Bush admitted to authorizing torture, specifically waterboarding when asked in Grand Rapids, MI.

article here: http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2010/06/03/bush-no-regrets-for-waterboarding/?iref=allsearch&fbid=9QyzM-gagy8

This is of course illegal and constitutes a war crime. Here is a portion of an NPR article prosecutions for waterboarding in the past:

A Punishable Offense

In the war crimes tribunals that followed Japan's defeat in World War II, the issue of waterboarding was sometimes raised. In 1947, the U.S. charged a Japanese officer, Yukio Asano, with war crimes for waterboarding a U.S. civilian. Asano was sentenced to 15 years of hard labor.

"All of these trials elicited compelling descriptions of water torture from its victims, and resulted in severe punishment for its perpetrators," writes Evan Wallach in the Columbia Journal of Transnational Law.

On Jan. 21, 1968, The Washington Post ran a front-page photo of a U.S. soldier supervising the waterboarding of a captured North Vietnamese soldier. The caption said the technique induced "a flooding sense of suffocation and drowning, meant to make him talk." The picture led to an Army investigation and, two months later, the court martial of the soldier.

Cases of waterboarding have occurred on U.S. soil, as well. In 1983, Texas Sheriff James Parker was charged, along with three of his deputies, for handcuffing prisoners to chairs, placing towels over their faces, and pouring water on the cloth until they gave what the officers considered to be confessions. The sheriff and his deputies were all convicted and sentenced to four years in prison


full article here:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=15886834

Bush belongs in prison.

6/4/2010 11:12:15 PM

hey I didn't realize it was 2006 all over again

6/4/2010 11:45:13 PM

haha, he just doesn't give a fuck

he's like "what are you gonna do? what? lmao..."

*middle finger*

6/4/2010 11:47:46 PM

Obama already said that they've moved on, and aren't going to prosecute possible war crimes from the previous administration. The only way this will gain any traction is through the ICC in the Hague, and even then the US isn't a signatory to the documents that established it.

6/4/2010 11:50:24 PM

Well its true... Obama wouldn't dare touch Bush. Can you imagine the shit storm if Obama's administration prosecuted Bush and then there was a successful terror attack on the nation?

I can hear O'Reilly right now, "So instead of spending our resources protecting this nation from committed terrorists, Obama has dedicated his energies to prosecuting a successful two-term president who, by the way, kept us safe from any terror attacks after 9/11!"

Yea... Give it up liberals. In fact, its in your best interests that Bush gets left alone. If they went after him, it would be the death of the democrat party for a generation... at least.

Oh, and the ICC wouldn't dare touch Bush either because if Obama didn't threaten nuclear war in order to get Bush released, he would be viewed the same way as if he himself had arrested Bush.

[Edited on June 4, 2010 at 11:53 PM. Reason : s]

6/4/2010 11:52:06 PM

I'm not sure I agree with how you arrive at that conclusion, but I will say that the nation has bigger problems facing it right now than Bush authorizing torture. Like the recession he caused. People were tired of Bush in 2008, and they're still going to be in 2010.

6/4/2010 11:54:43 PM

yea that's true. liberals are tired of bush and conservatives are tired of bush-bashing.

let's all just agree to move on!

6/5/2010 12:05:28 AM

I am just as tired of bush as anyone but it sets a dangerous precedent if he is not prosecuted in my view which could be very relevant to the future.

6/5/2010 12:17:15 AM

bla bla bla stfu mr. 2006, I already told you that no one's going to touch Bush with a 10 foot pole because they're all pussies.

6/5/2010 12:19:37 AM

this ^ and do you have any examples of people who didn't take part in it that were charged? just because someone authorizes/orders you to do something doesn't mean you have to do it; maybe you can go make a citizens arrest though

6/5/2010 12:26:15 AM

Someone's defensive

6/5/2010 12:26:20 AM

He should be more careful. The government may be uninterested in justice, but certain elements in the populace are.

6/5/2010 12:33:25 AM

ITT smc reveals the shocking news that former presidents are targets of crazy people.

