Noblesse oblige

Condoleezza Rice, President George W. Bush's Secretary of State, personally approved a CIA request to use "waterboarding" and other harsh interrogation techniques.

he verbally agreed to allow the methods to be used on Abu Zubaydah, an al-Qaeda suspect, in July 2002, a Senate report has revealed.

Miss Rice's role in was outlined in a narrative released by the Senate Intelligence Committee as the controversy over alleged torture by the CIA continued to rage. he information indicates that the programme was approved at the highest levels of the Bush administration.

The new timeline suggests Miss Rice played a more significant role than she acknowledged in written testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee submitted in the autumn.

It remains unclear, however, who inside the Bush administration first floated the idea of using "waterboarding" – simulated drowning – and other "enhanced" techniques against terrorist suspects in the months after the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington.

The Senate Intelligence Committee's timeline came a day after the Senate Armed Services Committee released a detailed exhaustive report positing links between the CIA's harsh interrogation programme and abuses of prisoners at the US prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in Afghanistan and Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

Daily revelations about the interrogation programme have followed Mr Obama's decision to release four US Justice Department memos last Thursday.

The memos, running to 126 pages, were written by officials in Mr Bush's Justice Department and contained explicit details of the CIA's methods of extracting information from al-Qaeda suspects between 2002 and 2005.

They revealed that emerged that the highly controversial technique of "waterboarding" had been used 266 times on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Abu Zubaydah, two senior al-Qaeda prisoners.

After initially indicating he opposed any prosecutions, on Tuesday he said he was open to congressional investigations of Bush administration officials and possible criminal charges.

According to the new timeline, which compiles legal advice provided by the Bush administration to the CIA, Miss Rice personally conveyed the Bush administration's approval for waterboarding of Zubaydah to George Tenet, then CIA Director, in July 2002.

In the autumn, Miss Rice stated to the Senate Armed Services Committee that she had attended meetings where the CIA interrogation request was discussed but could not recall details.

Days after Miss Rice spoke to Mr Tenet, the Justice Department approved the use of waterboarding in a top secret memo. Abu Zubaydah was subjected to waterboarding some 83 times in August 2002.

VIA...Telegraph

off Topic Playoffs Post

Im really looking forward to the postseason and getting this championship back to LA..Lebron can get the MVP thats not of my concern he deserves it totally focused on the ring so i can walk down figeroa and go wild..in a respectable way..this video has me hyped ecstatically..

Frontline Report..The Ghost Plane

This was a very good informative depiction into the depths of Rendition im using this info for the report..Frontline World Extraordinary Rendition..Click on Link

A Mind Is A Terrible Thing to Waste!!

Honda has demonstrated another milestone in man's attempts to control machines by the power of thought alone.This Goes to show you how advance technologically we've become, A contribution to the already outstanding work Japanese developers have become in the world.Sort of reminds me as something as Imaginary like the X-men movies now an Actualization. Using a helmet-like device that measures a person's brain activity and sends signals to the machine, Honda showed how a researcher could make its celebrity robot Asimo move simply by concentrating on the movement.Honda said the technology was not quite ready for a live demonstration because of possible distractions in the person's thinking. ASIMO can perform the motions correctly in 90.6 percent of cases - a record in the field of BMI technology - the scientists told a Tokyo news conference.This is Only a small break-through in the possibilities of the developments as Honda hopes to use this Robot to help people do many duties like Serving dishes and watering plants most objectives around the home.still seems a little Unsubstantial in people believing it works but only time will tell how we could very soon have our robot speak for us..

NOt So Obvious

the most modest and unpretentious way of seeing into the sky.. designed By ENESS For Those with curiosity of the Universe This photo Shows us the future of exploration and most interactive telescope.This Design of telescope shows many shapes or forms unlike our originals, it can seem so contrasting as if space aliens came down and left and forgot it here.One may look at this photo as if the woman represents us and our planet looking outward for means to our existence or simply a new way into the vision of space.Its called the" Humble Telescope" metaphorically speaking as this particular design shows us charisma, beauty, and such effective use.inside the telescope exists a 3D simulation of our entire known universe. Pointing the telescope in any direction immediately shows us what exists in that area of space, so now we can get a greater understanding of where the planets are and where we live in the Milky Way.Overall In today's world we have more now than ever the tools into these sort of developments probably more since the age of Galileo Galilei, major philosopher, scientist and innovator who played a huge role in the science revolution, their is great use to fill our need of awareness outside this world and more understandability.

feeling of Insanity

Butterfly Effect is a phrase that encapsulates the more technical notion of sensitive dependence on initial conditions in chaos theory..In the Film By Eric Bress the same notion is expressed in a story of Evan Treborn a young man in a small town living with his single mother and amongst his friends.Evan finds himself in a serious case of blackouts and in a confused state especially in high stress occurences ,in time he develops some immune to this case but with no certainty.When Evan was younger he kept a diary to keep a record of these events,As he enters college he decides to read from his journal and is able to travel back in time and essentially he is able to redo parts of his life.He then experiences a number of events trying to fix his life in good intentions but in the end nothing ever comes as he wishes..I can coincide from this as we all may do, looking at something in the past even though most of us in the face of compliance all say "I have no regrets" there's always something that make you say "What If?"

Learned Helplessness

In the past administration, the U.S. Government has been spying on the American people what should be done? Patrick Joseph Leahy, a Democratic senator from Vermont and current chairman of Judiciary committee, wrote in a recent article for TIME magazine “The Case For a Truth Commission”. He acknowledged the readers about findings by the senator frank church committee, testimony for over 800 witnesses and thousand of pages that disclose surveillance tactics and tools used against the public. With even going far into investigating domestic groups such as the NAACP, an established organization with 400,000 members. The tone of the article speaks to a broad audience when describing vividly the warrantless surveillance of Americans as “trading away the public’s rights as if they were written in sand, not stone”. Leahy used the example in the Uncovering of Abu Ghraib were torture memos were sent out and describing the Events of Bush-Cheney-Gonzales Justice department as the worst since Watergate. So after presenting the issue at hand, Leahy expresses rhapsodically how appointing a truth-finding panel can help America Move Forward. Having a variety of fair-minded groups to find the facts and share their knowledge and experiences without an “ax to grind”. He closes out his issue with the respective forbearance of the republican view as the people “Have a Right to know what the government has done with their names”.The presented issue over the truth commission and whether or not it should exist leads us to ask questions and have an input those that agree and the opposed. More notably Leahy asks for a process that could involve subpoena powers and he continued to quote Lincoln and his bicentennial “we must bind our wounds”, after President Obama turned away from the issue to salvage the nation, any type of extreme partisanship and debilitating divisions could affect the U.S. even more. There is much evidence of how the bush administration used The malice practices to investigate also recent news of videotapes that were destroyed showing the acts of torture and sadistic ways used against the detainees. At all cost the country will learn and use these events to avoid but should there be direct karma for bush’s break into the laws of torture and breaking the Geneva conventions? That is the key issue on Leahy behalf well most of America agreed. There is need to a course of action since USA Today/Gallup Show that over 60% of America wants an investigation for the doings of the last 8 years; Congress will continue to work with the new administration as we have already seen progress with the recent reports and have the system work for us not against us.