Yet Another WH Misunderstanding

Daisy · Oct 27, 2006

Just as "Listen, we have never been stay the course, George" was widely misinterpreted to mean that the President was disavowing all his previous, multiple "we must stay the course" admonitions over the past several years, Cheney is now being misinterpreted:

Here’s what Cheney said Tuesday to Scott Hennen of Fargo’s WDAY on Tuesday:

Hennen: I’ve had people call and say, “Please, let the vice president know that if it takes dunking a terrorist in water, we’re all for it, if it saves American lives.” Again, this debate seems a little silly given the threat we face, would you agree?

Cheney: I do agree. And I think the terrorist threat, for example, with respect to our ability to interrogate high-value detainees like Khalid Sheik Mohammed, that’s been a very important tool that we’ve had to be able to secure the nation. Khalid Sheik Mohammed provided us with enormously valuable information about how many there are, about how they plan, what their training processes are and so forth. We’ve learned a lot. We need to be able to continue that.

Hennen: Would you agree a dunk in water is a no-brainer if it can save lives?

Cheney: Well, it’s a no-brainer for me, but for a while there I was criticized as being the vice president for torture. We don’t torture. That’s not what we’re involved in. We live up to our obligations in international treaties that we’re party to and so forth. But the fact is, you can have a fairly robust interrogation program without torture, and we need to be able to do that.

Source: Austin American Statesman: (linkie)
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Just because Cheney immediately associates Khalid Sheik Mohammed with "a dunk in the water", it is ridiculous to make the jump that the "dunk in the water" refers to waterboarding.

Roll Call executive editor Morton M. Kondracke ... wrote, "According to ABC News, CIA officers said that the highest-ranking al Qaeda operative yet captured, Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, held out for two and a half minutes before begging to talk. The CIA claims it got valuable information from him."

However during the November 18 broadcast of ABC's World News Tonight, chief investigative correspondent Brian Ross reported that "CIA officers say 9-11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed lasted the longest under waterboarding, two and a half minutes, before beginning to talk, with debatable results."

Source: Media Matters (linkie)
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Tony Snow explains the misunderstanding:

Snow: The vice president didn’t make any comments about water boarding.
Q: That was what the question was about.
Snow: No, the question was a loosely worded question. Now the vice president never talks about questioning techniques in a theoretical or a real manner. We just don’t talk about that.

Q: The question was, “Would you agree a dunk in the water is a no-brainer if it can save lives?” Cheney: “It’s a no-brainer for me.”
Snow: Yes, but that is not a question — do the words “water boarding” appear there?

Q: No, they don’t, but …
Q: What was he talking about?
Snow: He did not interpret it as water boarding.

Q: Come on. What is that supposed to mean? Let’s be real here.
Snow: I am being real here. Do you really think the vice president is going to talk about water boarding when we have said many times …

Q: I don’t know.
Snow: The answer is no.

Q: No, he said he doesn’t support torture, but there was sort of a wink implied with the …
Snow: No, there’s not. Let me just say one more time, let me be very clear, and then you can go at me as many times and I’ll say the same thing over and over, which is: We don’t talk about techniques, that would include water boarding. He neither confirms nor denies its use; neither supports nor shows a lack of support for it. He is not, that was not the context that he thought it was being asked in.

Q: He didn’t explicitly talk about …
Snow: Not explicitly or implicitly.

Q: But he certainly…
Snow: No, you think he did. A reasonable person interpreting this when the questioner …

Q: A reasonable person interpreting this …
Snow: Well, … I’m telling you what the vice president’s view is, which is it wasn’t about water boarding and he wasn’t talking about it. Period.

Q: Then what was it about? What is a “dunk in the water” then by vice president?
Snow: It’s a dunk in the water. It’s a dunk in the water, as I said.

Q: To elicit answers?
Snow: No, look, you can look at the transcript.

Q: So the detainees go swimming?
Snow: I don’t know. We’ll have to find out.

Q: It just doesn’t make sense.
Snow: No, what doesn’t make sense is I’ve already told you what his position is, and also you know as a matter of common sense that the vice president of the United States is not going to be talking about water boarding. Never would, never does, never will.

Q: We know that’s your policy, but did the vice president slip up and …
Snow: No. Are you kidding? You think Dick Cheney is going to slip up on something like — no. Come on.

Source: Statesman, above.
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So there you have it, folks - Cheney didn't mean what he appeared to mean because he would not "slip up".

Color me convinced.

[/sarcasm]There is a wonderful Nixon-era word for that: stonewalling.

carpro · Oct 27, 2006

Daisy said:

Color me convinced.
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OK.

Consider yourself colored.:smilewinkgrin:

Bro. Curtis · Oct 27, 2006

Kinda sounds like ole' KSM got baptized.:laugh:

As far as the stonewaling, and while I don't hate Cheney as much as a lot of folks, he's the one who tried to float the "falling shot" theory, after he blasted his hunting buddy in the face. Could very well be he's trying to get around something.

Baptist in Richmond · Oct 28, 2006

Bro. Curtis said:

Kinda sounds like ole' KSM got baptized.:laugh:

As far as the stonewaling, and while I don't hate Cheney as much as a lot of folks, he's the one who tried to float the "falling shot" theory, after he blasted his hunting buddy in the face. Could very well be he's trying to get around something.
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I wonder if he would tell you what he told Senator Leahy for writing that.

Hope all is well with you, Bro. Curtis,
BiR (at the airport headed home to Florida)

Not_hard_to_find · Oct 28, 2006

Q: He didn’t explicitly talk about …
Snow: Not explicitly or implicitly.
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Actually, the entire exchange sounds to me as though Q's point is "I will not accept any answer from you unless it is the one I want hear -- and what I want to hear is my own interpretation. And, if I keep this up long enough I'll hear what I want to print."

Terry_Herrington · Oct 28, 2006

Not_hard_to_find said:

Actually, the entire exchange sounds to me as though Q's point is "I will not accept any answer from you unless it is the one I want hear -- and what I want to hear is my own interpretation. And, if I keep this up long enough I'll hear what I want to print."
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If Cheney was not talking about Waterboarding, what was he referring to then?

TomMann · Oct 29, 2006

As a graduate of Navy SERE (Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape) training during the late 60's, where as part of our training..... several of the class actually got to experience waterboarding..... first hand.... as the boardee, (gratefully I myself was not one) I find no sympathy for the Terrorist who finds himself on the down side of the spout.......

Daisy · Oct 29, 2006

TomMann said:

As a graduate of Navy SERE (Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape) training during the late 60's, where as part of our training..... several of the class actually got to experience waterboarding..... first hand.... as the boardee, (gratefully I myself was not one) I find no sympathy for the Terrorist who finds himself on the down side of the spout.......
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You have no sympathy for the Terrorist, but what about the person caught up in the dragnet who is NOT the Terrorist?

Bro. Curtis · Oct 30, 2006

He'll most likely live, and suffer no long-term effects.

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