We seem to have decided as a nation that a little torture here and there is the lesser of two evils: torture them before they torture us.

In this black and white world of preemptive torture what do people really think?

Even most conservatives don't seem to quite like it. Former assistant attorney Daniel Levin had to try it for himself before deciding it wasn't nice. But thinks it can be done right still. Jack L. Smith has written "The Terror Presidency" to expunge his guilt for his role in rationalizing torture. But still pines away for his "good friends" in the pro-torture wing of the neo-cons.

And now we have the "new neo-cons" for lack of a better term: senators Charles Schumer of New York and Dianne Feinstein of California have decided they will trust the words of Bush nominee for attorney general Judge Michael Mukasey that he too thinks torture (or at least waterboarding) aint necessarily so bad but he will consider obeying a future law of congress that specifically outlaws waterboarding. Apparently he still has not conceded, even to Schumer and Feinstein in private, that waterboarding is in fact torture and that it is in fact already illegal under both US and international law. Why do I get the feeling that Hillary Clinton will soon be finding a way to say that a little torture is not a bad thing....for Bill.

We've always tortured.


The "War on terror" has finally brought it front and center. The neo cons want to mainstream torture as a necessity for protecting the safety of America.


I am ok with using torture if it really serves in the best interests of America. However, I don't think any of us trust the intentions of our current administration. If Clinton had come out and stated it was in America's best interests to use torture methods to protect our vital interests after an attack similar to 9/11, would any of us not support him? Most of us would. Why? We trust him and his intentions at running the country.

With GWB, he's a train wreck whose policies are built on lies, manipulation, and mis governing through unlawful agenda seeking iniatives.


In there lies the difference.

Please don't say "we" as a nation have decided that torture is okay.

If by "we" you mean the majority of American people. "We" have had precious little say in a hell of lot that's occurred in our government over the last 8 years, because "we've" been lied to, manipulated, hoodwinked, conned, neoconned, and duped again and again, just as "we've" been illegally wiretapped, ignored, dismissed, or what have you. "We" have had ZERO say in whether torture is legal or okay, though the last polls I saw indicate that a majority of Americans does NOT aggree with this president's politics or policies, including torture.

Unfortunately despite the fact that "we" have now given this president higher disapproval ratings than RICHARD NIXON ON THE EVE OF HIS IMPEACHMENT, "we" don't have anyone representing our interests in Congress. The Democratic Party appears not to grasp that "we" exist or that "we" are fed up with their cowardice and failure to address the issues "we" elected them to address in November 2006.

This might be met with criticism on this board. I have no issues with torturing terrorists to gain crucial information that could save lives.


I doubt most Americans would be opposed to such tactics if saving American lives were the end results of such tactics.


With GWB, we have no faith or trust in his leadership. Thus it's difficult to for Americans to believe he distinguishes the difference between using such tactics only in crucial situations as the last resort in comparison to allowing it to become main tool of interogating the enemy whether it's suspected terrorists, Iraqis, or Taliban.

He's misused his power. Thus Americans are now skeptical of the method. It's not the method that's out of whack. It's the commander in Chief who has overstepped the boundries and created a culture of dysfucntion.

Amen, Fantomas. Lies on top of lies, crooked elections on top of crooked elections, how is anyone to know what is truth anymore at 1600 Pennsylvania St. What a sad, slippery slope we are sliding down. The whole world is indeed watching.

I'll have to agree with GymMountainEER. Unfortunately, this is what it's going to take to win this war. America and the rest of the world are going to have to fight down and dirty like the terrorist are. If we take the high road, the 'civilized' road, we'll lose for sure. Not just because of that, but add in our bureaucracy, corruption and incompetence from all levels of our government and their agencies. It just won't work in our favor.
The events in Pakisatan now are scarring the hell out of me. If the terrorist get their paws on those nuclear warheads, they will not hesitate to use them. They don't care if we retaliate or not. They want to die for their cause. No concern if they take the world with them. Which is why we must fight on their lower level.
This might be off base or off subject, but China is also concerned with these latest events. They know Al-Quida is a lose cannon. Earlier this year, when North Korea started flexing its muscle, China put a stop to it, to settle them down.
I guess what I'm saying is the terrorist will not play by the rules. And we better not either if we want to win. I'll gladly give up, temporarily, any civil liberties and rights needed for this nation and the rest of the world to survive. And if torture is on the agenda, then so be it. I'm tired of f*cking around with these terrorist.

