Does anybody at the Washington Post read?

Anne Kornblut, one of the best WaPo reporters, makes a gross factual error her report on the circumstances under which terrorism suspects will be interrogated in the Obama administration. There's to be a new unit of specially trained interrogators. The unit's purpose allegedly will not be to obtain information to put the prisoners on trial, but "to glean intelligence, especially about potential terrorist attacks". That was also the thrust of George W. Bush's infamous interrogation programs. The new unit will be housed in the FBI but report directly to the National Security Council. It will operate under the rules set out in the newly (2006) revised Army Field Manual.

Kornblut parrots the line propagated initially by the Bush administration, and repeated by Democrats: that the AFM strictly adheres to the Geneva Conventions and prohibits all forms of torture, abuse, and degradation of prisoners. Quite the contrary is true. The new Army Field Manual rules (while a vast improvement over the outrageous practices used by the CIA and DoD and authorization from the Bush administration) do in fact specify ways that prisoners may be abused. The abuse is euphemistically termed 'separation' and codified in Appendix M of the Manual.

Here is Kornblut's assessment of the new interrogation policy:

Using the Army Field Manual means certain techniques in the gray zone between torture and legal questioning -- such as playing loud music or depriving prisoners of sleep -- will not be allowed. Which tactics are acceptable was an issue "looked at thoroughly," one senior official said. Obama had already banned certain severe measures that the Bush administration had permitted, such as waterboarding.

The phrase "gray zone" ought to be an immediate tip off that the author is spinning the truth. There is no legitimate doubt that the use of deafening noise and sleep deprivation to 'soften up' prisoners is torture and illegal in the US. It was the Bush administration that sought to convince Americans that long prohibited practices somehow fell into a middle ground between the legal and the illegal. They did succeed in convincing most major news outlets to refrain from calling torture 'torture', which is why reporters like Kornblut continue in this absurd pretense.

In any case, can Kornblut or her editors be bothered to read documents? The Army Field Manual (PDF) explicitly permits interrogators to use isolation and sleep deprivation on prisoners. References are to sections of Appendix M of the Manual. Prisoners may be confined in total isolation for up to 30 days, and even longer if approval is sought up the chain of command (M-29). Furthermore, the Manual states (on the very last page of its last appendix) that prisoners need not be permitted more than 4 hours of sleep per day (M-30). Anybody who goes for weeks on only four hours of sleep will quickly become subject to all the psychological disturbances that sleep deprivation is notorious for.

Parenthetically, I note a passage worthy of Franz Kafka in Appendix M of the Manual. It asserts blandly (M-4) that 'separation' "is consistent with the minimum humane standards of treatment required by US law, the law of war, and does not constitute cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment as defined in the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 and addressed in GPW Common Article III" (emphasis mine). The US is of course bound by more than the Detainee Treatment Act, but the Field Manual ignores that fact (making no mention, for example, of the UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment). Instead, the Appendix consistently pretends that its procedures are acceptable because they are not banned by the 2005 legislation.

Valtin has a lengthy discussion of how the Army Field Manual codifies some of the Bush administration's torture practices.

Meanwhile, no word yet about whether the new government's interrogation unit will continue (as the CIA did under Bush) to employ Blackwater to fly terrorist suspects from their confinement in Guantanamo prison to secret prisons around the world, including such hell holes as Uzbekistan. The purpose of these 'extraordinary renditions' was to subject the prisoners to "special treatment", according to an internal Blackwater memo obtained by Der Spiegel. As if the torture employed at Gitmo were not special enough.

Incidentally, the memo also reveals that the CIA's contract with Blackwater to establish roving assassination squads was overseen by none other than Alvin B. Krongard, the former Executive Director of the CIA (and upon his retirement, a director of Blackwater). He is the brother of Bush's corrupt and partisan Inspector General for the State Department, Howard Krongard, whose hacktacular career we described here two years ago.

crossposted from unbossed.com

Can right-wingers read? Pt. 3

Debra Saunders complains that leftists have forgotten that dissent is patriotic now that a Democrat occupies the White House. A shame that Republicans on the whole didn't seem to think so during the last eight years.

But what's her evidence of vast left-wing hypocrisy? A gross – and apparently deliberate - misreading of a blog post at the White House website. Saunders goes so far as to rewrite the post to transform it into the very thing she wants to decry. Her best defense, in the circumstances, would be that she cannot actually read.

Here's her account of what she insinuates is a WH plan to track dissent against the President's healthcare policy:

Imagine it's four years ago and an aide to President George W. Bush posted a blog on the Whitehouse.gov Web site that bemoaned Internet criticism of the Iraq war, then continued: "These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain e-mails or through casual conversations.

Since we can't keep track of all of them here at the White House, we're asking for your help. If you get an e-mail or see something on the Web about anti-war protests that seem fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov."

Substitute the words "health insurance reform" for "anti-war protests," and you get the exact wording of a blog posted by Macon Phillips, the White House director of new media, on Tuesday.

