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    Graham Says Torture's Worked for 500 Years

    by: Tim Kelly

    Wed May 13, 2009 at 15:13:40 PM EDT


    Lindsey Graham, once a principled voice on the Bush Administration's treatment of detainees, has now gone all Dick Cheney on us:

    In today's hearing on detainee interrogations, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) attempted to defend the Bush administration's torture program. "Let's have both sides of the story here," Graham declared, saying there could be evidence that torture provided "good information." Graham then made the puzzling claim that since torture has been used for half a millenium, it "apparently" is useful:

    "The Vice President is suggesting that there was good information obtained, and I'd like the committee to get that information. Let's have both sides of the story here. I mean, one of the reasons these techniques have survived for about 500 years is apparently they work."

    One would think that having handily won re-election, Graham might be willing to do more than parrot right-wing talking points, but apparently that's too much to ask.

    Tim Kelly :: Graham Says Torture's Worked for 500 Years
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    Predictable (4.00 / 1)
    Graham's occasional deviations from Republican cant had to end.  He's getting savaged by the extreme right.  They won't tolerate him breaking ranks in the Senate very often.  Anyone listening to talk radio or taking a quick look at SC Republican online activity knows SC Republicans support torture.  They can't accept any model of conflict where anything other than cruelty and violence imposing their will on others is the operative mechanism.

    The Republican Party is shedding its remaining moderates as part of a 40 year process of ideological segregation in US politics that goes back to Nixon.

    Unfortunately, we can't just bomb, torture and kill the other 6.2 billion people on the planet into submission.  They're not going to cooperate.  We lack the power, money and people to get it done over their objections.

    If you look at the empires of the past, British, Roman and Alexandrian among others, there is a surprising amount of cultural sensitivity employed.  People make deals, they leave local power in place, they give local culture and religion a nod.  Even when you have a vast technological superiority, it's simply too expensive to oppress large groups of people over long periods of time.  

    Sadly, Graham understands that long, complex story but most of South Carolina doesn't.  They have a cultural bloodlust to satisfy and they're going to demand their Republicans support that.


    Just because they work ... (0.00 / 0)
    Slavery "worked" for hundreds of years in supporting economies.  Does that make it defensible?  

    Only 500 years??? (0.00 / 0)
    This comment portrays stupidity on any number of levels, but primarly because Graham apparently thinks torture just started 500 years ago?

    Haven't brutal despots of dictatorial regimes been torturing people since the days of King Rameses I and before.


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