AG Nomination One Step Closer To Reality
Updated 7 November, 23.17 Pacific
After President Bush nominated Michael B. Mukasey as Attorney General, Mukasey ducked a Senate Judiciary Committee question on tactics that constitute torture. He waffled when asked if waterboarding, a technique that simulates drowning, is illegal.
The nomination, which is almost assuredly a win for the White House, moves to the full Senate after an 11-8 vote in the Senate Judiciary Committee. Democrats Sen. Feinstein (CA) and Sen. Schumer (NY) voted with committee Republicans to let the nomination proceed to the full Senate for consideration, perhaps as soon as this week.
Sen. Feingold (D-WI) was in the no column, as was the remainder of the Democrats. Sen. Graham (R-SC) was in the yes column, as were all of the Republicans. (No surprises here.)
In announcing their support before the vote, both Feinstein and Schumer called for Congress to explicitly prohibit waterboarding by passing the National Security with Justice Act (S. 1876, which has had no Senate action since its introduction in July).
But do we need a new law outlawing this procedure, which dates from the Spanish Inquisition? For example, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT), committee chair, received a letter (pdf) from four retired JAGs that says, in part: "Waterboarding is inhumane, it is torture, and it is illegal."
The Rule of Law is fundamental to our existence as a civilized nation. The Rule of Law is not a goal which we merely aspire to achieve; it is the floor below which we must not sink. For the Rule of Law to function effectively, however, it must provide actual rules that can be followed. In this instance, the relevant rule -- the law -- has long been clear: Waterboarding detainees amounts to illegal torture in all circumstances. To suggest otherwise -- or even to give credence to such a suggestion -- represents both an affront to the law and to the core values of our nation.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has announced his opposition.
This Washington Times editorial takes the opposite stance of the WaPo when it comes to defining "courage" (and its stand on the nomination).
Which vote should come first -- the one that specifically outlaws torture or the one that makes Mukasey chief of the Department of Justice?
Originally posted 05 November 2007 @ 07:10 Eastern
Comments
Well, in a normal democratic country, you shouldn’t need a law to make torture illegal, because the Constitution (or its equivalent in non-written law countries) would be defended and respected by the government’s administrative and judicial systems.
Hi, Alphast — sometimes we forget the obvious. Don’t underestimate America’s old testament “eye for an eye” retribution streak.
Hi Kathy,
I was playing stupid…
But you are right, many Americans prefer to stick with the old testament (at least in their mentality) and forget two teachings of the New Testament: “Don’t do to your kind what you wouldn’t want him to do to you” and “Who lives by the sowrd will perish by the sword”… Again, my two cents. By the way, sorry if the translation from French is poor. I don’t know the official American English version of the Gospels.
Old testament, religion etc. have nothing to do with waterboarding. I guess you two think you can blame this on christians but it’s very simple. If it prevents another 9/11 or a dirty bomb from killing thousands of U.S. citizens, some feel it’s a necessary evil. Go ahead and wring your hands and whine and cry about it but if it saves U.S. lives, I’m all for it.
C
Hi, Chuck — you sound like a “ends justify the means” kinda guy. But research shows that torture doesn’t work, ie, it doesn’t get people to “spill their guts” as the vernacular implies. It gets them to tell their interrogators what they think the interrogator wants to hear.
Having the JAGs of every branch of service speak out against this practice isn’t sufficient to convince you it’s bad?
Alphast - removed the bad link
As usual, you’re choosing to use research that moves your own agenda forward. George Tenet said it worked and that’s good enough for me. Logic tells me it works. Commonsense says it works. Does it work every time? No it doesn’t work every time. But given the alternative you seem to ignore, I’ll take it.
No, the Jags don’t impress me. You can find dissenters for most anything.
If we come across someone in the middle east who has knowledge that one of his kind has a dirty bomb in the U.S. you better bet I want that scumbag tortured. Some things are much more important than your global dignity.
C
Then Chuck, I guess our dissent is more philosophical and political than merely about security policy efficiency. It is to fight people professing the ideas that you displayed in your last post that my grand-father went to war three times, that one of my grand-mother lost a child and my other grand-mother risked her very life. My kind would fight yours till our last breath (and Kathy, this is not a personal attack, just a saddened statement of a fact)…