Being anti-torture doesn’t make you pro-terrorist
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WASHINGTON — Torture is an impermissible evil. Except under two circumstances. The first is the ticking time bomb. An innocent’s life is at stake. The bad guy you have captured possesses information that could save this life. He refuses to divulge. In such a case, the choice is easy. Even John McCain, the most admirable and estimable torture opponent, says openly that in such circumstances, “You do what you have to do.” And then take the responsibility.
Some people, however, believe you never torture. Ever. They are akin to conscientious objectors who will never fight in any war under any circumstances, and for whom we correctly show respect by exempting from war duty. But we would never make one of them Centcom commander. Private principles are fine, but you don’t entrust such a person with the military decisions upon which hinges the safety of the nation. It is similarly imprudent to have a person who would abjure torture in all circumstances making national security decisions upon which depends the protection of 300 million countrymen.
The second exception to the no-torture rule is the extraction of information from a high-value enemy in possession of high-value information likely to save lives. This case lacks the black-and-white clarity of the ticking time bomb scenario. We know less about the length of the fuse or the nature of the next attack. But we do know the danger is great. We know we must act but have no idea where or how — and we can’t know that until we have information. Catch-22.
Under those circumstances, you do what you have to do. And that includes waterboarding.
Charles Krauthammer, via Townhall.com.
So I got pelted with emails from the usual lunatics this weekend after making the mistake of saying on television that I thought the lawyers who greenlighted the waterboarding program should be prosecuted. I’m not going to delve into this too deeply, because this is clearly one of those issues that few people are willing to change their minds about, but I feel like I’ve got to talk about one particular aspect of this debate, because it’s just too crazy to let go.
Here’s a snippet from one letter I got: “What really gets me about liberals like you is that when other countries torture and kill our people, and cut off their heads, [there's] not a peep from you. But you dunk some terrorist’s head underwater for a few minutes and you go all weepy.”
I saw the same kind of thing in a letter from a guy named Robert Reeg to the New York Post this morning:
My chest was crushed in the collapse of 2 WTC. If people think waterboarding is torture, they should try having their chest cracked while fully conscious. I haven’t had a pain-free day since then, never mind the memories. What outrages me most is the “selective” outrage. No one complains when Americans are tortured and murdered.
Obviously Mr. Reeg suffered a terrible experience; I would never make light of that. What I do want to say is that there seems to be this idea that those of us who are against making torture an allowable practice in the U.S. are somehow condoning the behavior of those wacko/asshole religious extremists, that we’re picking “their side” in the debate, like it’s an either/or proposition or something. I don’t think I could count the number of times I’ve had this argument on the campaign trail at Republican rallies:
ME: No, actually I’m not even talking about whether torture works or not, although incidentally it doesn’t. I’m just saying that no civilized society does it, and we probably shouldn’t either, so –
ANGRY WHITE PERSON: But what about what those monsters did to our boys in Fallujah? I suppose you’re not outraged about that!
ME: (perplexed) Well, I — wait, what? Where the fuck do you get that from?
ANGRY WHITE PERSON: You’re standing in front of me complaining about water-boarding! It just follows that you’re not outraged about what they did to our boys in Fallujah!
ME: (scratching head, confused) Um…
The thing is, we’ve been listening to this stuff for so long that when we hear it, we don’t recoil in confused disbelief anymore — we’re so familiar with these arguments we’ve forgotten that they don’t make any sense. It’s similar to that other Bush-era standard: “We fight them over there, so we don’t have to fight them here.”
I never understood what the hell that was all about. The best I could figure is that the people who were saying this think of the world like a big game of Risk, and they think that if we commit a big force to some place like Iraq, the “other side” will have to leave all his forces over there or something to keep us from moving through Eurasia. This might make sense in a real war, in a war-between-nations war, but it’s completely absurd in a conflict where the “other side” is actually hundreds if not thousands of different/unrelated actors and can successfully attack a country like the U.S. using just a few people at a time. Sending 160,000 troops to Iraq does absolutely nothing to prevent a terrorist group like al-Qaeda from sending over a couple of “exchange students” to dump botulinum toxin into the Akron reservoir.
Okay check that — it does nothing positive. Because it might prevent such attacks in the sense of giving foreign terrorists an array of more enticing targets to shoot at who are closer to home. But in real terms the idea “we fight them over there so we don’t have to fight them here” is just magical thinking, the kind of notion that feels like it makes sense because your brain is running amok in the unconscious making unsupervised connections between unrelated things, sort of like an OCD patient who believes that if he steps on every third sidewalk crack he won’t get into a car accident. What’s amazing about this sort of propaganda is that once it gets hammered into your head enough, the logic of it begins to feel self-evident, above the need for explanation. Over and over again on the campaign trail last year I had people explain this concept to me by simply repeating themselves. I once asked a guy in South Carolina who had laid that line on me if he thought our forces in Iraq were, simultaneous to their occupation mission, physically blocking the airports in Saudi Arabia and Yemen to keep potential terrorists from coming to the U.S.– if that was why fighting them over there kept “them” from committing terrorist acts here.
“You’re not listening to me,” he said. “The point is that if we weren’t over there, we’d be fighting them here. Now that we’re over there, they fight us there.”
