Shep flips out: “We do not f***ing torture!”
posted at 3:25 pm on April 23, 2009 by Allahpundit
Share on Facebook | printer-friendly
From yesterday’s “Strategy Room,” a candid if predictable reaction to Blair’s admission that enhanced interrogation works: “I don’t give a rat’s ass if it helps!” Most of the mindless absolutism on this subject has come from the left; nice to see Shep upholding the tradition. Pew’s out with a poll today that I’m reluctant to link because the margin of error by party is so huge (eight points in the case of the GOP), but for what it’s worth, 49 percent of the public thinks torturing terrorists is often or sometimes justified, including 54 percent of independents. Toss in those who say it’s justified in rare cases and you’re up to 71 percent. The most interesting data point is the partisan shift in the last few months. As of February, 22 percent of Republicans said it was often justified versus just nine percent of Dems; two months into Hopenchange, the GOP number’s down to 15 and the Democratic number’s up to 12, proving that America’s comfort with the practice depends to some extent on how much they trust the occupant of the White House. In fact, only 44 percent of independents thought torture was at least sometimes justified as of February versus 54 percent now — which suggests, ironically, that their greater confidence in Obama not to abuse the practice has made them more enthusiastic for it.
While we’re on this topic, I should correct an egregious error I made yesterday. In the Hillary post, I said that the torture debate isn’t academic. In reality, it’s entirely academic. Read Gutfeld’s latest and you’ll see why. When push comes to shove, if Obama has reason to believe that detainees in CIA custody have info that might stop an impending attack, rest assured that he’ll give the order to slap it out of them if need be. If he doesn’t and we’re hit, he’s finished politically; whatever queasiness about stress positions that the public feels now will evaporate and they’ll turn on him viciously, and he surely knows it. Even if he’s personally squeamish, he’s not going to blow his shot at a second term for the sake of not breaking Andrew Sullivan’s bleeding heart. Content warning.
You must be logged in to post a comment.
Blowback
Note from Hot Air management: This section is for comments from Hot Air's community of registered readers. Please don't assume that Hot Air management agrees with or otherwise endorses any particular comment just because we let it stand. A reminder: Anyone who fails to comply with our terms of use may lose their posting privilege.
Trackbacks/Pings
Trackback URL
Comments
Comment pages: « Previous 1 2 3 4 5 Next »
GunRunner, I don’t know if I’d wait to even ask before delivering the bullet. If I knew someone had one of my two children, I’d want to inflict some pain and want that person to know I meant business. I don’t think even the yellow weak-kneed leftists up in arms would wait either. It’s all about what’s near and dear to your heart: children, loved ones…country? Do they love their country that much to be willing to inflict a little discomfort on others to defend it?
ort777 on April 23, 2009 at 4:49 PM
Does Mueller consider waterboarding to be a coercive method? And is he speaking just for the FBI, or for all intelligence agencies?
hawksruleva on April 23, 2009 at 4:50 PM
Somebody get that cranky little b*tch, Shep, some
Midolvagisil. Stat!HornetSting on April 23, 2009 at 3:32 PM
FIFY
Absolutely right, there will be HELL to pay!
Liberty or Death on April 23, 2009 at 4:50 PM
Oh, damn! I missed that!
newton on April 23, 2009 at 4:50 PM
Hey Shep, Thousands were targeted for death and suffering. Three guys got water poured on them and now all those people including the terrorists are alive and safe. You have to be insane to prefer a different outcome. The alternative that the terrorists not be scared and thousands die is what you want … really? That would leave you proud? You would make that choice. I would like to see you explain that one to the victims’ families afterward. “Well everyone, I didn’t want to feel bad. This is America! We are better than everyone else. Sorry your families had to die to prove that we don’t scare people.”
bagoh20 on April 23, 2009 at 4:51 PM
LOL!
newton on April 23, 2009 at 4:51 PM
So you note Duh that INTEL training would not apply to “all” soldiers training.
Waterboarding hurts. So does your anal retentive bowel movement, Fleet. A lot of things in life hurt. Pain is relative. Ask any woman who gave birth to a child. You think like a cry baby, and with juvenile mental processing that if you and your gang can rule the world, everything will be so wonderful. TORTURE, dumbass, is when your eye or tongue or nails or fingers or intenstines or ear or feet or head are removed from the rest of your body. TORTURE is when you are pumped with poison, electrocuted but not killed.
Forcing a Muslim man to wear girly pants on his head is not torture. It’s rude and humiliating, but not torture. Waterboarding hurts like hell but doesn’t kill you. If you don’t want to feel that pain, then don’t get involved in the plotting; and if you chose to be a terrorist, then tell what you know if you’re caught. Otherwise, deal with your choice as an enemy of our nation.
