Did Durbin 'Embellish' The FBI Memo?

[Annie]

First a bit of perspective:

http://froggyruminations.blogspot.com/2005/06/al-jazeera-live-from-us-senate.html

Al Jazeera - Live From US Senate

Maligning the character of the US fighting man for political purpose is nothing new. Yesterday’s New York Times had an article about the propaganda efforts of the Japanese army in WW II. It seems the Japanese, in an effort to instill fear into the civilian population of Okinawa, made horrific claims against the Americans, encouraging suicide over capture by the barbarous invading forces.

“‘For a long time, the Japanese Imperial Army announced that, on other islands, the women had been raped and killed, and the men were tied at the wrists and tanks were driven over them,’ said Mr. Nakamura …”

Shortly after his mother mercifully killed his twenty-year-old sister (and unsuccessfully trying to kill himself) Mr. Nakamura was captured by the Americans.

“‘The U.S. soldier touched me to check if I had any weapons,’ he recalled. ‘Then he gave us candy and cigarettes.’”

Now I am sure that someone on the left (Durbin...?Durbin...?) will probably call those WW II troop Nazi’s for promoting tooth decay and lung cancer, but I think that most reasonable people can, in this case, draw a distinction between the actions of the Americans and the actions of the Japanese.

Just as it was in the interests of the Japanese to promote disinformation about the American liberators in order to maintain their barbarous stranglehold on the people of Okinawa, so it is in the interest of the Islamic terrorists to mislead the people of the Middle East in order to maintain their oppressive power. I am not surprised when some radical cleric calls us the “great satan”, or when some hotshot terrorist thug talks smack about our troops, on the contrary, I expect it, they are the enemy and that is what enemies do. I am, however, outraged when the enemy's propaganda is served up by a member of the US Senate on the floor of that same institution.

Fighting the propaganda war against our troops has always been and will always been the domain of the enemy. In that sense, Senator Durbin, you are the enemy. While you may not be wearing a hood and brandishing a severed head, you are complicit. The President spoke for America when he said, “Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.” If a tree is judged by its fruit, what color, Senator Durbin, is yours?

Now on the 'embellishments':

http://froggyruminations.blogspot.com/2005/06/durbin-may-have-embellished-fbi-memo.html

There is a link to the memo:

Durbin May Have Embellished FBI Memo

Via Myopic Zeal is the allegation that Durbin may have fabricated parts of his 'torture' example drawn from a confidential FBI memo. The charge is buried at the bottom of a Friday story on Foxnews.com:

"One knowledgeable official familiar with the memo cited by Durbin as well as other memos said the FBI agent made no such allegation and that the memo described only someone chained to the floor. Anything beyond that is simply an interpretation, the official said."​

If true this means that the charges made by Durbin that US officials at Guantanamo Bay treated detainees in a manner commensurate with that of Nazis, Soviet gulags, and the genocide in Cambodia are not only obscene but also FALSE.

Realizing that simply chaining murderers to the floor was insufficient to associate US troops with the most sinister and amoral regimes of the past century, Durbin may have made up the demeaning air conditioning treatment, the eeeeevil subjection to 100F temperatures, and the smelly and stinky poop and pee bath that the poor terrorists had to endure. Of course the use of anonymous sources in this instance is troubling, but the memo is ostensibly an actual document that could be accessed at least in part by the public. I call on the Senate Judiciary Committee to either release or review and comment upon the contents of this FBI memo. The public has the right to know, and the Senate has the duty to inform us whether a US Senator fabricated ?tortuous? actions and ascribed them maliciously to US troops serving at Guantanamo.

Making the connection between subjecting terrorists to temperature extremes and poopy pants with treatment in Nazi concentration camps disqualifies Durbin from holding office and demands censure. Maliciously and falsely charging US troops with torture on the floor of the US Senate entitles him to prosecution for Treason under 18 USC 2381.

UPDATE: Allow me to "Revise and Extend" my remarks above. Apparently the "memo" in question is in fact a pair of printed email transmissions from an agent in the Boston Field Office of the FBI. I have no reason to believe that the emails are erroneous although I do find them peculiar. If these activities mentioned by the FBI agent caused so much consternation such as is indicated in the first email, then where is the criminal complaint? Last time I checked, the FBI has the authority to charge anyone for violations of federal law occurring onboard a Naval installation. Liberals want to see terrorists charged and tried in federal court, but they'll take some lowly agent's word for it that these scumbags were tortured never mind the charges for that. The political points scored will do just fine I suppose. If this was the kind of egregious violation that Durbin is alleging, then this "very upset" agent and her management would have done something about it at the time.

The "memo" looks like the FBI is trying to A) Establish the inferiority of other agencies involved in the interrogation of detainees and/or B) Cover their own a$$. One reason that 9/11 occurred was because the FBI was unwilling to cooperate with other agencies due to its superiority complex (which ought not exist any longer). In addition there is the persistent belief in the FBI and the American Left that the Bill of Rights applies to terrorists encountered on the battlefield, just like it does for criminal suspects arrested in a drug bust.

I obviously disagree, but it seems that Durbin was merely parroting an FBI agent that found the minor inconveniences of terrorist murderers, "personally very upsetting." As a former federal agent myself who worked in the Department of Homeland Security, I never knew anyone who would have been "very upset" to see terrorists hosed down with a flame thrower let alone have poopy pants in an air conditioned room.