State of Our Fine Country’s Health Care for the Elderly

Been away from this thing for the duration of the Clinton/Obabma Wars....
As I stated before, this blog will surely just turn into a file cabinet of borrowed / lifted articles and anecdotes of things we ( I ) should not let slip my mind. We are bombarded daily with at least 2 or 3 of them. Real press stoppers! And folks just go about thier business like nothings wrong.
Well, anyway, from an article in the NYT's today about "The Health Insurance Counselor".
Just the fact that we NEED someone called a Health Insurance Counselor is a sign of things being in pretty sad shape. Socialized medicine my ass! Just keep making these companies richer fox news folks, just keep working your ass off for em... Oh yeah, little tidbit on Osama bin Ladin this morning, some kind of rift between the|White house ( that would be Cheney) and the CIA?...Hmmmm, Really?
From the NT Times:

Doggedly Persistent, Untying Medicare Knots for the Elderly

By JAN HOFFMAN

The client, a retired fabric cutter who looks older than his 66 years, slumps into a chair and empties a shopping bag stuffed with unopened envelopes, prescription slips and sheaves of official nasty-grams onto the counselor’s desk.

Ruby Washington/The New York Times

Related

Previous Articles in the Series

He manages an abashed shrug at the mess. The man is not feeling well; it has been weeks since he has been able to take his medications for hypertension and gastrointestinal disorders.

“The pharmacy says my insurance don’t cover,” the client explains, alternating between Spanish and tentative English during his appointment at the Isabella Senior Resource Center in the Upper Manhattan neighborhood of Washington Heights. With a combined monthly income of $1,050 from a pension and Social Security and rent of $800, he has had to forgo the medicine.

Frederic Riccardi, 32, an attack dog disguised as a health insurance counselor for the Medicare Rights Center, a nonprofit organization based in New York that assists recipients nationwide, lunges for the pile. After sorting the materials into Urgent, Eventually and Confetti, Mr. Riccardi calls up the man’s Medicare prescription plan and does a search on the Internet.

Indeed, the list of drugs on his plan doesn’t include three of his essential medications. “If your doctors want you to get your medicine,” Mr. Riccardi tells him, “they need to write your insurance company saying these prescriptions are ‘medically necessary.’”

He adds as he types, “I’m writing examples for them.”

Then Mr. Riccardi, who is bilingual, urges the fabric cutter to ask the doctors which private Medicare plans they accept so he can help his client figure out which of 45 such plans best meets his medical and pharmaceutical needs.

Ah, now, here’s a puzzlement. The fabric cutter is also enrolled in a state prescription-assistance program that should have helped defray the cost of the uncovered medications. He would still have to pay $20 per prescription, a hardship certainly, but at least not full price. So why didn’t it kick in?

Mr. Riccardi calls the pharmacist. The pharmacist says he is suspicious of secondary billing and doesn’t believe the state plan will pick up the tab.

Then Mr. Riccardi gets a state plan representative on the phone. He conferences the two in.

“So, sir,” Mr. Riccardi says, at last, to the pharmacist. “My client has a bunch of prescriptions. Can I send him over now to pick them up? Thank you!”

As the client departs, ceding his seat in a full waiting room, Mr. Riccardi says: “Do not leave the pharmacy without your medications. Call me if you can’t.”

This is high season for Medicare madness. Advertisements for insurance companies saturate the media; recruiting vans park outside senior citizen centers. Through the end of December, recipients may choose among dozens of prescription plans. In January, enrollment begins for private Medicare plans.

If only it were that simple. In addition, a recipient may weigh the advisability of supplementary coverage and charity programs; master the fine print of loopholes, deductibles and co-pays; track shifting rosters of physicians, therapies and medications; and try to anticipate new frailties in the coming year. Dental work? Wheelchair? Oxygen tank?

Health insurance counselors like Mr. Riccardi, who travels to senior centers around New York City, help the elderly to understand coverage options and to escape the financial and medical vises that may be gripping them. Hospitals and senior centers often employ these caseworkers, nonprofit groups like the Medicare Rights Center have hot lines, and every state has a health insurance counseling program (www.shiptalk.org).

