Dick Durbin

[scaeagles]

To the contrary -

He said that what we were doing to prisoners at Guantanamo sounded like what one would expect from the Nazis or Pol Pot. There is simply no comparison. I believe his intention was clear.

There have certainly been much discussed violations of what is acceptable, such as violations at Abu Ghraib. We choose to prosecute those who do such things. They are the exception rather than the rule. In the previously mentioned regimes, torture was the rule.

He compares things in the statement from the guy in the FBI, which are not in violation the Geneva convention, to the attrocities committed throughout history. This is what I find reprehensible. Saying that the statement conjures up thoughts of what happened then. There is nothing even close to equivalence.

Tref, I am not amazed at our feeding the prisoners, and you know that. It goes beyond bread and water - they are fed better than our own troops. I am not complaining that they are fed. I am merely showing to what extent our government has gone to be culturally and religiously sensitive. But Durbin would liken it to Nazi torture.

These are ununiformed enemy combatants. In wars, such captives are typically shot. I do not excuse beatings, but intimidation by dogs barking is certainly against nothing in the Geneva convention. Nor is sleep deprivation, yelling, screaming, temperature extremes, nor the like.

Continue to presecute those who have violated our standards. And rightly so. But our standards, some described in the FBI statement read by Durbin, are nothing remotely close to the regimes he specifically cited.