Torture is segregating and confining a group of American citizens, blasting noise at the American citizens 24/7 for weeks during a Federal bombardment based on inconclusive rumor, denying them their legal counsel, denying them their right to trial by jury, and then burning them to death, destroying evidence of their innocense. THAT IS TORTURE. That is what Democrats do when given too much power, the party of the KKK, the party of corruption and progressive Socialism.
maverick muse on April 23, 2009 at 4:52 PM
Leave Shep Smith ALONE!
On second thought….
Branch Rickey on April 23, 2009 at 4:52 PM
Ugh, I give Shep credit when it’s (rarely) due, but then he does dome sh** like this.
And not that I’m breaking news to anyone here, but we didn’t torture… we gave some smelly terrorists a bath. Seriously though, we train many members of our own military by waterboarding. Shall we bring up all recent SecDefs up on charges, etc.?
Also, congress was briefed 30 times… included the POSs who want to hang Bush today. They knew what we were doing and approved. Shameful SOBs.
At any rate, we didn’t torture, but we did thwart attacks after dunking 3 guys in water. Not just the Library Tower either. Dick Morris actually talked about a thwarted Brooklyn Bridge attack last night on O’Reilly.
Anyone find it odd that Obama’s people released the memo but blacked out the sections showing what information we got? Yeah… Seems borderline treasonous.
But what I really came here to do was say O’Reilly (justifiably) lost it over this issue last night… but not online, on his actual show (ignore the liberal BS title written by the YouTuber who posted this):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUeyoRgBI-I
RightWinged on April 23, 2009 at 4:52 PM
Is that it? Is that your reasoning for concluding:
Because in doing so, you have just engaged in changing the definition. If not, then why do you conclude that waterboarding is torture? By your seemingly absolutist conviction, I must be missing a very key component in understanding. Conversely, I am equally absolute in my contention that it is most definitely not torture.
anuts on April 23, 2009 at 4:54 PM
Who knew Shep had it in him?
If Americans in general weren’t pro-torture, tough guy movies and TV shows like 24 would not be as popular as they are. Most Americans really want there to be a Jack Bauer working for us, and most believe we do, but now Obama is assuring us we don’t. I think most Americans find that idea frightening.
We want there to be torture, we just don’t want to know about it.
Queen0fCups on April 23, 2009 at 4:54 PM
anuts, pain and suffering is pain and suffering. Torture inflicts both. Pretending you don’t understand that is pointless.
starfleet_dude on April 23, 2009 at 4:59 PM
Yes. The head diaper and the stench.
ckoeber, et al, are practicing the age-old self-righteous gig of “I’m morally superior to you.” It doesn’t hold up in the real world; never has. This is why people of their ilk teach college or go into politics: power over others without repercussion. Pontificating without consequence is the fortress of the coward.
In the end, we are no different than our “enemies.” We attempt to live by a stricter code of ethic, but when confronted with real evil, we are all reduced to pragmatism. So what? It is what it is. Someone has to man that wall in the night while the rest of us sleep peacefully. Thank God for those folks.
get a life, star fleet and the other Bozos are a danger to any civilized society that wants to stay in the business of breathing.
Oh, not the same Shep you have been discussing.
Shep on April 23, 2009 at 4:59 PM
Me, I just had my high carbon-footprint, high-protein lunch, in my air-conditioned office, wearing my incredibly well-constructed clothing (purchased at a reasonable price from a nearby merchant). I’ve been texting on my phone with a very lovely woman who paints her face to accentuate her beauty, and is free to wear clothing which make her attractive to members of the opposite sex. In a few minutes I’ll hop in my SUV and drive to my suburban home, not much, but a nice sized yard for my dog to run around in, in a fairly low crime area (though a lower middle class neighborhood). Life is good. The people who forged this country with their blood made it so. Grow Fins and Getalife need to be deported to sub-Saharan Africa to live a guilt-free life without such products of evil as safe food, a/c, security of person, property rights, freedom to love whom and how you choose, affordable personal transportation, and a decent health care system. And leave the rest of us who appreciate these artifacts of eeeeevuuuulll opression to continue to “oppress” those who threaten our way of life.
quikstrike98 on April 23, 2009 at 4:59 PM
“We do not f***ing torture!”
I certainly hope not. No goat deserves that!
Master Shake on April 23, 2009 at 5:03 PM
Torture is having to identify the remains of a loved one through dental records because some SOB terrorist murdered them for having the nerve to be an American.
