Panetta: "I think we have to define what kind of rendition we're talking about."

[EFerrari]

Leon Panetta is arguing that rendition is a good tool. Not "extrordinary" rendition, but kidnapping nonetheless.

So, if Cuba wants to come here and kidnap Posada, that's cool? He's a terrorist and I'm sure he's a "high value target" for Cuba.

This is a mistake, it opens the door to lawlessness and human rights abuses and CIA is going to fight to keep this.

You can't be a little pregnant.

[MarjorieG]

1. That's how we got Eichmann from Argentina. Yes, sometimes, okay, but not torture.

Was it Paraguay? But message the point.

[EFerrari]

2. This is how Eichmann was caught. That doesn't make it okay.

[Ichingcarpenter]

3. I'm not Israeli are you? The Americans didn't get out Eichmann

The Israelis did

Just to set your facts straight

[EFerrari]

18. It's so bizarre because the issue of rendition went up like a red flag for me

weeks ago. All this time of listening to BushCo has given me bat hearing or something because Obama has been careful to say "extrordinary rendition" and today's statements by this guy who I like, btw, were no surprise. :(

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

4. Is that like, "Not extraorodinary rape" but "Just plain rape"?

Or, "Collateral damage" rather than "mass slaughter"?

[EFerrari]

5. It's the rule of law without the rule of law part!

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

6. Badges? We don't need no steenking badges! We're 'Murkins!

:hi:

[EFerrari]

9. I guess nobody wants to know this.

Well, next time we get hot and bothered about crimes against humanity, we can't say we weren't warned.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

14. Try this for a restoration of your senses after the muck of politics.

I posted it earlier but got no responses.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=4987317&mesg_id=4987317

[EFerrari]

17. Evan Bayh asks about the one guy caught back on the "battlefield".

He called that "a significant per centage" and uses it to call repatriation into question.

Panetta buys it without question.

Christ on a trailer hitch -- what is the recidivism rate for Washington D.C.?

[frazzled]

7. Bull: there is legal rendition and illegal (extraordinary) rendition

What we normally call "extradition" is a legal form of rendition, for example. It means "handing over."

My understanding is that the renditions conducted during the Clinton (and Bush 1) administrations were within legal bounds to the extent that judicial warrants were obtained. Extraordinary rendition takes place outside of any (US) legal framework.

[EFerrari]

8. Extradition is not rendition. Rendition is kidnapping.

Both Poppy and Clinton signed off on kidnapping.

If you agree to it, you are agreeing that any agent of any government could come here and take you or any official of the American government off the street. Sweet.

[frazzled]

10. Rendition versus extraordinary rendition

It's important, here, to note that extraordinary rendition is not the same as rendition proper. Rendition is just moving people from one jurisdiction (in the cases at hand, one country) to another; includes all sorts of perfectly normal things, like extradition, which are not problematic legally. Extraordinary rendition is rendition outside these established legal processes: e.g., kidnapping someone abroad so that s/he can be brought to the US to stand trial, or delivering someone to another country to be tortured.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2009_02/016703.php

[EFerrari]

13. I distinguished between extrordinary rendition and rendition in the OP.

But rendition is not extradition as Panetta is using it today. WM is mistaken.

[frazzled]

15. You used your own definition/ Panetta used no definition

If we're going to discuss this issue, it's important to define the terms. Rendition, does not, by definition, require that kidnapping take place. And then, I suppose we have to define kidnapping. I'd start with black hoods.

[EFerrari]

16. Panetta is using rendition to mean kidnapping, not extradition or simple transfer.

That's his usage.

[gratuitous]

11. What kind of rendition?

How about the kind where we send some luckless schmuck to another country where they don't have quite so many qualms about hooking up electrodes to genitals or strapping guys down on mattress springs before applying enough electricity to fry a steak? We can track backwards from there, but I think this is a good place to begin stopping rendition of prisoners. If we can't try 'em and convict 'em, we shouldn't be holding them. And if we can't hold them without handing them over to brutal thugs, then maybe it's time to re-think this whole American Experiment.

Panetta has always struck me as a fairly intelligent fellow; why is he gibbering like an imbecile?

[EFerrari]

12. Imo, it's not his decision. This was CIA's bottom line and the admin agrees.

:shrug:

I like Panetta. He's one of the good guys but this is a mistake.