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CT-04: Shays Clarifies "Sex Ring" Gaffe
Rep. Chris Shays has now clarified his Wednesday remarks about Abu Ghairb, in which Shays asserted that what happened at the notorious prison "wasn't torture" and was just a "sex ring." Shays acknowledged to the Associated Press today that what happened at the prison was in fact torture. But he offered a curious qualification, saying "it was torture because sex abuse is torture." He added that his earlier remarks had been prompted by photos of "naked Iraqis, naked Americans, Americans having sex." It was unclear from his comments which disturbed Shays more -- the images of abuse or the images of sex.
(Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.)
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Too late. He's toast.
October 13, 2006 6:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
Let's not forget America's essential interrogation tool, the banana.
Oh, banana. How many lives have you saved?
October 13, 2006 7:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
Someone should check that statement again. In all the picture I have seen from Abu G., I don't remember any Americans having sex. Did Shay see pictures that the public hasn't ?!? Does he know something we don't ?!? One of those things that make me go hmmm. I hope someone close to the area has a chance to ask him that, in pubic, on tape.
October 13, 2006 10:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Just say anything, Shays. Sheesh.
October 13, 2006 10:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sickening, and you're absolutly right, we should not forget that incidents like that happened.
-Dave Adams-
October 14, 2006 12:24 AM | Reply | Permalink
As with others who have been in Congress too long, Chris Shays' head is addled. I put on this list pols like McCain, Warner, Lieberman, all good examples of trying to please all contributors no matter how diverse, forgetting sooner or later what is truth and what is fiction, working hard not to offend anybody and, in the process, saying stupid or inane things. This is not to excuse them. Only to explain how soggy one's brain can become. Also listening to your own voice has bad consequences; after a while you begin to like it, think it's authoritative; and you have the staffers to back it up. I vote for confining Shays in Abu Ghraib and letting the staff there have their way with him; then he can come back and tell us how it was only a "sex ring." And that "it was torture."
October 14, 2006 12:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
OCD, I think it was the ACLU which battling the DoD in a NYC federal court over the release of more Abu G. photos. I thought the ALCU won and more Abu G. pix were going to be released to the public after the DoD went through them.
IIRC, some of the Abu G. materials depict graphic sex. I think there is a video of a man raping a man, for one. One of the Republican senators, Lindsey Graham maybe? said to the effect the Abu G. material that has not been released publicly is sickening.
October 14, 2006 7:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
Shays has visited Iraq numerous times and is privvy to the entire report on AbuGhraib. I suspect the details and truth are more salacious and bigger than the public knows. This particular story involved enlisted people who were engaged in sex among themselves that tawdryjezebelleashholdingtrash, and the other wifebeatersuperior of hers were having sex. Recall, that she was pregnant?
Shays is basically saying that these folks were engaged in sadomaschistic sex acts and the public and general population view this as torture.
The truth is probably even worse than we know.
October 14, 2006 9:21 AM | Reply | Permalink
I watched the YouTube clip and it was pretty pathetic. People died at Abu Ghraib. I thought Shays was going to bring out the "panties on their heads" line the rightwingers like to use. It's just sad to see previously normal/semi normal people go off the deep end to protect their party's image.
October 14, 2006 10:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
We weren't shown those pictures, but they do exist. Those Republican National Guardspeople took a lot of footage of themselves having sex with one another. This probably violated military code, but photographing consenting sex isn't a crime outside the military (yet), so there was no reason to release these photos to the press.
October 14, 2006 3:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
In the original Stamford Advocate article carrying Shays' remarks, he is quoted as saying he has seen "probably 600 pictures." That's certainly more than has been released to the public, at least to my knowledge.
October 14, 2006 3:28 PM | Reply | Permalink