Why ever would you think that “GOP aides are simply not as ruthless and vicious as Democratic Party ones”?!?

There are many, many stories about the Bush the Younger admin that have never been told - ‘cause they had discipline, and they were “ruthless and vicious”.

The future’s tell-alls will eventually detail who knew what, and what was traded for silence.

Well, otherwise it would have to be that Old Media covered for Edwards out of political and/or ideological solidarity and that’s just inconceivable, right?

Rough, how about an advance preview of Bush’s ruthlessness and viciousness. I’m 75 already and don’t know how many more years I can wait for the craven cowards in Bush’s administration to reveal all the juicy details.

“Craven cowards” because they reveal where the bodies are buried, or because they wait before letting the peasants know what their betters were up to?

Personally, I lean towards the latter, but I guess it depends on to whom you think public servants should be most loyal: Their patrón, or the public.

Craven cowards was sarcastic because I don’t believe there were any vicious or ruthless goings-on under Bush’s watch, but if you know something, I ask again, please share it with us.

For future reference, craven cowards, among other not so nice things, make accusations they don’t back up.

President Bush instructed his subordinates to torture prisoners; that’s both vicious and ruthless.

Ah and yet they were cleared of crimes by the most fervent of the Kool-Aid drinkers in the Obama justice department. Odd that.

So, your position is that only unlawful acts can be vicious or ruthless, by definition?!?

I’ll update my dictionary.

But it is amusing, if sad, to note that your hero-worship of Bush includes whitewashing all of the traits that made him a man, not a God. One need not dislike him or his legacy to see him as he is. A host of angels didn’t miraculously Translate W. into the White House, he knuckled his way in - but under your interpretation of Bush, you would be unable to characterize what Bush did to McCain in South Carolina in 2000 as either vicious or ruthless.

That’s just… Crazy. And not in a good way.

Lawful acts can be ruthless and vicious, but as I’ve already said previously, I don’t think anything on Bush’s watch fits that description.

You brought up torture, so I mentioned the Obama justice department, chock full of people who’d like nothing better than to find Bush guilty of something, because they couldn’t come up with even an honorable mention in that department.

As for McCain in South Carolina — Bush obviously wasn’t ruthless and vicious enough because McCain was still around eight years later to lose the last election. Had he been down for the count then, perhaps we would have had a candidate who could have won and saved our country from the moonbats in charge now.

So all those tell-all books you mentioned in your previous comment the people in Bush’s administration are too frightened to write, are about are things we already know about.

Hero worship? Hardly. I do think Bush did an heroic job in leading our country during what could arguably be called the most dangerous period in our history and although I may be crazy, my craziness isn’t manifested by my admiration for the former president.

However, I’ll tell you what I’m not crazy about and that’s calling those who disagree with you, crazy.

Lawful acts can be ruthless and vicious, but as I’ve already said previously, I don’t think anything on Bush’s watch fits that description.

You do realize that you’re implicitly asserting that authorizing the torture of captives is neither ruthless nor vicious, right? Which is an indefensible position.

As for McCain in South Carolina — Bush obviously wasn’t ruthless and vicious enough…

Meaning, of course, that Bush was ruthless and vicious, but also weak.

However, I’ll tell you what I’m not crazy about and that’s calling those who disagree with you, crazy.

But what you do like is to call those who disagree with you “craven cowards” and “Kool-Aid drinkers”, as well as “moonbats” - how’s that last different from “crazy”, anyhow?

So all those tell-all books [will be about] things we already know about.

It would be life-enhancing not to labor under the delusion that there are no secrets, suppressed information or hidden back-room deals that might be revealed about the Bush the Younger administration - or indeed, any national administration, from any country. Embrace reality.

Since I’ve been chided all my life for being too sarcastic, it’s always a surprise when somebody doesn’t recognize my sarcasm.

I confess I don’t remember what Bush allegedly did to McCain in SC that you think of as being ruthless and vicious and didn’t have enough interest to even Google it up, so don’t even bother giving me your version of it. I’ve already said that ruthless and vicious are two words I don’t associate with Bush who is probably as decent a man as is possible in the world of politics.

I have no problem with “torture” performed by those in our military or intelligence community when the safety my grandchildren (and everyone else) is concerned. It’s very far out of my area of expertise, so I’ll leave it to those who’ve sworn to protect us either in the military, the intelligence community or the courts to decide the matter.

Kool-Aid drinkers, moonbats, etc. are merely sarcastic synonyms for the far left and I call craven cowards those in the Obama justice department who use our open government as a “gotcha” for those whose policies they oppose while giving a pass to obvious (they’ve been caught on video tape) law breakers, like the “Black Panthers” who were intimidating voters in Philadelphia and the union thugs who beat up a black conservative at a town meeting, with whom they agree.

To quote Charles Krauthammer, “We think the left is wrong, they think we’re evil.” That about sums it up. We want to set things right (pun intended) and they (and possibly you) want to punish us for thinking, what are to them, bad thoughts.

No one was tortured.

There is no evidence — none — that the Bush campaign had any connection to the push polling on Senator McCain, or that the push polling was effective.

No one was tortured.

Sir, you disappoint, as that comment displays a far lower level of intellectual rigor than is your norm.

