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Jesse the Body vs. Torture
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As Obama and Cheney clashed over fighting terror, a new voice has entered the fray: Jesse Ventura, who has declared war on torture. He talked to The Daily Beast about taking on opponents from both parties.
As the national debate over torture reached its boiling point this week, a new champion emerged: Jesse “the Body” Ventura. While President Obama and former Vice President Cheney gave dueling speeches Thursday, Ventura was talking to The Daily Beast about how he has suddenly become one of the most effective and sought after anti-torture speakers in the country—a noodge to Sean Hannity and Elisabeth Hasselbeck alike.
“Whenever the government says it's time to move on, that means there's something they don’t want you to know about," Ventura said.
Jesse Venture on The View; click here for full video.
Watching Ventura cut through the cable chatter like a rusty bayonet has been thrilling. "You give me a waterboard, Dick Cheney, and one hour, and I'll have him confess to the Sharon Tate murders," Ventura told Larry King last week, adding an exclamation point to his contention that torture produced unreliable intelligence. On Monday, he faced off with Hasselbeck, The View's house conservative, and took the debate over waterboarding's effectiveness to its logical extremes: "If waterboarding's OK, why don't we let our police do it to suspects so we can learn what they know?" he asked. "We only seem to waterboard Muslims. ... Have we waterboarded anyone else?" Later that night, it was a cage match with Fox’s Hannity. Ventura declared he'd rather have "a thousand Monicas" than the terrorist attacks that occurred on Bush's watch. Videos of these appearances generated hundreds of thousands of views on YouTube.
“Whenever the government says it’s time to move on that means there’s something they don’t want you to know about,” Ventura says.
For Ventura, it marked a kind of return to his tough-guy roots. Nearly four decades ago, he left home after a brief Christmas break from his military training to go be stalked, abducted, and tortured by his fellow soldiers. The exercise was part of the military's Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape program, known as SERE, which was designed to prepare soldiers for deployment to Vietnam by simulating the conditions of enemy capture. Participants who were captured during the training mission had a bag placed over their head and were waterboarded. Those who managed to escape won an hour of freedom and a jelly sandwich for their efforts.
"One of my SEAL team classmates—I don't know how he did it, but he escaped four times," Ventura recalled in an interview. "So he got four jelly sandwiches and four hours off."
Ventura was less lucky. His pursuers caught up with him, subdued him, and bagged him. Then came the torture.
"At one point, I was put in a box that was so small they had to stand on it to close it," the 6"4, 250-pound Ventura said. "I don't know how long I was in there: When I got out all my extremities were numb and I couldn't move."
Since graduating from SERE, Ventura, 58 years old, has journeyed through the professional-wrestling world, the Minnesota state house, and these days lives as a surfing hermit in Mexico. But it’s his SEAL training, mixed with a bit of wrestling bravado, that lends an emotional immediacy to his arguments that even Obama has struggled to match. And in contrast with Obama's reluctance to dwell on the issue, Ventura has gladly played the face to Dick Cheney's heel in myriad TV appearances, mercilessly citing the former vice president's five draft deferments and challenging him to submit to torture himself.
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Both parties are wrong, too.
The Democrats want to reveal the pictures, which will result in additional harm to soldiers (and the civilians they retaliate against) and the Republicans want the crime of torture to be ignored when we do it.
As Kurt Vonnegut once said, "You are what you pretend to be." If we torture, murder and ignore the Geneva Conventions, then how can we say that are morally superior to our enemies? The constitution says: no cruel or unusual punishment-- are we now denying the basic law of the land? This was brought home to me, a couple of years ago, while discussing the local gang problem with a gang unit investigator. "Here's the thing, Jeff: if we use illegal means to catch gangbangers, how can we say that we are any better-- or any different-- than them?"
After Salon released the pictures of Abu Ghraib, do you know what happened? Nothing. At all. However, the stunning willingness of our elected leaders to ignore and even defend the types of lawlessness we so strongly condemn in others was a lovely gift to terrorist propagandists.
Cute outfit on Jesse. Is he now in a Village People cover band?
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Jesse is fearless.
He says and wears
Whatever the hell he wants.
I'm one of the many
Who have to appreciate
That as the rarest of
Commodities.
Anyone who missed
His exchange with Hannity
Go to YouTube
'Shawn Hannity gets owned
By Jesse Ventura'.