This has been an ABC Special Report, now back to 'Laverne and Shirley'.

The problem is who is the government torturing? Anyone we've apprehended is, at best, only a suspect. Are you advocating that we take unconvicted individuals and give them electric shocks (for example) til they start confessing to various crimes or revealing various plots? How reliable are those confessions?

Khalid Sheik Mohammed was tortured until he started talking and CIA agents raced around the globe to investigate various plots he revealed under the duress of waterboarding. The result? Wild goose chase. Nothing he said was reliable.

I have 2 big problems with torture. First, the information we'd get would not be reliable or credible. People will say anything, confess to anything to make the agony end. They'll even lie to get a moment of reprieve. What good does it do our intelligence gathering if we blur the lines between credible info and cr*p info? Any interrogator will tell you that the best ways of gathering info from a suspect is to either forge a bond with that person or "bargain" benefits while in custody (better blankets, food, access to books, etc.) in exchange for info.

Second, torture is beneath us. Or, at least it should be. I have no doubt that we have tortured in the past, but the public face of the US has always been that of a nation of laws, of fair and speedy trials, of representation of the accused by counsel, of innocent til proven guilty. Our interntaional "brand" was that of a country that respected individual rights and liberties. That's all gone now because of Bush and Cheney. We have no moral high ground anymore. We cannot protest if, for example, a US airman goes down over North Korea and they decide to hook the electrodes to his genitals or pull out his fingernails. Nothing. Who will listen to our protestations? No one. We've left our servicemen and women open to the most base, inhumane treatment possible because we've set the standard that such treatment is not against the Geneva Convention. We've made a public display of the fact that we're no better than the most depraved among us.

In Gulf War I, Iraqi soldiers willingly laid down their arms because they knew if they were in US custody they'd get medicine and food and shelter. I wonder how many enemy combatants would willingly surrender now that they know Abu Ghraib is ahead of them?

Torture is not a valuable intelligence gathering tool and it weakens our moral standing globally. Furthermore, it directly hurts our servicemen. It's the Bush legacy.



You have no proof that we'll lose if we stick to our ideals. It hasn't been tried yet.

If you give up your civil liberties, what are you torturing people to defend? If you give up your civil liberties you live under, by definition, a dictatorship. What you're saying is that you'd willingly live under a dictatorship in order to be safe? North Korea is fairly out of al Qaeda's range -- would you even willingly travel to North Korea and be subject to their laws for a month? A week? That's what you'll end up getting if you say that you'd give up your civil liberties.

Don't give me this "temporary" stuff. Since when has anything any government promised been "temporary"? If you give up your civil liberties you will *NOT* get them back. If you give up your civil liberties, there is *nothing* about the US that is worth defending. The very essence of our being is to have civil liberties.

The best way of beating the terrorists is to remain a decent society and a society of laws. I have no doubt some people will die as a result of using solid policework and applying established legal processes to suspects we apprehend, but free people survive because they cherish what they've got and are willing to fight to keep it. People who live under dictatorships fold and crumble.

I really think you need to re-examine what it means to be an American.

Yes, of course we torture and Bush lies like a dog about it, like so many other things he does/has done.

It is incumbent upon anyone to realize that if they support torture they will inevitably be tortured IMO. Once a torturer starts for legitimate reasons they proceed to anyone with whom they have a disagreement. That is a fact of military/political life.

A short perusal through the website of Amnesty International gives some idea of what this nation could eventually come to.

We are currently protesting against the situations in such nations as Myanmar and Pakistan. It is Monks in the former and lawyers in the later who bear the brunt of the crackdown: beatings, disappearances and legal intimidation are only the things that we know about.

Unless you expect to agree with the current powers that be at any given time, expect an eventual knock on the door as soon as you express a difference of opinion and an willingness to express it.

And yes fantomas, I understand your difficulty and disagreement with my use of the pronoun "we". But as in other nations both the guilty and the innocent will be punished should retribution for the actions of the leaders be sought by one or another victim or imagined victim.

Just as "we" as a nation invaded Iraq, "we" as a nation are suffering the consequences. That is what happens in the abscence of a judicial system that determines guilt or innocence. Fortunately each of us has the opportunity and power to change "our" behavior. It is only through our words and actions that we may, at the least, absolve our consciences.

I fail to see the gray area with this issue. We can try to justify our reasons for condoning ANY type of torture on anyone (terrorist or not), but in the end, we are no better than those few we call "terrorist".

