Captain Canada Stephen Taylor can't figure out what all the fuss is about (all emphasis tail-waggingly added):
Today, Afghan detainees, one allegedly beaten with a shoe by an Afghan prison guard, is (allegedly!) throwing the country into madness.
And then there's reality, courtesy of none other than the National Post:
Gen. Natynczyk ordered a military investigation into the incident to find out why he was not told for more than three years that the captive had been in Canadian custody and to examine a Canadian soldier's report that he took a photograph of the captive "to ensure that if the Afghan National Police did assault him, as had happened in the past, that we would have a visual record of his condition."
The Canadians took the captive back when they found him being beaten with shoes by a half dozen Afghan police.
Tune in tomorrow when Taylor lectures us on how rancid dishonesty and gross misrepresentation is the very foundation of modern democracy. Or something.
FROM STEPHEN'S BLOG TO ADRIAN'S KEYBOARD: As commenter CWTF points out, Adrian MacNair is on the job, faithfully regurgitating his Stephen Taylor talking points:
The same old manufactured controversy about another hidden agenda, except that this time it’s based upon the testimony of a single Canadian out of the entire mission in Afghanistan who seems to believe there is even a remote possibility that torture may have occurred after detainees were handed over.
Quite so ... all that controversy based on nothing more than the speculative, uncorroborated testimony of a single Canadian. How irresponsible. Oh, wait ... what's this?
Canada's troops investigated for Afghan abuse
Canada's military police have been quietly investigating allegations for more than a year that the country's troops abused Afghan detainees, CBC News has learned.
Canadian soldiers captured the detainees sometime in 2008 and the investigation into their conduct has been ongoing for at least a year.
We have now (as I sort of predicted) come full circle: from "What torture?" to "Big deal, who cares about torture?", amusingly back to "What torture?". And the Canadian right-wing wurlitzer's job is now complete.
Good job, Adrian. Stephen Taylor has a biscuit for you. Done well, you have.
7 comments:
Adrian seems to be echoing the same talking points...
It's as if they all shared the same brain...
Adrian is a wonderfully loyal stenographer. From Stephen Taylor's blog to Adrian's keyboard -- that's pretty much how it works.
Cherniak, I don't think it's quite accurate to say that Taylor and his ever obdient minions share a brain.
Rather, they share merely a few brain cells. Certainly less than a dozen in total.
I'm just wondering how long it's going to be before one of these people lets six people beat them with combat boots... because that's almost certainly what went down here.
We have now (as I sort of predicted) come full circle: from "What torture?" to "Big deal, who cares about torture?", amusingly back to "What torture?". And the Canadian right-wing wurlitzer's job is now complete.
Actually, I think, with Craig Smith's "I luz torchure!" it is now complete. And bravo for him for being so honest.
When will these people learn that dancing around one's own cherished principles is always a mistake? The operative one here is that the Right loves torture. They think it works, and even if it doesn't, it, like harsh sentencing and the death penalty, has a retributive value that satisfies their emotional needs.
The rest of us make the mistake of listening to and responding to them when they're arguing other things (like...*har har*...claims of 'insufficient evidence') and moving goal posts around.
I don't really know where to put this but I felt like sharing:
http://www.torontosun.com/news/canada/2010/01/10/12412736-qmi.html
“He obviously has the right to his own opinion on that,” said PMO spokeswoman Sara MacIntyre. “Having a brother in cabinet doesn’t preclude Arthur from expressing his opinion.”
Eleanor Johnston, spokeswoman for minister Kent, said: “The fact that Arthur is the minister’s brother just happens to be coincidental and circumstantial. He’s certainly entitled to his own opinion.”
I really had no idea!
In reply to Colvin's assertion that prisoner-abuse was rampant, they said there wasn't a single documented incident of prisoner abuse. When a documented incident was found (as the government strove mightily to prevent anyone from seeing anything) they said "it was only one incident."
Assholes.
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