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I think they are just afraid to face honest unfiltered questions from normal everyday americans who are on to their BS.

They should be in the debate though.

Unfiltered? Yeah right. If they let CNN pick the questions, maybe they should let FOX pick the questions for the Republicans.

Let me give you a preview of the videos that CNN will choose to run:

#1 I'm a poor single mother who works three jobs to support my 6 kids. Why are republicans so mean?

2# I'm a crazy wacko racist, why isn't the republican party rounding up all the Mexicans?

3# My son is in Iraq, why are you mean republicans keeping him there?

4# I got laid of from my manufacturing job, why did you mean republicans tell my boss to fire me?

5# I'm an atheist, why do you mean republicans want to force me to convert to Christianity (or mormonism)?

JohnW,

Nope, that's what internets are for!

No way.

The YouTube debate was almost the dumbest thing I've ever seen. It was a complete farce - 40 second sound bite answers to asinine questions posted by idiots.

This is beneath the dignity of the presidential debates, and the Dems were fools for doing this. The Repubs will be even more foolish having seen what a freak show this is.

More of the "big lie" nonsense from conservatives:

Democrats were afraid to go on Fox News.

Fox is a rabid right-wing propaganda outlet, and we won't have hate mongers like O'Reilly (whose forum's website's featured commenters advocating the death of Hilary Clinton).

Of course, the truth is, if the Repubs are afraid to face the American people who ask questions via YouTube, how can they face al Qaeda?

we won't have hate mongers like O'Reilly

You have no broadcast hate-mongers on the Left? What about Keith Olbermann and his anti-American rants? And your blog world has the bigots and liars -- Fred Clarkson (sees a theocracy beind every rock), Barry Lynn (there was no proselytism), John Amato (nobody threatened Hillary), Nicole Belle (we're not Nazis), etc.

Collin Brendemuehl writes:

What about Keith Olbermann and his anti-American rants?

Get this straight: The Republican party is a criminal enterprise; it certainly is not America. George W. Bush is not America. He is an unindicted perp. (He has admitted to violating the FISA law.)

And your smears to the contrary, those other folks don't do hate; but they do respond to the Anti-Americanism of the extreme right.

Get this straight: The Republican party is a criminal enterprise; it certainly is not America.

Mumon, there's no need to be radical here. There is a difference between the Republican Party and the Bush Administration.

Collin
What about Keith Olbermann and his anti-American rants?

Indeed, Keith Olbermann is really, really scary. There are few people who are anywhere near as evil and sinister as he is. And I said near, I doubt any individual human being could ever equal his level of just pure evil. Why I doubt even if Satan himself was given a show if he could ever do as much damage to America, apple pie and cute little puppies as the horrible Keith Olbermann did.

Mumon, Boonton, Mike Toreno,

Y'all may disagree with my characterization of Olbermann. So be it.

But I'm still waiting ...
and waiting ...
and waiting ...
and waiting ...
... to hear someone from the Left denounce that level of coercion?

Boonton:

Mumon, there's no need to be radical here. There is a difference between the Republican Party and the Bush Administration.

Really? Then why is that the RNC has refused to turn over e-mails related to possible violations of the Hatch Act (the attnorney firings for political reasons) because of "executive privilege?"

Why is it that despite all the huffing and puffing of Republican Senators about the Iraq debacle they have not found enough of them who would actually challenge the Bush regime?

Why is it that not a single one of them has stood up for the rule of law, and taken the lead on violations of the FISA law?

Why is it that not a single one of the current contenders has not spoken out against the kidnapping and torture of innocent people via "extraordinary rendition?"

The fact that the RNC has been complicit at least in this, and hasn't distanced itself from the crimnal organization in the White House makes it a criminal organization in the very intent of the RICO statute.