Get your head straight Captain Kirk.
portlandon on April 23, 2009 at 5:04 PM
Specious justifications for immoral acts are a dime a dozen. BTW, if you were genuinely pragmatic, you’d listen to what former Bush-era F.B.I. directors have to say when they tell us that coercive methods haven’t provided us with actionable intelligence. We still manage to protect our country without making excuses for waterboarding in the process.
starfleet_dude on April 23, 2009 at 5:05 PM
No pain, no gain.
It’s as old as the hills and twice as dusty.
The PRECEDENT has always been to utilize water boarding. The only NEW precedent for this POTUS is to selectively spill the beans, SELECTIVELY to destroy national security, editing to hide conclusive evidence that water boarding WORKS, painful as it may be, no deaths and no disfigurement.
The Constitution specifically demands that the government protect and preserve the lives of our nation’s CITIZENS.
Potus Clinton set his own precedent to selectively torture and kill American citizens, destroy all evidence, and manufacture the wacko media propaganda. And the people walked on by.
maverick muse on April 23, 2009 at 5:05 PM
How does a puny jerkwad like sheppard smith get to claim, unchallenged, “we are America”? That punk does not speak for my American friends and me. How does he get a voice? What has he ever done for his country? Will anyone ever ask the meaningful questions of these quislings and shut them up?
Him banging on that table like he is a real badass makes me want to bang his head on that table.
Who the hell does he think he is and why do we let him get away with it? I never watch his show and if I did I would write his sponsors and let them know I don’t appreciate them supporting him.
jarhead0311 on April 23, 2009 at 5:05 PM
Shep, that was torture.
Claypigeon on April 23, 2009 at 5:10 PM
maverick muse, the problem with asking permission rather the begging forgiveness for state-sponsored torture is that you can bet it will be abused, and in the case of wanting to get a “confession” that Saddam Hussein was in cahoots with al-Qaeda, it in fact was. A nation of laws can’t torture and remain committed to the principle of true justice. Ever.
starfleet_dude on April 23, 2009 at 5:10 PM
Sure, but so does gout. Not ALL causes of pain and suffering are torture. Only severe ones. Otherwise, a papercut would be torture. Or having a bad mattress.
Extensive records of US Servicemen who have been subjected to waterboarding have recorded no long-lasting effects. To me, brief suffering=not torture.
hawksruleva on April 23, 2009 at 5:10 PM
Shep Smith: “We do not f***ing torture!”
If we’re Shep, that’s true. We just report on the horror that results & feign outrage. Shep, and those like him, disgust me. The next 9/11(I hope it never happens) will be because of people like Shep Smith who fail to face the reality of the threat. I’ve watched the Nick Berg video. I forced myself to and it made me sick. The kind of enemy we are dealing with cannot be reasoned with. They must be destroyed both militarily and politically. Torture on Twitter including brilliant tweets by AllahPundit, Jim Treacher and others.
Stickeehands on April 23, 2009 at 5:10 PM
Right on!
And +1 on the Waco reference, wonder how many picked up on that.
Ruby Ridge is another. That was a horror show, blasted the head off the wife as she ran into the house, even though she was unarmed and fleeing. Shot the 14 year old son in the back. Whole thing started when they tried to force Randy Weaver to join a Supremacist group so they could use him as an intelligence source, using falsified evidence and the threat of a prison sentence as the stick. Who thing blew up on the Feds when it went to trial, especially after several Agents turned on their own Agency.
Course Janet Reno was AG then. I am sure Holder is a nicer guy.
GunRunner on April 23, 2009 at 5:11 PM
Shep, Shep, Shep…..We.Are.America!!!! We don’t bandy with terrorists and dictators!
Where is your outrage about that Sheppy-boy?
csdeven on April 23, 2009 at 5:11 PM
The semantic argument about what is and what is not torture is a waste of time and effort. The question is, are the techniques used acceptable to prevent another 9/11 or worse? If you answer, “yes” you are a sane, rational human being. If you answer, “no” you’re a farking moron who doesn’t deserve to be protected. In fact, saving you is bad for the gene pool.
TheBigOldDog on April 23, 2009 at 5:11 PM
Immoral why? Because Spock told you so? Produce the moral code pal.
Not everyone is a brain-dead humanist who honestly thinks utopia is possible if we all only clap our hands and believe hard enough.
TheUnrepentantGeek on April 23, 2009 at 5:12 PM
Fear Factor be damned. Have you ever seen the show “Estate of Panic” or “Scare Tactics”? Now THOSE should leave some psychological scars on people. hehe Everyone on those shows should sue for psychological torture! HUURAH! lol
Highlar on April 23, 2009 at 5:12 PM
Absolutism is for teenagers. Grow up.