All day long, clients meet with Mr. Riccardi, a tall, slender man who grew up in Syracuse and learned Spanish while studying modern dance in Cuba and Mexico. He set aside that uncertain career to trouble-shoot for the elderly and to pursue a degree in social work. His clients this day are, for the most part, the retired working poor — factory workers, seamstresses, truck drivers. But for many, especially those who struggle with spoken English, the paperwork from hospitals, insurers and collection agencies, written in bureaucratic English, is beyond them. They do not understand the nuances of their plans; they pull cards from their wallets that are expired, redundant or conflicting.

“Do you answer the phone?” Mr. Riccardi says with a jesting smile to a tiny woman with frosty hair, as he sorts her envelopes. She has old bills from Medicare, collection notices, coordination of benefits snarls and new bills. Her husband, a retired hotel guard who now has Alzheimer’s, is in a nursing home; her daughter is fighting colon cancer. She herself is not in great shape, but at least she is physically and mentally able to reach out to a Mr. Riccardi.

“I just keep the answering machine on,” she replies, trying to laugh, because he has discovered her little secret. The tears well up suddenly. “It’s too much,” she whispers.

Her bills are so crushing that, Mr. Riccardi believes, she may qualify for “charitable consideration” from her hospital. He helps her fill out an application. He will also research clinics and write push-back letters to collection agencies.

“You have to take care of yourself,” he tells her. “Don’t worry about this.”

With faceless bureaucrats over the phone, Mr. Riccardi is polite but forceful: “Is it possible you can ask your supervisor to access that information?” But even an attack dog will bounce off a wall built of absurdities: “The call volume is too high, so you can’t answer my question now?”

By early afternoon, Mr. Riccardi, who has worked through lunch, buries his head in his hands. “I. Have. A. Headache,” he mutters.

The clients bring in prescription slips and plastic bags of empty vials that they can no longer get refilled. One woman has 28 prescriptions. A few are floundering inside “the doughnut hole,” the coverage gap in the Medicare prescription drug plans, when recipients must pay full cost for medications. As a result, some choose medicine over food; others, food over medicine. Some choose their spouse’s medication over their own. Some split prescriptions with friends or cadge samples from their doctors. Their blood pressure and cholesterol levels are rising; complications from untreated diabetes mount.

If you must choose between paying the hospital or the pharmacy, Mr. Riccardi advises some, pay for your medications so you can get better. The hospital can be paid in increments.

The next client, a disabled truck driver, is confused and worried. The hospital where he had cornea surgery on one eye now refuses to operate on the other, saying it doesn’t accept his insurance. What happened?

Mr. Riccardi peruses the jumble of cards, trying to figure out the man’s current insurance. He should be receiving Medicare and Medicaid, which would give him entree virtually everywhere.

“What’s this?” Mr. Riccardi asks. A card for the driver’s new private Medicare plan.

“Didn’t they tell you when you joined that you can only go to their hospitals and their doctors?” Mr. Riccardi asks.

The client shakes his head, bewildered.

Mr. Riccardi asks him why he picked this plan.

“They picked me,” he replies. They signaled to him on the street, he says in Spanish, and invited him into their van.

“O.K.,” Mr. Riccardi says, tightly, through his teeth. “Let’s get to work.”

From Welcome to Pottersville, CHENEY!

This is quite a piece. I just had to lift it, lest I forget.
From Suzan over at Pottersville

One can only hope that the national housecleaning movement has finally started when one reads an essay like Sheila Samples' Everybody Knows (currently appearing at The Information Clearinghouse). Her qualifications for such a grand task are that she is an Oklahoma writer, a former civilian US Army Public Information Officer (and, oh, right, an American citizen).

This can't help but give one some hope that the D.C. swamp draining will soon commence (but look out for the push-back!). (Click on the link for the links-included version.)

Everybody Knows

By Sheila Samples

Everybody knows that the dice are loaded.

Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed.
Everybody knows the war is over.
Everybody knows the good guys lost.
Everybody knows the fight was fixed.
The poor stay poor, the rich get rich.
That's how it goes. Everybody knows.

~Leonard Cohen - MP3


16/05/08 "ICH" -- - The fate of millions was sealed the moment Dick Cheney selected himself as The Destroyer whose charge to keep for the next eight years would be -- as Capitol Hill Blue's Doug Thompson so succinctly described George W. Bush -- a "criminally insane, pill-popping dry drunk." I don't know about that. I've seen some drunks in my time -- even dry ones -- and George Bush appears to be more than a little moist.