We know, indisputably, that some captives of the U.S. were subjected to “Enhanced Interrogation Techniques”, and that these included:

1. Prolonged isolation,

2. Prolonged sleep deprivation,

3. Sensory deprivation,

4. Extremely painful “stress positions”, including “Long Time Standing”: This technique is described as among the most effective. Prisoners are forced to stand, handcuffed and with their feet shackled to an eye bolt in the floor for more than 40 hours. Exhaustion and sleep deprivation are effective in yielding confessions,

5. Sensory bombardment (such as prolonged loud noise and/or bright lights),

6. Forced nakedness,

7. Sexual humiliation,

8. Cultural humiliation (such as desecration of holy scriptures),

9. Being subjected to extreme cold that induces hypothermia: The prisoner is left to stand naked in a cell kept near 50 degrees. Throughout the time in the cell the prisoner is doused with cold water,

10. Exploitation of phobias,

11. Simulation of the experience of drowning - “Water Boarding”: The prisoner is bound to an inclined board, feet raised and head slightly below the feet. Cellophane is wrapped over the prisoner’s face and water is poured over him. Unavoidably, the gag reflex kicks in and a terrifying fear of drowning leads to almost instant pleas to bring the treatment to a halt.

Also: CIA’s Harsh Interrogation Techniques Described:

Harsh interrogation techniques […] were first authorized in mid-March 2002, [say] former and current intelligence officers and supervisors. […]

Portions of their accounts are corroborated by public statements of former CIA officers and by reports recently published that cite a classified CIA Inspector General’s report.

Other portions of their accounts echo the accounts of escaped prisoners from one CIA prison in Afghanistan.

“They would not let you rest, day or night. Stand up, sit down, stand up, sit down. Don’t sleep. Don’t lie on the floor,” one prisoner said through a translator. […]

According to the sources, CIA officers who subjected themselves to the water boarding technique lasted an average of 14 seconds before caving in. [Emph. add.] They said al Qaeda’s toughest prisoner, Khalid Sheik Mohammed, won the admiration of interrogators when he was able to last between two and two-and-a-half minutes before begging to confess.

While far from the classic “acid bath and electric shock” methods of torture, they clearly don’t meet the standards of the Geneva Convention, and really, any method of interrogation which leads hardened terrorists to “beg to confess” within a few minutes, and volunteer CIA agents within a few seconds, cannot be described as “benign” by any reasonable person. During WW II the Japanese commonly used some of these techniques as part of their general discipline and humiliation of American prisoners, and at the time the American press described such behavior as “torture”.

Further: Believe Me, It’s Torture: Christopher Hitchens Undergoes Waterboarding [All emph. original]:

Here is the most chilling way I can find of stating the matter. Until recently, “waterboarding” was something that Americans did to other Americans. It was inflicted, and endured, by those members of the Special Forces who underwent the advanced form of training known as sere (Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape). In these harsh exercises, brave men and women were introduced to the sorts of barbarism that they might expect to meet at the hands of a lawless foe who disregarded the Geneva Conventions. But it was something that Americans were being trained to resist, not to inflict.

Exploring this narrow but deep distinction, on a gorgeous day last May I found myself deep in the hill country of western North Carolina, preparing to be surprised by a team of extremely hardened veterans who had confronted their country’s enemies in highly arduous terrain all over the world. They knew about everything from unarmed combat to enhanced interrogation and, in exchange for anonymity, were going to show me as nearly as possible what real waterboarding might be like. […]

[I]t was difficult for me to completely forget the clause in the contract of indemnification that I had signed. This document (written by one who knew) stated revealingly:

“Water boarding” is a potentially dangerous activity in which the participant can receive serious and permanent (physical, emotional and psychological) injuries and even death, including injuries and death due to the respiratory and neurological systems of the body.

As the agreement went on to say, there would be safeguards provided “during the ‘water boarding’ process, however, these measures may fail and even if they work properly they may not prevent Hitchens from experiencing serious injury or death.” […]

The first specialist I had approached with the scheme had asked my age on the telephone and when told what it was (I am 59) had laughed out loud and told me to forget it. Waterboarding is for Green Berets in training, or wiry young jihadists whose teeth can bite through the gristle of an old goat. It’s not for wheezing, paunchy scribblers. For my current “handlers” I had had to produce a doctor’s certificate assuring them that I did not have asthma, but I wondered whether I should tell them about the 15,000 cigarettes I had inhaled every year for the last several decades. […]

You may have read by now the official lie about this treatment, which is that it “simulates” the feeling of drowning. This is not the case. You feel that you are drowning because you are drowning — or, rather, being drowned, albeit slowly and under controlled conditions and at the mercy (or otherwise) of those who are applying the pressure. The “board” is the instrument, not the method. You are not being boarded. You are being watered. This was very rapidly brought home to me when… […]

I find I don’t want to tell you how little time I lasted. […]

I apply the Abraham Lincoln test for moral casuistry: “If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong.” Well, then, if waterboarding does not constitute torture, then there is no such thing as torture. […]

Maybe I am being premature in phrasing it thus. Among the veterans there are at least two views on all this, which means in practice that there are two opinions on whether or not “waterboarding” constitutes torture. I have had some extremely serious conversations on the topic, with two groups of highly decent and serious men, and I think that both cases have to be stated at their strongest.