TheUnrepentantGeek on April 23, 2009 at 5:13 PM
Cowards want to have their cake and eat it too.
Terrorists, once caught, must confess all that they know. If they want to play the tough guy, they play by the tough rules.
Don’t want to undergo water boarding, talk turkey.
maverick muse on April 23, 2009 at 5:13 PM
I wish the shark had eaten him when he jumped it.
Asher on April 23, 2009 at 5:13 PM
Sure, I can use a needle to remove a splinter and while that’s painful it’s laughable to call that torture unless your a five year old having the procedure done by your mother.
That’s not however equivalent to feeling like you’re being drowned, can’t breathe, can’t do anything but suffer at the hands of your torturer.
starfleet_dude on April 23, 2009 at 5:14 PM
Which is why we don’t torture. Though we do use waterboarding, in rare situations.
hawksruleva on April 23, 2009 at 5:15 PM
Wrong. It’s done because waterboarding works in getting information and that’s what they want to train against. They are also trained against being tricked into offering info. Is trickery now torture?
.
In fact, I would suggest that it is the things we are not willing to subject our solders to in training that are torture, like pulling fingernails. I suggest that would be an excellent definition of torture: Anything that volunteer (US) solders accept in their training is not torture.
bagoh20 on April 23, 2009 at 5:16 PM
Torture isn’t what civilized nations justify under law. You bet I’m an absolutist about that.
starfleet_dude on April 23, 2009 at 5:16 PM
I agree completely. Using a needle to remove a splinter could cause long term damage, if you hit a nerve in the finger. Or it could cause bleeding.
KSM could do something other than suffer. He could talk. When I have a splinter, I really DO have no choice but to suffer the pain.
hawksruleva on April 23, 2009 at 5:16 PM
Except for the fact that BEFORE they were ever “tortured” the detainees were told explicitly that they would not be permanently physically harmed in any way…they would not be allowed to drown…they would not be fully healthy before, during, and after the procedures. So…if they knew they wouldn’t be killed, does that still constitute psychological torture? And you would think that after having been waterboarded over 180 times, he KNEW he wouldn’t be killed, and that what was being done to him was in no way fatal. He just got TIRED of it, so fessed up, and helped us to save thousands of lives in LA.
Highlar on April 23, 2009 at 5:18 PM
188 times isn’t what I’d call “rare”. Nor effective.
starfleet_dude on April 23, 2009 at 5:18 PM
Except waterboarding isn’t torture. good grief.
Mommypundit on April 23, 2009 at 5:18 PM
No. It does not. The enemy is not made up of members of a national army. They are not American citizens. Nothing that happens to these individuals is in any way applicable to American citizens who have protection under the US constitution. It’s moot anyway, because what was done to those prisoners was not torture. Torture is fingernails being pulled out.
Torture is bones being broken. Being slapped and made to believe that you are drowning, that do not result in lasting physical damage, are not torture. Watch the video of Nick Berg if you want to see the reality of the threat we face. Look at the pictures of the WTC on fire with people leaping to their deaths to escape the flames and then tell me why we don’t slap non citizens to stop that from happening again.
Stickeehands on April 23, 2009 at 5:19 PM
Once again a lame attempt at “moral equivalency” on this issue from get-a-clue!
So according to your comment America is no better morally than terrorists that indiscriminately murder innocent non-combatant men, women, and children and the atrocities of 9-11 are equal to water boarding…BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA….what the hell planet/universe are you from anyway, do you even have a sense of reality? You need to get your moral compass fixed get-a-clue as it’s obvious you are unable to differentiate good from evil!
If panty-waist, thumb sucking, pacifist liberals like you get your way we will lose our liberty and freedom to be enslaved as dhimmi’s living under the fascist and draconian religious sharia law.
Seriously, have you ever read, studied, researched what sharia is all about, have you not heard of how the Taliban treated people when they were in power in Afghanistan, did you not see the arbitrary brutal hangings, stoning, and shooting of people in front of a crowd in a soccer stadium?
If you think living under sharia laws, values, and morals is no different than living under American laws, values, and morals I suggest you join up with the Taliban, I’m sure they would be more than welcoming to you, just be careful with all that you do and say as one slip up and you will find yourself being stoned, shot, or beheaded without trial or representation in a soccer stadium!
You are a naive fool get-a-clue and you and others like you will be some of the first that will be taken to Islamic death camps to go under the Islamic sword while the rest of us with a functioning moral compass will be fighting back!
Enjoy your sharia!
Liberty or Death on April 23, 2009 at 5:20 PM
Anyone who says f***ing instead of f***in’ is a smoker of the bone.