It's priceless.
The Taliban does not torture, they just cut your head off.
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I totally agree with your point. My husband who was a veteran also said the same thing. This country can't turn pages until a commission of some type does the job just like in Nurmberg, Germany. The truth will set us free.
It is clear the enemy kills. "We are actually committed to NOT being the same as the enemy."
So what do we do with that? Turn the other cheek?
You need to look at motive, justification, and moral standing. Dresden, Hiroshima, Nagasaki: all horrible atrocities if you don't consider those factors. Compare those acts to the alternative of inaction, or to the enemy's atrocities: terrorism and genocide.
Torture != Terrorism
I know your comebacks: "it doesn't work!" So, what? Does it hurt to try in a ticking timebomb scenario? Some people have low tolerances for pain and aren't that loyal to their cause.
"it's illegal!" So is speeding to get someone to the hospital. We outlaw torture because we abhor it. But we abhor other things much, much more: the killing of innocents.
What's your point? It seems completely irrelevant to this topic. Has anyone suggested the Taliban and other terrorists don't torture, main and murder? But what has that to do with a U.S. policy under Bush/Cheney of torturing people who are not terrorists or criminals?
For that matter even if our policy was to only torture known terrorists (if only that were so), since when did what a terrorist group does morally justify our doing it too? If that's true, I guess it is also appropriate policy for the US to start targeting civilians on purpose for random acts of terror? Let's kill thousands of innocent women and children caught in under Taliban's oppressively control, because that's what the Taliban would do.
" . . . torturing people who are not terrorists or criminals?
How do you know that, exactly? Because they said so? Under torture? The left not only wants it both ways but any way that occurs to it.
actually it's very relevant, I'm sure the Taliban chop heads off to kill that person and intimidate the rest of the populace - not to get answers to critical questions. Why do you think we waterboard people in prison? Certainly not to get answers - but revenge and intimidation - just like China, the Taliban and Saddam Hussein, and other political dictatorships that can get away with it.
Ok! Do you have a point?
Is it that the Taliban should be the moral compass for the U.S.?
Is it that the U.S. should follow the lead of scumbags to the bottom?
I for one want the U.S. to reclaim the moral leadership position. To be that beacon on the hill of reason and justice. When we do that, we reap massive rewards. When we flush our virtues down the toilet to satisfy the short term goals of the inept, or the greedy, then we have years of problems. For example, how about the U.S. efforts in the overthrow of Mosadaque? What vital U.S. national interest was being served by overthrowing a democratically elected government? What benefit did we receive by installing the Shah and his ruthless Savok? While most Americans have either forgotten, or never new about this, the Iranians have not.
Let's stick to our principles, and occassionally suffer minor setbacks. It is far better than acting against our principles, and suffering for years.
By ..."occassionally suffer minor setbacks", do you mean more attacks like 9-11?
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Who says they don't torture? Ask some victims.
Both parties are culpable. After 911 fear ruled Washington and everyone climbed onboard the patriot trolley and road it off the rails.
For one thing I think this torture debate is a perfect time to bring up TERM LIMITS for members of Congress.
I am pleased the Mr. Ventura has entered this discussion. He has the heft both physically and intellectually to get people's attention and make himself heard. And, because for the most part, he says what many are thinking it gets the message out.
For a draft "dodger" like Cheny to advocate war is one of life's sick ironies.
PLEASE Jesse get out there and talk to everyone about
torture. I heard you on both shows and you need to
speak out to all. "Enhanced interrogation" is TORTURE.
Go after them and their re-defining the word. Keep talking until the powers that be LISTEN!!!!!
After having watched Jesse Ventura completely demolish Hannity in thier interview, I found myself speechless that Ventura could be so impressive in his handling of the subject. For me, Ventura's opinion is uniquely persuasive because he himself has been subjected to waterboarding. While Hannity and draft-dodging Cheney like to speak on the subject as if they have any experience outside of reading about it on a piece of paper, Ventura has actually been subjected to it, and if he says it's torture, I tend to believe him.
The last time I checked my history, draft deferment was legal until 1971 when Nixon got rid of it. Approximately sixteen million men (about 60% of those eligible) used deferments.