The team who agreed to give me a hard time in the woods of North Carolina belong to a highly honorable group. This group regards itself as out on the front line in defense of a society that is too spoiled and too ungrateful to appreciate those solid, underpaid volunteers who guard us while we sleep. These heroes stay on the ramparts at all hours and in all weather, and if they make a mistake they may be arraigned in order to scratch some domestic political itch. Faced with appalling enemies who make horror videos of torture and beheadings, they feel that they are the ones who confront denunciation in our press, and possible prosecution. As they have just tried to demonstrate to me, a man who has been waterboarded may well emerge from the experience a bit shaky, but he is in a mood to surrender the relevant information and is unmarked and undamaged and indeed ready for another bout in quite a short time. When contrasted to actual torture, waterboarding is more like foreplay. No thumbscrew, no pincers, no electrodes, no rack. Can one say this of those who have been captured by the tormentors and murderers of (say) Daniel Pearl? On this analysis, any call to indict the United States for torture is therefore a lame and diseased attempt to arrive at a moral equivalence between those who defend civilization and those who exploit its freedoms to hollow it out, and ultimately to bring it down. I myself do not trust anybody who does not clearly understand this viewpoint.

Against it, however, I call as my main witness Mr. Malcolm Nance. Mr. Nance is not what you call a bleeding heart. In fact, speaking of the coronary area, he has said that, in battlefield conditions, he “would personally cut bin Laden’s heart out with a plastic M.R.E. spoon.” He was to the fore on September 11, 2001, dealing with the burning nightmare in the debris of the Pentagon. He has been involved with the sere program since 1997. He speaks Arabic and has been on al-Qaeda’s tail since the early 1990s. His most recent book, The Terrorists of Iraq, is a highly potent analysis both of the jihadist threat in Mesopotamia and of the ways in which we have made its life easier. I passed one of the most dramatic evenings of my life listening to his cold but enraged denunciation of the adoption of waterboarding by the United States. The argument goes like this:

1. Waterboarding is a deliberate torture technique and has been prosecuted as such by our judicial arm when perpetrated by others. […]

We also know, indisputably, that some captives of the U.S. were renditioned to Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Morocco and Uzbekistan. If any rational argument can be made that there was any reason to do such other than those nations’ acceptance of “white-hot-tongs and thumbscrews” interrogation styles, I’m all ears.

Thus, any claims that the U.S. haven’t engaged in torture since 9/11, either directly or by proxy, or that such action was neither approved at the highest levels nor common, routine and widespread, FAIL to be supported by fact.

N.B., I agree with the decision to torture these particular captives, although I am nearly certain that I would have ended its routine use well before the Bush admin did. (“Nearly” because I am not privy to POTUS intel briefings, of course.)

However, the question in this thread is: Can President Bush the Younger’s approval of torture, (or even of routinely using slightly-less-than-torture “enhanced interrogation techniques”), be considered “ruthless and vicious”?

An answer of “not” can only be given by using other than reality-based reasoning.

Do what needs to be done, and own it. Be enlightened. We may be revolted by what the world forces us to do to survive and thrive, but to lie to ourselves about it is juvenile at best, sometimes infantile. Adults either play the game with clear eyes, or they choose not to, accepting that their survival might be disadvantaged in this dimension.

Anything less is just silly.

Most of your descriptions are accurate, but how is any of that (other than waterboarding) torture?

As for waterboarding, the mere fact that people volunteer to undergo it means that it’s not torture as defined by the Geneva convention or US law. I don’t see many people volunteering to have slivers of bamboo shoved under the finger nails or electrical cords attached to their genitalia.

Rendition is a slightly different issue, being unquestionably legal and the consistent policy of the last three administrations.

For what it’s worth, you say that you agree with the decision to torture the people we tortured. I would not. Actual torture is always wrong under any circumstance — including the ticking bomb scenario. Here’s how I tell the difference: among the tortures used by Saddam Hussein was the practice of raping a prisoner’s wife and/or daughters in front of him. There is no circumstance on earth that would get me to agree that the US was justified in using that technique. That is torture.

[Y]our descriptions are accurate, but how is any of that … torture?

Without question, prolonged sleep deprivation, “Long Time Standing”, being kept naked in a 50° F cell and periodically doused with cold water, and waterboarding are prohibited by the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, so the argument that “it’s legal under U.S. law” cannot stand.

As for waterboarding, the mere fact that people volunteer to undergo it means that it’s not torture as defined by the Geneva convention or US law. I don’t see many people volunteering to have slivers of bamboo shoved under the finger nails or electrical cords attached to their genitalia.

We already know that bamboo slivers and electric shocks are unpleasant. People volunteer to experience waterboarding because it’s not commonly know how unpleasant it is, and so some are motivated, for various reasons, to find out.

And again, since almost everyone who undergoes waterboarding, even voluntarily, wants to stop almost immediately, and waterboarding breaks hardened terrorists/criminals within minutes, it defies reason for anyone to claim that it’s no big deal, similar to being denied dessert.

It’s clearly very unpleasant, even more so than slivers under the fingernails and electric shocks to the genitals, since people who have been subjected to such abuses have reported being able to hold out under such conditions for hours, even days.

