The "Beautiful Kidnapper" and Other Simple Responses to Torture Arguments

The ticking time bomb. We've been hearing about it for years, but it's never actually happened. Yet its constantly being brought up - to justify torture in thousands of situations where there is no ticking time bomb. What kind of sense does that make?

Here's an analogy: It's possible to imagine a scenario where the only way to free kidnapped children is by having sex with the beautiful woman who is holding them hostage. (Call it the 'beautiful kidnapper' scenario.) What we're seeing now is the moral equivalent of a roomful of cheating husbands, all citing the 'beautiful kidnapper' scenario - to justify their affairs with women they picked up in a bar.

The next time somebody mentions the 'ticking time bomb' scenario, hit 'em with 'the beautiful kidnapper' - then ask them if they believe in marriage and the family. Here are some other handy responses in case you, like so many other Americans, find yourself in a debate about torture policy:

Torture advocates say they're being more 'realistic' than torture opponents. Oh, really? Then why do the experts - the generals, the FBI, law enforcement officials - all say that torture is a bad idea? Short answer: The amateurs like torture. The professionals are against it.

Oh -- and a follow-up response: Why do you suppose all these amateurs are so excited about the torture scenario? Some psychological self-evaluation may be in order.

People who object to torture want to be 'nice to terrorists.' The people who make this argument are usually the same people who don't want you to even mention right-wing terrorism, much less use 'enhanced interrogation techniques' on far-right suspects. Remember, many of the people caught up in our Middle Eastern dragnets weren't terrorists. Some were in the wrong place at the wrong time, or were turned in out of personal vendettas or for bounty money. How would these American torture advocates respond if we started picking up right-wing militia types in the same sort of dragnets and using torture techniques on them?

What if there's a 'ticking time bomb' and (insert large number here) of children will die unless we find it? If there ever is a ticking time bomb scenario, torture is even more likely to yield bad information. The experts say people give false leads and bad information when they're tortured. In a 'ticking time bomb' situation, they'd only need to stall for 60 minutes, or six hours, or whatever's been set on the timer. We're more likely to rescue those children by using the techniques our military and intelligence experts tell us really work.

It's not really "torture." It's just 'getting wet,' or 'playing mind games,' or whatever else you'd like to say it is. Here's a simple thought experiment: Picture it happening to Americans. Does it seem like torture now? Right. That's one of the reasons the generals oppose it.

Obama's national security guy says torture works sometimes. Actually, what Dennis Blair said was far more parsed and wordsmithed than that. He said: "High value information came from interrogations in which [torture] w[as] used and provided a deeper understanding of the al Qa'ida organization ..." He's dancing around the subject, perhaps to appease the intelligence community. But he's not exactly saying that torture worked. And he was contradicted by an FBI interrogator who explained why torture doesn't work.

We got good intelligence at least once from torture. This is a variation on the Blair argument. Presumably it's true, too, although we don't know for sure. But the issue is probability. We're far more likely to get good intelligence from other techniques. I may drive drunk and get home safely, but that's not a defense for driving drunk. With torture we're more likely to get bad information than good -- and we're destroying our reputation, subjecting our citizens to greater risk, and lowering ourselves morally.

Oh, and we're breaking the law -- if anybody cares.

It's a "hard left" vendetta. First of all, there is no "hard left" in this country. I haven't seen any Trotskyites in the halls of Congress lately, much less Stalinists. Jon Meacham - and anyone else who uses that phrase - has tipped their hand with his choice of words. They're smearing people with whom they disagree, probably because they recognize the fundamental weakness of their argument.

Jon Meacham et al: Since when is obedience to the law "extreme"? And are those Army and Marine generals cited above members of the "hard left"?

An investigation would be Democratic partisanship. It's odd. A few months ago a bipartisan panel agreed that the Bush Administration's torture policies "redefined the law to create the appearance of (torture's) legality" and "damaged our ability to collect accurate intelligence that could save lives, strengthened the hand of our enemies, and compromised our moral authority." Not a single Republican Senator objected. Now that investigations could begin - investigations that might embarrass the GOP - Republicans and their media allies are blocking it.

That sounds like Republican partisanship, doesn't it?

Jay Bybee and the other attorneys shouldn't be punished for holding different opinions than their peers. It's not about a difference of opinion. Bybee and the others had constitutional and professional responsibilities. If they deliberately wrote opinions they knew to be false just to create a legal-looking cover for illegal activities, they could be subject to disbarment and possible criminal proceedings. That's why we need an investigation.

