CNN is coming out full-bore pro torture now...

[annabanana]

Every single neo-con talking point is being posited and reinforced right now.. lead by Fran Townsend.

[Echo In Light]

1. As was CSPIN earlier w/a Washington Post "journalist" who trivialized torture at every turn

You know, cause it's obviously a matter of policy debate, and not ILLEGAL and morally reprehensible.

[hobbit709]

2. I wonder how long all these pro-torture talking heads would last

I give them 30 seconds max before they'll admit to anything and everything.

[annabanana]

3. I'm mostly interested in keeping them from hijacking & twisting

the coverage any more than they already have..

[Doctor_J]

9. It would have changed the debate dramatically

if, when Hannity claimed that torture was no big deal, and then volunteered to be tortured, if he'd been scooped up off the street and subjected to real torture (not something he could quit at any time) over, say, a week, and broadcast on the internet.

As Lawrence O'Donnell said at the time, Hannity wouldn't last a minute, because there are two types of people in the world - those who are willing to die for a cause, and the other 99% who are armchair warriors. Hannity and the rest of the Hate Radio/Big Media cabal are devout cowards.

[madokie]

11. most would piss their pants upon the threat alone is my guess

[ejpoeta]

4. according to my brother, what the CIA did was ok because......

the people they did it to weren't americans. wtf!! what is wrong with these people!! i don't care if they were americans or not!! WE DON"T DO THIS SHIT!! this is not the american way!! and if we did this, then we have no standing to complain when it's done to our soldiers. it just makes me sick to think that my own brother could say something like that. and he didn't say it to me... my husband just told me this.

[NNN0LHI]

5. Jose Padilla is an American

He was left catatonic when they got done with him.

I am sure there were others we don't know about yet.

Don

[ejpoeta]

8. that's exactly right. and the whole enemy combatant thing..... the idea that

the president could decide who is an 'enemy combatant'.... and the whole habeas corpus thing.... it's dangerous. I sure as hell wouldn't want any one person to have that kind of power to take people like that and throw them in GITMO or other places to torture them. Not that hard a leap either.... But what kind of a country are we! we are supposed to be america.... The idea that it's ok to torture and kill people because they aren't americans!! i am sure my brother would be the first one bitching and outraged if anyone dared do any of the stuff we have done to others to an american or an american soldier.

[TankLV]

22. And don't forget that Obama has RETAINED that "right" - Obama has DEFENDED bush*s new "laws"...!!!

fuck 'em all...

[ejpoeta]

27. bet they don't like that idea.... more than happy to have that imbecile bush

have the right to throw anyone in black sites or gitmo, but not Obama.... personally, I don't want ANYONE having the power to do that... bush, obama or anyone else.

[Raster]

6. What did you expect from the Corporate News Network, eh?

Fair and factual? Puh-leeeeze.

[annabanana]

7. Sadly, most semi-attentive Americans consider CNN to be

fact based and objective.. (if not left-tilted)

I hope everyone got that t-shirt/bumper sticker/canvas bag from the DU store:

http://www.cafepress.com/du_store/6687430

[dana_b]

14. good one!

I've been looking for a good bumper sticker to cover the hole in my bumper. :)

[lame54]

10. they should demonstrate on Wolf Blitzer

[Swede]

12. They seem fairly balanced here.

http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2009/detainee.interrogations/index.html

[dem629]

15. The coverage has been balanced.

But just as there are media-bias conspiracy theorists on the right, so too are there some on the left.

To them, "media bias" = news/information that isn't presented EXACTLY as they'd like it to be presented. In other words, to the specifications of their own bias.

I usually ignore the fringers on both sides whining about the media. (Other than Fox and MSNBC who make no bones about being competitors that are extensions of the two parties. They aim for bias.)