Rendition is a slightly different issue, being unquestionably legal and the consistent policy of the last three administrations.

Which completely elides the issue of why we rendition. Sure it’s legal, but what’s the point? The point is to deliver U.S. captives to places where they can legally be tortured, for the benefit of America.

If you did not believe that the U.S. engage in torture-by-proxy, you would have said so, instead of writing that “it’s legal” and “everybody does it.”

For what it’s worth, you say that you agree with the decision to torture the people we tortured. I would not. Actual torture is always wrong under any circumstance — including the ticking bomb scenario.

Which would seem to be the reason that you don’t want to believe that the U.S. torture, or engage in torture-by-proxy.

You outline a particular interrogation technique that induces mental stress, rather than physical, and call that torture. If “torture” can be purely psychological, then even if you don’t believe that sleep deprivation¹, “Long Time Standing”, induced hypothermia, or waterboarding, alone or especially in combination, rise to the level of physical torture, how can it be denied that they are mentally torturous?!?

[A]mong the tortures used by Saddam Hussein was the practice of raping a prisoner’s wife and/or daughters in front of him. There is no circumstance on earth that would get me to agree that the US was justified in using that technique. That is torture.

So “torture” is anything that you would never, ever do? And conversely therefore, anything that you would be willing to do, given the most exigent circumstances, cannot be regarded as torture?

That seems to be a very solipsistic way to address the issue.

In summary:

• The argument that all of the “Enhanced Interrogation Techniques” are legal under U.S. law is nonfactual, although some are,
• That rendition is both legal and a longstanding policy at the highest levels of gov’t doesn’t affect in the slightest the fact that the purpose of these particular renditions is to transport prisoners of the U.S. to torture facilities,
• That people volunteer to experience waterboarding doesn’t mean that it’s not torture, it merely means that it’s not commonly-known to be torture. People try illegal drugs because they don’t have visceral experience with addiction; that doesn’t mean that they want to be addicted. In addition, what was the most common use of waterboarding by America before 9/11? To introduce our elite military forces to the experience of torture, for the purpose of building a resistance to such.
• If waterboarding isn’t torture, then why do volunteers stop the experience within a few seconds, and prisoners impress their interrogators by holding out for a few minutes??? Can you think of any other clearly “non-torturous” technique that produces such results? Indeed, almost all activities that are clearly torture don’t break people that quickly. If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck…
• If, as you write, “torture is always wrong under any circumstance”, then the legality of rendition is moot. Torture-by-proxy is still torture. Therefore, the U.S. have tortured prisoners.

Actual torture is always wrong under any circumstance — including the ticking bomb scenario.

Since that’s an absolute statement, let me address it with an extreme scenario: We know, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that there is a hostile nuclear device positioned in a major U.S. city. It’s not some jerry-rigged terrorist hack job, it’s been liberated from a known nuclear power, and it’s both sure to detonate, and not to be severely underwhelming. The terrorists are smart enough to get it on top of a tall building or lashed to a small plane before detonating it.

We’ve captured one of their leaders, subduing him before he could swallow his cyanide pill, and he’s a homegrown American, with a family nearby.

At issue are the following repercussions from a successful attack:

1. Hundreds of thousands of fatalities, both immediate and for a decade following.

2. Possibly millions of less-than-lethal casualties.

3. Trillions of dollars of property and economic damage, both in the immediate city, and from reaction across the city and indeed across the entire developed world, as people attempt to increase their security.

4. Decreased liberty and permanent increases in spending on security, again both in the U.S. and in the other advanced nations.

5. Military-Industrial Complex tightens grasp on national treasury and Federal policy, both foreign and domestic.

Even if one doesn’t buy a “sacrifices of the one against the benefit of the many” argument² if it’s one person paying the price for two people to be safe, it’s another kettle of fish altogether to maintain that it’s not worth it to sacrifice a few people to potentially save millions from immediate harm, as well as the permanent shaping of the world in an extremely negative way. After all, every bit of resources used for additional security forces and devices are resources that can’t go towards mitigating hunger or for helping disaster victims. So even if nuking an American city wouldn’t harm even a single person immediately, the trillions of dollars of productivity that would be bent towards defense would heavily impact industrial and R&D capital spending, thus decreasing future quality of life for everyone on the planet, as well as assuredly resulting in millions of indirect deaths over the next few decades due to decreased spending on medical tech, medical facilities and agricultural science, and a decreased ability to subsidize the food-consumptive side of the crops vs. fuel dynamic.

Really, it goes back to the olde philosophical chestnut, “if you could prevent [oppressive dictator of choice] from ascending to power by killing one random, definitely-innocent person…” And I would³.

Therefore, given the above scenario, I’d definitely give the go-ahead for Terrorist Leader X’s wife and kids to be raped in front of him, if I believed that he’d care enough to give up his bomb.

But, since it would be far more effective, (not to mention humane), to simply torture him by waterboarding, I’d do that first.

¹ Which I can assure you, from personal experience, IS torturous. Ditto for being subjected to cold for long periods.

² And if one doesn’t buy that paradigm, then how can one logically support police, firefighter and military organizations? After all, when a police officer, firefighter, or soldier, sailor, airman or Marine dies doing their duty, it’s usually not because it’s to their benefit to so do - it’s for the perceived benefit of society.