The very same liberals that throw the phrase "draft-dodging" are the ones that do not realize waterboarding was legal during the period it was used. Don't you just love how liberals cherry-pick laws and then subtly twist their meaning for the sole purpose of smearing someone's character. If a liberal cannot win an argument based on facts and logic (which is most of the time) they inevitable resort to character assassination.
Yah-are you high? Right now, coughing out some crack smoke? Or are you deliberatley missing the point so you can feel good about your twisted self-indulgent patriotism?
The difference between Cheney and Ventura, is one sat behind an air conditioned desk, while the other slogged through the jungle-who do you think is more credible in their understanding of the realities of war?
Yeah... we understand waterboarding was "legal" because the Bush administration "cherry picked" interpretations of the law and "subtly twist(ed) their meaning". And if liberals "resort to character asassination" its because we learned to appreciate its effectiveness (though not its ethic) as it has been applied to us by-hold your breath- the GOP.
Do you really think the majority of Americans can't see through this pathetic stance of "I know you are but what am I". Its like a husband, caught cheating, who looks at his wife and says "I can't believe you cheated on me!" Give me a break.
See, what I mean. Liberals cannot enter into any debate without first debasing the person they are addressing. Sorry, hardrain, but your attempt to draw me into a colloquial slapstick argument will not work.
There are indeed some "realities of war" that many Americans do not understand because most have not had to face it. War is life and death. Not only of human beings but sometimes a way of life. The US is facing this reality now with Gitmo. They don't want it to come to their backyard because of fear. The terrorists are winning and it is nonsense debates about supposed torture that are obfuscating the real issue at hand. Winning.
Wow, thanks for the astute insight into war! Life and death? Even death of a way of life? Golly, I just never thought of war in those terms.
Here's problem #1 with the right wing argument-thinking that no one else understands the realities of war. We get it-what we don't get is why anyone would covet those realities. Why anyone would deliberately start a "pre-emptive" war with all those pesky realities.
What I personally don't understand in your statement is... "The terrorists are winning and it is nonsense debates about supposed torture that are obfuscating the real issue at hand. Winning."
Winning? Winning what? How long do we pursue this "war"? Until all Muslims are exterminated? Until Saudi Arabia has gender equality? Until Palestine and Israel become super best pals? Until a President can guarantee the absolute safety of every American-forever? And how exactly does torture serve to further any of those objectives?
Bravo!
You Go Jesse!
Waterboarding is torture and torture is a crime.
I have been reading of the Obama vs Cheney speechs on Thur & the torture controversy on Daily Beast & other sites. I'm going to believe former Gov Ventura. I'll continue to watch the virtual pissing contest between Cheney, et al & Obama, et al. It looks like I'll have to wear my I'ntl Orange Rubber Raincoat as I watch this virtual pissing contest because of the blow back, Even at 50 feet from the ring there is a blowback of urine, Obama, et al & Cheney et al have drenched the debate with urine, not fact. The debate reeks of stale urine. That's politics in the USA.
I think your assessment of the direction of the urine is too universal. Cheney reminds me of a trapped wild animal, pissing on itself in fear and hopes of putting off its attacker. Also, self-fouling is a characteristic of those being hanged, gassed, or electrocuted.
Jesse towers over the chickenhawks Cheenee, Lush, Hannity, Beck and OReilly both figuratively and literally. He's been there and knows the score. I think that torture is a distraction at this point. It hasn't been used in 5 years since McCain made it an issue and won't be used in the future. The real issues in this context facing Obama and America is what to do about the prisoners at GITMO.
Yes, he does tower over them. Amazingly, these people you mention who have never put on a uniform continue to look a former Navy SEAL who has actually been waterboarded in the eye and have the nerve to say he's wrong about torture. It's laughable.
Jesse has never faced the burden of protecting an entire nation from terrorist attacks. In his role as Governor of Minnesota he didn't have any exposure to foreign policy. One does not have to be waterboarded in order to have a valid position on the torture debate. For the record, all SEALs are waterboarded. I would bet that the majority of them support waterboarding. They all go through it for training, it ends, and they continue serving their country IN WATER, and don't suffer longer term trauma. The individuals which the CIA waterboards are hardened killers. We shoot them dead in Afghanistan without thinking twice but we won't waterboard them to prevent another terrorist attack??? That may be in line with your morals, but not mine...