Boonton,
How convenient.
That was NICOLE'S headline, not mine!
And if they knew, and it was stated, that he would not come out because of their presence, how is that not coercion?
Yes, many pro-lifers have protested at the homes of abortion providers. Those who used intimidation were wrong to do so -- I'm not afraid to denounce those actions. Wrong is wrong. Will you do the same?
Yes, I'm still waiting.
And if you want to use some level of equivocation to justify this type of behavior -- have at it. Your character is showing.
Oh, and remember the Hillary Health Care meetings? Remember when a pizza chain owner told her that they couldn't raise the price of pizza enough to cover health insurance? Remember her response that the gov't couldn't be responsible for every undercaptialized small business? Remember from that point on that Clinton's public meetings were ALL screened? (Your icons set the precendent.) Of course not. You're just a partisan hack supporting intimidation.
Subvert the Dominant Marxist! ;-)

So I'm curious to hear why Collin thinks the left should denounce the freedom to peacefully protest the actions of elected officials?

Collin,

Clearly you're mostly insane but I'll entertain your points:

You act as though Free Speech can never be legally restricted. Ever have a job where you signed a non-disclosure agrement? We do this all the time. Even the gov't can legally do it to maintain both security and order.

Err no if you bothered to read what I wrote you'll note that I said there's probably laws about protesting in quiet residential areas. You'll also note that I said free assembly can be restricted under some circumstances (such a political rally).

"Trapped" represents coercion. It is intimidation to cause him to behave in a certain manner (in this case to not leave his house).

It is coercion to trap someone. But trap means to use force or the threat of force. If the Senator is embrassed to go out in public he isn't being 'trapped' by the public. "Cause him to behave in a certain manner" is too vague to mean anything. If the local TV station played his favorite movie and that caused him to stay home one evening is that coercion? Trapping him with entertainment?

Isn't a sense of threat is what the "Hate Crimes" legislation is all about. They wouldn't happen to Hate conservatives, would they?

No, hate crimes require an underlying crime. You are free to hate anyone you want. Hate crimes only would come into play if your hate motivated you to commit some crime. As far as we can tell, these people are exercising their right to assemble and protest and are abiding by the law. Whether they 'hate' the Senator or not is not relevant here.

Hmmm. Whether or not they behave themselves is one thing,

Actually it's a pretty important thing.

but whether they know that the target of the protests senses a threat and they continue, that's intimidation.

This is an interesting theory of intimidation. What if they protested outside the Senate? What if they protested by posting to blogs? The Senator may say he 'feels' intimidated. By your theory free speech comes to a dead stop as soon as someone declares they 'feel' intimidated. Isn't this at the root of the most absurd political correctness? The question is are these people peacefully protesting or are they doing objective acts that could reasonably be construed as threatening? I'll grant you it's a nuanced question but we do have a pretty decent judicial and law enforcement system that can evaluate the situation and balance out the conflicting interests.

Come to think of it, though, isn't the unsupported labeling of these people as 'trappers' and 'intimidators' in itself intimidating their right to freely express their opposition to the policies an elected official has supported? Will you turn yourself into the local police station intimidator!?

The later Clinton meetings were staged "townhall" meetings, just like Bush is doing. Personally, I think it's pretty shallow of both of them. But to denounce Bush for doing the same thing as Clinton is certainly not a consistent position.

I forgive you for being unable to follow my previous post. YOu clearly have grown used to ignoring reality but I think you should try to rejoin us here in Reality Land. Both Bush and Clinton are perfectly free to hold rallies, 'townhalls' and other events where they vet the participants ahead of time. In reality it is probably impossible not to hold an event that you would describe as 'staged'. If either Bush or Clinton said they were going to hold an 'open meeting' without any screening the result would probably not be a glorious representation of everyday citizens....lobbyists and political operatives would jockey to insert people that suit their agenda into the mix. Needless to say, you also need to worry about attention seekers and lunatics showing up that could be dangerous. Just about any type of event is going to be staged to one degree or another and there's nothing wrong with that.

Go get the permit and organize your rally, townhall etc. But if Bush or Clinton are going to walk or drive from point A to point B neither should get an automatic 'moving stage' to manage what the TV camera's pick up.

Your insinuation that I'm somehow unAmerican is pretty disgusting.

Sorry but you kind of have to expect that if you're going to launch a jihad against freedom of assembly and free speech.

