In an interview with PJTV's Bill Whittle on Friday, former New York Times reporter and now Fox News pundit Judith Miller had nothing but praise for the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, and claimed that not only was no one ever subjected to waterboarding there, but that any harsh treatment took place only during the first four months of its opening.
Miller has joined the ranks of former Vice-President Dick Cheney and daughter Liz Cheney this week as she defends Gitmo, and calls for President Obama to keep the facility open to house detainees there rather than bring them into prisons within the United States mainland.
Referring to Gitmo as a "model prison," that offers a wide variety of food and provides "extraordinary" health care that is "far, far better from what these people would get in a maximum security U.S. prison on American soil," Miller expressed what she called concern for excess waste during a period of economic strife within the nation.
Asked by Whittle if Gitmo still had a bad reputation overseas, Miller expressed dismay that, indeed, Gitmo carried the stigma of many media reports of torture and abuse at the facility, "Even though this hasn't been true for many, many years now," she explained. "No one was ever waterboarded at Guantanamo, according to Guantanamo officials," Miller continued. "Torture as ordinary people would call it took place only during four months when it first opened...like sleep deprivation, being doused with ice cold water...things that don't meet current standards."
Miller's only 'gripe' about the situation at Guantanamo Bay's detention facility was the "legal limbo" many detainees face as they wait to actually be charged with a crime and granted a trial, the same situation that endured during the previous administration's 8-year tenure.
Miller also wrote an opinion piece that was published in the Los Angeles Times today titled 'Keep Gitmo,' that echoed many of these praises, as well as denials of torture, and calls for continued operations at the facility:
"Although it's true that a 2005 Pentagon report concluded, after examining 26 complaints from FBI agents involving a small portion of more than 24,000 interrogations at Gitmo, that a few "high-value detainees" had been subjected to treatment that was "degrading and abusive," it "did not rise to the level of prohibited inhumane treatment" or torture. Furthermore, those techniques -- such as loud music, sleep deprivation, temperature manipulation and prolonged shackling -- ended long ago at Gitmo, officers say."
This video is from Pajamas Media TV, broadcast Oct. 23, 2009.
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