“But why can’t they attack us here anyway?” I asked.
He stared at me for something like thirty seconds. I remember having enough time to check to make sure I had tape left on my recorder. “Because we’re over there,” he said finally.
It’s the same thing with this torture business. There are a lot of people in this country who genuinely believe that torture opponents are “not upset” about things like 9/11 or the beheading of American hostages. The idea that “no one complains when Americans are murdered” is crazy — of course we “complained,” and of course we’d all like to round up those machete-wielding monsters and shoot them into space — but these people really believe this, they really believe that torture opponents are secretly unimpressed/untroubled by Islamic terrorism, at least as compared to American “enhanced interrogation.” For them to believe that, they must really believe that such people are traitors, nursing a secret agenda (an agenda perhaps unknown even to themselves, their America-hatred being ingrained so deep) against their own country. Which is really an amazing thing for large numbers of Americans to believe about another large group of Americans, when you think about it.
The reason it’s possible is that it’s been drilled into their heads to instinctively perceive opposition to their point of view as support for their enemies. They’ve lost the ability to distinguish between real, honest-to-God enemies (al Qaeda, Kim Jong-Il) and people they simply disagree with or dislike (Boston liberals, the French, gays, the ACLU, etc).
If you give a Yankee fan shit about Joba Chamberlain’s fist pumps, his first answer is going to be to wonder why you’re not also complaining about Jonathan Papelbon’s screaming — because he assumes everyone who disagrees with a Yankee is a Red Sox fan. The same sort of thing is at work here. You bring up the subject of torture as an American citizen, concerned about what allowing torture would do to us as a society, how it would change us, and these people answer the issue by wondering why we’re not also complaining about the terrorists on 9/11 or in Fallujah. Because the thinking here is that everyone who disagrees with the torture position is in some degree or another in league with a real murderous enemy.
They don’t understand that this is not a question of taking different sides in a war; this is two groups of Americans having a disagreement about how best to deal with a foreign enemy both of these groups of Americans despise, fear and revile equally. My group, the anti-torture group, believes that what should make us superior to terrorists is respect for law and due process and civilization, and that when we give in and use these tactics, we forfeit that superiority and actually confer a kind of victory to the al Qaedas of the world, people who should never be allowed any kind of victory in any arena. We furthermore think that the war on terror doesn’t get won with force alone, that it’s a conflict that ultimately has to be won politically, by winning a propaganda battle against these assholes, and we can’t win that battle so easily if people in the Middle East see us openly embrace these tactics.
Whether or not you agree with that is up to you — we could be wrong, after all — but when you respond to these arguments by asserting that people like me didn’t “complain” when Americans were tortured and murdered, what you’re really doing is calling me a traitor. And while it may be more interesting and exciting for you to think like that, in reality it’s just nuts. Seriously. Trust us on this one. So think it over and ask yourself again if it really makes sense to say that torture opponents like me didn’t “complain” when Americans get their heads chopped off. Ask yourself if you really mean that, before you say it. And then get back to me.
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Beautiful. I expect a simpleton response like you describe from my idiot uncle (who was 4F and can seemingly produce “support the troops” window stickers from his ass) but the right-wing TeeVee scolds do the same.
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I will, however, take a second look at some of my rote responses in defense of positions I hold. Maybe I’m being a dick. At least I think I have an open mind.
>For them to believe that, they must really believe that such people are traitors, nursing a secret agenda (an agenda perhaps unknown even to themselves, their America-hatred being ingrained so deep) against their own country.
Yup, you got it.
It’s amazing that U.S. citizens are arguing over torture in this day and age. Even though I’m growing weary of the argument, I still make my case because it’s a necessity for progress.
It seems that the best way to start with those who think torture is OK in some instances or as long as the captive is not killed (duh – that would be murder not torture, even if torture lead to that end) is to stress the lack of success with torture.
You can sometimes then lead the other person to see that other methods produce better results; our resources are thus well-spent.
It’s pretty difficult to take such a person to the points that you raise in your commentary – that it actually harms US security,that it’s a barbaric activity that we should be above; additionally that the torturer likely carries psychological scars as well. Cause, you know, that just means you’re not “with us,” but “agin us.”
or, a shorter version of this post: america is full of loud-mouthed douchebags who wouldn’t be able to understand, let alone create any sort of coherent argument. i get your attempt to try to understand, but it’s not going to happen. there have always been douchebags. there will always be douchebags. our country has been run by them for years, and that’s because other douchebags support the douchebags who are paid (well) to spread in(s)anity to the aforementioned massengill-ites.
Although I agree this is mainly a bit of dogma, rather than anything people on the right have thought about, I could see how some reasonable people might get that impression.
I have been more vocally outraged about American torture of prisoners than I have about beheading of Americans by bearded lunatics, even though I think they’re both deeply wrong. Why? A few reasons:
One, I expect obviously crazy people to do crazy things. There’s no surprise that terrorist nut-jobs with stone-age ideologies act like that. But people in the Virginia ‘burbs? WTF!
