Torture Never Happened

[Robbien]

http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/cjames/2009/05/torture-never-happened.php?ref=reccafe

That is the inexplicable conclusion one must draw from the Obama Administration's refusal to release these photos. A lefty blogger at Daily Kos sums it up quite well:

This is an unbelievable moment. Dick Cheney's PR offensive over the last month actually worked. Barack Obama just crumbled and will follow Cheney's command to not release the new set of detainee abuse pictures.

By the way, if you hadn't figured it out by now, that's why you saw every Cheney in the world on television arguing that torture works and that releasing more information would gravely harm the troops. They weren't worried about what was already released; they were worried about what was going to get released. They were trying to pre-empt the most damaging thing of all - the pictures that show the torture.

Just talk about torture doesn't really do it for the American people. But when they see pictures, they get it.

. . .

So, that is what this whole fight has been about - the pictures. And now Obama adopted Cheney's position that it endangers national security to release the pictures and he will be saddled for the rest of time with the obligation to fight Cheney's battle for him. And anytime any reasonable person makes a case that as a free and open democracy we should know what our government did, the right-wing will counter with, "Even Obama thinks it endangers national security!"

The reason why this is such a maddening argument is that it is so f'in obvious that the real problem isn't releasing the pictures; it's what we did in the pictures. The argument that Obama so stupidly accepted just now shifts the blame from the people who committed the abuse to the people who want to uncover it and put an end to it.

If you released the pictures and show how the "enhanced interrogation" memos directly led to these abuses, there would be no more torture debate. Everyone could see with their own eyes the horrific results of torture. Now instead, Obama has not just protected the torturers, but empowered them. They now get to claim they tried to protect America and that anyone who tries to show their misdeeds endangers America.

The X-Files Cigarette Smoking man once said "we tell you what you need to know." If torture did happen it would be on our television news screens wouldn't it? But I guess it never did happen. We were mistaken. Obama bought Cancer Man's ultimate argument for government secrecy, "if people were to know of the things that I know, it would all fall apart."

[gcomeau]

1. Absurd.

Yes, the EXACT way to say "torture never happened" is to publicly state "we can't show these horrible pictures of torture and abuse to people because they're just too nasty and people will react badly to them".

That's just textbook denial that torture occurred that is!

You can make a legitimate argument that the pictures should be seen, but saying it's a cover-up of the fact that torture occurred at all? That is 100% pure idiocy.

[Robbien]

2. Everyone was talking about torture but the American public was not upset

until the picture of the hooded Iraqi hit the airwaves.

Now we are talking about children being raped in Gitmo, prisoners were mutilated and killed, but the general American public is mainly unaware and complacent. For them the torture never happened.

But if there were pictures on the MSM, the mood of the general American public would quickly change.