Verschärfte Vernehmung

Posted by Tim Habersack on October 14th, 2007 filed in News Thingies

An interesting story from the New York Times regarding the parallels in how we define our “torture that isn’t torture” in prisons, and how the Gestapo utilized nearly the same wording.

Ten days ago The Times unearthed yet another round of secret Department of Justice memos countenancing torture. President Bush gave his standard response: “This government does not torture people.” Of course, it all depends on what the meaning of “torture” is. The whole point of these memos is to repeatedly recalibrate the definition so Mr. Bush can keep pleading innocent.

By any legal standards except those rubber-stamped by Alberto Gonzales, we are practicing torture, and we have known we are doing so ever since photographic proof emerged from Abu Ghraib more than three years ago. As Andrew Sullivan, once a Bush cheerleader, observed last weekend in The Sunday Times of London, America’s “enhanced interrogation” techniques have a grotesque provenance: “Verschärfte Vernehmung, enhanced or intensified interrogation, was the exact term innovated by the Gestapo to describe what became known as the ‘third degree.’ It left no marks. It included hypothermia, stress positions and long-time sleep deprivation.”

One Response to “Verschärfte Vernehmung”

Uncle Mike Says:
October 20th, 2007 at 15:50
While I believe that we should wrap up our business in the Middle East and get out, I do have to agree with a certain amount of interrogation procedures.

If you ask a person that lived in Stalinist Russia in the 30′s about torture you would get a completely different meaning from someone living in upper suburbia when they get punished by their parents and get grounded for the weekend. Both will cry torture- but time and perspective have a way of coloring your usage as does the intended outcome of the action. Grounding a child for disobedience will ultimately be for the good of the child. Applying 120VAC to an insurgent’s doo-dads to get critical information that may save 100+ innocent citizens on an airliner will be for the good of the country.

Since I am a frequent flyer, I would approve of the government taking unusual means to keep me safe from some bonehead trying to make the 6:00 news.

Uncle Mike has spoken…

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Verschärfte Vernehmung

One Response to “Verschärfte Vernehmung”

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