Two, the terrorists don’t work for me and act in my name. The US government does. Savagery against us is wrong, and to be fought. But savagery by us is something I’m personally responsible for. As are we all.
Three, one of these puts me at a lot more risk than the other. Compare how the world treated Americans after 9/11 versus after Abu Ghraib.
Four, I’m a patriot. That some Afghans are fucking up Afghanistan is regrettable, but it’s not keeping me up at night. That amoral scumbags are screwing up the land that I love? That gets my blood boiling.
Though I agree with most of what you’ve said, I think there’s a bit more to it than you hit on in this article.
Part of the problem is that conservatives don’t hear liberals rant about Al Qaeda, or when they do, it tends to be tepid. I’ve certainly heard liberals complain loudly — and rightly so — about our using torture, but their pro-attacking-terrorist comments tend to be fairly tepid, because they tend to take a more measured response to military endeavors.
All that said, I still think their argument is weak, but for another reason — which is the fact that people protest about things over which they expect to have a measure of control. Sure, we could complain and protest against all the awful things that happen in the world…but what exactly is the point? The chances of it making a difference in the attitudes and actions of Al Qaeda are basically nil.
Protesting against the actions of our own country, on the other hand, are significantly more likely to effect change. There are analogs throughout life — if I complain about something that happens at my workplace, for example, does that mean that I think what happens at my workplace is worse than every other workplace? Of course not, that’s absurd. But it’s just natural that people act — and protest — locally.
Couple that with the fact that, as a citizen of the US, the actions of our government reflect on me. I’m culpable for what our government does in a way that I’m not for other countries, so of course I care more about my country does than what other countries do.
I think one of the main reasons (and this may be too obvious to post) that so many people get reduced to this unthinking “either/or” scenario is that it’s one of the hallmarks of our democracy when it comes to the presidential campaign. To go so long thinking every act, no matter how unethical is a means to an end to get your guy elected at any cost drives home the culture war mentality that obliterates rational debate. I certainly felt I could justify some serious sabotage in Ohio in the name of getting my guy elected. Plus it would’ve felt more meaningful than going door to door getting sneers from people who’d been so inundated with crap from both sides they were just trying to figure out who they hated less. But the idea that I was unwilling to sink to the level of how bad I felt the opposition was, and a certain cowardess, kept me legit.
[...] Matt Taibbi – Taibblog – Being anti-torture doesn’t make you pro-terrorist – True/Slant Whether or not you agree with that is up to you — we could be wrong, after all — but when you respond to these arguments by asserting that people like me didn’t “complain” when Americans were tortured and murdered, what you’re really doing is calling me a traitor. And while it may be more interesting and exciting for you to think like that, in reality it’s just nuts. Seriously. Trust us on this one. So think it over and ask yourself again if it really makes sense to say that torture opponents like me didn’t “complain” when Americans get their heads chopped off. Ask yourself if you really mean that, before you say it. And then get back to me. Share and Enjoy: [...]
What’s sad is that this needs to be spelled out at all. Somewhere along the line in our evolution as a species we must have picked up a ‘polarization’ gene that somehow mistakes a strong opinion for intellectual strength, and agnosticism with intellectual weakness. Whether it’s torture vs. don’t torture, theism vs. atheism, Republican vs. Democrat, or Coke vs. Pepsi, we seem to like our choices to be binary. For those of us who like to hang in the grey areas, it’s easy to feel like we’re supposed to sit on the sidelines and wait for a victor.
Slightly off topic – Matt, you were on Bill Maher this past weekend, I’d like to hear your thoughts on something. I found it interesting that Bill was advocating that we should be pragmatic about the prosecutions because “nothing would get done” if we pursue legal action against those responsible. That we’d be unable to make progress on health care or the environment because we’d be bogged down on this topic for the remainder of Obama’s first term, and possibly beyond.
While I can appreciate the point, this argument seems awfully weak to me. Is this not just a different sort of spin on the same kind of fear-mongering we get from Cheney these days? Instead of “we can’t prosecute because it makes us less safe from terror,” it seems like Bill is arguing that “we can’t prosecute because it makes us less safe from environmental disaster/health care costs.”
I applaud anyone who argues against torture, and I’m happy that Obama seems to be making progress in this regard. But one of the main arguments against torture is that we should not let our fear of attack supplant our principles. I agree with this point, which is why I don’t understand why we should let our fear of slow progress on health care or the environment supplant our principles either.
At some point, someone will need to take a stand, however unpopular, and bring some accountability to light. If the Democratic agenda has to take a back seat for that to happen, then I say so be it.
Matt – A related argument often made by the right is that you cannot criticize any abuses committed by the U.S. because you have not criticized worse abuses elsewhere. Ironically, this complaint is offened directed at human rights groups (like HRW) that actually do work on documenting the abuses by the worst of the wrost, while the persons making the argument couldn’t care less what is going on in placed like Myanmar, Libya (after Khadaffi gave Bush a PR victory), Somalia, Sudan, Turkmenistan or Uzbekistan. But this oft-unfounded allegation of hyprocrisy then becomes another data point for the right in support of their belief that people concerned about torture or the execution of minors (prior to the Supreme Court ban) or other injustices in the U.S. are really pursuing some secret anti-American agenda.