Bush was the perfect foil for Cheney. The Scalia-driven 2000 election coup catapulted Bush to the top of the political heap. For the first time in his worthless, impotent, cruelly indifferent life, Bush was suddenly important -- the most powerful man on the face of the earth -- and all because he had been told to scream, "Jezus! Jezus is my philosopher!" to the swooning masses. Makes one wonder at the rigid consent of those same "believers" for the ensuing slaughter of so many innocents -- when murdering even one in the name of Jesus should have sent a collective shriek reverberating throughout the religious universe. (See Matthew 18:14; Mark 9:42; Luke 17:2)

Everybody knows that Bush isn't remotely qualified to be at the helm of the world's superpower. He can neither think nor speak coherently, can recognize little other than Texas on a map, has completely torpedoed every business venture he attempted, and admittedly was a hard-partying sot until he was 40. Cheney was another matter. He was a household word. He had been a public servant throughout his career. He served as President Gerald Ford's chief of staff, earned six terms in the House of Representatives where he ascended to the position of minority whip and, finally, was the elder Bush's Secretary of Defense.

We trusted Cheney to keep Bush from making rash decisions. Was it not Cheney who, at the conclusion of the 1991 Desert Storm assault, made the assessment that to expand the exercise to include regime change in Iraq was not morally sustainable because of the chaotic bloodletting -- the needless toll on our uniformed military?

We were wrong. Had we bothered to check the "other priorities" that allowed Cheney to dodge the draft five times on his rise to power, his chilling congressional voting record, his efforts to enrich the military industrial complex by privatizing defense duties and granting massive contracts to Halliburton, we would have known that Cheney was consumed with lust for power and money. We would have known Cheney had been champing at the bit for more than a decade to impose a new order wherein the American Empire controls the world and its resources.

Had we checked, we would have known Dick Cheney was the wrong babysitter for a kid who gets his jollies by blowing things up.

Cheney Unbound

In 1991, Cheney was in the wrong place at the wrong time. But the upheaval of the following decade, the 1994 Republican takeover of Congress, and the expanding manipulative power of the corporate media created the axis of corruption necessary for a Cheney reign of terror. Cheney was ready, as were the militant warmongers of the Project for the New American Century who had been demanding Saddam Hussein's head for years. At least 12 of the 18 co-signers of the January 1998 letter to President Bill Clinton, and another letter four months later to then House Speaker Newt Gingrich, demanding the overthrow of Saddam were given key positions on Cheney's destructive team.

The fix was in. Four days before the 2001 inauguration, PNAC's deputy director, Thomas Donnelly, wrote a memorandum to "Opinion Leaders," reminding them that "the task of removing Saddam Hussein’s regime from power still remains...Many in the incoming Bush Administration understand this challenge..."

Four months after the inauguration, the White House issued a press release warning that the threat of terrorist-nations using weapons of mass destruction against the American "homeland" was very real. To counter this danger, Cheney put himself in charge of the entire government -- departments of Defense, Justice, Health and Human Services, Energy, Environmental Protection Agency, FEMA, and "other federal agencies," which would naturally include both FAA and NORAD. A new department -- the Office of National Preparedness -- was created so Cheney could protect us from catastrophic harm and deal with "consequence" management.

The next four months were busy ones. With malicious indifference, Cheney set about screwing the American people; destroying 225-year Constitutional protections, passing secret laws to seize unlimited executive power, and locking both Congress and the public out of the legislative process. Bush provided cover by regaling us with hilarious "Benny Hill" bits of linguistic derring-do, strutting from one presidential photo op to another, falling off couches and bicycles, choking on pretzels, and attacking brush with a chainsaw at his Crawford ranch.

Cheney in Charge

Then it was 9-11. Suddenly Bush was no longer a spoiled, bumbling, schizophrenic little president. In an instant, he was transformed into a loaded codpiece -- The Commander in Chief, The Decider of life and death -- a modern-day Caligula towering above mankind with lighted depleted uranium firecrackers gripped in both fists. Cheney could not have picked a more willing accomplice to export death and violence to the four corners of the earth...

