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Reichert: waterboarding is torture. And so are Band-Aids.

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I just got finished listening to 25 minutes of Rep. Dave Reichert recorded at his recent campaign kickoff fundraising breakfast, and from his rambling, pointless and incoherent speech, one might think his head injury was more serious than was first let on… that is, if we didn’t already know Reichert for his rambling, pointless and incoherent speeches.

In fact, what’s most striking about Reichert’s comments is not what he says, but what he doesn’t say. Mostly he talks about his head injury, his hospitalization and his hair, with a sprinkling of platitudes about how he stands with Americans and for freedom. But what he doesn’t talk about are any issues. Nothing about the economy, nothing about unemployment, nothing about the environment or immigration or  Wall Street regulatory reform or any of the many other problems we send our representatives to the other Washington to solve.

In fact, the only policy issue Reichert even remotely addresses is health care, and even then, only to regale his audience with tales of his own brush with our health care system, and to reassure them that he took advantage of every opportunity he had to vote against extending health care access to millions of under- and uninsured Americans.

Speaking of which, here is a clip of one of the biggest crowd pleasers of the morning, an anecdote where he compares the removal of medical tape to waterboarding:

[audio:http://horsesass.org/wp-content/uploads/Reichert-Torture.mp3]

Hey, I was tortured while I was at the hospital. Uh, have you ever been in the hospital they put this tape on , for IVs and stuff like that. They use super glue. You know that? I’m not kidding. It’s super glue. I had six IVs: one on the top of my left hand, one on the top of my right, one in each wrist and one on each elbow, and they use super glue.

And uh, so when I’m being released, you know, they got to rip this stuff off. I mean I think I’m tough… am I tough Jon? I thought I was tough. The guy told me, the nurse came in and said, “Hey this is going to hurt.” I said okay, I think I can handle that. And he goes rip. And I go “Holy —!”  Sorry. I said, then he goes, he goes, “I’m sorry.” Yeah right, so he does another rip and I said “Shit…!” You know, I say “Why don’t you just water-board me? What do you want to know? I’ll tell you anything you want to know!”

That’s a joke everybody. I mean, if anybody’s got, if you got your, you got your little video phone or somehow, and post this on Google… I’m against torture. Except if you’re in the hospital, I guess it’s the same. Yeah that hurts, man I’ll tell ya.

So I guess there was a policy statement in there after all, as I suppose we can deduce from this anecdote that Reichert apparently believes that waterboarding is indeed torture. But then, he also believes that ripping off a Band-Aid is torture too, and he’s not afraid to say so, even at the risk of somebody posting it “on Google.”

Oh man… can’t get enough of those torture jokes. Hah, hah!

Comments

  1. 1

    If I needed information from someone, I’d subcontract the softening up to an endodontist. All he has to do is pop off one filing on a tooth with a live nerve, stick in one of those pokey little wire thingees he uses for root canals, and start massaging the nerve. It shouldn’t take very long before the subject starts talking.

  2. 2

    Goldy complains about torture jokes, but yet treats the death of Poland’s leader as political satire.

    dickhead much?

  3. 3

    @2 “treats the death of Poland’s leader as political satire”

    Really? I must have missed that. Of course, you being a wingnut simpleton, you interpret everything literally and are a humorless sack of laundry.

  5. 5

    @4 What’s degenerate about me? I worked for 45 years, paid taxes, served in the military, vote Democratic, and write liberal propaganda to help save America from degenerate sex-starved Republicans. I seem very respectable, if you ask me.

  7. 7

    I’m at the public library perusing the book shelves and ran across this title:

    “Witchfinders”

    “By spring 1645, two years of civil war had exacted a dreadful toll upon England. People lived in terror as disease and poverty spread, and the nation grew ever more politically divided. In a remote corner of Essex, two obscure gentlemen, Matthew Hopkins and John Stearne, exploited the anxiety and lawlessness of the time and initiated a brutal campaign to drive out the presume evil in their midst. Touring Suffolk and East Anglia on horseback, they detected demons and idolators everywhere. Through torture, they extracted from terrified prisoners confessions of consorting with Satan and demonic spirits.