Of course, the logic that we should ignore abuse and injustice until the worst offender is dealt with (is that North Korea, Myanmar, the Sudan, or some other country?) is a recipe for unchecked abuse and injustice. Moreover, as a U.S. citizen participating in a mostly functioning democracy, I can actually try to do something about U.S. abuses. Kim Jong Il, on the other hand, does not seemed particularly concerned about my criticisms. Why complain about torture when you busy tilting at windmills?
I think what you are seeing are the effects of the right wing true believes being fed a steady diet of Hannity and Limbaugh for more than a decade. They hear this stuff day after day after day, and group think sets in. For anyone living outside the right wing information cocoon, the right appears to be getting crazier and crazier. Yet, they haven’t a clue because they do not hear anyone questioning their growing nuttiness.
Alfred W. McCoy has written a book, “A Question of Torture,” which explains why torture does not work. He disassembles the ticking time-bomb scenario quite effectively. It’s easy to see why it’s bullshit. The premise is that the state has a person in custody who has a piece of information in his head that the state needs to know. But how do we know this fact? We simply don’t. You can’t prove that he does not know something. This is a recipe for torturing anyone.
My other comment is that I am sick and tired of seeing pasty-faced overweight white guys who look like they would last two seconds on the judo mat talk about getting tough with detainees. It’s disgusting, and it makes we want to choke them out just to make them shut up. The real tough guys are much more circumspect about such matters.
[...] Taibbi has a nice, if likely fruitless post explicating why it is that people who don’t support torture are not allied with terrorists. [...]
Here is what I don’t understand about the torture debate. If the reasoning behind why it’s OK to torture human beings who may or may not have “immanent information” regarding attacks on the U.S., why did we not water board, sleep deprive, hang in shackles with a diaper, various human beings BEFORE 9-11, and possibly prevent that tragic day? It’s not a secret that high level people like Condi Rice and even Bush were aware that “something” was being planned by radicals who wanted to kill US and other citizens, but the exact details were not known. It is also well known, that all of the hijackers blamed for 9-11 were known terrorists. So, based on the theory of saving America from an attack, why did we not systematically torture some people to get that valuable information? Seems over 3000 lives could have been saved. (Of course, then we would not have been able to go to war with Iraq etc. etc., but that is another argument) The immediate answer that comes to mind is that these practices were not legal and our government would have been breaking the law. So, after 9-11 we consciously changed the law to make it legal to do things we were not previously allowed to do, because they were considered torture. Am I wrong here?
I believe what is being argued is not essentially ‘you don’t care about our boys being tortured’ it’s actually ‘they did it to us, so we are either allowed or even *required* to do it to them’. It’s really more a form of punishment/vindictiveness than it is about getting information. Viewed through that perspective their arguments make more logical sense, however simplistic. If you can get the person to admit that this is actually the root of their thinking, then you eventually get to the overarching mindset of American exceptionalism that they assume gives us the ‘right’ to do things we would never allow others to do to us.
This is a product of the anti-intellectual good/evil thinking that has been carefully cultivated by the right over the past decade or so.
The current raging fervor of American exceptionalism has its foundation in actual exceptionalism. The US became the beacon of freedom for the world after WWII. American military practice during the war eschewed torture, fostered humane treatment of captured enemies. Many axis fighters chose the opportunity to surrender rather than fight to the death.
Reagan signed an anti-torture treaty in the 80s because torture was not a partisan issue; it was not even a consideration that the US would ever be subject to charges of torture.
Today a gang of perverts have destroyed every last scrap of our reputation and we have become the nation that tortures. Cheney boasts about it on TV. Even the Nazis tried to hide their war crimes.
Once again, Matt, another great piece. And to further expand on your point about the use of torture as it disables our ability to win the propaganda battle: with this issue being the center of such a heated debate, and so many people in favor of torture, it indicts our citizenry, which in my mind, puts us at an even greater risk. It’s one thing to have beef with imperialistic/colonial US foreign policy, but at least – and I can imagine this may be the case in some respects – the Muslim world could believe that our populous as a whole has a respect and reverence for basic human rights. This torture debate again reveals a very dark side to America.
My brother-in-law gave me that “we gotta fight them there so we don’t have to fight ‘em here” jazz when he first came back from Afghanistan. I stared at him for a moment or so, then burst out laughing and asked him if the airlines provided a special terrorist group rate. He was pissed, but later admitted that he had spent every second at base near Kabul being blasted by Fox Noise and Rush Limbaugh via whatever passes for radio and television service to American troops in the field.
Also, if we go over there to fight them, doesn’t it then make sense for them to come here and do their mischief while we’re over there?
V. well said Matt. The problem exists where the people with the loudest voices on these issues either do not have the intellectual capacity to understand their opponents’ arguments, or they stopped caring long ago. Their views on terrorism are so narrow and yet so all-encompassing, that the fallacies they spew completely escape them. Reminds me of a right-winger I heard the other day complaining about Hawaii honoring the religion of Islam with the creation of an Islam Day. He said something to the effect that he could not believe they would “honor Islam, which caused 9/11.” My response was, “No, a small group of nutjobs caused 9/11.” Saying that the entire religion is responsible for each terrorist attack is the same as saying all evangelical Christians are responsible for every abortion clinic bombing. But that’s the whole problem with a well-reasoned argument, the conservatives who think in those terms are either too dense to understand it, or they just don’t care.
