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Taguba: I Never Saw the Photos
Lawrence Jackson / AP Photo
Retired Army General Antonio Taguba says he was quoted out of context claiming the prisoner-abuse photos President Obama is fighting to keep secret depict rape. Taguba was referring to photos he’d seen while investigating the Abu Ghraib scandal, not the 44 photos that are the subject of an ACLU investigation, which he has never seen. "These pictures show torture, abuse, rape and every indecency," Taguba said to the The Telegraph, which attributed the quote to the new photos. White House officials blasted the account. Taguba agrees with Obama that the 44 photos should not be released because they pose a danger to U.S. troops.
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Ritarita
Slave-
Your boy is
Walking back.
SlaveRevolt
RitaRita:
Taguba is talking about the 44 photos Obama is fighting to keep secret because what they depict is apparently so rotten that the American people aren't being allowed to see what their fascist military has done in their name. He states in this same Salon.com article that the photos he was referring to that do show rape etc. have already been released by Salon a few years ago:
"Retired Army Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba denied reports that he has seen the prisoner-abuse photos that President Obama is fighting to keep secret, in an exclusive interview with Salon Friday night.
On Thursday an article in the Daily Telegraph reported that Taguba, the lead investigator into Abu Ghraib abuse, had seen images Obama wanted suppressed, and supported the president's decision to fight their release. The paper quoted Taguba as saying, "These pictures show torture, abuse, rape and every indecency."
But Taguba says he wasn't talking about the 44 photographs that are the subject of an ongoing ACLU lawsuit that Obama is fighting.
"The photographs in that lawsuit, I have not seen," Taguba told Salon Friday night. The actual quote in the Telegraph was accurate, Taguba said -- but he was referring to the hundreds of images he reviewed as an investigator of the abuse at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq -- not the photos of abuse that Obama is seeking to suppress."
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2009/05/30/taguba/
So while we have an admission that the photos he had seen (earlier, released by Salon) do in fact show rape and other depravity (so the right-wing morons I think we have both argued with who have on here claimed that photos showing U.S. military rape don't exist, Taguba is most certainly not reinforcing their "point" but adding another nail in its coffin), these were not the photos in question which still leaves us with the Obama regime refusing to release the 44 photos as to do so would be to add fuel to the fire regarding people who want to see their government operate like it's something other than a mafia establishment and actually see the war criminals from the previous regime prosecuted. The last thing they want to do is to give people with a conscience further tangible evidence of atrocities and further impetus to call for prosecution.
wolverine1987
In the words of Otter, from Animal house: "Man, you're dumb." The prefect example of someone who has a decent vocabulary but can't think a coherent thought. Massive fail.
SlaveRevolt
Wolverine:
Exactly what the hell are you talking about? Taguba has said plainly that the already-released photos DO show rape so surely you're not going to argue that. Obama still isn't releasing the 44 other photos as to do so would give even more incentive to have the war criminals that authorized it prosecuted, something which Obama obviously has no interest in doing and doesn't want more attention brought to the issue. What exactly are you taking exception with?
SlaveRevolt
And it brings up a couple of other questions, one being: What kind of an investigation into Abu Ghraib was Gen. Taguba allowed to conduct in the first place if he was never allowed to see these particular photos?
And another: Since photos showing U.S. military rape have been released years ago, just what on earth is in these 44 still-unreleased photos that is WORSE than rape?
sonofloud
It's not like anyone in the military would ever lie or anything.
squiggy
Or anyone in the media is careful to check facts, never mind grammar, spelling and context.
sonofloud
What's the world coming to when you can trust the word of a bunch of kidnappers and torturers?
Progressive2
Dick Cheney's and GOP world
wolverine1987
Do you guys have any concern with the fact that our President himself would say to anyone who brought these lines of argument to him that they were flat out wrong? Without any qualification whatsoever. That's why he decided not to release the photos.
I'm sure it wouldn't faze you at all. Anyone that would characterize people, the vast majority of whom are decent and honest, and working as hard as they can to protect us, as kidnappers and torturers, would not be able to recognize the idiocy and unfairness of that point. Thank God we have a President who is grown up and rational enough to understand what his supporters do not.
