Reagan on torture prosecution, via Andrew Sullivan, from the days before George W. Bush decided how to use signing statements for evil, rather than good…
“The United States participated actively and effectively in the negotiation of the Convention . It marks a significant step in the development during this century of international measures against torture and other inhuman treatment or punishment. Ratification of the Convention by the United States will clearly express United States opposition to torture, an abhorrent practice unfortunately still prevalent in the world today.
The core provisions of the Convention establish a regime for international cooperation in the criminal prosecution of torturers relying on so-called ‘universal jurisdiction.’ Each State Party is required either to prosecute torturers who are found in its territory or to extradite them to other countries for prosecution.”
My italics. Reagan was admant [sic] about prosecuting torture, but also prosecuting inhuman treatment that some might claim was not full-on torture. Now go read National Review or The Weekly Standard. And look what has happened to conservatism in America.
Reagan was, of course, part of the Blame-America-First crowd. Soft on terror. Friend of the evil-doers. Why did Ronald Reagan hate America?
Lawrence ODonnell pegged them perfectly the other day, with humility
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__8O7IDgcIc
The present Republican Party loves to quote “certain” Reagan quotes, not the ones that are diametrically opposed to what they stand for today. Same thing with their Republican Jesus quotes.
[ed note: Eliot, your comment was deleted for copying and pasting a huge amount. Please read our rules for commenting. Thank you. –99]
Ummmm….shouldn’t Eliot Bernstein be made aware of BB rules? I’m just sayin’.
As far as that goes, they SHOULD release Lindh, Englund, and possibly that other freak that coerced her, jail all of the hired contractors that gave them the orders, Cheney, Rummy, Bush and anyone else having to do with those orders.
My jury is still out on Karpinsky.
I guess England is out on parole now…where was I?
As for Lindh, did the new Christ/Mohammad show up and they tortured him and threw him in the clink?
Wow
Bush isn’t not really a true conservative like Regan, more of a corporate puppet. Reagen in this regard made the right choice, too bad Bush reversed all that.