It’s simply poor rhetoric. Remember these sorts of exchanges: “George Bush should not cut taxes in a time of war.” ” Bill Clinton lied about sex.” What you describe is a simple non sequitur It’s no different than “WTC deaths!” “Oh yeah, drunk drivers kill more than that every month!”. The arguments of your adversaries simply don’t follow.
What is of more interest to me though is that these ticking time bomb and related attempts to counter anti torture arguments work. It turns out that factually there is no ticking time bomb. There has never has been one case where good guys have found the bad guy with just enough time to rescue the damsel, tortured him and gotten the answer that saved the damsel.
If torture worked to elicit truth, the threat of it would lead to truth because resistance would be obviously futile. Smart people like and Dick Cheney and Leon Panetta know this. So why do they defend torture? Maybe it is to exact vengeance without the niceties of judicial process. I think it’s more likely, at least in Cheney’s case, that he wanted to elicit false information (Iraq = Al Qaeda) or terrorize folks abroad, but the fact that the poor argument has taken root shows that people want to believe that the violence works.
[...] Taibbi Blog: don’t think I could count the number of times I’ve had this argument on the campaign trail at Republican rallies: [...]
One thing that everyone should be very clear about in all of this: Were things reversed, were it a Democratic administration that had raged across the world and crossed the line into torture, these same people would be using exactly the reverse argument. They’d be the ones outraged about torture, reading the riot act up and down about jackbooted storm fascio-socialist-Demo-commies, or whatever, tromping all over the constitution and all the rest of it.
If you want proof just look at Rush Limbaugh doing exactly that about the Somali pirate rescue assault the other week.
My point is just that trying to take these kinds of arguments at face value and untangle them on their merits is of limited value. If it were all reversed, the logic would all untangle automatically and they’d be finding ways to condemn, not justify, using torture.
I don’t think this means that it’s all relative and that we all just pick our arguments based on partisan affiliations, though of course we all do to some degree. I think the extreme right-wing radio/tv demagogue-fueled fringe right “populist” wedge is particularly disingenous and into this kind of searching for any argument that fits the bill (you must love terrorists) and would find something equally absurd in the exact opposite direction (you’re oppresive jackbooted thugs) were things reversed poltically.
It’s not just that they won’t listen, in other words, it’s that it really wouldn’t matter even if they did. They’d say the opposite given half a motive.
[...] in Torture at 2:53 pm by LeisureGuy Excellent article by Matt [...]
Matt:
I’m pleased you sussed out the logic/illogic of the “torture” debate. I put “torture” in quotes because the term itself is hopelessly politicized and ambiguous. Also because listening to the debate in the public square is so entirely reductive that I’ve just waterboarded myself 27 times to try and feel better.
For my part, I simply want to thank you for writing this column in America because as long as you write it here, someone else doesn’t have to write it over there. (i.e. Middle East, Eurasia, North Korea). You’ve probably saved scores of American lives.
Your welcome, DoD, FBI, and CIA. (Also lawyers, psychologists, and physicians who helped design, implement, and oversee the U.S. torture, ahem, enhanced interrogation program.)
We can too fight them over there so we don’t have to fight them over here, smart guy. We fought the Nazis in Germany and we didn’t have to fight them here, and we fought Japs in Japania and we didn’t have to fight them here, and we fought the British too. You’re beginning to see a pattern, aren’t you?
Okay except for maybe the last part. But we fought them here in 1812, and now they’re our best allies. What do you think of that?
All you liberals are exactly that: jerks.
Oh, slowpoke, didn’t Taibbi cover your lame argument in paragraph 5. The one that begins with, “I never understood…”. I won’t make a blanket accusation similar to the one above about an entire political philosophy and reading comprehension, but yours ain’t the greatest.
And I am a jerk but it has nothing to do with being a liberal whatsoever.
[...] Matt Taibbi | ” There are a lot of people in this country who genuinely believe that torture opponents are “not upset” about things like 9/11 or the beheading of American hostages. The idea that “no one complains when Americans are murdered” is crazy — of course we “complained,” and of course we’d all like to round up those machete-wielding monsters and shoot them into space — but these people really believe this, they really believe that torture opponents are secretly unimpressed/untroubled by Islamic terrorism, at least as compared to American “enhanced interrogation.” For them to believe that, they must really believe that such people are traitors, nursing a secret agenda (an agenda perhaps unknown even to themselves, their America-hatred being ingrained so deep) against their own country. Which is really an amazing thing for large numbers of Americans to believe about another large group of Americans, when you think about it.” [...]
[...] Matt Taibbi – Taibblog – Being anti-torture doesn’t make you pro-terrorist – True/Slant [...]
The phenomenon you describe is rampant among conservative idealogues — to many of whom I am, for my sins, related. Over the years I’ve come to realize that is isn’t even a debate technique, it is simply their means of changing the subject when they can’t combat your point directly. It’s almost lovely in its boneheaded ingenuity, because it can be used ad infinitum to deflect any point on any topic. Your man in the Fallujah example at least kept his retort in the same logical neighborhood as your initial statement, but most of the time these types don’t even bother to do that.