I still say that torture works. Did we mention that the experts say that it doesn't?

Well, it works on '24.' 24 is a show with a partisan right-wing ideology. Imagine how people would react if a West Point general had gone to "The West Wing" or "The Daily Show," told them their program was endangering our troops, and asked them to stop - and had been blown off. Well, that's what 24 did to Brigadier General Patrick Finnegan after he asked them to tone down the torture porn. Too bad the show's producers aren't patriotic Americans who want to support our troops ...

___________

I saw an old friend last week who's a World Trade Center survivor. He told me that he doesn't object to 'a little rough treatment' of the people who carried out that attack. But that's not what we're talking about here. We're talking about people who had nothing to do with it. And this 'rough treatment' is helping Al Qaeda recruit thousands of new people willing to carry out just those kinds of attacks.

And we're not even getting good information out of it. The fact is, nobody's defending these torture policies except the amateurs. And the partisans. And those who don't want lawbreakers brought to justice.

Who's "tough on crime" now?

RJ Eskow blogs when he can at:

A Night Light
The Sentinel Effect: Healthcare Blog

Comments

[RadicalRepublican]

The Tokyo trials. Japanese military and civilian leadership charged with war crimes: waterboarding/water cure. Your granfather would be so ashamed. Hey Joe, What did you do during the war?

[mikey2]

Another thought: Look at where/how torture has been used in the past (ex. Spanish Inquisition, Salem witch trials, the torture of American prisoners in Viet Nam, the former Soviet Union, etc) and one sees that mostly torture is used to make someone confess something - like their sins against God or that they are part of an illegal conspiracy against the homeland or something along those lines. How often do you really see in history where torture was used for actual intelligence gathering? Not often. It's almost always used for confession.
Given that, now think about the sleep deprivation phase of the KSM and Zubadaya(sp?) interrogations. Why use that technique? No one with an ounce of common sense could actually believe they'd get good, actionable intelligence from a guy whose been kept awake for 4 days! Try staying up for 3 days and you'll find yourself too loopy and out of it to remember your soc.sec. number.

[realpolitic]

I don't really like Jon Meacham very much, whom the author mentioned in this article. He comes across as a very pioused hypocrite who seemed to support many of the far right positions, like torture, when they were popular. It is hard to say because he always uses a very namby pamby, he said-she said argumentation style. Meacham should just say what he believes and shrug his shoulders to any accusations of bias.

[jhamm1]

"The next time somebody mentions the 'ticking time bomb' scenario, hit 'em with 'the beautiful kidnapper' "

Or better yet just hit 'em over the head, period. I'm sick and tired of attempting to rationalize with those who obviously can't be rationalized with, given their inherent inability to distinguish between the world of Jack Bauer and real life.

[MajorKong]

Unless the terrorists have the timers on their ticking time-bombs set to "a month or two" I don't think waterboarding someone 183 times would be all that effective in that scenario.

[ObjectiveRealist]

About that lousy Dennis Blair endorsement of the valuable intel extracted by torture, that came from an *internal* memo whose purpose was to boost morale within his organization. When asked specifically, for the record, about his opinion of the value of torture, he said *clearly* that there isn't any.

[ProgressiveVoice]

The saddest part of the whole torture "debate" is that it has completely overshadowed the other memo or memos released at the same time that indicate Bush wanted to suspend a number of the rights granted under the Bill of Rights.

Perhaps that is the TRUE goal of the torture apologists.

[pjburke]

Great article, RJ. Simply great. No criticisms.

Of course, the Red Socks -- the hapless, unreachable tr0lls who'll stumble through, spewing their Central Opinion Distribution Center sheep-parrot bile -- won't be persuaded from their witless nonsense.

Fresh from posting "what part of illegal don't you understand?" in a thread on immigration, they'll wander into a thread on the Bush-Cheney torture and war crime policy to say "partisan witch hunt" . . . because that's what their Central Opinion Distribution Center e-mail told them to say.

But the more they go on record as pro-depravity, the longer they'll be out of power.

We hope.

[maxgen1]

To those who say waterboarding's not really "torture:"

You personally should agree to publicly demonstrate that it is benign. If your claim is valid, you will experience minor pain by being waterboarded and will sway others to your viewpoint. If you cannot stand the pain, you could stop it by signing a statement that it is torture.

