Senate torture report

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twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

FuriousxGeorge posted:

^ Yeah, that.

Only time I recall someone credible claiming the US was about to attack Iran was Sy Hersh during the Bush years.

Given that we've already attacked Iranian infrastructure with a computer virus, I'm unclear on why anyone is debating on whether Obama is preparing to attack Iran. (edit: Or whether someone claimed that Obama is preparing to attack Iran)

# ¿ Dec 13, 2014 21:53

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# ¿ May 14, 2024 14:55

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

Anubis posted:

Closing Gitmo was specifically banned by congress in such a way that Obama literally had no choice in the matter.

This is simply not true. Congress certainly made the alternatives politically disadvantageous, but Congress absolutely can not force the executive branch to detain people.

# ¿ Dec 15, 2014 05:11

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

Anubis posted:

I notice you like selective quoting to try and make it seem like I didn't know an unrealistic option of vetoing the already contentious spending bill existed. But hey, the tens of thousands that would likely die in the economic turmoil of a US default is just the price of moral high ground, right? Seriously, hate him for the reasons you should but the man did spend more political capital trying to close gitmo than any other national politician that I'm aware of, even if that isn't a high bar to step over.

Sorry, I should have been clearer. Obama didn't need to veto anything to close Guantanamo. Closing Guantanamo is something the President has stroke of the pen authority to do. Congress made it so that these prisoners can't be transferred to the US, but that is not a necessary condition of closing the prison. Also the notion of spending political capital (on a failed plan especially) is stupid, if from office you can't accomplish good things, then possessing the office is worthless.

# ¿ Dec 15, 2014 17:33

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

computer parts posted:

To close the prison you need to put the prisoners somewhere else. Nowhere else was (immediately) available.

This also isn't true. You can just stop being a prison. Obviously it's not ideal to be stuck on base with no available transportation, but there is absolutely nothing forcing us to keep those people in cells. I also suspect that options for places to go will open up if we say "We shouldn't have put those people in prison, also they are not in prison anymore".

# ¿ Dec 15, 2014 19:43

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

spacetoaster posted:

Well, that's something, at least.

I still want the place shut down. If there isn't even enough evidence for a show military trial, why are we keeping them?

Assuming the government isn't run by literal super villains, presumably they have evidence which would get thrown out at trial (torture coerced confessions), not that they literally have no evidence.

# ¿ Dec 15, 2014 20:42

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

PhilippAchtel posted:

Your secret evidence example is a torture coerced confession?

That seems most likely to me given what we know. There's obviously other ways to gather inadmissible evidence, they probably also have some hearsay evidence where they can't or aren't willing to produce the actual person for testimony. I'm unclear on the admissibility of evidence gathered without a warrant/probable cause oversea.

# ¿ Dec 15, 2014 23:40

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

OwlFancier posted:

I think the issue that you may be missing is that the reason evidence obtained through torture is not admissible in court is because it isn't actually evidence.

This is just denying reality. Torture coerced confessions are evidence. They are bad evidence that is frequently wrong, and we should assume they are wrong, but even if we had some corroborating fact telling us one was right, we still shouldn't admit them in court, because torture is immoral, and the exclusionary rule is there to influence law enforcement policies, not because it could be wrong.
edit:
Setting admissibility standards on what evidence is correct seems innately problematic because it requires us to know the correct outcome ahead of time.

# ¿ Dec 15, 2014 23:49

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

OwlFancier posted:

It's pretty well documented that torturing people doesn't produce actionably accurate information, it produces whatever the torturer wants to hear so that the torture will stop.

The best you can achieve with torture is confirming your pre-existng bias, and if you want to do that there are much cheaper ways to do it.

Right I agree torture is bad/stupid. We were talking about whether or not things people say after they are tortured qualifies as evidence, and why such evidence wouldn't be admitted at trial (it is because the exclusionary rule is attempting to force law enforcement to act morally/within the law, not because the exclusionary rule is attempting to make law enforcement use effective policies).
edit:
I mean imagine that we created a perfect lie detector, we would still not allow people to torture confessions out of people.

# ¿ Dec 15, 2014 23:55

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

OwlFancier posted:

My point is more that if the justification for holding them is that we have evidence, but it wouldn't be prosecutable, possibly 'we tortured him until he said he did it so we'd stop' isn't really the best example of 'we all know he did it but we can't bring it to court'

I think you are reading more into my post than what I said. The people who perform torture presumably believe it does produce useful information (again, I'm assuming they aren't super villains who torture for no reason), so information produced via torture is, I suspect, a prime component of their inadmissible evidence. This is a bad reason to hold someone indefinitely without trial, but there simply doesn't exist any good reason to hold someone indefinitely without trial, so that doesn't seem remarkable. (Similarly my other example of "Oh a guy told us you did something bad, but we can't/won't find him for cross examination" is a bad reason)

# ¿ Dec 16, 2014 00:25

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

Booourns posted:

Torture coerced confessions do not become evidence just because the person doing the torturing really thinks it works.

