Skeptomania - Paranormal / UFOs, etc.

enigma · Deputy Dawg

Secret Service Catch Mexican Official Nabbing White House BlackBerries

Whether he was up to no good or simply desperate to play BrickBreaker, a Mexican press attache was caught on camera by Secret Service pocketing several White House BlackBerries during a recent meeting in New Orleans, FOX News has learned.

Sources with knowledge of the incident said the official, whose first name is Rafael, took six or seven of the handheld devices from a table outside a special room in the hotel where the Mexican delegation was meeting with President Bush.

Everyone entering the room was required to leave their cell phones, BlackBerries and other such devices on the table, a commonplace practice when high-level meetings are held. American officials discovered their missing belongings when they were leaving the session.

It didn't take long before Secret Service officials reviewed videotape taken by a surveillance camera and found footage showing "Rafael" absconding with the BlackBerries.

Sources said "Rafael" made it all the way to the airport, where the Mexican president was preparing to leave New Orleans, before Secret Service officers caught up with him. He was forced to return the BlackBerries.

Sources said the man claimed to have taken the devices accidentally. The sources said they believe no further actions were taken against him by American authorities, though it is unclear what disciplinary measures, if any, await him in Mexico.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,352378,00.html

asmodee

Well, isn't that just about enough to piss you off? If I did that I'd be charged with theft, espionage and treason, but then I'm only a tax paying citizen of this country. The fact that a foreigner, for any reason, can simply walk away after that is infuriating, diplomatic immunity or no. At the very least he should have had a couple hour long session with Bertha, the cavity search wench.

Raven · Google Meister

What ever happened to the good old days of killing government spies... Oh'no, killing spies isn't nice anymore, can't do that. Instead we can just slap him on the hand and say "no, bad, no touch".

asmodee

That's pretty much it, unless he's a lowly soldier for a country we are at war with. Then we can nail him to a chair and peal his skin off to make him talk, or at least find out that, being a lowly soldier, he doesn't know anything. Same old crap as always. The more power you have, the fewer rules apply to you.

Yaish · Intel Chief

asmodee

Okay, we don't literally nail them to a chair and peal their skin off, but we do routinely torture people for information in Iraq, or at least we did before it hit the fan. I have a nephew in the Air Force. He's a hell of a guy. Never hurt anyone in his life. It was a shock to hear him explain to me the last time he was back how it was necessary to get the information we needed to keep our troops safe. Now, to be fair, he didn't admit to me any torture he witnessed or knew about and he did not act as if he had seen or heard about it firsthand, but he was definitely brainwashed enough with the old '80s "the enemy is the devil" mentality we had with Russia to try to convince me that, in certain instances, this type of treatment of prisoners was justifiable. It makes me wonder exactly what the value of a signature of a US official on any document is these days. We've never been real good at honoring our agreements, in this case, the Geneva Convention.

Yeah, the bad guys are really bad. They're so bad because they're nuts. That does not justify torturing them.

Yaish · Intel Chief

asmodee

That's where we will have to disagree. My nephew is trying to kill him, too. That makes them equals on opposite sides. To him, we're the devils. And while you may not consider sleep deprivation to be torture many people who've confessed to crimes in this country have successfully argued that the police deprived them of sleep to elicit a false confession, and that's in time frames closer to a day and a half or two days. I've read reports of prisoners being deprived of sleep for three weeks. While it may not cause physical pain or scarring, it is very much torture.

The United Nations Convention Against Torture defines torture as "any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity. It does not include pain or suffering arising only from, inherent in or incidental to lawful sanctions." Torture does not necessarily mean pain.

I can certainly see where you are coming from on this, but I have empathy for the other side, too. Yes, by our standards, these are vile people and it is easy to think of them as subhuman, but they are very much human. The problem with the word "justified" is that there is never a clearly defined line on what is "justified" and what is not. Each time we deem something to be "justified" we get a little more desensitized to that type of thing. It's easier the next time to go just one tiny step further. I would like to think of us as being a little more human than that. Don't put them up in the Ritz or anything and, by all means, execute them if they are found guilty of war crimes, but don't commit war crimes in the process.

enigma · Deputy Dawg

OK... I'm gonna say this one time, then I'm out because I could get real ugly real fast on this.

