Watched the hearings on CSpan. Democrats, Biden and Grassley and others tried to get new Attorney General Mukasy to say that waterboarding is torture. Mukasy did a duck and weave and managed to avoid getting pinned down. A least in the morming session. Didn't bother to watch the afternoon session. The democrats wanted Mukasy to call waterboarding torture because there is a law against torture. With waterboarding defined as torture by the new US Attorney General, they can go after some waterboarders, making the administration look bad.
We are pretty sure CIA waterboarded some ugly captives, that fuss about "interrogation tapes" last week must have been about a video taped waterboarding session. CIA summoned up the guts to destroy the tapes before they got posted on UTube. CIA has been fairly worthless lately but at least they have some sense of self preservation. It's a start for them. Needless to say the last thing Mukasy or anyone else wants is a another Valerie Plame kind of case where some special prosecutor goes looking for CIA waterboarders. It's just too messy, and damaging to the national interest. So Mukasy won't say waterboarding is torture, even if they waterboard him. Besides, these are senators. If they feel waterboarding is torture they can pass a law to that effect, if they have the votes, which they probably don't.
Personally I'm not in favor of duress, extreme duress, or torture for interrogation. Under duress the subject will tell you anything you want to hear, just to make it stop hurting. It's against the principles of America, the principles of my religion, and my conscience. Plus I gotta weak stomach.
On the other hand, if a few Al Quada scumbags got waterboarded that's too bad. Some practical minded Americans decided to extract information by practical measures. I don't necessarily approve, but I am not ready to condemn. Especially not for terrorists who dress teenagers in explosive vests and send them out to kill innocent bystanders.
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