UPDATED: Torture... What The FUCK Has Happened To Us?

(I blogged about torture very briefly two years ago HERE.)

Messed up world we live in. Folks all over - some I know personally - are defending the "right" of our government to torture our "enemies" *. Some refuse to call it torture, but I do not think you can read THIS and think rationally "That's not torture." (Hat tip to Cunning Dove from Vox' blog.)

Having been subjected to this technique, I can say: It is risky but not entirely dangerous when applied in training for a very short period. However, when performed on an unsuspecting prisoner, waterboarding is a torture technique - without a doubt. There is no way to sugarcoat it.

In the media, waterboarding is called "simulated drowning," but that's a misnomer. It does not simulate drowning, as the lungs are actually filling with water. There is no way to simulate that. The victim is drowning.

Unless you have been strapped down to the board, have endured the agonizing feeling of the water overpowering your gag reflex, and then feel your throat open and allow pint after pint of water to involuntarily fill your lungs, you will not know the meaning of the word.

How much of this the victim is to endure depends on the desired result (in the form of answers to questions shouted into the victim's face) and the obstinacy of the subject. A team doctor watches the quantity of water that is ingested and for the physiological signs that show when the drowning effect goes from painful psychological experience, to horrific suffocating punishment to the final death spiral.

Waterboarding is slow-motion suffocation with enough time to contemplate the inevitability of blackout and expiration. Usually the person goes into hysterics on the board. For the uninitiated, it is horrifying to watch. If it goes wrong, it can lead straight to terminal hypoxia - meaning, the loss of all oxygen to the cells.

And that's leaving aside the possibility of the doctor fucking up and killing you or secondary drowning killing you later on (maybe not a possibility with distilled water? I dunno.), that is beyond fucked up. To hear and read folks saying "It's just getting water splashed in your face" is insanity.

If someone had said this would come to pass 20 years ago, I simply would not have believed them. Hell, 10 years ago even.

I hope Obama does set a new precedent and his administration prosecutes EVERYONE involved. Including Bush. Then the die is cast and HIS Magic Mulatto Illegal Alien Ass might be jailed for the capital crimes he will almost certainly commit during his comical administration. At least then some measure of justice would be seen and future administrations might wake up to the fact that there IS some accountability on this earth.

Yeah... fat chance.

* Of course, they're forgetting that the definition of "enemies" changes from time to time, often every four or eight years. Only "lunatics" said after 9-11 that the Patriot Act could or would be used against non-terrorist American citizens. And now we have the "Justice" Dept issuing memos about how anyone that dislikes Obama is a racist and an enemy of the people! Only complete fucking morons didn't see that possibility coming.

UPDATE: Or we could waterboard this kid to see if he REALLY was involved! He's probably a terrorist! Shit! We all know the feds can't and don't fuck up on stuff like this!

Really, by what reasoning do we NOT torture him? Lives are at stake!