With smoke still rising from the ashes of Afghanistan, the drive to topple Saddam, who was demanding Euro for his oil, quickly turned into a crusade. It was Cheney-orchestrated and Cheney-driven. Under the deepening shadows of mushroom clouds, administration neoconservatives teamed up with ecstatic corporate media co-conspirators to terrify an already traumatized public. Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith launched a separate intelligence unit, the Office of Special Plans, to create the propaganda needed to invade Iraq.

Since Bush can't be trusted to maintain a single train of thought in one-on-one interviews, he hit the campaign trail with a prepared speech he delivered over and over -- is now delivering about Iran -- frantically catapulting the propaganda that Saddam was 'threatening America and the world with horrible poisons and diseases and gases and atomic weapons." Bush convinced a majority of Americans that the Iraqi dictator was allied with Al Qaeda and provided a "safe haven" for terrorists, and if we didn't wipe him out, he would strike us again without leaving any fingerprints."

Cheney's fingerprints are all over every aspect of the drive for war. For a year and a half, Cheney bullied the entire intelligence apparatus, especially the CIA, into making a false case that Saddam was an immediate nuclear threat. He denigrated the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) report that there was no evidence, sneering that the intelligence was faulty, and IAEA Director-General Mohammed El-Baradei had no credibility where Iraq was concerned.

But it was Secretary of State Colin Powell who rolled the loaded dice at the UN Security Council on February 8, 2003, in a presentation even he admitted was "bullshit." Powell, who is adept at leaving no fingerprints, but whose shadow lingers over decades of slaughtered innocents, carried the water for his masters one last time. When Powell completed his somber charges that Al-Qaeda was in Iraq running "poison camps" full bore, that Saddam was obtaining magnets for uranium enrichment -- charges backed up with photos and vials of poison -- we were sold. Because we trusted him.

A Moral Fork in the Road

I don't want to go off on an Aristotelian rant here, but thanks to Cheney and those around him obsessed with world government, this nation appears to be running on empty where morality, or ethos, is concerned. Values such as compassion, sympathy, prudence, virtue, decency, ethics -- cannot thrive in a nation controlled by war criminals who force its citizens into submission through fear, violence and propaganda. How can a society be "just" when natural laws have fallen by the wayside and nobody is held accountable for crimes against God and humanity?

We are under the control of the criminally insane. Cheney has turned the greatest democratic republic ever conceived into a world corporation and anointed himself its Chief Executive Officer (CEO). He has supplanted two centuries of protections afforded by the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights with executive orders and secret laws. In their lust for power and riches, Cheney and Bush have managed in just seven grueling, sadistic, morally corrupt years to destroy entire nations, including their own. And they accomplished this in the only way possible. Because we permitted it. Because we lost our moral compass.

So we stand here in the blood-sodden mess of two lost wars. Millions -- millions -- have been displaced, destroyed, dishonored in Cheney's quest for oil. Tens of thousands of our own citizens are injured, maimed -- 4,077 dead -- an entire generation of Americans lost in a depleted uranium wasteland. "So?" Cheney says, "They were all volunteers." He admitted that losing sons or daughters could "be a burden" on families, but reminded us sternly that "the biggest burden" is on the President, who has to send even more to their deaths.

We're at the crossroads. We can no longer remain neutral nor mill around in confused acceptance of the genocidal madness into which we have been swept. Thomas Jefferson said, "When once a republic is corrupted, there is no possibility of remedying any of the growing evils but by removing the corruption and restoring its lost principles; every other correction is either useless or a new evil."

Everybody knows the folly of the treasonous "corrections" made to counter the Iran-Contra evil in the 1980's and early '90's -- the flurry of Presidential Christmas-Eve pardons allowing convicted criminals to recede into the shadows only to return and metastasize throughout the current Cheney/Bush administration.

Cheney, Bush and their co-conspirators throughout the three branches of government must be removed. Indicted. Convicted. Imprisoned. Voting records of the 435 members of Congress and 33 Senators up for re-election in 2008 must be vetted, and those who do not reflect the will of the people must go. No exceptions. The remaining 17 Senators must either stand or fall on their voting records. If those who are guilty of the same breach of trust as their cohorts refuse to budge, they must be impeached and removed from office.