I made the group behavior secondary to the perception of a threat, which was the most important point. The stayed because the knew it kept him indoors.

Notice the double standard. About pro-lifers you said:

Yes, many pro-lifers have protested at the homes of abortion providers. Those who used intimidation were wrong to do so -- I'm not afraid to denounce those actions.

with the Senator your standard of judging intimidation was "does he say he changed his behavior". What if the Senator said he decided to vote a different way because he didn't like those people protesting him? By your standard that would be intimidation. Likewise what about an abortion provider who decided to quite doing abortions?

But with the pro-lifers your standard is did the protestors 'use intimidation'. Did they do objective acts that threatened their target. But with the Senator the question is just does he say there's a "perception of a threat"....with the only person judge being the Senator himself.

No doubt the abortion providers felt a 'perception of a threat'. After all, not being public figures like the Senator, they probably were not used to seeing people protesting them (let alone outside their homes).

But the test isn't does the target of the protest "perceive a threat". That becomes nothing more than the abolition of free speech. The Senator will happily play the victim and 'perceive a threat' whereever there is a protest that 'gets in his way'. The test is did the protestors behave in a way that a reasonable person would view as making a threat? If not you have no right to tar their legal acts as 'intimidation'.

If the Senator honestly perceives a threat the police should be called. If they see the protestors behaving in a threatening manner, they can arrest them. If not they can escort the Senator for his 'peace of mind'. The Senator himself can file charges against any protestor that threatens him (but if he is dishonest about it he himself runs the risk of being cited for making a false report).

Now I'm sure that are some legal limits on protesting in residential areas. The community does have a right to peace and quiet so they probably can restrict protestors to daylight hours, limit how long a protest can last, cap the number of protestors at any one time etc. These limits would be more strict than, say, at a public park or "town square". But there is no right to be immune from criticism. If the Senator chooses to hide from public criticism he isn't being intimidated or 'trapped'.

I raised the point of restricted speech because of your pushing the Constitutional matter. It appeared to be a contradiction in your presentation.

Pretty bizaar because my 'presentation' referenced areas where speech can and should be restricted. At best you're just re-making the points I already made.

Insane? Jihad? Unamerican? Will you stop at nothing to demonize your opponent? Belle calls us Nazis. Frankly, if that's what you call Reality, you're in my prayers.

I'm just being perfectly frank with you. I say your disconnected from reality because you seem oblivious to what people say...even to the facts that you yourself reference. Unamerican because you're pushing an idea that radically guts the right to free assembly and free speech...probably the most American of political rights you can find in the Bill of Rights. If that isn't unamerican then what type of policies would one have to advocate to be fairly accused of being unamerican? Single payer healthcare?

Ease up Boonton, you're coming across as a jerk.

When NB framed the "trapping" situation as "the heat on these congresspeople to get our troops out of Iraq" that was enough. In fact, too much. And since you seem to approve of NB's support of intimidation and coercion (because you won't denounce it) by your silence to the request, you've spoken clearly. Don't blame me just because you don't understand "coercion".

I really don't understand you Collin. Congressmen shouldn't feel any heat? Perhaps we shouldn't even have elections? No guts no glory. Whatever 'heat' a Senator feels from anti-war protesters pales in comparison to the actual heat of being deployed in Iraq, having your life in danger. If you have actual evidence that these protesters did anything wrong then present it. Otherwise what are you asking us to denounce them for?

Man, where were these people back when Clinton was in office? I wonder how they would have greeted "critics intimidate me, make them stop!" from him?

We, the People" have a right and duty to speak out when things are going wrong.

I'll be in DC on Sept. 11 to call for the troops to come home and the impeachment of the Cheney/Bush.

Maybe I'll see some of the evangelical outpost regulars there? Sure we have some members of the "Gathering of the Eagles" group here....

Now knowing what that means look carefully at what ucfengr is saying. Bush has basically declared that whatever 'elite opinion' is, he doesn't care. He has basically declared whatever the decisions of the courts or Congress are, he doesn't care. He doesn't even care about the normal rules of the game such as, say, having an Attorney General not gleefully perjure himself every chance he gets.