LtE126 on April 23, 2009 at 5:21 PM
Or as the female Rickeys call it “Wednesday.” (=
Branch Rickey on April 23, 2009 at 5:23 PM
Whoops…meant they WOULD be fully healthy before, during, and after the procedure. Darn typos. :(
Highlar on April 23, 2009 at 5:28 PM
Exactly…I’d agree that it’s probably very uncomfortable, but misses the mark historically when it comes to real torture.
If it’s something you might see on a Japanese gameshow or on Fear Factor….it’s not torture.
Beam me up, Scotty….last I heard it was all of 3 times. Please post your sources.
Asher on April 23, 2009 at 5:28 PM
Rare – 3 people had this done to them. If he survtived it 188 times, he was probably somewhat enured to its effects. And the fact that we did it to him 188 times is an argument against it being torture. If it’s severe and debilitating, then he’d no longer be able to function. How many times can they break your legs before you’re unconscious or dead?
Effectiveness is measured by whether or not results are obtained. And results WERE attained. The informatin they gathered was analyzed, action taken upon it, and terrorists were neutralized as a result.
hawksruleva on April 23, 2009 at 5:31 PM
Torture?
“188 times isn’t what I’d call “rare”. Nor effective.
starfleet_dude on April 23, 2009 at 5:18 PM”
It would seem to me, that standing in a highrise and watching a plane barreling down on you is.
LtE126 on April 23, 2009 at 5:33 PM
I am not pretending. I think I am engaging in an honest discussion with no intentions of being pointless. To begin, since find ourselves on opposite ends of this debate, I think it’s best to agree on the definitions and go from there. Pain and suffering is, as the exact words suggest, pain and suffering. Torture, indeed, has components of each but does it end there? That makes for vague criteria, would you not agree? Below are examples of how that kind of ambiguity is troubling in any legal setting:
In a sense, life has pain and suffering. Torture? The same. Life does not equate torture, however. At least in that it should not be outlawed.
Imprisonment is painful and one would most certainly suffer (all coercively by the hands of another). Should prisons and/or jails be outlawed as well?
As you see in my absurdities, it begs for more specificity than ‘pain and suffering’ only. What then is that does it for you?
anuts on April 23, 2009 at 5:33 PM
I’d also point out that having to waterboard someone 188 times is probably a reason to have a few more tools in the toolbox when it comes to enhanced interrogation techniques.
hawksruleva on April 23, 2009 at 5:33 PM
I completely agree with what you said there, hawksruleva. That’s the thing I don’t get about the lefts insistence that it was torture. If the man had it done to him over 180 times, and he was perfectly fine before and after all of it, how was he tortured exactly? He just didn’t want it done to him anymore, so he broke down and gave answers. I don’t exactly see that as being tortured if there were no real harmful lasting effects to the men that were waterboarded. And don’t try to tell me that there was permanent psychological damage without providing me psych exams of the 3 men in question by at least 3 unrelated, impartial doctors, to compare between them.
Highlar on April 23, 2009 at 5:36 PM
And then having to make the choice between burning to death or jumping a thousand feet to the street below-all the time totally unaware as to why you were being murdered that day.
Del Dolemonte on April 23, 2009 at 5:39 PM
+1 Damned straight
Answer “no” is complicit, enabling terrorism, sabotaging our national security, much too costly for our nation to afford to subsidize. If you answer “no” then pull your head out of your ass to cover it yourself. Offer yourself up for slaughter without pushing us in front of you to comfortably cover your cowardice. You go first into Afghanistan or Iran to protect or share your sense of virtue. Put your body where your mouth is and experience the cost of your own self righteous hypocritical indignation. Feel the impracticality of your lack of sensibilities at your own expense, bed wetter.
maverick muse on April 23, 2009 at 5:40 PM
Hey starfeet, can you please explain the moral reasoning by which you conclude that it is moral to allow innocent people to die in order to save a terrorist from discomfort, even pain and suffering?
ProfessorMiao on April 23, 2009 at 5:42 PM
You failed to reply to those, including me, who have called you on Mueller…and now you’ve inflated it to “directors.” You will not convince anyone when you not only fail to link your citations but change them later. Seems like “specious justifications” fits you in this instance.
Deanna on April 23, 2009 at 5:43 PM
I would even go as far to say I don’t give one rip about ‘permanent psychological damage.’ Every human is different including their breaking point. I’m sure ‘permanent psychological damage’ happens to some (even many?) in even the most benign settings. Can’t necessarily help that. There has to be an agreement on what is too far and what is within reason. I am still unconvinced that pouring or sprinkling water over someone’s nostrils and mouth is beyond the realm of reason.
anuts on April 23, 2009 at 5:45 PM
Shep’s right. We don’t torture. We aggressively interrogate. Long live aggressive interrogation. Protect and defend.
