Sen Dick Durbin

[rubberneck]

At least his first name is appropriate. I hope the Senate penalizes him for his comments yesterday in which he likened american troops to Nazi's. Real classy....

From the WSJ:

Sen. Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat, took the Senate floor yesterday and likened American servicemen to Nazis (link in PDF):

When you read some of the graphic descriptions of what has occurred here [at Guantanamo Bay]--I almost hesitate to put them in the [Congressional] Record, and yet they have to be added to this debate. Let me read to you what one FBI agent saw. And I quote from his report:

On a couple of occasions, I entered interview rooms to find a detainee chained hand and foot in a fetal position to the floor, with no chair, food or water. Most times they urinated or defecated on themselves, and had been left there for 18-24 hours or more. On one occasion, the air conditioning had been turned down so far and the temperature was so cold in the room, that the barefooted detainee was shaking with cold. . . . On another occasion, the [air conditioner] had been turned off, making the temperature in the unventilated room well over 100 degrees. The detainee was almost unconscious on the floor, with a pile of hair next to him. He had apparently been literally pulling his hair out throughout the night. On another occasion, not only was the temperature unbearably hot, but extremely loud rap music was being played in the room, and had been since the day before, with the detainee chained hand and foot in the fetal position on the tile floor.

If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime--Pol Pot or others--that had no concern for human beings. Sadly, that is not the case. This was the action of Americans in the treatment of their prisoners.

We are fighting an enemy that murdered 3,000 innocent people on American soil 3 1/2 years ago and would murder millions more if given the chance--and according to Dick Durbin, our soldiers are the Nazis.

[jbour13]

The Washington Times had an interesting block of info on how Gitmo stacks up against his claims.

Hitler's Concentration camps: 9 million killed (6 million being Jewish)
Stalin's Gulags: 2.7 million killed
Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge: 1.7 million

Gitmo: 0 deaths
5 admitted Koran abuses by US persons
15 Koran abuses by detainees.

3 hots and a cot. When the detainees where picked up very few had a Koran in their possesion, where typically in dire medical condition, etc.... We give them a Koran to read as a religious right, and medical/ dental benefits most Americans don't even get.

What an injustice

Look,... anyone who follows this man's lead on this is a political sheep, nothing more. Hopefully he will be admonished by his peers from the same party.

Bottom line, Gitmo sucks,.....it's supposed too. This is not the Taliban summercamp. This is meant to help the US and it's allies counter the threat of terrorism. At what point do you cross the line in extraction of info from these detainees? That is not for weak stomached policy makers. I only believe a few on this forum know what it's like to be in the booth with these fella's and know how it really works.

Rant over, sorry.... this....Senator got me a little pissed.

He's referred to as the number 2 man in the Democratic Party, I think with that being said I'll now go take a Dick and wipe my Durbin!!!!

Somehow I think I'll pay for posting that comment.

[Team Sergeant]

Sounds like "dick" has stepped on it.

"dick" does not realize, yet, the ramifications of what he has said.

I’m betting "dick" will issue an apology before the day ends, or within 24 hours.

See "dick" run.

What a dick.

[rubberneck]

Originally Posted by Team Sergeant

I’m betting "dick" will issue an apology before the day ends, or within 24 hours.

I wish you are right but sadly Durbin refuses to apologize for his idiotic comments.

from the AP:

CHICAGO Illinois Senator Dick Durbin says he won't apologize for comments comparing American interrogators at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to Nazis and Soviet gulags.

News of the Democrat's comparison created a buzz around the Internet today, fueled by sound bites of yesterday's Senate floor speech on radio talk shows. By this afternoon, Illinois Republican Party Chairman Andy McKenna asked Durbin to apologize.

Durbin says the Bush administration should apologize for abandoning the Geneva Conventions.

Human-rights activist groups and some lawmakers -- mostly Democrats -- want Bush to close the prison.

But administration officials say some of the people who have been detained at Guantanamo later return to fight against the United States.

Copyright 2005 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

The only good that is coming out of stuff like this is that the modern Democratic party is speeding along blindly towards irrelevance. Most American's have no issues with officials who don't like Gitmo but they rightfully draw the line when they attack the troops there.

[Bravo1-3]

Awesome, Durban has found a new career... lead recruiter for Al Queda, inc.

[Bill Harsey]

Uncle Rush is on this pretty hard today.

[Bill Harsey]

Rush just reported that Dick Durbin has been featured as a hero in that fine middle eastern news service called Aljazeera.

edited to add: Bravo 1-3, I think you are on to something.

[Team Sergeant]

Originally Posted by rubberneck

I wish you are right but sadly Durbin refuses to apologize for his idiotic comments.

Patience, it will come. I'd place money on it. This guy doesn't have the balls of the common nat. Give him a day,he'll soon cave in.

[Roguish Lawyer]

OpinionJournal

Best of the Web Today - June 16, 2005
By JAMES TARANTO

Durbin Digs In http://www.sj-r.com/sections/news/stories/58552.asp

Dick Durbin of Illinois, the Senate's No. 2 Democrat, is refusing to apologize for likening U.S. servicemen to Nazis, comments we noted yesterday http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/?id=110006823 . Instead, as the State Journal-Register of Springfield reports, Durbin issued a statement that said, "This administration should apologize to the American people for abandoning the Geneva Conventions."

In truth, it isn't the Bush administration that is abandoning the Geneva Conventions. It is the critics, such as Amnesty International http://web.amnesty.org/library/index...pen&of=eng-2am , who insist that terrorists should be protected under the conventions as if they were legitimate soldiers or civilians. The purpose of the Geneva Conventions is not to protect combatants' "human rights" but to spell out the rules of war, rules that impose reciprocal obligations on both sides of a conflict.