We have not tortured anyone... bring me proof that someone is being or has been torture. Just because you don't like or couldn't do it doesn't mean it's torture.

Sleep deprivation is NOT torture... it is sleep deprivation, period. We haven't pulled out fingernails, broken bones, nothing of the sort. Water-boarding... while unpleasant is not torture. So far the worst I've seen is some photos of the enemy in embarrassing positions and poses.

This isn't the crowd to bring any anti-American, anti-troops BS to...

Raven · Google Meister

i didn't see it as anti-either...

asmodee

Loving your country and supporting your troops does not mean you have to give up all rights to not like what your country or your troops are doing. I am not anti-American. Quite the opposite. It infuriates me that politicians routinely wipe their asses with the Constitution, current president especially.

I'm not sure exactly where the anti-American/anti-troops sentiment comes into play in anything I've posted. So many people want their cake and want to eat it too. Is this a free country, or do we give up the right to bitch if we choose not to vote? It's one or the other, not both. If you don't like what I have to say, welcome to America! The system works! The very nature of freedom is that you won't always like what I have to say, but I am free to say it anyway. One of my pet peeves is the saying, "You don't have the right to bitch if you didn't vote." My rights were paid for in blood, not ballot boxes. To claim otherwise is to cheapen the blood which paid for our freedoms. I have the deepest respect for our troops and the deepest love for my country. That doesn't mean I have to like the government or any given politician, nor does it mean I have to automatically agree with everything our troops do. Just because I see the enemy as a human being and not a thing to be slaughtered does not give me any less respect for my own country, just more respect for a human life. Quite frankly I am surprised to see the general sentiment here that the "enemy" is one amoral, evil entity and not a bunch of individual human beings who mostly think they are doing the right thing.

You ask for proof that people are being tortured? The ACLU has enough proof to start a lawsuit about it. How about the leaked DOJ memo that, while doesn't actually say "people are bing tortured", sure as hell says, "it's okay for the President to order people tortured". You are a logical bunch and none of you are stupid. You don't say, "it's okay to ..." unless you intend to "...", do you? Hell, autopsy reports PROVING that prisoners were tortured to death were released clear back in October...of 2005. I leave you with a few gems from some of those autopsies:

Yaish · Intel Chief

None of those COD's show torture. They show injuries, but how were those injuries obtained?

Is capturing an enemy combatant torture if you have to use force? Is subduing a prisoner who attacks guards torture? Sorry, doesn't cut it.

I don't buy the U.N.'s definition of torture either. Under that definition everyone is guilty of torture since it's so broad that spanking a child's butt or putting them in timeout would even qualify.

We could try it differently though, we could just ask real nice if the guy with the gun will tell us where the other guys with the guns are. If he tells us, maybe we can ask real nice that they don't shoot us. I wouldn't want to use any force that might cause them pain, injury, or even mental distress.

As for your nephew trying to kill 'them', do you really think so? Does your nephew go looking for Iraqi's driving down the street and deliberately plant bombs next to their cars? Does he go into police stations or government offices and kill people he never met?
If he did happen to have an enemy combatant in front of him, who gave up his gun and surrendered would your nephew still shoot him anyway?
Acts of war and acts of terrorism are a little bit different.

enigma · Deputy Dawg

Those autposy exerpts prove zilch... those are injuries.Could have been caused by having to be restrained following an attack on soldiers or guards, or they could have had some of those injuries before they were ever taken into custody... hell, one of them died due to complications from coronary artery disease... how is that torture?

Wanna hear about the injuries my brother sustained when the fuckers blew him up? How about the injuries my father suffered when they flew a plane into the building he was in? The latter would be tougher to tell you about though... since his remains have never been recovered.

These are terrorists we are dealing with... not a noble fighting force defending their country. These are animals who think the 'infidel' (us) should be exterminated.

Raven · Google Meister

I'm confused about you two... is your argument to disprove torture, or support torture? because both of your posts start with disproving, then end with supporting... why would you worry about supporting it if you already disproved it?

asmodee