But the WH blog post doesn't concern dissent or opinions. Phillips is quite clear that WH wants to learn what kinds of false information about health care reform are being circulated beneath public scrutiny, so that it has a chance to rebut them publicly. Pretty simple and reasonable request, I'd say, asking people to tell them what dumb lies they've been hearing.

Saunders can't be bothered to address what Phillips actually writes. So instead she transforms his "disinformation about health insurance reform" into "criticism of the Iraq war", and "health insurance reform" into "anti-war protests". In other words, she equates questions of fact with political opinions in order to insinuate that the right to express dissenting political opinions is under threat.

It appears to be calculated deception by Saunders. A more charitable explanation of course would be that she's simply illiterate.

What follows is the full text of the WH blog post in question (minus a video link):

Opponents of health insurance reform may find the truth a little inconvenient, but as our second president famously said, "facts are stubborn things."

Scary chain emails and videos are starting to percolate on the internet, breathlessly claiming, for example, to "uncover" the truth about the President’s health insurance reform positions.

In this video, Linda Douglass, the communications director for the White House's Health Reform Office, addresses one example that makes it look like the President intends to "eliminate" private coverage, when the reality couldn’t be further from the truth.

[Video clip]

For the record, the President has consistently said that if you like your insurance plan, your doctor, or both, you will be able to keep them. He has even proposed eight consumer protections relating specifically to the health insurance industry.

There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov

Here are the complete videos that Linda refers to. First from the AARP:

[Video clip]

And then from the President's news conference:

[Video clip]

crossposted at unbossed.com

Can right-wingers read? Pt. 2

The recently released inspectors general report on Bush's warrantless surveillance programs had almost nothing positive to say about them or John Yoo, who provided specious legal justifications for those programs on demand. Today Yoo lashes back at the inspectors in a Wall Street Journal op-ed. His matrix of illogic is so dense that the piece appears to be intended to make your eyes bleed. In the interest of public welfare, I'll supply a summary:

Shorter John Yoo: I don't understand the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978. And neither do you.

There are so many deplorable gaps and misstatements (as with his many Bush-ear OLC opinions) that the question naturally arises: Can John Yoo read?

Yoo doesn't understand the clear meaning of the FISA law or how it was updated since 1978.

Yoo isn't aware that the FISA law came into existence in 1978, long after Franklin Roosevelt's death.

Yoo makes a constitutional argument without displaying any apparent awareness of the text of the Constitution.

Yoo doesn't understand what was at issue in Youngstown v. Sawyer, with its landmark ruling by the Supreme Court on the balance between Congressional and Presidential power.

Yoo quotes from but evidently hasn't read the Federalist Papers.

Yoo hasn't even read what he himself wrote about the Patriot Act in 2003.

Traditionally it has been John Yoo's writings that have evoked horror and disgust. But the deeper problem appears to be Yoo's reading ability.

Can right-wingers read?

Any post with a title such as that probably should be an ongoing series.

Today the right-wing nuts hostile to health care reform have seized upon and uncritically parroted a frivolous accusation made by the hyper-right-wing Investor's Business Daily. Their absurd claim is that the House Democrats' health care bill would outlaw private health insurance. The evidence? A single sentence snatched out of context from a document of more than 1,000 pages.

Here's the accusation:

The provision would indeed outlaw individual private coverage. Under the Orwellian header of "Protecting The Choice To Keep Current Coverage," the "Limitation On New Enrollment" section of the bill clearly states:

"Except as provided in this paragraph, the individual health insurance issuer offering such coverage does not enroll any individual in such coverage if the first effective date of coverage is on or after the first day" of the year the legislation becomes law.

So we can all keep our coverage, just as promised — with, of course, exceptions: Those who currently have private individual coverage won't be able to change it. Nor will those who leave a company to work for themselves be free to buy individual plans from private carriers.

What IBD neglects to mention is that the subheading that this sentence occurs under reads: GRANDFATHERED HEALTH INSURANCE COVERAGE DEFINED. That's what "such coverage" in the quoted sentence refers to. The bill does of course allow other health insurance plans to be developed in the future, but they're just not grandfathered.

You'd have thought that before making the accusation, or parroting it, the right-wingers would have read the relevant part of the bill (PDF). Brings us back to our original question.

One high-profile right-wing nut who evidently didn't bother to read the bill before parroting IBD, later posted this hilariously revealing update:

Reader Patrick Ying disagrees:

Investor’s Business Daily did not continue to read the bill to page 19. “Individual health insurance coverage that is not grandfathered health insurance coverage under subsection (a) may only be offered on or after the first day of Y1 as an Exchange-participating health benefits plan. ” It does not outlaw individual private coverage – you can still buy the plan on the Exchange where they will compete with the public option, not be replaced by it. The advantage of the Exchange, is that the coverage no longer has one of the problems of individual coverage – skyrocketing premiums should you become ill.

Hmm. We should have more time for all this stuff to be sorted out. Instead they’re ramming it through as quickly as possible. That makes me suspicious.

The "stuff" will be sorted out by those who bother to read it, of course. Hmm. Now that is suspicious.