By way of looking for an explanation of the content of Cheney's speeches, I have noticed among both national-level pundits, and right-wing friends and associates, a tendency to become extremely defensive, almost to "over-defend" torture and extraordinary detention. They seem angry and touchy. This reminds me of nothing more than the way a young child behaves upon realizing that it is he who has been unfair: instead of backing down, he makes his accusations even less reasonable. Even so, I believe that (at least on a subconscious level) most torture-defenders know that what they are saying is horrendous and unworthy of the American republic. However, unwilling to back down from a position forged in the heady, confusing times after 9/11 and so vociferously attacked while Bush and Cheney were in office, they are compelled to go even further across the line of propriety than before. In short, these are people who cannot bear to see their doctrine rejected, and they are striking out in wounded anger.

While I do NOT support the use of torture I don't agree with your post at all. Based on what I have read at the Fray both sides have been very angry and both over-defend their POV.

For example, many on the left are not even willing to discuss if torture should be used in limited situtions or the entire concept of whether torture is effective. All one hears is an angry; Torture is wrong you Nazi.

Of course many of the GWB and Cheney supporters defend their point of view anger and over the top rheotric. My understanding is that this issue is still fairly evenly split. In other words about half the nation believes torture should never be used and about half feel that torture can be used limited situations. Since GOP membership is at an all time low of 20% this means that there are a lot of NON GOP members that support the use of torture. While the ticking time bomb situation maybe a myth many Americans feel it isn't and support the use of any means to protect American lifes. I'm not suporting this POV but it is what it is. Note that in the lastest surveys more Americans identify themselves as conservatives than liberals.

as a democrat, I have no problem with torture. What I do have a problem with is hypocrisy. If we want to torture prisoners then we should opt out of the Geneva Convention and announce to the world that we are no longer bound by international law and will torture at will.

Again, we have a similar POV. I not ready to say that the USA should use torture (I'm still not convince it is really is ever effective or not), but if some methods that are currectly defined as torture are effective I could support there use in limited situations but as you said then we would to this openly and opt out of our existing treaties.

The main point of my reply is that there are a lot of NON Cons \ GOP members that have a 'modrate' or middle ground POV on this topic. The anger is from the left and right that don't see any middle ground on this or many other issues.

What bothers me is that the ones who claim the mantle of "most moral" are the same ones defending torture as a policy of the US government. At least Jack Bauer knows/admits he is a scumbag, but does it anyway. There is no such thing as "you torturing prisoners is bad" but "my torture of prisoners is good"

Jazz and Gaffer - the notion of an unwillingness to discuss efficacy of torture is a strawman.

Reality is that Torture doesn't work as a means of extracting useful information. It works GREAT as a weapon of terror, but that's not I think what most people think of when they talk about its efficacy. ALTHOUGH I would suggest that there is very much a "impose terror" aspect to its advocacy by a large minority.

Torture doesn't work because

• In the short run - the so called "ticking time bomb" scenario
• the types of torture that are pain inducing can be resisted for long enough for the ticking time bomb to go off, thus demonstrating the lack of tortures efficacy. In fact in such a scenario the victim is encouraged to give lots of false leads which WASTE the resources that otherwise might find the bomb
• If the interval is sufficiently long, the co-conspirators can reset the bomb's location sufficiently that any torture derived info is useless
• In the long run
• "actionable" information rapidly becomes stale and useless
• "linkage" information (who else is in your conspiracy) quickly taints guilty and innocent alike, and then further use of torture invariably will be used against the innocent that initially deny complicity.

In the last scenario, a small conspiracy quickly magnifies into the kind of broad McCarthyist threat that we saw Cheney et. al. claim.

There is nothing to discuss on the efficacy of torture. IT DOES NOT RELIABLY WORK. Never has.

The issue of efficiency and effectiveness is the key to discussion with regards to whether torture should be used or not. The fact you believe it doesn't reliablty work has no bearing on if it should be part of the discussion or not. i.e. even if torture doesn't work efficiency is still the key to any discussion about the use of torture since if torture isn't efficient there is no logical reason to support it. The discussion ends right there, but if torture is effective then one moves on to the reasons why it should be used and when.

Note that methods of torture can be refined and improved in the future. e.g. new drugs developed. These methods could be effective and efficient when prior methods were not. Thus effectiveness is key to any discussion.