³ The innocent die all of the time, without any good coming from it. Another one, vs the known damage that [oppressive dictator of choice] would, is or did do, is virtually no price at all to pay, especially if one is of a religious bent. (And that holds true even for lightly-oppressive dictators, like Putin or Chavez.)

Mr. Cohen isn’t the only one who views many of these as non-tortuous.

… where they can legally be tortured, for the benefit of America.

Rough, The quote above is odd in two ways. 1. Why would you think that information gained about terrorists would only benefit the U.S. and even if that were true, why wouldn’t that be reason enough? and 2. The formation is odd in itself. We mostly refer to our country as the U.S., not America.

The hypotheticals are sily, but no I wouldn’t torture that terrorist. I would waterboard him, though, and as you agree that waterboarding is actually effective, resort to torture would be unnecessary. But if the hypothetical was that only torture (what I consider torture) would work, then no, I wouldn’t torture him or allow him to be tortured. Nor would I kill an innocent to prevent the rise of Hitler. Nor would I throw the bum onto the tracks in order to stop the train from running over the children.

Thinking that we can ignore personal morality out of service to some greater morality is always just an excuse to avoid doing what we know to be right. Individual morality is the only morality.

The Eighth Amendment is not applicable; enhanced interrogation techniques are not punishment, but an attempt to elicit information. Similarly, the Fifth Amendment prevents techniques being used in prosecutions that are allowed if the purpose is to gain actionable intelligence. That is, actions that are prohibited by the Fifth Amendment if the information is used in court; or the Eighth Amendment, if used as a punishment, are not proscribed by the Constitution for use in interrogating enemy troops.

As for rendition, who are we to impose our subjective cultural values on other peoples?

To cut to the chase, I consider torture the imposition of grievous bodily harm or a significant risk thereof, or continuing mental or physical distress that compromises the ability to participate in important life activities. (I’m paraphrasing the law, but it seems like a pretty good definition.) Therefore, I’m OK with less than grievous bodily harm and with threats that are not likely to cause ongoing problems. Waterboarding, in which the risk of grievous harm and the long-term effects are relatively miner, don’t cross the line. Of course, I understand why people think waterboarding comes up to the line, and so I have no problem with the Bush Administration’s policy that it could only be used with cabinet level approval on the highest value prisoners, and only rarely at that.

Mr. Cohen isn’t the only one who views many of these as non-tortuous.

Many of them aren’t torture. Some of ‘em are, as you (they?) appear to acknowledge, given the “many” qualifier.

1. Why would you think that information gained about terrorists would only benefit the U.S…

They are prisoners of the U.S., and they are being turned over to foreign gov’ts for the express purpose of acquiring information that will possibly benefit the U.S. That the information might also benefit other nations is true, but irrelevant. That’s not why America is renditioning captives. Indeed, I suspect that if the U.S. gov’t believed that the information obtained would only benefit other nations, few of the prisoners would be turned over.

…and even if that were true, why wouldn’t that be reason enough?

I support the torture, to a certain extent. David Cohen is absolutely against it, and therefore it is to him that you should address that question.

2. The formation is odd in itself. We mostly refer to our country as the U.S., not America.

Sorry ‘bout that. I am a foreign agent/agitator, and I don’t always get the colloquialisms right.

On the other hand, the Catholic Church, the Library of Congress, the U.S. State Dept., and Katherine Lee Bates & the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services all disagree with your interpretation. So there may be hope for me yet.

Thinking that we can ignore personal morality out of service to some greater morality is always just an excuse to avoid doing what we know to be right. Individual morality is the only morality.

Well, no. What I know to be right is that shooting an innocent child in the face would be worth it, to avoid Hitler and everything that came after. Therefore, by my reckoning your “personal morality” is truly personal, in that it benefits only you. YOU get to avoid staring into the abyss, at the cost of millions of random innocents killed.

But don’t get me wrong, “individual morality is the only morality” is a legitimate, reasonable, G-d-approved choice. It’s just a lesser part of the whole of morality.

But if the hypothetical was that only torture (what I consider torture) would work, then no, I wouldn’t torture him or allow him to be tortured.

Thinking that we can ignore personal morality out of service to some greater morality is always just an excuse to avoid doing what we know to be right. Individual morality is the only morality.

As for rendition, who are we to impose our subjective cultural values on other peoples?

These seem like contradictory statements to me. “Greater morality” is always wrong, and you would never, ever, regardless of circumstances, allow anyone to be tortured, but it’s A-OK to turn somebody over to known torturers, for the express purpose of allowing the prisoner to be interrogated by torture????

If we politically pressure (or invade and occupy) Uzbekistan, because they have the charming habit of anally-raping interrogees with broken bottles, then that would be “impos[ing] our subjective cultural values on other peoples”.

But if America chooses to turn over prisoners to Uzbekistan, so that they can do our dirty work for us, that’s importing the superior culture - accepting their subjective cultural values due to some weakness in ours.

Prisoners of the U.S. are in our total control. We are morally responsible for what happens to them. If we turn them over to others, for the explicit purpose of having them tortured, then we are as guilty of torture as are the actual interrogators. In no way are we attempting to impose American cultural values on the societies receiving such prisoners. If, for the sake of argument, we assume that American cultural values include an aversion to torture, then it would be COUNTERPRODUCTIVE to impose such a value on our torturing partners.