    “Acclaimed historian Malcolm Gaskill retells the chilling story of the most savage witch-hunt in English history. By the autumn of 1647 at least 250 people — mostly women — had been captured, interrogated, and hauled before the courts. More than a hundred were hanged, causing Hopkins to be dubbed ‘Witchfinder General’ by critics and admirers alike. Though their campaign was never legally sanctioned, they garnered the popular support of local gentry, clergy, and villagers. While Witchfinders tells of a unique and tragic historical moment fueled by religious fervor, today it serves as a reminder of the power of fear and fanatacism to fuel ordinary people’s willingness to demonize others.”

    (From the jacket flap.)

    Roger Rabbit Commentary: Sound like anyone you know? Human nature never changes, and some humans never learn anything from their own specie’s history. That’s why liberals must arm.

  13. 13

    @2

    Goldy complains about torture jokes, but yet treats the death of Poland’s leader as political satire.

    Goldy’s post on the deaths of the folks in Poland was in poor taste, but it’s a stretch to say that he was laughing it off.

    And really the point is that Hairspray has been in office for how many years now and he still can’t speak about policy matters.

    But, as far as I’m concerned, if the folks in the 8th want to have a know nothing, do nothing, congressman that leaves more of the spoils for those of us in the 6th.

  16. 16

    Did anyone ask him if he has concluded his “investigation” of whether or not President Obama is a citizen? I’d love to know what he found.

  18. 18

    Oh, look, Vince is posting Zzzzzzzzzzzzz Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

    Loser.

  20. 20

    Vince has to use someone else’s celebrity to promote himself.

    What a loser!!

  24. 24

    No health care professional superglues anything to anyone.

    Dave is not just an incompetent, lazy, sub-par US Representative, he’s also a liar.

  25. 25

    So, poll time. Given that one of the chief causes, to the extent that we know them at all, of Alzheimer’s syndrome is head (cranial) trauma, is it a net plus or minus that Dave had him some?

  26. 26

    Daddy Love @24,

    Actually, superglue is used to close wounds. Bonds skin instantly and all that. But no, they don’t use it in medical tape.

  30. 30

    Pops Sheehan shoulds pimp-slapped that woman years ago…

    Great – not only is he a coward, he’s for knockin’ around women too..

    I so appreciate our dear right wing contingent here.

  31. 31

    YLB definitely needs a pimp slap….might make him man-up a little….

  32. 32

    @19 et al. — Rarely have so many pixels been expended with so little thought.

  33. 33

    @27, 29 — So, you think a mother who sacrificed her son in the GOP’s recreational war in Iraq is a “psycho bitch” and a “nutcase”? I know wingnuts hate our soldiers and their families, but aren’t you taking that a little too far?

  34. 34

    @30 Of course they’re wife-beaters (in addition to being warmongers, torturers, kidnappers, murderers, thieves, liars, perverts, and social misfits). That’s why they’re Republicans — no one else will have them.

  35. 35

    Reichert is the ultimate style over substance GOP airhead.

    Not unlike the habitual Nordstrom shopper he inherited the seat from.

    His puliticul base complains that Obama is an empty suit.

    Yet, Sheriff Dave gets a free pass when it comes to being super stupid. But God knows, his Constitutional Law class was very popular at Internet University.

  36. 36

    Geez……the inane banter that passes for comments on this pitiful blog is unreal. What’s wrong Goldy, is blog traffic down?? What other explanation is there for allowing pointless, vacuous comments by a dolt who thinks he’s a rabbit? No other readers/posters carrying your water?

    Now, about your post – Reichert vanquished his last Microsoft dilettante opponent TWICE during election years with huge democrat tailwinds. This year, another no-name, self-funded MS political dabbler steps forward just as the winds shift strongly in Reichert’s (and Republicans’) favor. A little advice, Goldy – don’t waste keystrokes trying to denigrate Reichert this year. You’re wasting your time. He’s a shoo in……

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