’ ”
UPDATE at 5/22/09 3:44:45 pm:
Here’s the video:
 
 
 

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May 14, 2009

Nancy Pelosi, her eyes wide, her hands gesticulating wildly

It's almost sad to watch  Almost. But hypocrisy has its own "rewards". And Jeez, are there any times when Pelosi's eyes aren't wide? How did someone so manifestly lacking in talent or brains get to be speaker of the US House of Representatives?

Which to trust: Pelosi or the CIA? 

Andrew Bolt

Friday, May 15, 2009 at 07:22am

Nancy Pelosi raises the stakes by accusing the CIA of lying to her:
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi accused the CIA and Bush administration of misleading her about waterboarding detainees in the war on terror and sharply rebutted claims she was complicit in the method’s use.

“To the contrary ... we were told explicitly that waterboarding was not being used,” she told reporters, referring to a formal CIA briefing she received in the fall of 2002.
Big call. If she’s proved wrong, she’ll be a joke. Or is she a joke already?
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, her eyes wide, her hands gesticulating wildly, on Thursday laid out a third version of what she knew and when she knew it on the Bush administration’s interrogation policies…

With her own second-in-command now demanding more answers, the California Democrat, her voice barely audible at times, read a rambling statement at her weekly press briefing about her prior knowledge of the “enhanced interrogation techniques” (EITs) employed by under President Bush, asserting that she was not told in a September 2002 briefing that the U.S. government used waterboarding.

Minutes later, though, she acknowledged for the first time that her top security adviser was part of a February 2003 briefing in which he learned that American interrogators were in fact waterboarding suspected terrorists.

“My statement is clear, and let me read it again. Let me read it again. I’m sorry. I have to find the page,” said a flustered Mrs. Pelosi, shuffling through papers, her hands quivering a bit, as she sought to stick to her prepared text.

“When — when — when my staff person — I’m sorry, the page is out of order — five months later, my staff person told me that there had been a briefing — informing that there had been a briefing and that a letter had been sent. I was not briefed on what was in that briefing; I was just informed that the briefing had taken place,” she said.

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May 13, 2009

Andrew Sullivan has a worrying thought

May 13, 2009

ANDREW SULLIVAN FIGURES OUT WHO THE RUBES ARE: “I have a sickeningly familiar feeling in my stomach, and the feeling deepens with every interaction with the Obama team on these issues. They want them to go away. They want us to go away. . . . Yesterday, Robert Gibbs gave non-answer after non-answer on civil unions and Obama’s clear campaign pledge to grant equal federal rights for gay couples; non-answer after non-answer on the military’s remaining ban on honest servicemembers. What was once a categorical pledge is now - well let’s call it the toilet paper that it is.”
 
In entirely unrelated news, Obama has also flip-flopped on releasing the “torture” photos. Meet the new boss, yada yada. All of this was entirely predictable. And yet, his election was a matter of fierce moral urgency about which there could be no serious disagreement. . . .
UPDATE: More hope and change! Indefinite Detention Weighed. “The Obama administration is weighing plans to detain some terror suspects on U.S. soil — indefinitely and without trial — as part of a plan to retool military commission trials that were conducted for prisoners held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.”
 
Previously: “You were expecting a Chicago machine politician to show an enthusiasm for civil liberties?”
 
 

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Filed under  //   Andrew Sullivan   Barack Obama   don't ask don't tell   Gay   Guantanamo Bay   military tribunals   torture  

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May 8, 2009

The Democrats and waterboarding

May 8, 2009

VIDEO: It Wasn’t Just Pelosi. “The leak clearly shows that some in the CIA have resolved not to take the heat for waterboarding all by themselves, and shows what a miscalculation Obama made by releasing the legal memos. Until that time, the CIA appeared content to let people talk about Bush-era tactics in academic terms, especially since the agency had dropped the procedures in question several years earlier. After the release of the OLC memos prompted talk of prosecutions, that all changed, and now Obama knows how Bush felt when the CIA decided to leak damaging information to the press.”
 
 
 
Also, from Greg Sargent: Hoekstra’s Office: He’s Seen Documents That Prove Pelosi Was Briefed On Waterboarding.
Hoekstra spokesperson Jamal Ware says that Hoekstra is now seeking the release of the memos and notes that comprised the basis of the documents that came out today that claimed Dems had been briefed on enhanced interrogation techniques.
 
“He has seen documents that would clarify exactly what the Speaker was briefed on,” Ware tells me, “including whether she was briefed on all enhanced interrogation techniques that had been used.”
 
Asked if those techniques included waterboarding, Ware replied: “Yes.”
 
That ups the ante considerably.
Indeed.
 
ANOTHER UPDATE: Moe Lane watches the moral-superiority bubble deflate.
 
And Jules Crittenden comments. “OK, I think we’re ready to start those torture prosecutions.”
 
 
STILL MORE: Allah is pitiless: “Two defenses of Pelosi’s lies circulating in the nutrootsphere today, one dumber than the other. . . . Anyway, they wanted ‘truth’ and now they’ve got it.”
 
 

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May 7, 2009

Pelosi Briefed on Interrogation Tactics in 2002

May 7, 2009

ABC NEWS: Pelosi Briefed on Use of Interrogation Tactics in Sept. ’02. Pelosi says her recollection differs from the written report. Obviously, we need a Truth Commission to sort all this out.
 
 

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