More Commenting on News

From the CBS News website:

"The image that's been portrayed is, we sat around the campfire and said, 'Oh, boy, now we go get to torture people.' Well, we don't torture people. Let me say that again to you. We don't torture people. Okay?" Tenet says.

"Come on, George," Pelley says.

"We don't torture people," Tenet maintains.

"Khalid Sheikh Mohammad?" Pelley asks.

"We don't torture people," Tenet says.

"Water boarding?" Pelley asks.

"We do not – I don't talk about techniques," Tenet replies.

"It's torture," Pelley says.

"And we don't torture people. Now, listen to me. Now, listen to me. I want you to listen to me," Tenet says.

My comments on Quaker-P (Sun Nov 4 10:41:21 PST 2007):

So was that all a lot of hooey? Why should we believe as he believes, right?

Another gestalt: if you use torture, you're simply not part of the CIA in Tenet's view. Something of a tautology perhaps? Doesn't he have the right to a view though, as an exDCI and all?

At some level we're each a walking microcosm. How you tell history is really a window into your own personal psyche no? This was Kierkegaard's point in his Concluding Unscientific Postscript I think.

This idea of an Objective Voice that narrates history from some omniscient God's eye view is a literary conceit. One may pretend to such a voice, but is it ever authentic?

These "objective stories" are a manifestation of people herding together, seeking comfort in a shared telling -- more Will to Power at work, to take Nietzsche's slant.