They have left us with but one choice, and one last chance to make that choice. We have reached a point in the "course of human events" where it is not only our "right but our duty" to throw off this destructive government and institute one which remembers it "derives its just powers from the consent of the governed."

The time has come for Americans to blink. Because the Abyss is staring back at us.

Sheila Samples http://sheilastuff.blogspot.com/ is an Oklahoma writer and a former civilian US Army Public Information Officer. She is a regular contributor for a variety of Internet sites. Contact her at rsamples@wichitaonline.net

Corporate Reach-arounds

Oh, Just too much to even begin with and it goes on and on.... I want the following saved so up it goes. Like the Finger this admin and their cronies give us.

From Olberman:

And finally, more Republican hypocrisy on the Orwellian “Protect America Act.” When Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid offered up by Unanimous Consent a 30 day extension of the revisions to FISA and the PAA so that the Senate could continue to negotiate in good faith. But Senate Minority Leader Mike McConnell objected to the extension, thereby blocking it.

Turned down an act that the President pretends is vital for our safety. Why? Because Republican Leader McConnell said it did not include the total immunity for the telecom companies which helped the administration break the law by spying domestically. “It’s time for us to get serious,” said Sen. McConnell, “and protect the companies and protect us.” Certainly, you misspoke, Senator. Protect America, protect the people. Nah, the Republican Leader in the Senate actually placed his priority (as) protecting the companies. You wouldn’t want to put just a little daylight, would you, Senator, between your party and that concept of fascism?

FUCK YOU WALMART Part Two

Again, Just cut and paste, otherwise I will sink into nothing more then a ranting lunatic.

From http://welcome-to-pottersville.blogspot.com/
______________________________________________________________

I wonder if Hillary still cuts any ice with Wal-Mart’s board of directors?

Yeah, I’m in the zone and am chomping at the bit to type up what little of my novel I had time to write at work today but then I came across this story and was reminded once again that virtually everything in the world is more important than my rock-n-roll novel.

Debbie Shank is a sterling example.

In my three plus years as a political/social blogger, I’ve read and have written about some incredibly outrageous stories that had tempted me to try to alter my DNA so I could no longer be considered human even at the genetic level. Because what Wal-Mart is doing to this family, one that seems to attract tragedy like a magnet attracts iron filings, makes me ashamed to be a terrestrial human.

I’ll give you the abstracts:

Debbie Shank, former Wal-Mart employee, was hit by a semi eight years ago. To this day, she has no short term memory, is incapacitated and will live in a nursing home for the rest of her life. Her husband, just recovering from prostate cancer, has to work two jobs to pay for her medical costs.

Or, should I say her ex-husband, because he divorced her just so she could get more disability benefits.

When Debbie was almost killed by that semi, Wal-Mart’s health insurance paid the medical bills promptly. However, what they didn’t go out of their way to tell Debbie when she first signed on for that coverage was that the company (a self-insured entity, in case you’ve yet to come to that conclusion) reserves the right to recoup all the medical bill money if they receive a settlement, which in this case was $417,000.

When Wal-Mart got wind of it, they immediately sued the Shanks for that amount plus $51,739, making nearly $470,000 in all. The trust fund opened for Debbie now contains roughly $277,000, far short of the money Wal-Mart, which pulled down $90,000,000,000 (that’s ninety billion) in retail sales in their last quarter alone, is trying to squeeze out of them. In fact, Wikinvest states that Wal-Mart’s annual revenue, based on the 2008 fiscal year, would place it in the world’s top 25 nations’ GDP.

If Mr. Shank were to somehow magically pull the other $200,000 out of his ass, not only would the family be broke and unable to pay Debbie’s medical expenses, their 17 year-old son wouldn’t be able to go to college.

Oh, and a year and a half ago their 18 year-old son Jeremy was killed serving in Iraq.

But the law is the law, Wal-Mart’s flaks keep saying, so that means we can and should completely fuck over this tragic family.

Here’s an article from the St. Louis Dispatch. I’ll save you the time in case you’re pressed for it: The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the family’s appeal to overturn the lower court’s decision. A week ago, the right wing, pro-corporation Supreme Court refused to even hear the case without deigning to give an explanation.