A central reason for those rules is to protect civilians by declaring that they are not legitimate targets of military action. Combatants who pose as civilians (i.e., do not wear uniforms) or who target civilians are spies and terrorists respectively and are not entitled to protection as prisoners of war. Indeed, Durbin acknowledged in his Senate speech http://www.sj-r.com/extras/release/G...ment061405.htm that "the Geneva Conventions do not give POW status to terrorists."

But he went on to insist that the conventions "protect everyone captured during wartime." He bases this on the "official commentary on the convention," which states that "nobody in enemy hands can fall outside the law." Durbin is unclear as to just what protection he thinks al Qaeda terrorists should get. And little wonder, because the implication of his comments is that terrorists are entitled to protection as civilians.

As the Amnesty International report linked above notes, the source of the commentary Durbin quoted is the International Committee on the Red Cross, and it refers to Article 4 of the Fourth Geneva Convention http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/92.htm , which protects civilians captured during wartime. Yet the actual text of Article 4 says something quite different:

*** QUOTE ***

Nationals of a neutral State who find themselves in the territory of a belligerent State, and nationals of a co-belligerent State, shall not be regarded as protected persons while the State of which they are nationals has normal diplomatic representation in the State in whose hands they are.

*** END QUOTE ***

This would exclude someone like Mohammed al-Qahtani, the Saudi national whose "torture" at the lungs of Christina Aguilera made the cover of Time this week. As a matter of international law, his fate has nothing to do with the Geneva Conventions but is a matter between Washington and Riyadh.

In any case, if Dick Durbin thinks terrorists are the moral or legal equivalent of civilians, let him say so directly. And even if this is a legitimate point of view, it doesn't excuse his smearing American soldiers as Nazi-like.

[Bravo1-3]

I posted this on another board, but just to elaborate:

Around 1938, my grandfather was picked up by the NKVD while he was at work. His family was not notified. He was beaten with a sap, and had a pistol pointed at his head and told to name 5 names of other local "sedicious jew traitors". When he refused, they drove a nail through his left foot into the floor of the room, smashed his hand with a hammer, and used his abdomen as an ashtray.

They put him on a train after making him sign a statement confessing to counter-revolutionary activities. He spent 3 years breaking rocks for the trans-siberian railway and a canal. He lived on less than 1000 calories per day in a camp with no heat in the prisoners barracks, with guards who would randomly beat and execute prisoners for no reason other than boredom. Every morning, they would have to remove the bodies of prisoners who had died and dump them into a pit.

My grandmother survived the Warsaw Ghetto, and a concentration camp where she lost every member of her family.

Comparing anything that has happened at Gitmo to a Gulag or a Concentration Camp makes me think about doing irrational things. Did we make the nice "Freedom Fighter" sad? Did he make a poopie on himself? Didums get cold and not have his blankie? Tough shit.

Dick Durban has obviously found a new a new job as a head hunter for Al Queda

[Gypsy]

Originally Posted by jbour13

Look,... anyone who follows this man's lead on this is a political sheep, nothing more. Hopefully he will be admonished by his peers from the same party.

Wouldn't hold my breath too long on that one...you hear some of the other senators on GITMO?

Dick Durbin, U.S. Senator
332 Dirksen Senate Bldg.
Washington, DC 20510
Primary Phone: (202) 224-2152
Fax: (202) 228-0400
E-Mail: ed_greelegs@durbin.senate.gov

[CoLawman]

Originally Posted by rubberneck

I wish you are right but sadly Durbin refuses to apologize for his idiotic comments.

from the AP:



The only good that is coming out of stuff like this is that the modern Democratic party is speeding along blindly towards irrelevance. Most American's have no issues with officials who don't like Gitmo but they rightfully draw the line when they attack the troops there.

I concur with Rubberneck!

"DICK" just insulted some very powerful lobbyists.
American Legion
Veterans of Foreign Wars
Marines
Families of Soldiers
This list goes on.

"DICK" is now a front runner for the Neville Chamberlain award!

He is alot like the idiot that ignores that bumper sticker in Fayetteville!

You chose the wrong city to pick a bar fight in!

[jbour13]

Originally Posted by Gypsy

Wouldn't hold my breath too long on that one...you hear some of the other senators on GITMO?

Dick Durbin, U.S. Senator
332 Dirksen Senate Bldg.
Washington, DC 20510
Primary Phone: (202) 224-2152
Fax: (202) 228-0400
E-Mail: ed_greelegs@durbin.senate.gov

No disrespect towards you ma'am, but I refuse to hold my breath for this F***ing Punk.

I will however continue to put my ass on the line for the greater good of this nation and gracious citizens like yourself.

[Team Sergeant]

Originally Posted by CoLawman

I concur with Rubberneck!

"DICK" just insulted some very powerful lobbyists.
American Legion
Veterans of Foreign Wars
Marines
Families of Soldiers
This list goes on.

And this is the reason he will issue an apology! He will fold soon enough.

[Gypsy]

Originally Posted by jbour13

No disrespect towards you ma'am, but I refuse to hold my breath for this F***ing Punk.

I will however continue to put my ass on the line for the greater good of this nation and gracious citizens like yourself.

I wouldn't either...and I thank you.

My comment was only in reference to your comment that hopefully others in his party would admonish him.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,159885,00.html

Durbin, the No. 2 Senate Democrat, said Friday that he was sorry if his initial inflammatory comments had been taken the wrong way.

"I sincerely regret if what I said caused anyone to misunderstand my true feelings: Our soldiers around the world and their families at home deserve our respect, admiration and total support," he said. "My statement in the Senate was critical of the policies of this administration, which add to the risk our soldiers face."

Why is it he can't see that what he said IS adding to the risk? This is no apology.