If you truly believe what you’ve written about torture and morality, then you MUST KNOW that renditions-for-torture are WRONG. (By your standards.) It is “allowing to be tortured”, at the very least. And it’s COMPLETELY PREVENTABLE by the U.S., since we’re the ones making it possible.

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On another topic, if sacrificing innocents for the greater good is verboten, then how do you feel about the ~250,000 combat deaths among American draftee service members during WWII?

Since they had to be conscripted, they obviously weren’t of a mind to volunteer to be placed in harm’s way. Would you say that forcing them into combat was wrong?

Would you also find it to be immoral if draftees weren’t sent to war, but were instead forced to labor in defense plants, providing arms and materiel in support of an all-volunteer fighting force?

Indeed, I suspect that if the U.S. gov’t believed that the information obtained would only benefit other nations, few of the prisoners would be turned over.

Quite a leap considering we have a long history of cooperating with allies as is your assumption that all renditions are for the purpose of extra-torturous torture not allowed in the U.S. … and in that vein, I’m less squeamish than David. I wouldn’t allow innocents to be sacrificed to avoid the discomfort of or save the life of a killer.

That icon of the left Franklin Delano Roosevelt got congress to declare war on Germany when his bud Uncle Joe Stalin was attacked by his former ally Adolph Hitler ergo the draft was necessary. You may be too young to remember, but people were very patriotic in those days and many, many volunteered before they were drafted. The media was gung-ho too as was Hollywood.

Yes, I do remember Pearl Harbor, but am not convinced that Frankie didn’t know well in advance of the attack, but let it happen to make sure we got in the war. There were a lot of books written after the war about that and no I don’t remember any titles or authors, but the arguments seemed plausible at the time, especially given that FDR was so easily manipulated by the left.

One of the reasons I’m even slightly optimistic that we’ll weather the current assault on our country by the Chicago gang of socialist thugs, is that we weathered similar assaults from the left in the 40’s and the 60’s.

GO USA.

Millions volunteered for service during WWII, but 85% of those who served were draftees - at least, according to the U.S. Selective Service System. Draftees can be patriots; perhaps they just aren’t willing to give up their personal situations until they’re absolutely needed.

Torture is inherently immoral, thus always wrong; going to war using conscript troops isn’t, thus it depends upon the circumstances. WWII is an easy case. WWI, on the other hand, was immoral; the product of electing our only truly evil president.

It seems to me that “I [wouldn’t] kill an innocent to prevent the rise of Hitler” and “going to war using conscript troops isn’t [inherently immoral]” are largely conflicting statements. Killing one random innocent person to prevent Hitler from coming to power is abhorrent, but causing the deaths of a quarter-million random innocents to put Hitler down is somehow moral?

And really, that applies to any war using conscript troops. If we could execute one person at random and avoid the Vietnam conflict, how’s that worse than sending 55,000 random mostly-conscripts to their deaths?

In other words, whether the deaths are pre- or post-rise of Oppressive Dictator or other Threat to America seems irrelevant to me. Pick one dude off the street at random in NYC on 9/10/01, kill him, and the terrorists are arrested at the airport on 9/11 - how’s that so very wrong?

For all we know, Random Man would have been hit by a taxi later that day, or killed in 9/11 anyhow. As I wrote up-thread, random innocent people die every single minute of every single day. Death comes to us all anyway - we’d not be sacrificing immortals.

What made Wilson more evil than some of the other horrors that we’ve had as POTUS? The only evil Prez?

You do understand that there’s a difference between murder and killing, right?

Sure, but in our “magic scenario”, where we are assured that Hitler doesn’t come to power if we murder one random person, then if we don’t sacrifice the one, instead choosing to wage a total war after he’s ascended, we are in fact murdering a quarter-million people - because we could have chosen to spare them. And that’s just the death toll among conscripted American service members, a very small piece of the overall carnage.

Really, the difference between murder and justifiable homicide is in the eye of the beholder. The U.S.’ preemptive move into Iraq is viewed by many as murderous, because Saddam seemed to pose no clear and present danger. He was just hostile and potentially dangerous.

If Iraq and America were individual people residing in the U.S., and America had taken out Iraq because Iraq had quarreled and fought with America in the past, and then looked at America funny, America would be in prison right now.

Rough, your arguments are getting into very deep and rough (no pun intended) waters.

The invasion of Iraq was preventative, not preemptive. The difference is that preemptive wars are begun to avoid a clear and present danger, like Israel jumping out first in the 67 war rather than wait for the massed Arab armies to attack. Preventative war, by its very nature, is not aimed at a clear and present danger.

The difference between murder and killing is not in the eye of the beholder. It’s perfectly clear: one violates law and morality and the other doesn’t. Whether people disagree on the facts is a separate question, but the invasion of Iraq was perfectly legal. In any event, in a representative democracy will elect people to make those decisions. If we don’t like their decisions, we elect different people, but while they’re in office, they’re empowered to decide whether we should invade.

