Host Chuck Todd asked Cheney to respond to the Senate Intelligence Committee report's account that one detainee was "chained to the wall of a cell, doused with water, froze to death in CIA custody."
"And it turned out it was a case of mistaken identity," Todd said.
"Right," Cheney responded. "But the problem I have was with all of the folks that we did release that end up back on the battlefield."
"I’m more concerned with bad guys who got out and released than I am with a few that in fact were innocent," he continued.
Todd pressed Cheney, asking if he was okay with the fact that about 25 percent of the detainees interrogated were actually innocent.
"I have no problem as long as we achieve our objective..."
Dick Cheney has "no problem" with America murdering - torturing to death - an innocent man. And he has "no problem" with the fact that one-quarter of the people we tortured were actually innocent. We tortured them for information they did not have.
For any number of reasons, torture isn't right, even if you're only torturing people who do have the information you need. (Was it OK for the Gestapo to torture people during World War II, as long as those people were associated with the Allies or the Resistance? Torturers usually have a reason for torturing people, you know.)
But to be so completely unconcerned about torturing innocent people - killing at least one of them - well, this just blows my mind. I know that George W. Bush and Dick Cheney don't dare leave the United States, for fear of arrest for war crimes, but why aren't they in jail, awaiting trial, here?
In America, both Bush and Cheney are treated as celebrities, rather than criminals. What is wrong with us?
If Americans were treated by these techniques in another country, I wonder what Cheney would call those techniques then. War is horrible, but we do have rules for war. We can't break them because we feel righteous.
ReplyDeleteExactly right, Jim. Cheney thinks torture is justified if Americans are in danger. Leaving aside what it does to us, in so many different ways, and the fact that it's a piss-poor way to get information, does he really think that other nations tortured prisoners for no reason at all?
DeleteThe Gestapo tortured prisoners during World War II, when Germany was in a fight for its life. So did the Imperial Japanese. So was that justified, then?
What if Muslim terrorists torture our people? Are they justified because we're waging a 'war on terror' against them? Are they justified to torture in defense of Islam, as they see it?
If we can torture people whenever we feel scared, how can we criticize anyone else for doing the exact same thing? But this is the problem with conservatives like Cheney. It's always about them. They have no empathy for anyone else, and they can't - or won't - put themselves in someone else's shoes.
They're justified in torturing people when they get scared, but no one else is. I suppose that's because 'God' is on their side, huh? After all, that's not a claim anyone else makes, right? LOL