Jesse is a hypocrite. Do you think if he was back in county humping the boonies with a 8 men squad and they captured a bad guy, he would keep the bad guy safe in the rear while his men died in an ambush. I doubt it. He would make the bad guy walk out in front to trip an ambush, hey that's kind of like water boarding. Besides I noticed that Barry is keeping the water boarding just in case.
You really need to learn how to make better analogies. That had to be the worst scenario ever, for one, and the two situations DO NOT COMPARE. Apparently you have either never been in the Military or did not pay attention during the Rules of Engagement training. You may want to read up on it. I suggest Google.
Two points: As a former SEAL, Jesse knows he would have been prosecuted for a warcrime had he and his comrades done this. Second, President Obama has forbade future use of torture. If you listen to Jesse's entire spiel, you'll realize that torture is done to elicit false responses. Cheney wanted a link between Al Qaeda and Saddam, thus the resort to torture.
Torture is done to elicit false responses? Hmmm. Lets think about that one. One of THREE terrorists that were waterboarded was Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. He was a mastermind of the 9/11 attacks. He openly admitted it. Now, if the United States already had all the evidence they needed to prosecute him...what false responses could they possibly be looking for??? Do you think they were going to torture him until he changed him mind and started denying he was involved in the attacks??? In case you are unsure, the logical answer to that question is, NO!
"If waterboarding's OK, why don't we let our police do it to suspects so we can learn what they know?"
Perfect question, when will any Republican answer it.
Not a Republican but the answer is, One is a crime involving a laws within the United States. The other is a crime coming from a criminal enterprise, dedicated to the destruction of the United States with any means possible. To include dirty bombs and chemical agents. The world changed August 6, 1945, but some people have not gotten it yet.
No, the world did not change. A lot of scared fat asses ue that as an excuse for their hysterical reaction. The guys in charge used that hysteria to enact a series of policies and giveaways that were far to unpalatable to be enacted any other way. The world has always been a scary place, you idiot. That's why virtue means something.
Tango your BS is showing ;)
If we do the same things they do (torture, EITs, etc), then we become them. Might as well slap on a turban and robe and ululate every time you're excited. And, if we're them, why stop at waterboarding or wall-shoving. Might as well go right for cutting off their nuts and stuffing them in their mouth right off the bat. The only problem is, if your nuts are in your mouth, you can't make false confessions and give your tormenters exactly what they want to hear, then deliver it to the American people and call it a success. While you're at it, torturing and the like, might as well make women wear the veil and not let them leave the house unless they're with a male relative or their husband. Allah, er God knows they're too stupid to go out alone, or such sluts that they'll couple with strangers every chance they get. Or, if they're without relatives or husbands, they must be prostitutes and want to get laid. Forget paying them, they're pieces of meat and when you're done and fix your robe to cover yourself, set up a stoning for the stupid sluts. They deserve it. If anyone disagrees with you, pull out your AK47 and send them to heaven. They'll like it there better anyhow.
When you're done with the womens' stonings, go ahead and set up some roadside bombs to kill any strangers from outside your neighborhood. The stupid infidels aren't from around here, or they'd know where you do your terror. They deserve to die too.
In the end, there will be you and the couple of people you couldn't manage to kill in the name of your God. Hopefully you'll get them before they get you. Then go on TV and tell everyone you made your country safer by doing what you did. Noone will object-they're all dead or got nuts in their mouth.
We, as a country, made promises to ourselves and the world when the constitution was written and used to govern us. Underlying it was a set of rules that, no matter how many lawyers you hire to tell you different, govern our behavior and the way we treat people. It was a terrible tragedy to lose what we did on 9/11. My heart goes out to those who were murdered, and their families and friends.
They paid the price we may all someday pay for being free. Turning into terrorists ourselves is not, in my opinion, a way to remember or revenge these victims. Let's defend ourselves the best way we can without becoming animals.
Will it cost more lives? Yes, I'll concede that. I hope it aint me or mine that gets it next, but if we do, we die knowing that we died as Americans, free and proud to be from a country that does not torture those we hold captive.
Freedom is not free.
Jesse understands this. I love the guy.