6/5/2010 12:45:39 AM

Quote :

"The government may be uninterested in justice, but certain elements in the populace are."

you mean the non-gun owning pussified left? I'm sure Dubya is shaking in his boots at the thought of some liberals whining in public and then crying in private.

6/5/2010 12:57:30 AM

This is America. Everyone owns guns. Even the liberals. But the conservatives really have more to be pissed with him about.

6/5/2010 12:58:59 AM

Quote :

"I am just as tired of bush as anyone but it sets a dangerous precedent if he is not prosecuted in my view which could be very relevant to the future."

Quote :

"Bush belongs in prison."

Quote :

"Bush belongs in prison."

Quote :

"Bush belongs in prison."

6/5/2010 8:07:21 AM

Clinton lied under oath! We better impeach him!!

6/5/2010 9:42:47 AM

^ the 'pubs really showed their asshole on that one. history will look unkindly on all of the participants.

6/5/2010 9:46:59 AM

yea... democrats should definitely ignore that lesson and go ahead and repeat the mistake.

6/5/2010 9:49:34 AM

Obama already set a course to move on from it. There's no upside for him to go back to it now.

6/5/2010 9:59:50 AM

Frankly, I don't see why Obama should have any say in the matter, except for possibly pardoning Bush after he's convicted.

6/5/2010 10:05:02 AM

you think the sitting president wouldn't be directly involved in the DOJ choosing to investigate or prosecute a former chief executive? he'd at least have to give the green light to such an action. no career service employee or lower-level political appointee is going to shoulder that responsibility without approval from the top.

6/5/2010 10:06:49 AM

I'm a general opponent of selective prosecution. (not trying to change the subject...)

Quote :

"he'd at least have to give the green light to such an action"

In as much as if Obama said he'd pardon Bush upon being convicted, then yeah -- they wouldn't bother going through with the prosecution. But it should be clear to the American public that Bush is in fact, a guilty, albeit not prosecuted, war criminal.

I'm just saying.... I'd personally rather we had a system where all laws were just, and every potential criminal prosecution were pursued. (Equality under the law.)

6/5/2010 10:14:25 AM

The only way to do that would be to separate political influence from prosecution, such as making the FBI an agency independent from the executive branch, headed by a non-political appointee. But even that would have its own problems (KGB, anyone?). Yours is a theoretical ideal that just doesn't work in a world where judges are voted into office based on their partisan leanings (at all levels).

6/5/2010 10:20:47 AM

It is not by any means a clear conclusion that it was a war crime to waterboard a belligerent who was not subject to the geneva conventions

6/5/2010 11:17:34 AM

Quote :

"I am just as tired of bush as anyone but it sets a dangerous precedent if he is not prosecuted in my view which could be very relevant to the future."

wat

The precedent already exists. Look at every goddamn conflict that the US has ever been involved in. Lets go ahead and get posthumous indictments of FDR and Harry Truman for firebombing Japanese and German civilian centers.

Let it go, dude.

6/5/2010 1:51:30 PM

you can't be a war criminal if your side wins the war.

6/5/2010 3:51:41 PM

What president hasn't authorized torture, is a better question.

It wouldn't surprise me if Obama has in some way "authorized" torture directly.

The difference with the Bush admin is that they were open about it, and seemed to be proud of the fact that they openly supported torture.

6/5/2010 4:18:38 PM

Obama has greatly increased extra-judicial death squads operating across the globe but you don't hear a peep from all these idiot bush bashers.

6/5/2010 4:32:53 PM

"I suppose if I had lost the war, I would have been tried as a war criminal."
-Curtis Lemay

6/5/2010 5:33:02 PM

Nah, obama's a war criminal too, for exactly that reason. Killing americans without trial and not on "battlefields". I think they still torture too. They certainly hold prisoners indefinitely with no due process.

I don't care that he tried to bribe people with political jobs. I do care that he's dropping predator death all over the world like the morning milk.

[Edited on June 5, 2010 at 8:23 PM. Reason : .]

6/5/2010 8:21:51 PM

Solinari said:

Quote :

"Obama has greatly increased extra-judicial death squads operating across the globe but you don't hear a peep from all these idiot bush bashers."