NuclearPhysicist on April 23, 2009 at 5:46 PM
The only thing absolute about you is your ignorance.
Go do your homework from reference books to learn.
maverick muse on April 23, 2009 at 5:48 PM
Oh, I’m with you on this that they weren’t tortured, in any psychological or physical way. I mentioned that merely for those that like to say that “well, it might not have been physical torture, but it was mental torture all the way!”
Highlar on April 23, 2009 at 5:49 PM
KSM was waterboarded 183 times?
Wow … That seems excessive.
BUT IT’S FULL OF AWESOMENESS!
Obama Administration = Clown Car of Fail
HondaV65 on April 23, 2009 at 6:03 PM
Poor Shep is still suffering from ‘post-dramatic Katrina reporting’ syndrome.
Sergeant Tim on April 23, 2009 at 6:04 PM
Glad to see Shep jump the shark. Now maybe Beck can get the time slot. Fox needs to make a trade with CNN: Dobbs for Shep.
Dire Straits on April 23, 2009 at 6:04 PM
I think it is interesting that neither of the other guys reacted to the f-bomb.
Queen0fCups on April 23, 2009 at 6:11 PM
Shep is a hand-wringing, liberal news reader. His Katrina coverage exposed him as a hyper-emotional, gossip-mongering, BDS-suffering fool.
MCPO Airdale on April 23, 2009 at 6:12 PM
Hey starfeet, please explain to me the moral reasoning by which you conclude that it is better to let innocents die than to waterboard.
ProfessorMiao on April 23, 2009 at 6:12 PM
Dump Shep. If I wanted to watch unhinged liberals, I’d watch MSNBC or CNN.
That sound was Shep’s career ending.
Angry Dumbo on April 23, 2009 at 6:14 PM
I heard if you click the heels of your ruby slippers 183 times, you get to go home.
benny shakar on April 23, 2009 at 6:22 PM
Shep isn’t referred to as a Drama Queen for nothing!
KittyLowrey on April 23, 2009 at 6:25 PM
Right on Muse!
I remember the “Human Shields”. They were all for defending the Islamists killers right up until the shrapnel started to fly, then it was back to the latte stand.
GunRunner on April 23, 2009 at 6:25 PM
Have any of you allegedly intelligent people figured out yet the people we are fighting are not civilized? They have absolutly no respect for life of any kind. Do the words “fight fire with fire” have any meaning for you? Our interrogators do what is necessary to obtain information that will save American lives.
As one who has been waterboarded, I’m here to tell you it is not a lot of fun and you will tell whoever is doing it what they want to know. There are NO long term effects and there is relatively little pain. What pain there is goes away immediately. The procedure works on your fear of drowning. It really is not like having your bones broken with a small diameter metal rod. If you have read the memos, the waterboarding lasts for no more than 46 seconds. Yeah, that’s real torture.
Do everyone a favor and GROW UP!
Nuts4koi on April 23, 2009 at 6:30 PM
You’re right Shep,…we don’t torture, or cut the heads off of terrorist with butter knives. I recommend that Shep visit terroristcamp dot com and find out who really does “torture”.
christene on April 23, 2009 at 6:42 PM
I gave up on Shep after Katrina, watching him was torture. The hysteria, the hamming it up…etc.
The guy loves drama.
Terrye on April 23, 2009 at 6:45 PM
starfleet:
Oh come on, do you want to see people die? I mean really.
Terrye on April 23, 2009 at 6:45 PM
Yeah, civilized nations do not torture, instead they do what Obama does and send people over to uncvilized allies who do.
Terrye on April 23, 2009 at 6:47 PM
Hey Shep, whatever happened to fair and balanced?? Think Shep has gone over the edge. And the junk about this being torture is ridiculous. As someone said earlier, had we not done this and stopped attacks, we would have saved the terrorists and lost the innocents. I believe even most on the left are only pretending to be outragesd. But hey, they lie about it. Modus Operandi.
Christian Conservative on April 23, 2009 at 6:47 PM
Jesus, will someone show Shep the movie 300.
I wanna hear THIS IS SPARTA!
upinak on April 23, 2009 at 6:47 PM
I wish Fox would flush this turd. He belongs on MSNBC.
Wade on April 23, 2009 at 7:04 PM
You know what, if he did that with me sitting next to him, I would tell him to back off pal – on air.