The "extraordinary rendition" policy was originated under the Clinton administration; Bush has decided to continue it, appropriately so given the current environment. I think a bigger question is where was the left in 1995 when the policy was originated. Were you against it then; did you even care about it, or does it only become an issue because Bush does it? What did Hillary think about it? As co-President, she must of has some awareness of the program? Does her involvement in the program disqualify her as a Presidential candidate for the left?

Now knowing what that means look carefully at what ucfengr is saying. Bush has basically declared that whatever 'elite opinion' is, he doesn't care. He has basically declared whatever the decisions of the courts or Congress are, he doesn't care. He doesn't even care about the normal rules of the game such as, say, having an Attorney General not gleefully perjure himself every chance he gets.

What have the courts said about "extraordinary rendition"? What has Congress said? What did they say in 1995, when the program was originated, before we were at war? What Bush did was continue a policy that began in the prior administration. What were the legal and Congressional opinions then? With the exception of Obama, all the current Democratic Presidential contenders were either in the Congress or members of the Clinton administration. Which of them spoke up against it?

At the end of the day we are seeing the near complete moral and intellectual bankruptcy of the right wing here.

I didn't have a problem with the program when it was originated, nor apparently did much of the left. It is only now, when a Republican is President that it becomes a moral crisis for the nation. Why is that? I agree that we are seeing "near complete moral and intellectual bankruptcy" here, but I disagree that it is coming from the right.

If the left would grant that the people we are dealing with are not criminals, but enemies in a war, then I think the "extraordinary rendition" policy could be safely discontinued.

Who is this left? The Supreme Court? Congress? The guy sitting in the Starbucks outside of NYC sipping a latte and reading the Village Voice? Why do they all have to sign onto your demand? This President has declared himself outside all checks and balances on his actions from Congress and the Judicial Branch. Now, all in the sudden, the ACLU is so powerful that he cannot stop 'extraordinary rendition'?

Grow up, if these are enemies in a war why send them to countries like Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Syria etc? Those are all countries with known sympathies for Al Qaeda. If these are enemies then they need to be held under our custody.

If these are simply suspects there is no right to torture them even indirectly.

Now there are legititmate uses of 'extraordinary renditition'. If someone is, say, a murder suspect in Germany but is a citizen of Jamacia and ends up in the US the US should be able to deport him to Germany where he will be arrested instead of sending him to Jamacia where they may or may not coorporate with Germany in prosecuting him. What is not legitimate is the purposefully having people sent to countries where the administration not only knows but expects them to be tortured.

In fact, the policy of keeping suspected terrorists in Cuba is a way of making sure that suspected terrorists are not granted Constitutional protections, while at the same time being kept in US custody. In that respect, Bush has done a much better job than the previous administration in prevent torture of people being held by the US.

The detaining of 'suspected terrorists' is a different issue than either torture or extraordinary rendition. The above is nonsense. Even the 'in that respect', which means in the above context "ignore all the facts" doesn't save it.

Which leads to the other problem, the reason 'the left' is causing ucfengr such pain is that the detaining of 'illegal combatants' is legal but ends when the war ends. The problem is that this 'war' exists only at the whim of the President. There is no objective way to determine when, if ever, it will end or even if it has ended already. There being no objective way to tell if the war has ended there is now ay to evaluate whether or not people are being held legally. And this matters because the President has essentially said he can hold anyone captured anywhere, even US citizens.

There has been precedent in our history of the executive placing people under arrest without charge in war time. For example, Lincoln did that to Southern sympathizers in the Civil War. But there was an objective way to evaluate when the Civil War ended. HOlding a suspected sympathizer for several years is one thing, holding for a lifetime is something else. There has to be a check and balance in principle. Now practically, considering how corrupt and incompetatent this administration has been the need for a check and balance is all the more compelling.

Boonton, I see you are still dancing around the fact that the "extraordinary rendition" policy is an artifact of the Clinton administration and that almost nobody on the left thought it was a big deal until Bush became President and continued the practice. I can also find no evidence that any of the current crop of Democrat Presidential candidates had a problem with it before now.

