Obama angers ACLU

[Trollbait]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... id=topnews

Obama Reverses Position on Release of Photos of Detainee Abuse

[Lurker]

Good. I thought releasing the photos was a bad idea when I heard about it a few weeks ago.

Releasing documents and investigating the criminal acts (which Obama doesn't want to do for some reason dammit) is more than enough.

[Partha]

Disagree.

Show it all. If the American people support it, they won't mind looking. And if they don't...well...this is what they bought.

[Harlowe]

I don't know, I have mixed feelings on releasing all the pictures. The documents, absolutely, but I have a nagging feeling the pictures are going to cause us more harm - in the sense of endangering Americans internationally. Then again, full disclosure might be the best deterrent for this in the future.

I'm torn on this issue.

[Trollbait]

So then you would have agreed to the withholding of the Abu Ghraib photos as well, Lurker?

[Lurker]

The media disclosed the Abu Ghraib photos. Obviously I'm not opposed to the media exposing ongoing criminal acts by our Government, which was the case when those photos were released. That's a vastly different circumstance to this present situation.

If I remember correctly, the Pentagon did show the unreleased torture photos and videos to Congress after the scandal broke. I don't think a wider public viewing was warranted then or now. There's just no added benefit. Public viewing of photos isn't needed for the investigation to continue.

[Klast Brell]

I have heard rumors that some of the pictures are truly horrifying. Pictures of very bad things being done to minors.
Shit like that would be an inspiration to a whole new generation of terrorists.

It was absolutely wrong that it was done to those prisoners. And the USA needs to do some atonement on the world stage. But releasing some of those pictures would do vastly more harm than healing. Admitting your guilt and saying your sorry is part of how we as humans operate. It is part of how we redeem ourselves in the eyes of our peers. But to share some of the most horrifying details is like another attack. You can hear a rapist's confession. But could you stand it if the rapist wanted to confess to you in such detail that he showed you a pictures of the rape happening.

It's a terrible situation that the new White House inherited. Maybe you and I can say "That was Bush, this is Obama". But in the eyes of so many people of the world it would all just be "The Americans" The Americans who did these nightmarish, sinful, things to our children and must be be punished.

[Harlowe]

I think you both make good points and have expressed precisely why it scares me. I think it's the only call you can make right now. People will be less inspired to violence by words and reports, than by the actual images.

[Partha]

You mean like they're not now?

[Harlowe]

You don't think it could get a lot worse?

[Partha]

No, I don't.

They've already had images of torture for years from Abu Ghraib. They've had interviews on various media with actual detainees who were tortured. Obama himself has said these photos aren't the worst of what's out there. Plus, how many people do you think might be related to any of the hundreds of thousands who have been killed or imprisioned in both theatres since the war started? Revealing them won't make it any worse - but hiding it won't make it any better.

[Trollbait]

I am with Patha. Show the pictures.

Will it make folks want to kill U.S. Soldiers? Undoubtedly.

Did those folks already want to kill U.S. Soldiers? Undoubtedly.

Who is the government to tell us what we can and cannot handle? Jack Nicholson?

We want the truth.

[Harlowe]

You can have the truth without a plethora of graphic images.

[Ddrak]

Now that the existence of the photos has been confirmed you may as well show the photos. It's not like the things you can imagine won't be worse than the actual photos. Saying "we have these photos of what we did but they're so horrible we can't show you because it would make you hate us more" isn't really going to fly.

Why the hell were they taking photos anyway? Don't they know the golden rule of government - if you record it then you can assume that someday, somehow the press will get a hold of it and paint it in the worst context possible, and once it's recorded it is never, ever destroyed because bureaucracies never destroy anything.

Dd

[Klast Brell]

I would guess there was a mix of things.

-- Record keeping and documentation. Ponderously large organizations live on red tape. The more the better. I have seen one of the logs kept on the interrogations of a prisoner in Gitmo. Updates written every hour, sometimes evry few minutes detailing the minutia of his intergation over a perion of 2 months. And if you look at it for a while you start to notice things. The sleep deprivation. He was never allowed more than one or 2 hours of sleep a day. Physical effects of his treatment Swelling of hands and feet, changing of bandages on ankles.
-- Idiots taking pictures of themselves the same way they would film themselves trying to light their farts on fire.

[Embar Angylwrath]

Obama fucked this one up. His reversal on the issue can lead one to beleive the pictures are truly horrifying, even when his official stance is they really aren't that bad.

Might as well show them now. Get it all out and over with.

[Lurker]

Ddrak,
We've known about the photos for years now. Hopefully they can be used as evidence against the architects of all this without being released to the general public. Oh, and the CIA destroyed 92 interrogation tapes in 2005, against a court order, which unfortunately negates your second point.

[Ddrak]

Ddrak,
We've known about the photos for years now. Hopefully they can be used as evidence against the architects of all this without being released to the general public. Oh, and the CIA destroyed 92 interrogation tapes in 2005, against a court order, which unfortunately negates your second point.

I'm with Embar - no matter what they contain, it can't be as bad as what the terrorist recruiters will say they contain.

And, you completely missed my second point if you think it was a statement of fact. My point was that in any sufficiently large organization if you want to do something shady and/or against the rules then you document nothing.

Dd

[Lurker]

I'm with Embar - no matter what they contain, it can't be as bad as what the terrorist recruiters will say they contain.

Words don't carry the visceral impact that pictures do.

We wouldn't even know about the systemic torture of prisoners if the original Abu Ghraib photos hadn't been exposed by the media. The pictures broke the scandal in a way that nothing else could. But now the scandal is out in the open and can be investigated and I don't think that requires the public release of more pictures. If it turns out that not releasing the pictures hinders or prevents a full investigation into the architects of all this then I hope Obama loses the court fight over them. If not, we don't need a few hundred more examples floating around. It serves no purpose.

[Partha]

Yes, Lurker, it DOES serve a purpose. Abu Ghraib was pinned on 'a few bad apples'. Lower level subordinates who carried out improper behavior on their own hook. Showing the photos where these 'few bad apples' were not the torturers proves once and for all that the abuse was systemic and contingent on the orders of higherups to carry out. The soldiers who were (possibly) wrongly accused of committing war crimes on their own initiative should be allowed the chance to clear their name, even though I think they're pieces of shit anyways. It can't and won't be done without photographic evidence.