The real problem is that your magic scenario is silly. We can never know the future well-enough to decide that a small sin know is worth avoiding a large tragedy later. So, the real question is: would you commit suicide if it were likely, but not certain, to avoid 9/11 and, if you wouldn’t, how could you morally impose that same price on someone else?

To be perfectly clear, I’m denying that one life is worth less than 10 or 100 or 1000 or 1 million lives.

Rendition of U.S. prisoners to torture facilities in, e.g., Egypt and Morocco is legal.

The U.S./UK invasion of Iraq was legal.

But you of all people should know that legality doesn’t bestow morality, and that sometimes what’s moral is illegal.

Which is the problem with the formulation that “the difference between murder and killing is [that] one violates law and morality and the other doesn’t.” Humans are (sometimes) capable of determining if a killing has violated the law, but rarely capable of determining the ultimate morality of the death.

That’s why the difference is in the eye of the beholder, the paradigm under which one operates. In the U.S., we find honor killings of females to be murder. In other parts of the world, it’s justifiable homicide. And the saying that “one person’s terrorist is another person’s freedom fighter” contains more than a grain of truth.

For instance, given that you believe that one life is exactly as valuable as one million lives, and I believe in something diametrically opposed, we’d both act in LAWFUL ways during a “ticking time-bomb” scenario - but we’d both view the other’s actions as abominable and deeply abhorrent to G-d.

Immoral, in other words. Which is why bringing up the legality of torture or military attacks is well beside the point.

Yes, the “kill a child to thwart [any really bad thing]” scenario is silly. That’s why it’s a philosophical challenge instead of a debate on policy. But sometimes thinking about absurdly extreme scenarios can clarify situations that we’re more likely to face, which are likely to be far more complex and not nearly as clear-cut.

Of course I’d have committed suicide if there were a 50/50 chance that it would have prevented 9/11. Anyone who wouldn’t is infantile or a rank coward, unworthy of Valhalla. (Members of religions or sects who believe that regardless of reason, suicide is damning, excluded.)

I’d do it if there were a 20% chance of stopping 9/11 and everything that has flowed from it. Logically, I ought to be willing to do so if there were a 1% or even .1% chance that it would stop 9/11, but those odds are cold and bitter.

Humans are … rarely capable of determining the ultimate morality of the death.

This is exactly my point.

By the way, I don’t believe “one life is exactly as valuable as one million lives.” I believe that lives aren’t quantifiable.

I’m also not sure why you say we’d both act in lawful ways during a ticking-time bomb scenario. I’d act lawfully, you’d torture some terrorist.

I’d act lawfully, you’d torture some terrorist.

According to your own earlier arguments, that’s perfectly legal:

The Eighth Amendment is not applicable; enhanced interrogation techniques are not punishment, but an attempt to elicit information. Similarly, the Fifth Amendment prevents techniques being used in prosecutions that are allowed if the purpose is to gain actionable intelligence. That is, actions that are prohibited by the Fifth Amendment if the information is used in court; or the Eighth Amendment, if used as a punishment, are not proscribed by the Constitution for use in interrogating enemy troops.

I don’t know if you saw or enjoyed Watchmen, but this disagreement strikes me as being very similar to the fundamental philosophical conflict between Ozymandias and Rorschach. You’re Rorschach.

In fact, some things that are without-question illegal in the U.S., such as raping a prisoner with a broken bottle or using electrical shocks, should be A-OK with you for the purposes of interrogating a terrorist during a ticking-bomb scenario, since they’re deemed acceptable in the places where we lawfully rendition prisoners for the sole purpose of forcing them to undergo such questioning.

If you accept that renditioning-for-torture is lawful, as you have argued up-thread, then you can hardly object that copying such techniques as our putative allies use during questioning is unlawful.

Humans are … rarely capable of determining the ultimate morality of the death.

I don’t believe “one life is exactly as valuable as one million lives.” I believe that lives aren’t quantifiable.

It seems to me that what you’re saying is that in the face of uncertainty - the inability to know whether our actions are ultimately and net moral or immoral, our inability to precisely quantify lives - we should do as little as possible. While I agree that we aren’t omniscient, I don’t think that we should be paralyzed by what we don’t know. We can make a rough guess about morality and immorality, and I’m going to side with saving a million lives every time. One life and one million might be of equal weight Celestially, but we don’t live in the Celestial world.

AVRRA;

What’s funny about that is that Miller intended Rorschach to be a hideous caricature of Objectivist / Libertarian thought that everyone would hate. He turned out to be possibly the most popular character.

In the end, I agreed with Rorschach too. I think Ozymandius’ plan was hopelessly utopian and would by at most 5 years of peace.

Why do you think I think that torture isn’t illegal? Torture is clearly illegal and should be. Waterboarding, and the other enhanced interrogation techniques, aren’t torture.

I’m open to the idea that waterboarding would be cruel and unusual punishment. If we sentenced criminals to waterboarding, I’d probably agree that the 8th Amendment prohibited that. But waterboarding as an interrogation technique does not violate the 8th Amendment because “interrogation” is not “punishment.” It doesn’t violate the 5th Amendment because the resulting information is not used in court.

My position is that torture is illegal, cruel and unusual punishment is illegal and forcing people to provide evidence used to convict them is illegal, but that “enhanced interrogation techniques” used against enemies of the United States for the purpose of gaining actionable intelligence is not illegal.