What the Clinton administration did was more like the example I gave. There the issue was the opportunity to capture an Egyptian who had not attacked the US but was involved in terrorism against the Egyptian gov't. The concern was whether it was legal to essentially kidnap people from the soil of other sovereign nation. The conclusion was essentially that it wasn't legal but covert operations are by definition 'illegal' (under international law).

We don't know if or how often it was used under the Clinton administration but under the Bush administration we have evidence that this has expanded into a large program involving hundreds of people. Unlike the previous administration, this no longer involves clear violations legitimate laws of the country we are sending people too. In other words, Egypt legtitimately has laws against terrorists who attack Egypt. Egypt also has what we can say are illegit laws against opposition to Egypts dictatorship. It's one thing to render over to Egypt someone involved in setting off a bomb at an Egyptian resort. It's quite another to render over someone who hasn't done anything like that.

In either case it is illegal to render over someone who there is good reason to believe will be tortured. Both law and treaty clearly state that if we do that we have to get assurances from the gov't that the person will not be tortured. From what we've seen though, rendition appears to have become a way to offshore torture so we don't have to do it ourselves.

Joe Biden has recently proposed regulating the process, which I suppose is a step forward, but he hasn't proposed banning it, and again, I ask, where the heck was he in 1995?

I'd be interested to know if Clinton's directive was known at the time. The directive was originally classified so it's possible Biden didn't even know about it directly, at least for a while. I haven't been able to locate when it became unclassified BUT there's a difference in terms of scale. When it was used rarely, if ever, you probably don't need a system to regulate it. Responsibility for its proper use attaches directly to either the President or to high ranking members of the administration who can be held accountable for its misuse. When you're using it in hundreds of cases then it has to be regulated because you know it is not being reviewed on a case by case basis (especially by this lackadasical President).

So to address your point I can't judge the Clinton administrations use of it nor can I say Democrats should have been on top of it back then. My impression is that it was probably too new and too rarely used for them to have focused on it (that's ASSUMING the information was even available back then). This is an important factor. Our system is centered on case over theory. In other words, Courts do not address abstract questions like "is extraordinary rendition legal?" but address specific cases like "was it legal to take Mr X from a street in Paris and send him to Cairo where he was tortured?". Obviously a policy may be very flawed but if it is rarely used those flaws will not present themselves.

You may recall a similiar example from the Clinton era. Conservatives went ballistic over charges that US companies transferred ballistic missle tech. to China. This was because US companies were allowed to go into China and help them launch satallites. This was a policy that began under the Reagan administration but there were few if any critics of it then.

So, Clinton approved the sending of captured al Qaeda members to known human rights abusers, apparently under the assumption that they would be tortured. Yeah, that's just like your example.

"...could get each receiving country to guarantee that it would treat a person according to its own laws..." I read this as a guarantee for no torture. Many 'human rights abusers' do indeed have laws on their books prohibiting torture. Unfortunately, like laws against bribery in developing countries, these laws are often ignored.

It doesn't seem sensible to demand that receiving countries treat rendered people per US legal standards. If there was a case to be made against them for violating US laws then why not make it in a US court? What this was probably being used for was to get people who were violating laws of those countries, laws that wouldn't be enforceable in our courts because they are probably anti-freedom. That doesn't automatically make the policy wrong but it does give us good reason to worry about it since we are essentially talking about our gov't acting as a branch of law enforcement for these countries.

But if this was indeed the assumption...that torture was legal in these countries and "treat according to its own laws" meant torture then I'll agree it was wrong for the Clinton administration to do it, wrong for the Bush administration not to reject such a policy and doubly wrong for the Bush administration to increase the use of such a policy.

I think I've followed the particular rabbit trail far enough. It's pretty clear that your problem is not with any particular program, but with Bush. If Bush was giving terrorists ice cream and balloons 3 times a day, ...

Now now, let's not confuse the issue with his policy on Pakistan.

Bush, on the other hand has largely kept the captured al Qaeda members in US custody and held them according to guidelines permitted by Congressional oversight committees as well as US government lawyers. In other words, it is less likely that a captured prisoner will be tortured under the Bush application than the Clinton one.

