And not just to foreign terrorists, but to friends, family, dinner guests, fellow bridge players, and even professors.  Very rarely I deliberately forced smoke into their faces, but only very rarely, and then only when I was really, really annoyed.

In my own defense, I insist that the cigars were invariably very good ones.  Before Kennedy banned the Cuban cigars, they were almost always from the island.  More recently, they’ve come from Central America and sometimes Miami.

If it can be demonstrated that the cigars in question were cheap cigars, crappy cigars, then I think the redacted interrogators should be prosecuted with vengeance.  Otherwise, they’ve got an invitation to come over for dinner and I’ll provide the cigars and limoncello.

Leeden’s parties must be a blast… if I’m going to get smoke blown into my face until I vomit, it must be top quality:

Powerline thinks that only two bad things happened, and they weren’t by one of our guys so it’s OK:

As a threshold matter, it is important to note that the allegations that have been reported in the press are just that–allegations, sometimes based on hearsay. The CIA’s Inspector General singled out two incidents for special investigation, both of which involved the same debriefer–not a trained interrogator.

Never mind that many of the incidents are described by people who participated in them or directly witnessed them.  The debriefer in question here thought threatening someone with getting shot or drilled in the head was OK because he had already participated in interrogations with CIA agents in which mock executions were used to terrify detainees.   This confirmed by numerous witnesses and participants:

And Powerline’s lying about there only being two incidents under further investigation.  There’s also, you know, beating someone to death:

Oh, and as far as torture being OK because we do it to our own guys (to teach them how to withstand torture)… apparently that wasn’te enough:

And never mind that there are whole categories of torture that are redacted here and we still know nothing about.  63 consecutive sections are entirely redacted including the 9 or 10 section headings.

John Stewart does a decent job pointing out that, of course, the bill doesn’t actually do that. But he doesn’t recognize the main lie that McCaughey’s employing here. Here’s the relevant text of the bill:

McCaughey claims that doctors will be penalized if patients don’t adhere to their living wills, and that doctors will force patients to stick to their previous decisions and deny requests for life-sustaining care.  That’s her lie.  ”Adherence to orders for life-sustaining treatment,” refers to adherence by the health care provider, not adherence by the patient to previous plans.  If the patient is able to communicate, they can make their desires known and direct their treatment.  This will still count as adhering to the patient’s will, and doctors will still be credited for doing the right thing.

McCaughy says she’s on the side of doctors, but seems to be willing to assume that doctors are so evil that they’ll pretend they’re not hearing a patient’s call for help as they’re pulling the plug.  This section requires measurement of quality of end-of-life care based on whether doctors do what you asked them to do.  If you are able to ask them to do something else, they have to do that.  If you are unable to direct your own care, doctors will be judged on following the directions you laid out instead of the emotional (and often conflicting) pleas of your family members.  Pretty simple.

Palin Tonight: A number of people have suggested to me Bristol introduce her mother tonight.

Kathryn Lopez Monday:

Bristol: Obama says “back off.” Good for him. Now let’s.

Because nothing says “back off” like thrusting your newly betabloided daughter into the limelight.

Palin listens and laughs as cancer survivor-colleague is called a bitch:

Palin, who knows full well Lyda Green is a cancer survivor, didn’t do what any decent person would do, say, “Bob, that’s going too far.”

Lester questioned Green’s motherhood, asking Palin if the senator cares about her own kids. Palin laughs.

Then Lester clearly sets the stage for what he is about to say by warning his large audience and Palin. He says, “Governor you can’t say this but I will, Lyda Green is a cancer and a b—-.” Palin laughs for the second time.

She released a half-hearted explanation at the time.  Yesterday, she fielded a call from the same radio show with John McCain.  Quote Palin, “I love you guys.”

“She first ran for office back in 1992. I don’t know what Senator Obama was doing then, but the first time she ran was 1992. That’s 16 years. I think that’s a pretty, pretty event-filled and record-filled resume.”

During 1992, Obama got married and was executive directory of Project Vote:

In the final, climactic buildup to November’s general election, with George Bush gaining ground on Bill Clinton in Illinois and the once-unstoppable campaign of senatorial candidate Carol Moseley Braun embroiled in allegations about her mother’s Medicare liability, one of the most important local stories managed to go virtually unreported: The number of new voter registrations before the election hit an all-time high. And the majority of those new voters were black. More than 150,000 new African-American voters were added to the city’s rolls. In fact, for the first time in Chicago’s history-including the heyday of Harold Washington-voter registrations in the 19 predominantly black wards outnumbered those in the city’s 19 predominantly white ethnic wards, 676,000 to 526,000.

…

At the head of this effort was a little-known 31-year-old African-American lawyer, community organizer, and writer: Barack Obama.

In 1992, Palin was elected to the City Council of Wasilla, AK. Population, 5,000.