DICK Cheney and State Sponsored Torture
Filed under: Afghanistan, Bush Foreign Policy, Terrorism
VP DICK Cheney appeared on CBS’ Face the Nation this morning. This interview wasn’t substantively different from any of the others he’s done in the past month:
Cheney also urged the Obama administration to continue the Bush administration’s interrogation policies.
“I would hope [Obama] would avoid doing what others have done in the past, which is letting the campaign rhetoric guide his judgment in this absolutely crucial area,” Cheney said. “We were very careful, we did everything by the book, and in fact we produced very significant results.”
So many problems with that statement, DICK. There are a great many smart people, including former members of the Bush Administration who warned you and David Addington about getting too carried away with agressive interrogation techniques. Chief among their concerns was something we patriots like to call the U.S. Constitution. There’s also this other little concern known as the Geneva Convention. You can argue all you want that our foes in the war on terror are not lawful combatants, but the rest of the world needs to somewhat agree, or, it looks like selective application of an international human rights treaty. And, what about the old bromide that we’re not going to stoop to their level. There’s so much more than campaign rhetoric behind the criticisms of the Bush Administration’s endorsement of torture.
