the techniques used were brutal. The acronym 揈IT

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On Dec. 9, a Senate Select Committee issued a report on CIA interrogation methods that focused on the use of 揺nhanced interrogation techniques.?The report was clearly flawed. Nevertheless, it brought to the light a policy that all Americans should denounce.According to Sen. Jay Rockefeller,30 p.m. on Thursdays., D-W.Va., who served on the committee,gucci factory online, the interrogation process failed on five major points. First, the program was conceived by people who had never met a terrorist and was conducted along the lines of untested theories of interrogation.Secondly,gucci outlet online, the people performing the enhanced interrogation techniques lacked the necessary linguistic skills, interrogation training and real-life experience to know whether the process was working.Thirdly, senior officials failed to provide sufficient oversight for the program, which was fraught with the personal and financial conflicts of those involved.Fourthly,gucci outlet sale, and most disturbingly,according to the arrest repor, the techniques used were brutal. The acronym 揈IT,?despite Dick Cheney抯 denials,gucci outlet, means nothing more or less than torture.Finally, the quality of the intelligence gained from the ruthless treatment of detainees was suspect, and claims that it prevented further attacks or saved Americans?lives are doubtful.To someone who grew up watching old war movies in which the Americans acted with honor, regardless of the ruthlessness of their enemies, the report is deeply distressing. As a follower of Jesus, I find it simply appalling.Freezing a man to death,http://rembrandtsociety.org/websites.php, threatening to rape and murder a detainee抯 children, placing a man in a coffin-sized box for 11 days, and perpetrating other acts of torture ?in one case on a man later discovered to have been wrongfully accused ?these are not the kind of things that Americans do. They are certainly not things a Christ-follower can approve.Some people have argued that, while excessive, these methods were necessary to protect innocent lives. But how do we know that? Even the director of the CIA cannot say that these techniques provided life-saving intelligence that could not have been otherwise obtained.And even if it did, are we willing to corrupt our character and stain our national honor to obtain that information? Are we willing to become the kind of people we deplore?Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., himself a victim of torture as a prisoner of war in Vietnam, put it this way: 揟he main reason to oppose its use ... isn抰 about our enemies; it抯 about us. It抯 about who we were, who we are and who we aspire to be. It抯 about how we represent ourselves to the world.?/blockquote>McCain hit the proverbial nail on the head. It抯 about who we were, a people who stood, at great cost to themselves,gen8293, against Nazi brutality. It抯 about who we are,cheap gucci factory bags, a nation that promises 搇iberty and justice for all.?And it抯 about who we aspire to be.Page 2 of 2 - Ah,gucci factory outlet, but who is it that we aspire to be? On that point, I think, there is confusion and a lack of consensus. We no longer share a common vision,in no time, one capable of evoking our aspirations. As the biblical proverb rightly warns,gucci outlet store, 揥here there is no vision, the people perish.?/blockquote>This lack of an inspiring vision helps explain the bitter partisanship that has crippled our government in recent years. We cannot find common ground on issues of immigration, race and taxes partly because we have no guiding vision of who we want to be. We can抰 decide on a road because we抮e not sure where we want to go. There have been calls for a national conversation on these issues, but that conversation keeps turning into a shouting match for just this reason.Before a national conversation about legislative issues can be productive we need to have a conversation about national aspirations. What kind of nation do we want to be? That may be, in our increasingly pluralistic society, a long and difficult conversation. One thing I hope we can all agree on: we do not want to be the kind of people who resort to torture when we抮e afraid.Shayne Looper is the pastor of Lockwood Community Church in Branch County, Michigan. Read more at shaynelooper.com.

As I finally got the chance to drive up and present my ID, the inspector, a woman, was telling her co-worker casually about how she was sure there was something in the vehicle because she could see spotters watching from just south of the line. I had my own opinion about which car the spotters might have been monitoring — an Impala that made a suspicious lane-switch in front of me in the lines at the port.?

She dedicated the self-published book to her daughter, Kalena, 12, who danced alongside her mother onstage for several "Nutcrackers." Kalena never became a die-hard ballet "bunhead," (she favors martial arts these days), but Gabay says being a mother definitely colored the way she wrote the book.

He's not a DJ and never has been. Although Gillis may seem like he'd be at home in a DJ booth cueing up tunes for folks to dance to, he says that's not what Girl Talk is about. He even had T-shirts created at one point that said "I am not a DJ." "I never came up in a DJ scene, which is why I have the T-shirts that say that," he says. "In all the years I've done this, I've never played an unaltered song, not once."