"24" Hurts our troops?  Who would say such a thing?

"This past November, U.S. Army Brigadier General Patrick Finnegan, the dean of the United States Military Academy at West Point, flew to Southern California to meet with the creative team behind “24.” Finnegan, who was accompanied by three of the most experienced military and F.B.I. interrogators in the country, arrived on the set as the crew was filming. At first, Finnegan—wearing an immaculate Army uniform, his chest covered in ribbons and medals—aroused confusion: he was taken for an actor and was asked by someone what time his “call” was.

"In fact, Finnegan and the others had come to voice their concern that the show’s central political premise—that the letter of American law must be sacrificed for the country’s security—was having a toxic effect. In their view, the show promoted unethical and illegal behavior and had adversely affected the training and performance of real American soldiers. “I’d like them to stop,” Finnegan said of the show’s producers. “They should do a show where torture backfires...

"At other moments, the discussion was more strained. Finnegan told the producers that “24,” by suggesting that the U.S. government perpetrates myriad forms of torture, hurts the country’s image internationally. Finnegan, who is a lawyer, has for a number of years taught a course on the laws of war to West Point seniors—cadets who would soon be commanders in the battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan. He always tries, he said, to get his students to sort out not just what is legal but what is right. However, it had become increasingly hard to convince some cadets that America had to respect the rule of law and human rights, even when terrorists did not. One reason for the growing resistance, he suggested, was misperceptions spread by “24,” which was exceptionally popular with his students. As he told me, “The kids see it, and say, ‘If torture is wrong, what about “24”?’ ” He continued, “The disturbing thing is that although torture may cause Jack Bauer some angst, it is always the patriotic thing to do...

"The third expert at the meeting was Tony Lagouranis, a former Army interrogator in the war in Iraq. He told the show’s staff that DVDs of shows such as “24” circulate widely among soldiers stationed in Iraq. Lagouranis said to me, “People watch the shows, and then walk into the interrogation booths and do the same things they’ve just seen.” He recalled that some men he had worked with in Iraq watched a television program in which a suspect was forced to hear tortured screams from a neighboring cell; the men later tried to persuade their Iraqi translator to act the part of a torture “victim,” in a similar intimidation ploy. Lagouranis intervened: such scenarios constitute psychological torture.

“In Iraq, I never saw pain produce intelligence,” Lagouranis told me. “I worked with someone who used waterboarding”—an interrogation method involving the repeated near-drowning of a suspect. “I used severe hypothermia, dogs, and sleep deprivation. I saw suspects after soldiers had gone into their homes and broken their bones, or made them sit on a Humvee’s hot exhaust pipes until they got third-degree burns. Nothing happened.” Some people, he said, “gave confessions. But they just told us what we already knew. It never opened up a stream of new information.” If anything, he said, “physical pain can strengthen the resolve to clam up...”

- The New Yorker, February 19, 2007.

Please spare me comments about The New Yorker as a source.  The new US Military Counterinsurgency Field Manual includes just 3 acknowledgements  - one of them is The New Yorker.  If it's good enough for those folks, it certainly is good enough for NB.

Jolo Island is off the coast by the oil port of Um Qasr, Iraq - right ? Uhh, if not why are you even bringing this up - there's a war going on . Did Abu Sayaff attack us on 911 now along with Saddam ? Does bin laden or wmd mean anything to you,other than "missing" ? I don't see what you said has to do with anything going on, why even post it, it doesn't matter to 3,000 wasted lives.

How did I do balboa ? blarsen ?

( Use a baseball bat, a golf club is too flexible )

Make that 2 billion minus 1, because I certainly won't be watching or listening to it.

"A communist is someone who reads Marx.  An anti-communist is someone who understands Marx."  Ronald Reagan

The people passing and enforcing these laws are truly afraid of the female orgasm.

Here's an interesting tidbit on this case, Sarc.

The three-judge panel (all men) were 2 appeals judges and 1 district judge.

Of the two appeals judges, one was appointed by Bush (Dubina), the other by Clinton (Wilson).

The district judge (Hodges) has to be older than dirt (I have since found he is 73), having sat on the bench since 1971. Now, Nixon was prez, but the Dems controlled the Senate, which has to approve all judges at that level, unless I am mistaken.

This ruling is stupid, but is it BI-PARTISAN stupidity. You may want to correct some of the lesser-endowed mental giants who posted comments to that story @Reason.