Let’s try it, shall we? If I criticize Bush II’s foreign policy, roll your eyes in disgust and remind me that Clinton got a hummer, even though the two things have absolutely nothing to do with each other.
I mention a Republican ethical hypocrisy and, without even processing what I’ve said and replying to it on its merits, you can come back strong with the latest talking point about Nancy Pelosi.
Wasn’t that fun? It’s like a rhetorical one size fits all where a point about Iraq can actually be countered with one about the Bay of Pigs.
The best part of this method is that no conservative can be held accountable for anything, ever, because at some time, somewhere, someone did something worse. Preferably this person should be a liberal, but in a pinch you can use other evildoers, such as Qadafi, Vlad Tepes, and Gargamel.
I’ve dealt with this horseshit my whole life. Any attempt to fight it is about as productive and pleasant as teaching the proverbial pig to sing.
Ah, what? You’re attempt to sound smart is just that, an attempt. You really sound like an ignoramus. And I’ve been dealing with horseshit like yours all my life too. Oh my, you’re so smart with all those big words and references to history! Are you a teacher? What the hell is your point? Conservatives bash Libs, Libs bash Conservatives. Big f’ing deal. What you say about GWB, I can counter with any of your pukes. So get real and stop trying to act like you’re so intelligent. You’re a Lib, so, you’re not.
In response to another comment. See in context »Dude, you had me at hello. I am actually not intelligent, and my feeble attempts at using big words (which ones, by the way?) taken in hand with my historical ignorance combine to prove that I am only a stupid liberal, not worthy of anything but ridicule. I tried to sound smart, but, alas, I failed, and can only turn to you for instruction as to how to achieve the formation of an worthy opinion.
In response to another comment. See in context »Beautiful. You responded to his post about conservatives thinking of political arguments as contests for finding blue/red equivalence by…equivocating.
And then bragging about how you can find “blue team” examples for any “red team” examples someone comes up with. Congratulations, you. Too bad it’s not a fucking football game.
In response to another comment. See in context »Having not a few ideological conservatives in my family, I know how you feel. It’s as if any criticism can be made invalid simply by pointing out someone on “your side” who has done something simialr or worse. It’s part of an unfortunate tendency to break anything and everything down into two opposing sides, no matter how complex it is.
In response to another comment. See in context »Matt; As I began reading your article I was taken aback. ‘Wow, Matt really get this.” I read on and realized you were quoting Charles Krauthammer. That disappointed me because your’s is a respected voice in today’s media. I thought you were going to bring some common sense into the argument. Like you, I know that those who oppose “torture” aren’t traitors. The people who call you that are way off base. Where we part ways is when you portray them as crazed right wingers who thurst for blood, anybody’s, yours or the bad guys. I see it differently. People who call your position traitorous are frustrated because they misguidedly think you don’t support the country. What is really going on here is a serious debate about what constitutes torture. Paraphasing a former president, it all depends on what the meaning of torture is. Some people think any “enhanced techniques” are torture while others believe anything short of murder is fair game. As a guy who spent 24 years in the NYPD I can attest to having seen torture, and the effects of it firsthand. I’ve seen babies with cigarette holes burned into their small defenseless arms and legs by someone entrusted with their care. I saw a dead gangster with his penis stuffed into his mouth. I happened upon the hacked up body of a lover caugh by an “Old World” husband. I have to say in my opinion what our guys did to the terror suspect to get information falls far short of torture in my book. Even waterboarding, a horrid, ugly procedure doesn’t measure up. Thankfully most Americans have not walked in the shoes of police officers, soldiers or other first responders. They have not been forced to deal with the ugly side of human nature. They have been spared seeing this ugliness first hand. They live in the a world protected from such things. The protection provided by the men and women who have volunteered to stand between them and real danger. So when ugly realities come to light, many express outrage. They want us to take the high ground. The truth is, in the real world, there is no high ground. In the real world, like in the street, there is the sidewalk, the gutter and the curb. Four inches seperate the Blonics from the dog shit. Most of us are on the sidewalk, while the fight is in the gutter. What looks like torture from the safety above the curb, is actually part of a fight for survival in the gutter. Don’t believe me? Ask any cop, fireman,or veteran whose opinion you trust. Ask someone with a little dog shit on their shoes.
Amen Joe. Nicely put. Common sense reigns here with Joe’s offering.
In response to another comment. See in context »What you’ve got going on is this new mentality that the GOP has adopted for reasons I cannot fathom. For some unknowable reason, they’ve decided that any Republicans who aren’t frothing, raving, pharmaceutical-gobbling madmen are no longer allowed to represent their party. Take former Rep. Wayne Gilchrest (R-MD), for example. He had 9 successful elections under his belt, and we all loved him. Had he run in 2008, he would have won again; that was nearly a guarantee at that point. But Club for Growth decided that he wasn’t ‘republican enough’ and took him down by throwing billions on Andy Harris who lost the general election anyway. And then you’ve got Arlen Specter in PA who just switched parties because mainstream conservatives are rapidly becoming hard-core right-wingers and forcing their ‘us or them’ mentality upon everyone else. You’re either a Limbaugh, Hannity, O’Reily or Beck or you’re Commie-loving, french-kissing, pinheaded scum.