Shenanigans!

6/6/2010 9:57:16 AM

i for one care about war crimes/abuses by both obama and bush. i'm guessing that obama backed off some of the more heinous things. but that doesn't mean that i find his current stance acceptable.

6/7/2010 9:25:11 PM

Quote :

"Like the recession he caused."

I despise Bush, but this is some goddamn ignorant shit to say. This recession really started in 2000 when private sector non-defense jobs started to decline, the artificially manufactured housing bubble combined with massive growth in the military-industrial complex (whose primary industry is the mass-manufacture of destruction) simply concealed it for 8 years.


That being said, large chunks of the Bush administration (the President included) should be in jail. Hell, large chunks of most administrations and both houses of congress should be in jail.

6/7/2010 9:43:15 PM

^^^

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article7144445.ece

I only say death squads because that's what the McDanger, Supplanter, moron, and smc types would be calling it if Bush was prez and doing the same thing.

6/7/2010 9:56:58 PM

Good luck getting any US President to press any type of charges against any former US President

Are you fucking nuts?

6/7/2010 10:55:06 PM

^
What does the likelihood of Bush's prosecution and conviction have to do with the fact that he did in fact commit war crimes and belongs in jail. Just because the criminal proceedings will never happen, doesn't make the allegations not true.

^^^
This.

6/8/2010 5:51:09 AM

bla bla bla bla bla clinton comitted war crimes too

6/8/2010 8:16:37 AM

Did his administration fabricate evidence that locked us into a 7+ year war?

6/8/2010 8:41:13 AM

Quote :

"LONGEST SUSTAINED CONFLICT"

Quote :

"IN U.S. HISTORY"

6/8/2010 8:43:01 AM

bush lied people died!!


2006 wants its slogans back

6/8/2010 8:58:42 AM

^
I didn't see Clinton or Obama in the thread title. If they commited war crimes, they belong in jail too. This is not a partisan issue, you damn antisemite.

6/8/2010 9:09:18 AM

^ hahahaha... damn!

gg

i say we put bush and solinari in a cell together and see what transpires!

6/8/2010 9:14:35 AM

^Anal sex.

6/8/2010 9:15:52 AM

who on who?

[Edited on June 8, 2010 at 9:16 AM. Reason : btw, consensual, or RAPE?]

6/8/2010 9:16:30 AM

Bush would make love to Solinari's brown star. Of course it's consensual, Solinari's been bending over for the right for years it seems

6/8/2010 9:24:29 AM

indy has effectively repeated this statement in his last few posts...

Quote :

"But it should be clear to the American public that Bush is in fact, a guilty, albeit not prosecuted, war criminal. "

What the fuck do you want to happen then? This is how you end up with a reputation as a bitching/whining/complaining liberal.

You acknowledge that nothing will ever be done you just want to give him the title of war criminal? Should we get him a sash like miss america? I mean what the fuck?

let it go already

6/8/2010 9:37:01 AM

Quote :

"What the fuck do you want to happen then?"

Criminals go to prison, right? Isn't this the "personal responsibility" that the right always crows about? How about taking responsibility for lying not only to the entire country, but to the military servicemen who have died?

Quote :

"This is how you end up with a reputation as a bitching/whining/complaining liberal."

Some things should be complained about. If being led to an unbelievably long, expensive war on fabricated "evidence" is not worth complaining about, what is?

Quote :

"You acknowledge that nothing will ever be done you just want to give him the title of war criminal? Should we get him a sash like miss america? I mean what the fuck?"

At the very least he should be recognized for what he is. At the very most he should be in prison with many members of his administration and Congress. That'd suppose we were a country of principles and greatness, though.

Quote :

"let it go already"

I'm gonna go with "no" on this one.

6/8/2010 9:41:38 AM

Michelle Obama admits that Barack is from Kenya!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1111111111!!!!!!!

6/8/2010 10:18:40 AM

^ oh snap! guess the birthers were right all along.

On a serious note, wtf... why would she say that? Seems pretty, unamerican.. "His home country Kenya"

6/8/2010 10:34:30 AM