I mean, come on. Give me a break! We can't get upset when we find out citizens/soldiers of the US get tortured, when it's clear that we engage in many of the same tactics.

Just because we say we're better, doesn't make it so. I can sh!t in my hand and call it a rose, but it's still sh!t. We've lost the ability to be defined by our words; it's all about our actions now.

When our supposed "civilized" society decides to allow any kind of torture, we slowly start to lose any sense of humanity.

As a non American, my view is that of course the US tortures, otherwise there wouldn't be all of the push back from the White House. They have attempted to redefine what has been considered torture for generations, in order to justify using it.

But please realize, that what the US does, in the name of "National Security", makes it justifiable for a rogue nation, or any nation for that matter, if they seize Americans, to use the same "enhanced interrogation techniques" on US citizens. The silence of the American Government on the issue, gives a tacit approval, both domestically and internationally.

And since the US government doesn't recognize the world court in The Hague, they will have little or no redress.

As the bible says, Do unto others.....................

I just pray for January 20, 2009 to come ever so quickly. Or better yet I wish the dictator and his illegal drunken quail hunting buddy would just get thrown in jail.

Its pretty hard to say its ok to justify torture when at the same time the US claims the right to regime chnage and exporting freedom and democracy abroad. You also cannot comment on other nations human rights records when by any definition "torture" is a violation of human rights.
But of course the US does torture prisoners because there can be no other reason for "rendition" of prisoners to countries such as Syria, Jordan and Egypt, and no reason for such secrecy surrounding these prisoners and there where abouts.

And a perfect example of that was the case of Maher Arar, the Canadian citizen who endured torture and imprisonment in Syria, largely due to the over-zealous actions of US authorities (although the RCMP and CSIS showed their incompetence too). Arar has since received a formal apology and compensation from Canada's government. I was pleased to see that some individual members of Congress have expressed their own apologies to Arar, and even Condoleezza Rice recently admitted that the case was poorly handled, but of course she stopped short of apologizing, and Arar is still barred from entering the US.

This story about the destruction of videotapes of CIA torture doesn't answer the first question I posed at the beginning of this thread - in the present tense. But it does strongly suggest that we have tortured in the very near past.

And it also begins to answer the second question I posed, though it is not clear how long momentum can be sustained given that Bush has gotten an I'm-not-sure-what-torture-is judge as his attorney general.

But the big question that screams out at me and has had little or no mention in the press is:

WHAT DID DICK KNOW AND WHAT DID DICK DO?

The timing and nature of the destruction of evidence has all the hallmarks of an operation that was approved by someone at a very high level in the Bush administration. Using Dick gives W deniability.

This issue is at the very heart of the hypocrisy we have endured for a long time in the form of an institution that has been ineptly managed - if at all - by both the Republican and Democratic overseers, in both the White House and congress.

I doubt that any serious reform would survive politically or judicially with the Bush-appointed Supreme Court.

Its been a rough week for Bush and for Dana Perino between this fiasco, and then the other day I heard that something like 10 MILLION White House e-mails have gone missing during the critical time frame of about 2003-2005...oh where oh where have my missing e-mails gone?????!! Good grief...

What makes you think that'll change a thing re torture by the US? Pelosi & Co have essentially not lifted a finger to stop any of these practices.

The house of cards just keeps falling but no one seems to care enough. We all know that the destruction of these tapes wasn't accidental. We all know that this administration has bullied our country into submission to our great detriment. Who's tough enough and bold enough to battle back?

Her name starts with an H.

Virtually everyone who has spoken publicly about this or seems to know about the workings of the CIA says that it was not necessary to destroy the tapes to protect the identity of the agents doing the torturing.

The Bush administration obviously doesn't care what people think of them for torturing.

That raises the question of why the tapes were destroyed.

There is a lot of speculation out there.

My best guess is that someone other than the agents or the Bush administration is being protected.

Now who might that be?

Just a thought.

Edit to add: Who could possibly be connecting enough dots to make destroying the tapes necessary now? The mainstream press is starting to catch up with the long-term conspiracy theorists. Perhaps we are finally beginning to learn something interesting about those who destroyed the Tower.

Edit to add: This trailer for the film Taxi to the Dark Side says a lot about why this administration should not be given carte blanche to spy on anyone, much less the power to decide without review who should or should not be accused.

The words of both Bush and Cheney are the most chilling thing in this documentary.