"less likely" is just about meaningless here without some handle on numbers. If Clinton's admin. got 5 terrorists and rendered 3 of them to torturing countries that's a 60% rate. If Bush's got 5,000 and rendered 1,000 to torturing countries that's a 20% rate but nevertheless is an unacceptably dramatic increase in torture.

As for the checks and balances, I notice that 'US government lawyers' means the administration. I hope you wouldn't be so silly as to try to sell the DoJ as run by this attorney general as any type of 'oversight'.

Of course if Bush made the same agreement, you would read it as a guarantee of torture.

No but in both cases I would be concerned about whether the 'agreement' was sincere or just being done for CYA reasons.

So either entire Clinton national security team were idiots of Bushian proportions for believing that these known human rights abusers would honor their laws, or they knew full well what would happen and didn't give a rip. I know what I am guessing.

It depends on how the request was made. If it was made with the understanding that the US was doing these countries a favor and if they broke their agreement favors wouldn't be done in the future then they probably would work. If it was made with the attitude of "just say you ain't going to torture we don't care" then that's something different.

Of course you are missing the key point of Scheuer's testimony, namely that Bush changed the policy so that we were keeping the renditioned prisoners. This serves two purposes, first it assures that we have access to any intelligence, and second it assures that there is no torture.

1. It assures no torture if this administration made it clear they will not accept torture. Unfortunately it has done just the opposite...another topic of course...

2. We may be keeping a larger percentage of prisoners than were were before but this doesn't mean the rendition program was stopped. As I pointed out you can dramatically increase the number of people rendered and still see a huge fall in the % if you're suddenly getting a lot more prisoners than you used too.

Actually it doesn't. The vast majority of executive branch lawyers are career civil servants who are not a part of the administration. But say that they are just for the sake of argument, does senior members of the Congressional Intelligence Oversight committees mean the administration too?

Yea, you mean like lawyers for the DoJ wouldn't be fired for political reasons?

guidelines that were crafted by U.S. Government lawyers, approved by the executive branch and briefed to and permitted by at least the four senior members of the two congressional intelligence oversight committees

This sounds more like the oversight members were briefed. I'm unaware what Constitutional provisions permit just four congressmen to write laws.

I am guessing you have never seen a map of Afghanistan. Afghanistan is land-locked and the only route we have to supply our forces there is through Pakistan, unless you want to invade Iran. Pakistan is also, at least a nominal ally in our war with al Qaeda. I

1. We now have air bases in Afghanistan and most of the supplies come in through air. We aren't driving caravans of camels through Pakistan to bring food and ammo to our troops in Afghanistan. The days of Lawrence of Arabia are long gone.

2. Osama bin Laden is in northern Pakistan and the gov't of Pakistan is unable or unwilling to get him or allow us to enter there. We have really strange allies and enemies in this war don't we?

Are you really this stupid, or are you pretending? Countries don't just control their land, they also control the airspace over their territory. We can't fly over Pakistan without their permission. I am having a really hard time believing you are this clueless.

So let's see, if we went back to the point right after 9/11 we told the Taliban that bin Laden had attacked the US and he was in their country. We told them we were going to get him. They said they didn't give any permission for us to go in & they were not going to arrest him themselves.

Odd isn't it that back then we didn't consider the Taliban an ally & feel we must not destablize them least they upset our efforts in Iraq. I guess Bush being still somewhat new then didn't have the time to teach use the nuances of this new type of thinking about foreign policy.

Really, you know for a fact that bin Laden is in Pakistan? If you have his GPS coordinates, you could be a rich man. The reality is we don't know where he is; he might be in Pakistan; he might be in Iran; he might be somewhere else completely; heck, he might even be dead.

Indeed, nothing to see in northern Pakistan. Please move along now...

Maybe you should take some time off from EO and read a freakin' history book. We've had strange allies and enemies in most of our wars. During WW2 we sided with Stalin against Hitler....

Naaa, at best you can say we've had some ironic allies but there was logic to all of the examples you cited. Then again we had smarter people running things back then.