First of all the people in Gitmo are not American citizens & are not entitled to our constitutional rights. They were captured on the battlefield & are military combantants. They have no rights. They are out to kill all Americans & they saw our Journalists & troops heads off along with any other infintile & we should treat them with compassion? They throw their body waste on our soldiers in Gitmo while they live in one of the cleanest prisons ever built, & get things like TV & other entertainment to keep them from getting bored. I think before we take any more prisoners from now on it would be better if they just get killed on the battlefield & keep liberals out of this cuddle the terroists mode. They cannot be covered under the Geneva convention because they do not wear uniforms & use their own people as bombs to kill us, especially women & children. How would you feel if they came up to your family & blew up themselves taking your family with them? Ventura has had just a few too many concussions.
You have a rather odd understanding of US law. I do not believe there is any denial of constitutional rights to anyone who becomes liable to our law; it goes with the liability. Their behavior in prison is also no worse than one finds in our regular prisons. There is no desire to coddle them; we simply must obey our own laws, even as the Gitmo prisoners (and more common criminals) break them. BTW, how do you answer the families of our dead soldiers in an illegal and foolish war?
Even assuming US Constitutional Law doesn't apply (which I would argue it does - just because you are not a US citizen does not mean you are not entitled to Due Process), there is this little thing called International Law that DOES apply.
It's just that many US citizens seem to forget that the universe does not revolve around the USA.
The Bush administration conveniently opted out of the ICC in 2002, even though their Constitutional experts believed the ICC rules offered similar Due Process rights as the US Constitution. Why? Because they would have been in direct violation of very similar laws as those Saddam Hussein was tried and convicted for. The sad part is that opting out of the ICC may not protect them from prosecution in an international tribunal after all.
Also, you are assuming that all Guantanemo inmates are guilty in the first place!
egw7777
The whole point of our foreign policy is EXACTLY to spread our constitutional viewpoints around the world, and to have other people experience in their country what we know works so well for us here.
To say that people from outside of the US are not entitled to our constitutional rights (especially when we capture them and hold them) is to say that our whole foreign policy is NOT the spreading of democracy. And stupid.
Since you clearly don't comprehend what I'm saying, at least I'm betting you don't (by the way, it's 'infidels' unless they're baby foreigners, then it's 'infant infidels'), you need to brush up on your academic skills. I never suggested treating anyone with compassion (if you're equating 'compassion' with 'not torturing', you might be beyond help), but if we have them in our custody, it's our moral obligation to treat them humanely.
As I plainly stated above, if we act like them, there's no difference between us. To me, torturing indicates that one is so scared, so deeply terrified of the power that another has over us, that we are willing to throw everything we hold dear and have fought for and sacrificed for away. It indicates to me that the power that controls us is so omnipresent we will disregard all that every American has ever given their life for in the service of this country, and lower ourselves to practiucing what 'they' do.
As I said above, freedom is not free. There is a price to be paid. Are we going to run scared from the bogeyman or are we going to show the rest of the world what it's like to be strong? What it's like to have discipline and honor? What's its like to die for something you believe in, not for future reward for oneself, but for the betterment of ourselves, our families, and the rest of the watching world?
One more time:
Freedom aint free.
Wow, it's surprising how many ways you can be wrong in just a sentence or two...
First, most were not captured on any battlefield. Many were hunted down and rounded up while conducting their normal lives in countries to which they are legal citizens by U.S. agents operating illegally outside of any system of law, including the international laws we supposedly agreed to abide by. Many weren't soldiers, some weren't even terrorists or (prior to their illegal detention and torture) enemies of the U.S. They may have just been in the wrong place at the wrong time or looked wrong at the sister of the wrong warlord who was getting paid to provide a list of names to the U.S. Some are legitimate terrorists or terrorist sympathizers, but we didn't do a lot of distinguishing up-front then skipped all the due process after the fact that would have allowed us to correct our mistakes.
Second, even the U.S. under Bush was careful not to classify them as "military combatants," because if they did so they knew we would be violating the Geneva Convention to which we are signatories and they wouldn't have had any excuse to pretend it was "legal." So the Bush Administration literally made-up a brand new classification called "enemy combatants" which they said was completely distinct from military combatants and which they basically classified as the same as spies on foreign soil, never mind that most were illegally swept up in raids on their own soil where they were citizens with rights.