SlaveRevolt
Wolverine:
Assuming you aren't somehow inside Obama's head, what makes you so sure of why the photos aren't being released in the first place? Because of what this plastic phony politician has said? Come on. Get serious. Surely you don't take what any American president says as gospel do you?
SlaveRevolt
In an unrelated matter, why is Obama refusing the F.O.I.A. requests to release the records of Rahm Emanuel's tenure at Freddie Mac?
http://realtime.sunlightprojects.org/2009/03/26/freddie-mac-records-exem pt-from-foia/
Rahm Emanuel "received about $300,000 for very little work at Freddie Mac".
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/04/warren_buffett_profits_heavi ly.html
The public has a right to know why Obama's White House chief of staff got $300,000 for doing next to nothing for Freddie Mac. Surely Obama can't use the excuse of it endangering the troops. Transparency administration my ass.
DreddBlog
Even the "good pictures" are an abomination. All of a sudden the Jack Nicholson syndrome applies to the military who can't handle the truth.
http://blogdredd.blogspot.com/2009/05/mother-of-all-enemies.html
mattbenzor
Some christian army we turned out be.What and embaressment to jesus christ and everything he stands for.As a believer in christ this not what jesus died for.This is why we should seperate excuse me keep seperate church and state and military.Can you imagine What they think of us in one hand is a bible and toture and human abuse is in the other hand.DISGUSTING and this what the christian conservative and evangelic's voted for and this what they believe in.Its sick and not of God and like of satan
Hawnzz
I've been saying that for months! Torture has no moral or legal leg to stand on.
connie47
I couldn't agree with you more. The American Evangelicals have become the clanging cymbal of 1 Corinthians 13:1.
exploora
http://www.prisonplanet.com/leaked-torture-photos-published-in-2006-went-la rgely-unseen-graphic.html
delete space keep hyphens between each word.
http://www.antiwar.com/news/?articleid=2444
jus1drun
good grief people! if there is something in those photos that obama could construe as shoveling more dirt on the last administration they'll see the light of day eventually. in the mean time what are you, masochists? do we really need to stoke jihadist fires?
SlaveRevolt
What on earth would ever make you think the neo-conservative Obama wants to shovel dirt on the previous administration? Whenever he isn't busy adopting their policies he's going out of his way to indicate that nobody associated with the preceding regime is going to be prosecuted. If he wanted to shovel dirt on them he'd sic his attorney general on the war criminals but he's made it clear he's not interested, as anybody who gives it much thought would conclude because had his elite puppetmasters had any inkling that he'd do such a thing he'd still be a community organizer. Don't make me break out a list of Obama's obvious fellatio of the elite. He's plainly all about continuity, not change.
jus1drun
there's no doubt he isn't what we all thought but i have a problem with fanning the flames.
squiggy
Slave! So explicit! LOL
SlaveRevolt
Jus1drun:
Well don't count me in what "we" all thought because I had this guy pegged from the beginning. As far as fanning the flames, shouldn't the Cheneyites have thought of that before they sanctioned such abominable behavior in the first place? If they were half as concerned about their own humanity or lack thereof as they are about being exposed for the beasts that they are then they wouldn't be in this mess anyway. I personally don't have any sympathy for American troops but covering up evidence of a crime so that the victims of American occupation don't take it out on other U.S. military personnel who may or may not have been involved in atrocities themselves but are nevertheless volunteers who are helping keep the fascist boot of occupation clamped down on Iraq's and Afghanistan's necks doesn't strike me as a compelling reason to help criminals avoid prosecution. I say release the photos and let the chips fall where they may. The troops are in FAR greater danger simply by being IN Iraq and breathing the dust there that's contaminated with depleted uranium (D.U.) from widespread use of American D.U. munitions (D.U. poisoning goes by a more familiar euphemism you might be familar with -- "Gulf War Syndrome") than they are of being killed by rebels.
And if Obama had a real concern for the troops he would pull them out of their two wars instead of treading water in Iraq with the Bush plan from late last year and escalating the war in Afghanistan.
The real reason he's not releasing these photos is because it would give fresh incentive to the people like myself with a conscience who want to see the war criminals of the previous regime face justice for their crimes against humanity, something Obama is obviously NOT allowed to pursue.
jus1drun
you may be more clairvoyant than me but i'm still willing to let the dust settle first. LOL on your intensity though.
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