The Opposite of Intelligence

realclearpolitics.com ^ | April 28, 2009 | Debra Saunders

[neverdem]

The mantra from the left during the Bush years went something like this: The world is not black and white. Sophisticated minds should seek out different, nuanced opinions.

Now that Barack Obama is president, you can say a farewell to nuance. The left chants, "torture doesn't work" -- defining waterboarding and sleep deprivation as torture. Obama has a longhand version of that mantra in his rejection of the "false choice between our security and our ideals."

In Obamaland, somehow there never are difficult choices. From the presidency that was supposed to promote intellectualism comes the argument that waterboarding is immoral -- which is a fair argument to make, until its adds: and it doesn't work.

But common sense tells you that techniques like sleep deprivation, waterboarding and a forced bland diet work, at least some times.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (aka KSM) didn't exactly want to help the CIA. Yet Americans are supposed to believe that asked-nicely interrogations yielded or would have yielded the same information as "enhanced techniques" designed to inflict extreme discomfort and dread?

As I reported last week, the newly released Bush administration memos credited the use of waterboarding and other methods with leading to the discovery of a planned "second wave" attack on Los Angeles and other terrorist plans. But there are contradictions in the official accounts of when that L.A. attack was foiled. At one point, the Bush White House had claimed the plot was discovered and interrupted in 2002 -- the year before Mohammed was captured.

Even if that Los Angeles claim does not stand up -- and we don't know at this point -- we do know that former CIA chiefs George Tenet (a Clinton appointee) and Porter Goss believe the "enhanced techniques" program worked. OK, you say: They supported waterboarding, so of course...

[p. henry]

I get so tired of the recruitment argument. We were told the same thing about the Iraq war. Then the recruits came to Iraq and died, while Al Qaeda failed to launch another major attack and is running low on funds. Axelrod's argument is so hollow. In essence it is that we should forgo interrogation techniques that are demonstrably effective because they are used as a recruitment tool, without any evidence that the enemy would not assert their existence even if we banned them.

Guys, we are talking about a madrassa educated population that believes in the Protocals of the Elders of Zion. Remember the reaction of the Arab Street to the false story of the flushed Korans by Newsweek? Maybe we should ban Newsweek because it is a recruitment tool. We could arm our troops with wiffle bats and the potential recruits would still be told about, and would believe in, our atrocities.

[OneWingedShark]

“Extreme discomfort and dread” is what I experience when I hear of what the government is doing {or trying to do}; the corruption is staggering.... can I claim torture?

[bigheadfred]

Hey, hold my purse a sec...

[Hardastarboard]

We could arm our troops with wiffle bats

And they'd still kick the living sh!t out of the terrorists. It would just take a little longer.