I respect those that say torture shouldn't be used even IF effective, but I also understand the POV of those that believe torture should be used when it is effective. As I have said 100 times I have NO clue of whether torture is effective or not. All I know is that experts on the subject do have different opinions.

There is no logical structure within which torture works reliably as a means of extracting actionable information. The form of torture that we know to be effective takes too long for the ticking time-bomb scenario.

The issue isn't that of getting raw information out of someone - as you suggest with "new drugs" - but rather whether that information is any more effective than what you can garner through other means. Because at the end of the day, you have to VALIDATE the information extracted. And the VALIDATION step inherently requires resources that could be otherwise allocated.

Thus in the "ticking time bomb" scenario, there is a strong incentive for the victim to provide false information (and there is no such thing as a "truth serum" - there are only drugs that suppress inhibitions and Orbito Frontal Cortex capabilities to associate current actions with future consequences).

And of course it isn't hard to understand the POV of those who believe torture should be used when it is effective - they are scared. They are unwilling to pay the price of living by the rules they wish to be protected by. OK.

But how is that in any way a justification of anything?

All I know is that experts on the subject do have different opinions.

Sorry you don't know that. There aren't any experts out there that say that torture is a RELIABLE means for extracting ACTIONABLE intelligence that cannot otherwise be collected.

There are those - like Dick Cheney - who have political agendas and no actual expertise, who are making this claim. And there are experts who claim that you can "break anyone" - but they don't make the claim that it can be done quickly or that it reliably generates actionable intelligencce.

Remember what Cheney's actual political agenda was in authorizing torture. Remember that ALL of the "actionable" intel had already been garnered BEFORE we started torture.

The agenda was simple. They wanted to break these men for two reasons

1. To get them to testify that Iraq was linked to Al Qaeda - so as to justify that invasion
2. To keep them from being able to effectively participate in any sort of Legal defense (as they did with Padilla) - making it easier to convict them on unrelated charges and thereby sequester them out of the spot light.

And the third reason was to oestensibly project an image of the USA as "tough" and "willing to do what it takes" - because the Cheney BELIEF was that 9/11 happened because the USA was preceived as "weak".

NONE of those are related to torture as an effective way to EXTRACT ACTIONABLE INTELLIGENCe.

But in all those motivations, torture is "effective" because of the very nature of it.

But again, what is the basis CONSTITUTIONALLY for using it? And absent a Constitutional basis for permiting The Government to use it, if we make an excuse for using it simply because it is efficacious - then similar effectiveness arguements can be used to eviscerate any and all protections within the Constitution.

Pick. A discussion on the efficacy of Torture - or - a discussion on the efficacy of The Constutition.

But you cannot have both.

Sipping coffee and chatting with the terrorists also does not produce reliably information, and indeed terrorists may be giving even more wrong information.

Books written by professional Russian spies (take Suvorov for example) claim that according to KGB training - everyone sings under torture and tells all the info - the trick is to hold on long enough.

Anyway, tell me - if you nicely ask terrorist to tell you about the location of his leaders, and he tells you that he won't talk to an infidel - do you count this as 100% reliable information?

So gringo, can we take it that you approve any and all torture, or other renditions, without equivocation?

Sipping coffee and chatting with the terrorists also does not produce reliably information, and indeed terrorists may be giving even more wrong information.

Besides being a strawman arguement it is also wrong. Over time it does yield more information than torture does - because it extracts the information without showing your hand as to what questions are being sought.

Books written by professional Russian spies (take Suvorov for example) claim that according to KGB training - everyone sings under torture and tells all the info - the trick is to hold on long enough

Well if you want to live with all the brilliant freedoms and rights citizens had in Soviet Russia - be my guest. Me? I prefer the US Constitution. What you have underscored is that the Ticking Time Bomb scenario doesn't work.

So in essence you are saying that torture should be part of the standard arsenal of interrogation. Ok so lets just get rid of the 8th amendment.

Oh and we know that habeas and the 4th amendment and 5th amendments also result in dangerous individuals being released inot society - so lets get rid of those two.

And since we know the information garnered by torture is so reliable- who needs actual trials by jury - lets just toss the Sixth and Seventh amendments as well.

And of course torture is much worse than forced labor, so out goes Amendment 13 as well.

And of course if we decide that someone is a bad guy and need a way to keep them in jail, we should be able to define that something they did in the past is a crime as well.