If you shop at Wal-Mart, stop. Stop now. Stop bloating these already bloated Bentonville fucks and running buddies of Hillary Clinton and email them, call them, voicemail then, fax them and otherwise tell them why you will no longer shop there. It’ll mean supporting your local economy and merchants but oh well, sacrifices will have to be made. If you’re hurting as much as the Shanks, which is impossible for me to imagine, then compromise and shop at K-Mart.

It’s not very often that even Wal-Mart makes me madder than the GOP (although there may not be a difference) but do not let them maintain this sickeningly cloying and incredibly dishonest PR campaign that bills them as a family-oriented company. Let them know you’re onto them, let them know that you know about what they’re doing to the Shanks and let them know why they’re losing your business (Why stop at costing them $470,000?).

(I can’t find an embed code for this video (the only one on Youtube is for some reason unavailable) but this link will take you to the original CNN.com video.)

FUCK YOU WALMART, JUST FUCK YOU!!!

I just don't have words for this, I just am finished, really.
Fuck these people and their shoddy crappy two-bit products!
From crooksandliars.com
Wal-Mart Sues, SCOTUS Screws Brain Damaged Woman

The family of Deborah Shank has lost its last chance to stop Wal-Mart Stores from recouping hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical expenses from an accident settlement the Shanks hoped to use for her future care in a nursing home.

Last November, the WSJ reported in a front-page story how the retail giant had sued Deborah Shank—a 52-year-old former Wal-Mart employee left permanently brain damaged from a car accident nearly eight years ago—for the money and won. Like most employee health plans, Wal-Mart’s gives it the right to recover medical expenses for accident-related care if a worker also collects damages in an injury suit.

After losing in federal court and again on appeal, the Shanks’ last legal hope was a bid to the U.S. Supreme Court. Yesterday, though, the court announced it wouldn’t take up the case, bringing the matter to a close.
Welcome to the Bush-Wal-Mart America. Corporations trump the common folk every time. Elections matter, vote Democratic in November.

Just what I see...

Nuff Said...

WE DON"T DO THAT part 3

Well, the Decider vetoed the Intelligence Authorization bill, stating that the CIA should not be held to the Army Field manual, which is of course written for dumb 18 year-olds who cannot even drink yet. Fucking asshole!
I forgot where I lifted this, but if you click links you will get where you supposed to.

President Bush Vetoes Prohibition on Torture

March 8th, 2008 by Karina

This morning, President Bush announced he vetoed the House and Senate passed Intelligence Authorization bill because it extended the prohibition on the use of waterboarding and other harsh coercive interrogation techniques that currently applies to the military to the entire Intelligence Community, including the CIA.

On the veto, Speaker Pelosi said:

The intelligence authorization bill invests in human intelligence, counterterrorism operations, and analysis to protect our nation and ensure that policymakers have access to accurate, timely and actionable intelligence. This legislation is a critical component of securing our nation and the President should have signed it into law.

Instead, the President vetoed these essential investments in our intelligence capabilities because this legislation extended the Army Field Manual’s prohibition on torture to Intelligence Community personnel. Failing to legally prohibit the use of waterboarding and other harsh torture techniques undermines our nation’s moral authority, puts American military and diplomatic personnel at-risk, and undermines the quality of intelligence.

In the final analysis, our ability to lead the world will depend not only on our military might, but also on our moral authority. We will begin to reassert that moral authority by attempting to override the President’s veto next week. The world must know that America does not torture.

Military leaders – including General David Petraeus, Commanding General of U.S. forces in Iraq – have publicly stated that these techniques are inhumane, un-American and are not necessary to produce results.

General David Petraeus, Commanding General of Iraq:

“Some may argue that we would be more effective if we sanctioned torture or other expedient methods to obtain information from the enemy. That would be wrong. Beyond the basic fact that such actions are illegal, history shows that they also are frequently neither useful nor necessary. Certainly, extreme physical action can make someone ‘talk;’ however, what the individual says may be of questionable value. In fact, our experience in applying the interrogations laid out in the Army Field Manual….that was published last year shows that the techniques in the manual work effectively and humanely in eliciting information from detainees.” [Open Letter, 5/10/07]

Lt. General Michael D. Maples, Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, asked by Sen. Carl Levin if he thinks waterboarding is consistent with the Geneva Conventions:

“No, sir, I don’t.”