[...] Matt Taibbi opines: There are a lot of people in this country who genuinely believe that torture opponents are “not upset” about things like 9/11 or the beheading of American hostages. The idea that “no one complains when Americans are murdered” is crazy — of course we “complained,” and of course we’d all like to round up those machete-wielding monsters and shoot them into space — but these people really believe this, they really believe that torture opponents are secretly unimpressed/untroubled by Islamic terrorism, at least as compared to American “enhanced interrogation.” For them to believe that, they must really believe that such people are traitors, nursing a secret agenda (an agenda perhaps unknown even to themselves, their America-hatred being ingrained so deep) against their own country. Which is really an amazing thing for large numbers of Americans to believe about another large group of Americans, when you think about it. [...]
As a quick note, joelisi’s argument is a well-thought-out one and he should be commended for that. Most people who I have had this discussion with who favor torture have very little productive to add.
My issue with joelisi’s argument is that it becomes an all-or-nothing debate. Yes, maiming them is unacceptable. We can agree on that (at least I think we can based on your argument).
There are a few problems with this argument, though. It was torture when the Japanese did it, and we prosecuted them. It was torture when the Koreans and Vietnamese did it. And it was torture when the inquisition did it, the Russians did it, the Nazis did it. And it’s torture when Al-Qaeda does it. But it’s not torture when we do it. We have to reconcile that logically and legally.
Second, these aren’t people on the battlefield. These are people taken off the battlefield. Also, we aren’t a street gang. We are an army, an organized fighting force paid for by all of our tax dollars. While I stand safely on the curb, that does not mean that I need to accept what is done in my name. This is done by the American military.
Third, does it matter whether or not these processes work? Shouldn’t that hold some bearing on their legitimacy?
Fourth, would you, as a retired police officer, feel comfortable having these practices (waterboarding, stress positions, phobia-exploiting, sleep deprivation, etc.) used on a drug dealer or a murderer? Someone in your station? Would you feel comfortable being trained in doing this to get information? If so then you are either stronger or crazier than me, and probably both.
No one is debating the horrors of war. Nor the horrors of the streets. But when it comes to an organized military action, should we be allowed to violate laws we have agreed to, and treaties we have signed? Should we allow everyone else?
I don’t think we should. I think the rule of law and the sanctity of our nation as a whole is far more important than an attack. If we allow torture now to foreigners (even though Jose Padilla was an American citizen, but let’s not discuss that here) because they might have knowledge to hurt us, what do we do when it happens to our men and women? Do we get outraged? Of course. But now we don’t have a moral high ground. Now we, as an entire nation, are in that gutter too.
Jared, are you kidding me? Please spare me the crap about using waterboarding on drug addicts. That’s not the point one iota. You FIGHT TO WIN. There’s no compromise when the enemy you are fighting wants nothing less than to blow this country off the map! These techniques are NECESSARY UNDER CERTAIN CIRCUMSTANCES. Give me a break man.
In response to another comment. See in context »Yes, we fight to win. I’m not arguing that. And I’m not saying we tie our hands behind our backs.
But it isn’t a crap argument. Where does it end, that’s what I want to know. Why is this okay to do but not in different circumstances? And what happens when that argument comes up?
And, at that, does that mean there are no rules, no restrictions whatsoever? I am not saying we don’t fight to win this war, but once I can get a solid definition of what a “victory” is, and where the line is for our moral high ground, I want to know the answer to these questions.
In response to another comment. See in context »Jesus man. This torture argument is quite ridiculous. To quote the infamous Herm Edwards, “You play to win the game.” Translate to, “You fight to win the war.” Call it torture, call it a necessary means for justice, call it waterboarding. I don’t care. Use it when necessary. I think the lives and freedoms of Americans are a JUST reason for torture. How the #$%@#$ else are we to gain the valuable information needed to stop the bs?? Do Americans just go out and torture people for the hell of it? COME ON MAN! If you’re anti-torture, I ask you…no, I beg you…what is your solution then? I anxiously await this reply.
If shooting a kitten in the head will save American troops, then it’s a just reason for shooting a kitten in the head. Whatever it takes.
“Wait, what evidence do you have that shooting a kitten in the head will sa–”
WHATEVER IT TAKES!!
In response to another comment. See in context »Can you explain what would constitute a “win” or a “loss” in this scenario?
Did we “lose” on 9/11? If we suffer another terrorist attack, does that mean we “lost”?
No. It just means there are still assholes in the world. That’s not changing.
The only way we can “win” is by holding true to our Constitution and our values. If we enable or direct our armed forces to commit evil acts in the name of our safety, we have given up those values. When we become that which we fight against, we lose.
This is precisely why the President’s oath of office states that he will defend the Constitution, not the citizens. Sometimes citizens will die because we choose as a nation to embrace liberty. Liberty comes with risk, and our soldiers should not be the only ones bearing the load of that risk.