Oh yeah. I wouldn’t be a vigilante, but I’m perfectly comfortable with Rorschach’s choice at the end.

I also wouldn’t go vigilante like Rorschach, but I understand why he would. I find him and his actions much more sympathetic than Ozymandius, who is the archetype of the “educated class” that’s going to break a whole lot more innocent eggs for less benefit.

My position is that … “enhanced interrogation techniques” used against enemies of the United States for the purpose of gaining actionable intelligence is not illegal.

Yeah, that’s my point. We’d both act lawfully - you by refusing to do anything, which ain’t illegal, and me by using “enhanced interrogation techniques” to save the city. Now, it’s true that I consider many “enhanced interrogation techniques” to be, in fact, torture, but I’m OK with using torture in some circumstances. So for you to write that you’re “not sure why you say we’d both act in lawful ways during a ticking-time bomb scenario [since] you’d torture some terrorist” is a bit of a nullity. You have stated several times that “enhanced interrogation technique” torture is both lawful and moral.

You’ve also failed to address the ramifications of legal rendition-for-torture - unless you’re alluding that it too is an “enhanced interrogation technique”.

I think Ozymandius’ plan was hopelessly utopian and would by at most 5 years of peace.

[Ozymandius] is the archetype of the “educated class” that’s going to break a whole lot more innocent eggs for less benefit.

A lot more than five years, I’d guess. I’d be shocked if, after destroying so many cities, and killing so many millions of people to make Earthlings think that they must unite against the “threat of Dr. Manhattan”, Oz wasn’t planning to unleash more “Intrinsic Field Energy” death-from-above occasionally to remind everybody to focus on the “real” threat, and quit squabbling amongst themselves.

The U.S./USSR “MAD” threat resulted in fifty years and counting of global peace…

As for benefit - Oz manipulated Dr. M into developing “Intrinsic Field Energy” generators, which technology was retained by humanity. Given that in order to grow in both numbers and sophistication¹ humanity will need to develop a gargantuan and ferocious primary energy source which is not fossil-based², the price paid was so light as to be relatively nothing. Now that’s a deal!

The above relates only to the movie version. The comic version of events, and the ending, were somewhat different.

¹ Or even just to survive in our current numbers, with our current comforts and abilities, for longer than the end of this very century in which we now live.

² Which includes fissionable materials.

I don’t have much to say about rendition. Rendition for torture is all speculation, hearsay and the word of ex-prisoners. It is also inconsistent with the idea that the US engages in torture itself, since it presumes that the US has to rely on others to conduct the torture because the US doesn’t torture.

You’ve been a good sport. I appreciate the conversation.

Rendition for torture is all speculation, hearsay and the word of ex-prisoners.

LOL. Yeah. That passes the smell test about as well as the Iranian “peaceful nuclear electrical program”. The U.S. are sending prisoners to Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Morocco and Uzbekistan because what, their conventional interrogators are better than American ones? Hardly.

The reason that I keep pressing you about rendition, is because you are so adamant that you would rather die than mistreat another human being, and that in fact you “would not allow” anyone else to torture a prisoner around you, but all you have to say about the U.S. rendition policy is that “it’s legal”.

No doubt, but is it moral? You seem to have an enormous aversion to gazing directly at what your government is doing.

As for inconsistency, we would both agree that the U.S. don’t want to be seen directly, illegally torturing prisoners. That doesn’t play well in Peoria, and also undermines our global good-will PR efforts, so we have to get our henchmen to do the really dirty work. But America is still legally and morally responsible for them doing so, since we are complicit co-conspirators.

Where we disagree is about the effect and morality of the legal stuff. I think that some “enhanced interrogation techniques” are torture. Apparently the Obama admin agrees, since the list of approved “enhanced interrogation techniques” was cut to bar the more-traumatic actions. And if the morality and torture-status of given techniques rests solely on their legality, then some of ‘em are on rather shaky ground - while apparently nobody has been prosecuted for using these techniques, there is great controversy over whether or not they’re legal, and just as “acquitted” is not the same as “innocent”, so too does “not prosecuted” not mean “lawful”.

However, I will say that one aspect of the situation that I can’t explain is that, given that waterboarding was previously accepted, if it’s so all-fired effective why were we sending anyone to face more conventional tongs-and-pincers torture?

One answer could be domestic American politics - even though quasi-legal, waterboarding is still unsavory and hugely controversial, and therefore the Bush the Younger admin might have wanted to keep the heat off.

Rough, why do you refer to “your government” in the comment above to David. Isn’t it our government, i.e., all us ‘mericans?

Give me an example of rendition for torture.

Rough, why do you refer to “your government” in the comment above to David. Isn’t it our government, i.e., all us ‘mericans?

It’s a rhetorical device used to personalize and intensify a message.

Give me an example of rendition for torture.

Give me a credible reason why the U.S. would send hundreds of captured intel assets to Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Morocco and Uzbekistan without first processing them and wringing them dry.

Surely some of the captured terror suspects are wanted fugitives in those nations; a few dozen turned over is unremarkable. But hundreds?

The burden is on you, not me. However, I find the reason given compelling: rendition to their home countries stops them from harming the US in the future.

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