And lastly, since we know that some people who scare us actually are bad guys, lets just allow The POTUS to determine by "finding"(writ) who shold and should not be detained/attained.

there, I think that about does it in protecting us from those terrorists who won't tell us what we want to know when we want to know it

Those who would sacrifice any of our precious liberties for a temporary measure of security deserve neither liberty nor security - Benjamin Franklin.

Seems like Franklin is suggesting that immigration rights should be stripped from folks like that...

Well lets not get off topic here. The question first is effectiveness. Unfortunately, the KGB was correct. As was the Gestapo during WWII, rolling up almost all active resistance groups through its use. To base one's opposition to the practice on the basis that it doesn't work perfectly in all cases is ideology not wisdom . It seems to make a lot more sense to me to say you don't want to live in a society where it is practiced on its citizens. That's pretty much irrefutable. Over-reaching makes one position look weaker, not stronger.

Sipping coffee and chatting with the terrorists also does not produce reliably information, and indeed terrorists may be giving even more wrong information.

Besides being a strawman arguement it is also wrong.

You quote no evidence...

Over time it does yield more information than torture does - because it extracts the information without showing your hand as to what questions are being sought.

Over what time? Are you saying we have infinite time?

Books written by professional Russian spies (take Suvorov for example) claim that according to KGB training - everyone sings under torture and tells all the info - the trick is to hold on long enough

Well if you want to live with all the brilliant freedoms and rights citizens had in Soviet Russia - be my guest.

Obviously you know your arguments are weak, so you are attacking a strawman - which explains the title for your post. The argument is not that USSR was a free country, but whether torture produces useful information faster than any other technique.

Me? I prefer the US Constitution.

Which one? Per your own view, US Constitution is a living breathing document, and its meaning is constantly changing based on views and circumstances.

What you have underscored is that the Ticking Time Bomb scenario doesn't work.

No, what I underscored is in the case of TIcking Bomb - torture is THE only valid techniue that could work. Your idea of sipping cofee for 10 years surely won't work. Heck, your technique qon't work, period.

So in essence you are saying that torture should be part of the standard arsenal of interrogation. Ok so lets just get rid of the 8th amendment.

Now you are lying - since nowhere did I said this. Surely you could debate with me wihtout lying, can you?

Oh and we know that habeas and the 4th amendment and 5th amendments also result in dangerous individuals being released inot society - so lets get rid of those two.

No, never said that either. Just explained to you that your argument "torture does not work" is full of shit. Can you man up and debate my arguments?

And since we know the information garnered by torture is so reliable- who needs actual trials by jury - lets just toss the Sixth and Seventh amendments as well.

Again, you are lying here. I did not make this argument.

And of course torture is much worse than forced labor, so out goes Amendment 13 as well.

Clearly you know your argument about inefficacy of toture is bogus, so you write a post titled "strawman argument". Good job.

And of course if we decide that someone is a bad guy and need a way to keep them in jail, we should be able to define that something they did in the past is a crime as well.

You said this, not me.

And lastly, since we know that some people who scare us actually are bad guys, lets just allow The POTUS to determine by "finding"(writ) who shold and should not be detained/attained.

Well, now you are saying FDR was a war criminal. Hm. You said it, not me.

there, I think that about does it in protecting us from those terrorists who won't tell us what we want to know when we want to know it

You said this, not me.

Those who would sacrifice any of our precious liberties for a temporary measure of security deserve neither liberty nor security - Benjamin Franklin.

Seems like Franklin is suggesting that immigration rights should be stripped from folks like that...

No, seems like Franklin is saying that all the crap that you support - welfare, social security, medicare, medicaid, foodstamps - all are wrong. I guess you should go back to Cuba, your ideological motherland.

In my post I simply ask degsme to be intellectually honest... Is this too much to ask?

The question is really "effective at WHAT"? The reason the Gestapo could use torture to "roll up active resistance groups" as could the KGB - because they didn't care about the "false leads". ANYONE accused was "rolled up" regardless of their guilt or innocence.

Which is precisely my point about enumerating the "effectiveness" of suspending the other Amendments to the Constitution that similarly get in the way of "protecting us from terrorists".

Given that the KGB and Gestapo didn't care about the "False Positive" case, you really don't have proof there that ACCURATE ACTIONABLE INTELLIGENCE is garnered.