Third, you are wrong to assume that the U.S. does not legally recognize the rights of any persons who are not U.S. citizens as you state. This is just patently false. We are signatories to any number of international agreements which we are breaking by denying these people rights, not to mention you must have flunked social studies in grade school because you seem to have forgotten the part about the U.S. believing in "unalienable rights" (it was not inalienable BTW). Our system of government was founded on the assumption that all people have rights. Too borrow the misappropriated phrase the whack-jobs like Rush and Ann like to use too often, to claim that anyone has no rights would make you a traitor to the United States and what it stands for.
A little light reading for you egw777-
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men" (not just Americans) "are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator" (which might not be your Christian God) "with certain unalienable Rights," (they cannot be taken away by simply labeling them as 'enemy combatants') "that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."
More powerful words have never been written, and these, you dunderhead, are the chief guiding principles of our Nation. How conservatives have construed patriotism to be defined as the stalwart denial of these rights to others is a sickening testament to the sad, lowly state of fearfulness and cowardice currently enjoyed by torture apologists and their chicken hawk masters. Part of being the greatest nation on Earth, is staying above the fray, and not letting adversity pervert or undermine your strength or character. Something you're apparently too weak or cowardly to do.
Constitutional enumerations are for the US government, not people. It limits what the government can do to US citizens. Besides, Cuba still has sovereignty over the land that Gitmo sits upon and I don't care how liberal you are our Constitution is not transferable to other countries or territories. The military facility there is based upon international legal rights, much to the chagrin of Castro all these years. The Geneva Convention does spell out things quite clear to those who decide to follow it. But what about those who do not? Clearly, it needs updated but that is never going to happen because the reason to update it, religious zealot terrorists, happen to come from countries that would need to ratify the changes. That ain't gonna happen either!
So what do we do? As liberals like to say, the nuances of this debate are quite sophisticated. Maybe a clear definition of what torture is from the UN? Maybe a clear definition of the difference between a terrorist and freedom fighter? This would take at least 10 years to debate through the UN during which I pray our country is still around to host that decrepit place. I say until there is some universally accepted clarity on the above issues, there are a world of non-lethal, non-physically or psychologically damaging tactics we can use to keep our country safe. That is unless Mr. O' tells the world about those too.
I have always thought that all the ones promoting the use of torture (Cheney, Limbaugh, etc.) were compensating for their own personal cowardice when asked to do their part in Vietnam. They seem to see being pro-torture as proof of toughness.
However, they don't understand that only cowards give up their values and adopt illegal and immoral means (not to mention stupid and ineffecient) out of fear. People with courage and who are really tough keep their heads and do the right thing. Proponents of torture, in my opinion, merely demonstrate that they are ruled by fear and cowardice and lack the vigor and integrity that America deserves from not just its elected leaders but its citizens. They shame us with their craven weak and cowardly behavior.
Please Neocons cowards come out and defend torture against a REAL conservative warhero with experience.
I'll simply enjoy reading this one.
It is sort of like peeing in the pool.
It saves time, if you are trying to win a race, but it is gross, and even anti-social, and most people would never admit doing it.
And I think the worst thing about torture, if it becomes part of public policy, is that the tone will lead to a more secretive society, where one group will assume they know best, and the other group has no idea what they are doing.
Being from a small town, I see how many of the so called service clubs, one for example is the masons, is secretive and exclusive and creates a tone in the town related to politics and the social position of the insiders and outsiders, men and women.
And all kinds of social abuse happen relating to spreading to false rumours that can lead to personal failure and suicide even.
Some also, by association, become counter culture, and believe in standing up for social justice, and can look very nice wearing tights and a cape :).
Jesse for president.
Would it be considered torture to put Jessie to work as an interrogator? Just looking at him is cruel and unusual punishment enough to scare the crap out of the most hardened criminal.
As I was saying, we helped rebuilt their infrastructure, put their country back together and in short, we won over the hearts and minds of the people there.
GO JESSE!
Tell it like it is and those who cant take the truth? Slow boat to China!
Jesse Ventura, 2012.
I am from Minnesota and I remember Jesse's governorship well. The rest of the country thought we were crazy to make a former pro wrestler our governor, but we respected the same straight talking you saw on this clip from the view.
There are many good things to say about him as a leader, and a few things that ultimately buried him. He is enormously and famously thin skinned. He speaks like the angels when he agrees, but when he feels attacked, he shows no grace. Not a good trait for a politician, as being attacked happens every day when you choose this career path. There were many times when I wished he'd stop blustering on about himself and get on with doing the people's business.
