Dems Trying To Give Terrorists Extra-Constitutional Rights & Gut Our Human Intel Capability

These Democrats are scurrilous and dumber than rocks. They are continuing their war on our intelligence capabilities and they will get people killed. Chief among them on the dumber than a rock list is House Intelligence Committee Chairman Sylvester Reyes, pictured above. When he took over the chairmanship in 2006, at the height of the Iraq War, this bozo did not know the difference between Sunni and Shia Muslims. His sole qualification for the Chairmanship was kissing Nancy Pelosi's very wrinkled ass. And now this mental midget has introduced a bill that would not only provide a new Constitutional right to terrorists, but it would actually give stronger protections to terrorists than that enjoyed by all American citizens under the Constitution. Moreover, it is so poorly written - so vague and ambiguous - that it would literally stop our intelligence agencies from conducting interrogations for fear of being put in jail. What an utterly idiotic, asinine, bottom feeding, incompetent, worthless S.O.B.

In the dead of night, Reyes using a procedural tool that allowed him to offer amendments to the Intelligence Bill that was to be voted on today - insuring that they would not be subject to hearing or debate, and he did so without any consultation with the CIA. His amendment, which you can find here beginning on page 33 of the pdf file, provides:

“Any officer or employee of the intelligence community who in the course of . . . [an] interrogation knowingly commits . . . an act of cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment . . . shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for not more than 15 years, or both.”

Note that the 8th Amendment to the Constitution provides a prohibition against “cruel and unusual punishments.” The language of that Amendment has a long history of interpretation and, in his amendment, Reyes specified that he meant his new law to be read in light of the 8th Amendment. But the language of his amendment went beyond that. To “cruel,” Reyes has added “inhuman” and “degrading.” That is so ambiguous and so potentially far reaching that it goes far beyond any limitation found in our Constitution. Left wing lawyers and judges would have a field day with this. Does degrading treatment mean that the FBI can no longer keep trying to break the Undiebombers will by telling fat jokes about his mother – upon pain of 15 years in jail?

In giving examples of the things outlawed under this provision, Reyes cites to many examples of prohibited acts "including but not limited to . . . waterboarding, . . . depriving the individual of necessary food, water or sleep, . . . using force or threat of force to compel an individual to maintain a stress position . . . exposure to excessive cold, heat or cramped confinement . . . prolonged isolation . . . placing hoods or sacks over the heads of individuals," and many more.

So what is "prolonged isolation?" Reyes doesn't define it. So at what point does a CIA agent risk going to jail? Our jails use solitary confinement as a punishment. What about sleep deprivation. Does a CIA officer risk jail time if he does not stop an interrogation when a prisoner says he's tired and wants to go to bed? This is beyond ridiculous. And none of that even begins to plumb the depths of what could be considered "demeaning" treatment.

Only two months ago, polls show that a wide majority of Americans thought that the Christmas Day Undiebomber should have been in military custody getting waterboarded for all he is worth. And here we have Reyes attempting to slide in a law to give the Undiebomber more legal rights than an American citizen. These people are suicidal in the way Jim Jones was - he was quite willing to commit suicide but forced the rest of his followers to do the same.

Andy McCarthy has much more on this at NRO, including a discussion of how Reyes and the left are, by this amendment, attempting to equate waterboarding with "torture." God help Reyes and crew when the next explosive devise sent in underwear from Yemen explodes. A bill will come due, and these utterly scurrilous individuals have to be made to pay in full.

Update: Reyes has now withdrawn his managers amendment. This from Rep. Pete Hoeksta:

That Democrats would try to bury this provision deep in the bill, late at night, when they thought everyone’s attention would be focused on the health care summit is a testament to the shameful nature of what they were attempting. . . . Republicans brought this to the attention of the American people, who were rightly outraged that Democrats would try to target those we ask to serve in harm’s way and with a unified push we were successful in getting them to pull the bill.

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Scandal, Lies & Post-Modernism In Full Fury

Several days ago, an attorney and Democratic Party campaign contributor, Thomas Lauria, went public with allegations that the Obama administration was using extortionate threats to convince secured creditors of Chrysler to, in essence, give up their rights in favor of the UAW. It was an incredibly serious charge. The White House immediately denied it and, to the best of my knowledge, only Jack Taper followed up on the charge. The left wing has gone nuclear on Taper for refusing to take the White House denial at face value and following up on Lauria's allegations. Now, more people are going public, confirming Lauria's allegations and adding to the story.

This from the Business Insider:

Creditors to Chrysler describe negotiations with the company and the Obama administration as "a farce," saying the administration was bent on forcing their hands using hardball tactics and threats.

Conversations with administration officials left them expecting that they would be politically targeted, two participants in the negotiations said.

. . . The sources, who represent creditors to Chrysler, say they were taken aback by the hardball tactics that the Obama administration employed to cajole them into acquiescing to plans to restructure Chrysler. One person described the administration as the most shocking "end justifies the means" group they have ever encountered. Another characterized Obama was "the most dangerous smooth talker on the planet- and I knew Kissinger." Both were voters for Obama in the last election.

One participant in negotiations said that the administration's tactic was to present what one described as a "madman theory of the presidency" in which the President is someone to be feared because he was willing to do anything to get his way. The person said this threat was taken very seriously by his firm.

. . . These allegations add to the picture of an administration willing to use intimidation to win over support for its Chrysler plans--and then categorically deny it.

Hope and Change, eh? Has the administraton violated any laws - no. That said, strong arming creditors to forego their constitutional right to property so that the Administration can reward Big Labour is a scandal, as are the White House categorical denials.

And in a clear example of intellectually dishonest post-modernism in action, The Business Insider also reports that the "Left Wing [is] Losing Its Mind . . ." over this story.

When we started writing about the allegation that Steve Rattner had threatened to use the White House press corps to ruin Perella Weinberg if the firm didn't drop its opposition to the Obama administration's Chrysler plan, we never expected it to become a political football. But on the left-wing of the political blogosphere, the story is quickly picking up steam. It's being portraryed as some kind of plot by political conservatives.

Left-wing blogs Think Progress and Media Matters have both attacked ABC News reporter Jake Tapper for picking up the story. Here's Think Progress's complaint::

By reporting the story, Tapper chose to accept the validity of Lauria’s claim that the White House could get 'the full force of the White House press corps' to threaten a private company. Despite the fact that the parties with direct knowledge — the White House and Perella Weinberg — denied to ABC that any threats were made, Tapper still reported Lauria’s false accusation on his 'Political Punch' blog. Drudge and other right-wing outlets are glad he did.

By our count there are at least two important errors in those two sentences.

- Your don't have to accept the validity of the claim that the White House could get the White House press corps to do its bidding to accept the possibility that Steve Rattner would make the threat. . . .

- Perella Weinberg hasn't denied that the threats were made. . . . [To the contrary], it seems that PW went out of its way not to deny that it was threatened. . . .

It boggles the mind to see progressives deciding that because the White House and a corporation deny a charge, that the charge must be false. Imagine, for instance, these folks accepting a version of events simply because it had been put forth by the Bush White House and Halliburton. But this is exactly what Think Progress and Media Matters are doing. It's as if their cognitive critical apparatus had simply stopped functioning sometime in January. . . .

Read the whole article. And welcome to the world of post-modern thought, where you are objectively and knowingly lying if you make a statement at odds with what the far left wants to believe. It is not that their "cognitive critical apparatus" stopped functioning in January, its that intellectual honesty is not a part of their core post-modernist paridigm.

H/T Hot Air. Find more links on this story at Memorandum.

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