Asked if it he believes it’s humane:

“No, sir. I think it would go beyond that bound.”
[Testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, 2/27/08]

Lt. General Harry Soyster, (Ret.) Former Director of Defense Intelligence Agency:

“Experience shows that the field manual’s approaches to interrogation work. The Army Field Manual is comprehensive and sophisticated. It contains all the techniques any good interrogator needs to get accurate, reliable information, including out of the toughest customers.” [2/29/08]

Rear Admiral Donald J. Guter, (Ret.) Judge Advocate General, Navy, Rear Admiral John D. Hutson, (Ret.) Judge Advocate General, Navy, Major General John L. Fugh, (Ret.) Judge Advocate General, Army, Rear Admiral Donald J. Guter, (Ret.) Judge Advocate General, Navy:

“As far as we’re concerned, this shouldn’t be a point the United States should have to debate… There’s no disconnect between human rights and national security…They’re synergistic. One doesn’t work without the other for very long.” [Pittsburgh Post Gazette, 12/10/07]

Maj. General Evan Wallach, (Ret.) Judge Advocate General, Nevada National Guard:

“The United States knows quite a bit about waterboarding. The U.S. government — whether acting alone before domestic courts, commissions and courts-martial or as part of the world community — has not only condemned the use of water torture but has severely punished those who applied it… We know that U.S. military tribunals and U.S. judges have examined certain types of water-based interrogation and found that they constituted torture. That’s a lesson worth learning. The study of law is, after all, largely the study of history. The law of war is no different. This history should be of value to those who seek to understand what the law is — as well as what it ought to be.” [Washington Post, 11/4/07]

Brigadier General David M. Brahms, (Ret.) Staff Judge Advocate to the Commandant:

“Waterboarding is inhumane, it is torture, and it is illegal… This is a critically important issue - but it is not, and never has been, a complex issue, and even to suggest otherwise does a terrible disservice to this nation… Waterboarding detainees amounts to illegal torture in all circumstances. To suggest otherwise - or even to give credence to such a suggestion - represents both an affront to the law and to the core values of our nation.” [Letter, 11/2/07]

General Joseph Hoar, (Ret.), General David M. Maddox, (Ret.), Vice Admiral Lee F. Gunn, (Ret.), Vice Admiral Albert Konetzni Jr. Ret.), Maj. General Paul Eaton, (Ret.), Rear Admiral Don Guter, (Ret.), Maj. General Melvyn Montano, (Ret.), Brig. General David Brahms, (Ret.), Brig. General David Irvine, (Ret.), Brig. General Murray Sagsveen, (Ret.), General Paul J. Kern, (Ret.), General Merrill A. McPeak, (Ret.), Lt. General Claudia J. Kennedy, (Ret.), Lt. General Charles Otstott, (Ret.), Maj. General Eugene Fox, (Ret.), Maj. General Fred E. Haynes, (Ret.), Maj. General Gerald T. Sajer, (Ret.), Brig. General James P. Cullen, (Ret.), Brig. General John H. Johns, (Ret.), Brig. General Anthony Verrengia, (Ret.), General Charles Krulak, (Ret.), Admiral Stansfield Turner, (Ret.), Lt. General Donald L. Kerrick, (Ret.), Lt. General Harry E. Soyster, (Ret.), Maj. General John L. Fugh, (Ret.), Rear Admiral John D. Hutson, (Ret.), Maj. General Antonio M. Taguba, (Ret.), Brig. General Evelyn P. Foote, (Ret.), Brig. General Richard O’Meara, (Ret.), Brig. General Stephen N. Xenakis, (Ret.):

“We believe it is vital to the safety of our men and women in uniform that the United States not sanction the use of interrogation methods it would find unacceptable if inflicted by the enemy against captured Americans…The current situation, in which the military operates under one set of interrogation rules that are public and the CIA operates under a separate, secret set of rules, is unwise and impractical…What sets us apart from our enemies in this fight…is how we behave. In everything we do, we must observe the standards and values that dictate that we treat noncombatants and detainees with dignity and respect.” [Letter, 12/12/07]