With all due respect to joelisi above, our police do see horrors every day, but we do not permit them to beat or torture confessions out of suspects even if they know them to be guilty. We risk, as citizens, that the guilty might go free, that criminals may walk the streets for no reason other than we cannot convict them with due process. That is an inevitable consequence of limited government, and should apply whether the offenders are domestic or foreign.
The alternative to torture is to act like mature adults and accept that there will always be evil in the world. We cannot root out evil by becoming evil ourselves. Terrorists will kill Americans again, whether we torture or not. All that torture does is give the terrorists extra motivation, even a sense of righteousness.
Torture is a cowardly act. It inflicts pain and suffering on a captive individual with no means to defend himself. When you sit in your comfy little home and ask soldiers to torture just so you can feel a little safer, then you’re a coward.
Fear of terror is natural, we all feel it and none of us wish harm upon our fellow citizens. But do not succumb to cowardice. That’s how we lose.
In response to another comment. See in context »But now you’re putting the burden of proof on those who do not want to torture. This is backwards.
Torture has been deemed reprehensible and illegal already. We have agreed to a standard of laws, a code of conduct, based around not torturing.
But you, and those who agree with you, want it to be legal. So, prove to us why it should be legal. This should be the argument.
Prove it works, first of all. Find me evidence, verifiable evidence, that torture provides any legitimate information or intelligence that any other means of interrogation would not prove.
Because 500 years ago torture was used to prove that people were controlling the weather and putting curses on people. And tehn they accused other people. And those people were tortured. And this was done with agreement from the governments. *shrug* And they believed their safety was at risk.
In response to another comment. See in context »Yeah, the “well they did it” justification has always been one of my favorites. I always want to say, “Really? What is this? Fifth grade or something?” But more than that, the point I always try to make is “Okay, so the disgusting, lowlife piece of human excrement that murdered say, Daniel Pearl is now our benchmark? These are the people we will have directing how we conduct ourselves? Well, then, the war is lost. The terrorists have won. We’re now the same scum they are. Congratulations! You must be very proud of our country!”
But then, you have to cut through that good old American exceptionalism; when they do it, it’s bad, when we do it, it, at the very least, is completely understandable given the circumstances.
Oh yeah, one more question for all you pro-torture “realists” out there. What makes you think once we let our government torture “enemy combatants” and “terrorists” that it will stop there? A lot of these designations rely heavily on the mindset of the person doing the designating.
The anti-torture/pro-torture fallacy is similar to reactionaries claiming that someone is “pro-abortion”–as if those who resist giving control of the uterus to the Church-State are actually somehow “for” abortion. The reactionary right has been wildly successful in controlling the language and framing of the debate. Until we have people who are willing to froth on teevee about why reactionary politicians are pro-sadism, pro-genital-slicing, or challenge them on why they believe women’s wombs are property of the state, e.g., we’re going to be on the defensive.
Meant to say “anti-torture/pro-terrorist fallacy”
In response to another comment. See in context »I think it’s true that the right-wingers really believe that we on the other side are in league with the terrorists. The problem with not displaying our disapproval when these accusations are made is that it may make them even more convinced that they’re right.
If I insult you, and you don’t even act insulted, I think it would make me more convinced that I’m right.
[...] Matt Taibbi is fed up. Fed up with being called a traitor for taking a firm stand against torture of prisoners. There are a lot of people in this country who genuinely believe that torture opponents are “not upset” about things like 9/11 or the beheading of American hostages. The idea that “no one complains when Americans are murdered” is crazy — of course we “complained,” and of course we’d all like to round up those machete-wielding monsters and shoot them into space — but these people really believe this, they really believe that torture opponents are secretly unimpressed/untroubled by Islamic terrorism, at least as compared to American “enhanced interrogation.” For them to believe that, they must really believe that such people are traitors, nursing a secret agenda (an agenda perhaps unknown even to themselves, their America-hatred being ingrained so deep) against their own country. Which is really an amazing thing for large numbers of Americans to believe about another large group of Americans, when you think about it. [...]
This may seem overly glib, but the main reason for the demonization of any opposition is that most people are just basically kinda dumb. They have never, through lack of capacity or tradition, actually reasoned their way through any of their “knowledge.” Complexity and nuance are viewed with suspicion, if not outright contempt. Uncertainty is seen as a moral weakness.
Plus, most people think of themselves as basically “good;” if you are on the opposing side of one issue, then you are an enemy, opposed on all. That means you are not just wrong, but evil.
See, Matt, it’s shit (and by shit I mean quality writing) why I can’t stop reading you.
*shit like this* …
In response to another comment. See in context »[...] Best Things I Read This Week: Porn, Chauncey Billups and free markets By patrickhayes13 Andrew Sullivan: Being against torture doesn’t make you supportive of terrorism. That should go without saying, but obviously it doesn’t. [...]
[...] E.g. Just think of people voting for Bush because he is guy who one would like to have beer with or people claiming that being anti-torture is the same as being pro-terrorists orpeople making irrational statements like fight terrorists in Iraq so we don’t have to fight [...]
Your man from South Carolina sounds like he has an amp that goes to 11