I would also tell him that if he makes another threatening move toward me like he just did, I’d break his hand – on air.
He, and most liberals (look at all the leftist protestors who grab a sign and pull it down, or put their hand in front of a camera) really think they can get away with this kind of stuff, because, you know, conservatives aren’t supposed to fight back. I am looking forward to the day one conservative puts an end to it. Once that happens, you won’t see this any more.
Joe Pyne on April 23, 2009 at 7:05 PM
I wonder if Shep would undergo waterboarding. You know, so he can “feel” what the terrorists feel.
darwin on April 23, 2009 at 7:07 PM
Shep has been increasingly throwing little liberal comments in when he reads the news lately. Check out the video of him talking about Glenn Beck and Chris Wallace slamming him on being jealous. But to the point of the thread: I don’t care what they have to do to these people to make them give up information. A whole lot of people lost wives, husbands, children, parents….on 9/11. If you are going to fight these people, you have to grow you some balls.
TXMomof3 on April 23, 2009 at 7:14 PM
I’m sure Shep is very familiar with the sensation of “gagging” and fluids in his nostrils.
Tim Zank on April 23, 2009 at 7:30 PM
I’m sure Shep is very familiar with the sensation of “gagging” and fluids in his nostrils.
Tim Zank on April 23, 2009 at 7:30 PM
That’s just wrong.
TXMomof3 on April 23, 2009 at 7:36 PM
Naaaah, a little snide perhaps, a tad snarky even, but still accurate. His sexual preferences aside, I really dislike him because of his sanctimonius “holier than thou” schtick…
Pompous ass. Period.
Tim Zank on April 23, 2009 at 7:41 PM
Every time I hear one of you weak g-string wearing little boys whining about pouring some water in the face of a murdering terrorist, I remember seeing those innocent men and women jumping out of the windows of the twin towers on 9/11. I guarantee you that the CIA treated those animals better than I would have.
coldshot on April 23, 2009 at 7:49 PM
The Judge was laughing hehe
- The Cat
MirCat on April 23, 2009 at 7:50 PM
Give Glenn Beck Shep’s time slot!
Disturb the Universe on April 23, 2009 at 7:50 PM
A tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
This idiotic performance is now part of Shep’s wiki bio (which I went in vain to see whether or not he had children – since it’s difficult to imagine any parent/New Yorker who lived through 9/11 taking this position).
Buy Danish on April 23, 2009 at 7:58 PM
It’s been downhill for Shep since he blistered Joe the Plumber last Summer.
FireBlogger on April 23, 2009 at 8:13 PM
Time to retire, Shep.
madmonkphotog on April 23, 2009 at 8:27 PM
…aside from the “f-bomb”, which shows a chink in Mr. Smith’s button-up suit of armor vis-a-vis being an on-air news dude…professionalism doesn’t mean that you’re gettin’ a check, dude….
…somebody in Washington needs to read Horne’s “A Savage War Of Peace”. The French Fourth Republic, as healthy as Ozzy Osborne with a hangover, was brought down by their handling of the Algerian War. The Fifth Republic, after worshipful expectations of what that sphinx De Gaulle was going to to, almost went into the toilet. The Right (is there still a French “right”? was there EVER a French “right?”) held out for a continued French presence in Algeria…and what did the Left throw at them? Torture.
Now, 47 years after the war’s over (and at least two rather nasty “civil” wars in Algeria later), they’re still chasing folks down about torture the way Weisenthal went after Nazis….
…and, once again…(wait for it)…THE LEFT IS USING OUR OWN BEST INTENTIONS AGAINST US…to bring down the house, so’s they can rebuild it…in their own image…and they’ll decide what that image is at a later date…once they’ve won…and they have a better idea how much they can get away with…and, of course, after the purges….
…I don’t know what Mr. Smith thinks America is. Does he think it is an ideal? No, Mr. Smith…it’s a country. It’s not an eternally pristine concept shining like a diamond from the brow of God. It’s a country. An historical construct…constructed by human beings…who built stuff pretty soundly back in 1787, but with imperfections nonetheless. Ever read anything about that pesky “3/5ths of a person” deal codified into our Constitution? I’m sure that your native Mississippi benefitted by it prior to its being expunged, Mr. Smith. (And I say this as a Confederate partisan!) Ever read anything about the abortion that was Prohibition? Remember Margaret Sanger and eugenics? Remember Jim Crow?
America has done a number of things it should be ashamed of. (And I say this as a veteran, the husband of a veteran, the father of veterans.) Defending itself against the brainwashed members of a murderous death cult by gathering intelligence isn’t among them.