[arcadian]

17. That is bullshit. There should be no debate.

That's how far gone this country has gone and it's the fault of the MSM that there is actually a "debate" over torture. When taken in this context, there really is no "debate" it's merely the MSM covering for their corporate buddies. What about the debate over the invasion of Iraq? Oh wait, there wasn't one.

[dem629]

18. I understand your position, and it demonstrates what I said about

people who cry "media bias."

You have your view. I have mine. We'll just have to agree to disagree.

[arcadian]

19. Wow, you actually think that torture is a debatable issue?

I understand the media far better than you you do. There is no media bias, but if you think the media doesn't have an agenda then you are a fool.

[dem629]

20. LOL.

Whenever you're in a discussion and someone resorts to "So you believe (make up a position they never advocated)..." you know that person has nothing to go on.

And you're perfectly within your rights to believe you understand the media far better than I, and you can call me all the names you wish. It means nothing. It just further proves that you're arguing from a position you can't back up. So I'll leave this sub-thread to your further frustrated rants.

:hi: Have a good day!

[arcadian]

21. Pot. Kettle. Black.

[dem629]

26. Highly original and painfully stinging rebuttal.

I'm crushed.

;)

[arcadian]

28. You can't stand that I'm getting the last word on you.

I'm in your head, man. I'm in your head collecting LULZ.

[TankLV]

23. EXACTLY!!! There is TRUTH and then there are LIES. There is what WE Americans STAND for and what

we rightly CONDEMN!!!

There is no "other side"!!!

WAKE THE FUCK UP!!!

[dem629]

25. Why should we be afraid to put the other side on TV

and knock down their view?

We aren't that scared of them, are we? Are you?

There are perhaps millions of people who believe that torture is just fine, so why not show them, through the exercise of a debate, that their side falls flat on its intellectual merits?

We may agree that the other side in this debate is wrong, but there IS another side, and I have no problem with them airing their views and then having them knocked down. I don't think anyone is well-served by stifling debate in a democracy.

[Swede]

29. Exactly right.

Some here want to stifle the expression of others views,this goes against everything they seem to be objecting to of the other side.

[PassingFair]

31. Jeez..."there are perhaps millions of people who believe that" WIFE BEATING is just fine, too!

It doesn't give the wife beaters a VALID position.

Torture, like wife-beating, is against the LAW.

There is no VALID pro-torture or pro-wife beating position.

To afford the apologists a forum on a NEWS cast is shameful.

[anigbrowl]

24. +1 .nt

[Doctor_J]

30. MSRNC is an extension of the Democratic Party?

Whoa. Someone needs to tell Scarborough, Mika, Buchanan, Greenspan, and Norah! Their presentation of the party line is sorely lacking

[gratuitous]

16. And not even there, really

The subhead says "Critics want a probe of Bush administration interrogation methods -- banned and labeled as 'torture' by President Obama." This makes it sound like there's some "debate" about what constitutes "torture" or what might be "banned" because it's been "labeled" as "torture."

There are definite, objective standards in the works here, not some political "labeling" by one administration that can be changed by the next one. And there were plenty of people who quit at the time and said they didn't join up to be torturers, and others who didn't go back because they knew that what they had done was wrong - despite what their superiors assured them. Strangely enough, those voices never quite make it into CNN's "debate" over "torture."

I suspect that's because there are plenty of people -- loud-mouthed, yammering people with strong corporate backing -- who will go on the air to gin up some fake controversy about whether or not our star-spangled, freckle-faced all-American fightin' men and women would ever torture anyone. Yes they would and yes they did. There isn't a "balance" to be struck between torturers and decent human beings.

[dana_b]

13. absolutely disgusting

encouraging the thought that it's okay to torment people like this is beyond me. Birthers, tea baggers, pro-torture - these "news" networks have become nothing more than organizations to rally thr far right.

I wrote them and told them that they can keep their "news" and talking heads. I know it won't do any good but I can't justify watching these vultures who are obeying their corporate masters wishes and hurting true civil discourse.