Via Impolitical, we learn that newly-minted CPoC spokesasshole Kory Teneycke is, well, an asshole:
“This is the process the Liberals chose, and we're sticking with it,” Mr. Teneycke said in an interview Sunday. Accusing the opposition of “playing politics,” he said recent public revelations about the Khadr file should have been known to the previous government. "This information was in their hands when they made these decisions," he said.
They had all the relevant information, did they, Kory, you sleazy little douchebag? Here, let me enlighten you on just two eyebrow-raising revelations that came out only this year and that we covered here at CC HQ regarding Omar Khadr.
First, there's this from February:
... in an interview with The Nation in February after the six Guantánamo detainees were charged, [Col. Morris] Davis offered the most damning evidence of the military commissions' bias--a revelation that speaks to fundamental flaws in the Bush Administration's conduct of statecraft: its contempt for the rule of law and its pursuit of political objectives above all else.
When asked if he thought the men at Guantánamo could receive a fair trial, Davis provided the following account of an August 2005 meeting he had with Pentagon general counsel William Haynes--the man who now oversees the tribunal process for the Defense Department.
"[Haynes] said these trials will be the Nuremberg of our time," recalled Davis, referring to the Nazi tribunals in 1945, considered the model of procedural rights in the prosecution of war crimes. In response, Davis said he noted that at Nuremberg there had been some acquittals, which had lent great credibility to the proceedings.
"I said to him that if we come up short and there are some acquittals in our cases, it will at least validate the process," Davis continued. "At which point, [Haynes's] eyes got wide and he said, 'Wait a minute, we can't have acquittals. If we've been holding these guys for so long, how can we explain letting them get off? We can't have acquittals. We've got to have convictions.'"
And then there's this from just last month:
Lawyer: Khadr report altered
GUANTANAMO, Cuba–A U.S. military commander altered a report on a firefight in Afghanistan to cast blame for the death of a Delta Force commando on a Canadian youth who was captured after the shooting stopped, a defence lawyer said today...
The military commander’s official report the day after the raid originally said the assailant who threw the grenade was killed, which would rule out Khadr as the suspect.
The report was revised months later, under the same date, to say a U.S. fighter had only “engaged” the assailant, according to Kuebler, who said the later version was presented to him by prosecutors as an “updated” document.
Kuebler told reporters after the hearing that it appears “the government manufactured evidence to make it look like Omar was guilty.”
And guess what, Kory? It doesn't appear that the Liberals were aware of either of these things. Now don't you feel like a complete asswipe, Kory?
6 comments:
I remain uncomfortable defending the likes of Tory Keneycke but — do you really think any of this is news to CSIS? Do you really believe that this was a completely rogue CSIS operation, conducted with absolutely no knowledge of the responsible ministers? I'm sorry but it seems to me the Liberals have unclean hands here. But I admit Tory's an asshole.
seer:
If you look at the first example I provide above, you can see that it refers to a meeting in August of 2005, which means that it's highly unlikely that it came to our attention up here until after the January 2006 election.
Which means that the previous Liberal government could not possibly have known about that. Hence, Mr. Teneycke is still a total asshole.
Seems we have two choices here. Teneycke is either: a) ignorant of the facts of the case; or b) a complete douchebag.
And yes, being that he's a "Conservative" hack, "both of the above" is always a possibility.
CC, respectfully, as the dissenting justices always say in their dissents, I dissent in part and concur in part.
According to my information http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2008/07/15/khadr-tapes.html
CSIS spent seven and a half hours with Omar in February of 2003. Either these CSIS guys are clueless or they had an inkling. Either they shared their inkling(s) with the responsible minister(s) or they didn't. If I had been the responsible minister, they damn well would have shared their inklings with me, for I would have no use for CSIS agents who didn't.
I can understand a responsible Liberal minister deciding, ATC, not to open this can, but not without first tipping off the PM and probably not without tipping off the priviest part of the privy council (the part that handles national security issues.)
I personally would have less respect for the prior Liberal Government if I believed they were clueless than if I believed they made a decision, based on the facts and circumstances known to them at the time, on what they in good faith believed to be in the best interests of Canada, however painful their decision may have been.
But I concur in your judgment about Tory Keneycke .
Likewise agreed that Corn Cob Kory is far beyond belief. But I'd argue that regardless of what the Libs knew or didn't know about the exact interrogation at Guantanamo, they still had ample reason and opportunity to seek to have Khadr transferred to Canada.
Remember that transfers to other countries started well before the Libs left office. And in addition to that opening which was being granted to countries seeking to repatriate detainees in general, the Libs were of course well aware that Khadr's detention also raised additional aggravating factors based on his status as a child soldier.
All of which means that it's impossible to take them at face value either when ex-PMPM now claims remorse over having declined to do anything at the time.
Remember that transfers to other countries started well before the Libs left office. And in addition to that opening which was being granted to countries seeking to repatriate detainees in general, the Libs were of course well aware that Khadr's detention also raised additional aggravating factors based on his status as a child soldier.
Based on the article, Khadr would be among the 5% of detainees actually captured by the US, and also in the 8% identified as Al Quaeda.
I think the US was focusing on those who were simply turned in, often by rivals, and had no connection to anything. Khadr was certainly a "found in" after a battle so he would be at the bottom of any list of people they are trying to repatriate as being uninvolved.
At the time, Martin would tend to take the US's word for whatever the status of Khadr was. We do tend to trust the US a lot, and with good reason. Nobody would check up on it, since all the opposition parties were totally focused on defeating Martin, rather than giving him a chance to govern like the Liberals today have done with Harper.
Harper was too busy working on Cadman to be bothered finding something like this. And Layton, who might be expected to chase this kind of issue, was simply staying at Harper's heel, hoping for some scraps.
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