Once upon a time, a certain Secretary of War from Tennessee looked down on such doings as intelligence collection. He thought that gentlemen don’t read other gentlemen’s mail. Well…Mr. Hull…what if your being attacked by a bunch who’re less than gentlemen?
There’s a line in movie “Big Jake”, and Maureen O’Hara (may she live forever) says, in response to a need to deal with Richard Boone and a collection of villains, that they’re facing a hard and unpleasant job…and that they’ll need a hard and unpleasant man to do it. Then, the screen is filled with the face of John Wayne.
That’s what we’ve got now, and have had since 2001…a hard and unpleasant task. It’s been increasingly more unpleasant with the passing of years, going back to at least 1948, when the morons in Atlee’s cowardly administration cut the cords in the Middle East because “colonialism is wrong”, beginning an avalanche of new nations to rise, as lovable as stillborn piglets, from relative (enforced) peace to full-throttle revolving door dictatorship from Jo’burg to Jerusalem, from Algiers to Bangladesh. Colonialism may’ve been wrong, but turning tribal basket-cases, “Deformed, unfinish’d, sent before (their)time Into this breathing world, scarce half made up”, loose on the world was creating busloads of potential Richard III’s…and wasn’t he a well-adjusted, friendly and sympathetic sort of Shakespearean guy….
…so, America The Pure doesn’t do torture…with or without the “f-word”…it also doesn’t leave the lavatory without washing its hands…doesn’t belch audibly…doesn’t fart without saying “excuse me”, and never in the presence of a lady…wouldn’t think of bullying banks into accepting unwanted “bail-out” funds…and would get the vapors at the very thought of putting a chill on free speech….
…but, in the “through the looking glass” world we live in today, without the information derived from even the limited and controlled torture practiced by professionals who’d be less apt to lose their cool on the job than Mr. Smith (apparently), we may not have a country, pure or polluted, to brag and posture about.
Puritan1648 on April 23, 2009 at 8:33 PM
Watching Sep on TV, now that’s torture!
nazo311 on April 23, 2009 at 8:35 PM
…by the way, on another related subject, Napolitano’s been singin’ this song about how the CIA’s been somehow hoodwinking people into letting it get away with illegal stuff…usually, Judge Andy’s pretty cool…but he seems to be indulging here, on Beck yesterday or the day before, in a rather rare bit of bias…it would seem that he likes his law as pure as Mr. Smith likes his national reputation…forgetting that the law is a thing formed with human hands…and are human hands ever pure?
…after all…the Ivory Soap people even admit to a fraction of a percent of schmutz in their product….
Puritan1648 on April 23, 2009 at 8:36 PM
I DRV all around him, but don’t watch Schlep. He lost all my respect during his over the top and outragous Katrina coverage. I’ll bet Rush watched Shep during Katrina and that’s where he coined his “drive-by media” phrase.
Sheppard should move on to MSNBC or CNN. He’d be welcome with open arms, though his job wouldn’t be very secure.
SoldiersMom on April 23, 2009 at 8:41 PM
Can he get fired now? What an idiot.
-Aslan’s Girl
Aslans Girl on April 23, 2009 at 9:30 PM
I wonder how ‘tolerant’ Americans will be after 9-11 Part Two: Armageddon debuts?
The irony is that the most vocal of the terrorist sympathizers live and work in the very urban areas to be targeted by them.
Dr. ZhivBlago on April 23, 2009 at 9:36 PM
That is exactly what I was thinking. Shep looks a little buzzed. Red faced, slurring, speaking to himself…I hope this isn’t true but I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a trip to Betty Ford in his future.
Bill C on April 23, 2009 at 10:27 PM
Exactly the impression I got. It was the muttering under his breath that tipped me off. I’m surprised there hasn’t been any kind of apology, or at least a statement of some sort from Fox. Dropping the F-bomb just when the kiddies are arriving home from school…Shep, sober up.
Dee2008 on April 23, 2009 at 11:28 PM
For once in my life I agree with Shep. America doesn’t torture. We differ on the other part. Telling somebody you’re are going to put them in a box with a bug, keeping them awake or pouring water on their face ISN’T TORTURE, you dolt. What a pussy.
Remember when he sat on a bridge after Katrina and spread all of those false stories?
Now not only do our enemies now know that we won’t do anything more than ask them politely to rat out their co-conspirators who are going to carry out the attack that the prisoner helped plan, but now they also know that the idiots running our country are so weak that we think crap like this is too much, it’s torture.
I need to puke now. Thanks for nothing, Uhhhbama
darwin-t on April 23, 2009 at 11:35 PM
Comment pages: « Previous 1 2 3 4 5 Next »