Right, torture coerced confessions are evidence, because that is what that word means, not because of anyone's perception of its effectiveness. Can you give me the definition of evidence you are using? I'm not aware of any definition that would exclude torture coerced confessions. Also keep in mind, this whole discussion started because someone asked what the point of detaining someone is if they didn't have evidence, and I answered that the people in question probably have torture coerced confessions they can't bring to trial, which is why they are refusing to bring people to trial.
edit:
Alternately, can you conceive of the concept of bad evidence? Can you imagine a piece of evidence which might cause you to believe a wrong conclusion?

twodot fucked around with this message at 04:34 on Dec 16, 2014

# ¿ Dec 16, 2014 04:30

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

WhiskeyJuvenile posted:

Per the report, at least one guy was tortured to play hours screams to his family to get information from them

I don't know why you think this is relevant to anything I've said (other than the posts where I said torture is bad, which you didn't quote).

# ¿ Dec 17, 2014 03:27

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

WhiskeyJuvenile posted:

They're evil; they didn't torture him to get information.

While I'm willing to entertain the notion that the CIA is abjectly evil from the top down, I think I made it pretty clear that all of my posts were made on the assumption that they aren't literally evil in the D&D sense. Even assuming my assumption is wrong (which is entirely possible), I still don't see what relevance your post have to mine.
edit:
Perhaps I should state this more directly, I believe two things: 1) The government believes it is justified in holding these people indefinitely, and 2) They believe their reasons for believing that are legitimate. I propose that 1) is true, but 2) is badly reasoned. Do you have an issue with that?

twodot fucked around with this message at 07:43 on Dec 17, 2014

# ¿ Dec 17, 2014 05:55

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

Orange Devil posted:

Yes. You are wrong on point 1 and also quite probably evil.

If I'm wrong on point 1, why do you think the government is holding those people? (Your later post suggests you are simply incapable of reading, I don't know what to make of your posts anymore)

Chomskyan posted:

Under what circumstances is it acceptable to hold uncharged criminal suspects indefinitely?

None. Which is why I said earlier there are no good reasons to hold uncharged people indefinitely:

twodot posted:

This is a bad reason to hold someone indefinitely without trial, but there simply doesn't exist any good reason to hold someone indefinitely without trial, so that doesn't seem remarkable.

What is confusing about this?

Shbobdb posted:

That doesn't absolve them from evil. #2 is basically what drives real world evil.

Right, this is why I never said anyone was absolved of anything, and which is why with I led with saying the government's inadmissible evidence is most likely evidence created from an evil act.

Seriously people, just read what I'm actually writing.

# ¿ Dec 17, 2014 17:27

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

OwlFancier posted:

You're a little bit difficult to follow, every time you rephrase it it still sounds like you're saying the government is doing the right thing.

Please quote anything I've said that said the government is doing the right thing instead of the government believes it is doing the right thing (which is what I've actually said). Keep in mind that I've said multiple times that we shouldn't torture people, that there are no good reasons to hold people without charge, and that the best benefit of the doubt I'm willing to give the government is that they aren't literal comic book super villains.

# ¿ Dec 17, 2014 17:44

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# ¿ May 14, 2024 14:55

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

OwlFancier posted:

When you say stuff like:

It's confusing, because it sounds like you're saying you agree with the first one but not the second.

"agree with" doesn't make sense in this context, it can mean "Yes I agree you are factually correct" or "Yes, I agree with your goals/morals", and I'm explicitly saying that reality exists in a suboptimal way. I think both of the two sentences are true statements. The first one is basically tautological, the government only does things that it thinks is a good idea to do. The government seems to be acknowledging it's made a number of mistakes, but it's also doubling down on a number of other people (which are the people we were talking about). The second statement is basically "Is the government engaging in doublethink regarding how it gathers information?". I don't think it is, I think the government believes that torture is a just way to collect information. The government is wrong about this, but they believe it regardless.

You appear to saying the agreeing with "The government believes it is justified in holding these people indefinitely" implies agreeing with "the government is doing the right thing", which is just wrong. If I wanted to say the government is doing the right thing I wouldn't need to insert "believes" into my sentences. If I wanted to say the government were good guys, I would call them not-villains instead of not-super villains.
edit:
I suppose it might be more clear to say 1) is true, but they are mistaken, but part of the issue is they are mistaken primarily because of 2), because if they didn't gently caress up 2) they could have an actual trial and justice.

twodot fucked around with this message at 19:02 on Dec 17, 2014

# ¿ Dec 17, 2014 19:00

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Senate torture report