O'Reilly facetiously denies having psychic abilities

A few days ago, Jimmy Carter said that he was certain the U.S. has been engaging in activies that under international law are defined as torture. Bill O'Reilly responded

Now, I can't read his mind, but I'll admit that President Carter thinks anything other than name, rank, and jihad number qualifies as torture.

What? O'Reilly said he can't read Carter's mind, but then admits that he can. Nevermind that, it's just more absurdity from a man who every day seems to be spiraling further into insanity.

"Name, rank, and jihad number" is the straw-man position that O'Reilly trots out anytime anyone objects to illegal "enhanced interrogation". Does O'Reilly think that until Bush's lawyers attempted to legalize what had previously been illegal that the United States was unable to effectively interrogate prisoners? Or does O'Reilly think that al Qaeda are some kind of superhuman brand of Evil that somehow sets them apart from every other enemy that United States has ever had.

It's a false dichotomy. One could equally suggest that O'Reilly thinks that either we beat prisoners to death (like the ones who died at Bagram) or we never get any intelligence.

I marvel - marvel - at how dumb/ignorant O'Reilly is. What does he think of the people who wrote the Army Field Manual on interrogation? Were they all far leftists who think anything other than "name, rank, and jihad number" is torture? Has the United States been unable to effectively interrogate prisoners all the years that it abided by the Geneva Conventions?

Are these retired military leaders under the impression that anything other than "name, rank, and jihad number" is torture?

The Army Field Manual was the product of decades of experience – experience that had shown, among other things that such interrogation methods produce unreliable results and often impede further intelligence collection. Discounting the Manual’s wisdom on this central point shows a disturbing disregard for the decades of hardwon knowledge of the professional American military.

The United States’ commitment to the Geneva Conventions – the laws of war – flows not only from field experience, but also from the moral principles on which this country was founded, and by which we all continue to be guided. We have learned first hand the value of adhering to the Geneva Conventions and practicing what we preach on the international stage.

But that's just far left foolishness.

Bill O'Reilly devoted the beginning of his show last night to warning Americans about the dangerous radicalism of John Edwards, proclaiming that "John Edwards has no chance to become president because he's simply too far-left for most Americans." After highlighting all the scary, fringe positions Edwards holds, O'Reilly summarized what the Far-Left America would look like once John Edwards got done with it:

[W]ould you support President John Edwards? Remember, no coerced interrogation, civilian lawyers in courts for captured overseas terrorists, no branding the Iranian guards terrorists, and no phone surveillance without a specific warrant.

Who could even fathom an America plagued by habeas corpus, search warrants, and a military that fails to beat, freeze and mock-execute its detainees? And nothing is more sacred to core American values than branding other countries' armies as "Terrorists" ("The [Revolutionary] Guard is the SS of Iran").

Read the rest of Greenwald's post to see that the "Traditional" O'Reilly is really a pseudo-conservative in the sense that he "is a man who, in the name of upholding traditional American values and institutions and defending them against more or less fictitious dangers, consciously or unconsciously aims at their abolition." [source]