I think Jesse is the absolute best when he is allowed to speak his truth without the cumbersome need of being a politician too.
Still, I can't help but miss him as this state wrangles with Franken/Coleman under the LACK of leadership of Pawlenty. Love him or hate him, Ventura would have signed the certificate long ago---for whoever he thought won the contest.
You could never pin him for being a partisan for either party, he was and still is, for better or worse, his own man.
It is sad to think, that so much of what is wrong with politics, is that too few people willing to be a real person ever get elected to office. Instead we get talkers, dealers and blowhards, people unwilling to state their mind and conscience, and all too willing to pander. We need more Jesse Venturas out there, dropping atomic elbows of truth into the muddled and politically obfuscated world of punditry politics.
He's very opinionated and very outspoken. I really like him.
What does this say about American politics when a former wrestler understand and respects the constitution more than anyone in the Democratic or Republican parties ???
I am not sure what President Obama does not know or respect about the constitution. Your attempt at even-handedness is inappropriate.
Well lets see......kidnapping and torturing people is against the constitution, spying on your own people (FISA) is unconstitutional, giving tax revenue to churches is unconstitutional, taking away the right to have a lawyer present during questioning is unconstitutional, etc.
We have been brainwashed into thinking water boarding is torture. Here are the facts and this is the only place you'll find them.
1. Water boarding produces a euphoria. Prison camp life can be stressful. Prisoners from time to time can get some relief by getting a little wet. Haven't you ever been told a little soap and water won't hurt you. There's not even any soap involved in this enhanced interrogation technique.
2. The folks who go through this process form bonds with their interrogators. They quite willingly talk about whatever their interrogators want to talk about. Usually, that's pussy, but occasionally, they talk business.
3. For decades, the super-wealthy have been going to waterboarding resorts for years. You won't find these facilities in your AAA book, but they're out there in undisclosed locations. (Dick Cheney spent most of his vice presidency in such a resort.)
4. For the rest of us, Guatemala has a number of such resorts staring at $69 a day.
5. A Rumanian manufacturer is producing SAWBs -- self-administered water boarding devices. Libertarians are getting a campaign together to remove their prohibition in the United States. California already has legislation pending. Gov. Schwarzenneger will sign the bill, if it includes a huge tax.
"We have been brainwashed into thinking water boarding is torture. Here are the facts and this is the only place you'll find them."
LOL nice one, tell me is the sky purple in your mind?
I never liked TV wrestling, but I sure do enjoy watching Jessie pin the torture proponents to the mat.
He did a lousy job pinning anyone. Challenging Cheney to be waterboarded, not persuasive. Comparing a false confession to actionable intelligence, not persuasive. Mancow, a conservative, was waterboarded and changed his tune, saying it's torture. That's very persuasive. However, if it can generate results and save my life or the lives of my families, let's (carefully) do it!
Fasten your seatbelts, look both ways before crossing, don't eat peanuts if you're allergic, be careful getting out of the tub... probably several thousand actions that are more likely to protect you and your family than trading the moral wealth of 330 millions Americans gained over 200 years
You need to take a long term perspective. Torture will NOT save the life of your children or children's children. Torture fuels the fire that is extremist hate, and as long as we provide the enemy examples of how "evil" America is, they will continue to breed hate and terrorism. However, if we discontinue torture, and fight the fight with honor and pride, the Muslim world will begin to understand who we are and what we truly fight for. It won't be until we win the support of the people that the war on terrorism will end.
What disturbs me is how the media insidiously portrays people like Jesse Ventura. There's always the subliminal suggestion by anchors and commentators that no matter what he says or how right he is, deep down he's a kook. A wierdo. The eccentric of the village. The "colorful" character who knows a lot but can't be trusted with serious matters. Not fit to be a serious national figure.
I saw this condescension most clearly whenever the MSM discussed Ron Paul. There'd always be the "lean forward and rock the shoulders" mannerism of the anchor with a smirk or grin whenever discussing him, like it was an ice hockey fight segment rather than the "sit up to attention like a good dog" pose when discussing "respectable" people who wear a suit and have 30/70 parted short hair. Mr. Ventura is a fcking genius. Literally. He could fix the USA but he will never get a shot at it. Sad, sad, sad.
Thank you.
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