Of course, the waterboarding should be as severe as that currently used by our government, with none of the changes usually made for demonstrations (such as shields to prevent drowning). (All interested parties should be allowed to examine the equipment and procedure to assure present practices are followed). You must arrange to automate the apparatus so you can trip its trigger on cue, thereby absolving anyone of murder should you be killed in the demonstration.

Also, many persons can withstand extreme pain for some time; especially if they know when it will come, how long it will last and how many sessions they will have over how many years. Since the current detainees don't know these data, you must not know them either.

What fun!

[Davis Sweet - Huffpost Blogger]

The torture fans already know they're lying. The torture justifications, crafted for them by RNC types, are just that: justifications. There is no way to use facts to argue them into taking a different position, because their current position isn't fact-based; it's emotion-based, mostly fear but including healthy doses of imagined powerlessness, tribalism/racism, and sadism.

To understand why argument won't work, imagine somebody giving you a point-by-point breakdown (facts) explaining why you shouldn't love (emotion) the person you love. Even if the person arguing against your love is your best friend (a common enough scenario), you'll listen, but you'll reject their advice. If the person with all the facts is your ideological opponent, you won't even listen.

Similarly, a torture fan wouldn't credit any number of conservative Generals on this issue; why in the world would they listen to a liberal writer, co-worker, in-law, or stranger?

Arguing them into spluttering submission won't "yield actionable intelligence" for either party. We need to stand up for morality, genuine security, and the law, thoughtfully considering their arguments (we are liberals, after all) and rejecting those that don't match up with those three guiding principles. At the moment, it seems like all of the arguments for brutality, counter-productive tough-guy tactics, and lawlessness are empty, so "thoughtful consideration" should be a pretty easy thing to pull off.

[pjburke]

A very good post... but "at the moment?"

Those arguments -- for "brutality, counter-productive tough-guy tactics, and lawlessness" -- FAIL universally. . . always, everywhere, at all times, and under all conditions. Otherwise, they would not have become encoded into the no-exceptions "jus cogens" criminal law prohibitions that they inarguably are.

[GOP4MoreTears]

))))))))))­))))))))))­)) BAM ((((((((((­((((((((((­(

[trotskylives]

A simple solution is for Obama and congress to make water boarding and other exact enhanced interrogations illegal by US law, so there are no questions about it and no ways lawyer can get around it in the future.

Yet, that is not on the table. Does Obama need the water boarding option in case of a ticking bomb scenario?

[BluestateGuyInTX]

It is already illegal and has been punished in the past (US soldiers even). The prosecution of previous water board torturers has been neatly dropped down the memory hole by the majority of the main stream media outlets. It's as if it never happened. As Santayana said: "Those who forget history are condemned to relive it.".

[trotskylives]

Clearly there are still loopholes that need to be closed.

Also, if we investigate Bush, will we also investigate Clinton officials who outsourced torture to Egypt, where there was no threat to the US?

Are any of those officials currently in the Obama administration?

It doesn't make what Bush did ok, but is seems strange to open the books on one president and not another who did similar crimes.

[Gdebs]

I think the best response is to ask them," now that we accept torture as a legal technique and water boarding isn't very effective ( 183 times ) why don't we go directly to thumb screws, the rack, iron maidens, and save a lot of time and money?" And why not hire Blackwater?

[KenGirard]

"Jay Bybee and the other attorneys shouldn't be punished for holding different opinions than their peers. It's not about a difference of opinion. Bybee and the others had constitutional and professional responsibilities. "

If they can claim it is a difference of opinion then a doctor can claim it is just a difference of opinion when he says you don't have cancer while all the other doctors say you do.

[Rogan]

Doctors do that kind of thing all the time. You'd be shocked. Hope you never find out firsthand.

[doctorkosan]

Then it is mal-practice just like Bybee's memo.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

Thank you.

[dakotawoman]

The fact that we are even DEBATING this is the first place, shows how far off we are from the American ideals of COURAGE and FREEDOM.

I can understand that some people think too much worry about "doing the right thing" endangers the potential victims of terrorism.

And therein lies the terrorists’ victory over us.

We cave in to their tactics whenever we perjure ourselves, compromise our ideals, resort to their immoral tactics of abuse, lies, pain and death. Yes, some Americans might die for ideals, but well, all I know is the idea that MY safety is being assured by the agony (frequently repeated) and terror of possibly innocent others, makes me sick.

Of course, I can speak only for myself. And I cannot necessarily imagine the depths of pain that the victims of terrorist "ticking bombs" suffer either. But, since the ticking bomb is often only hypothetical and likely never to blow, while the torture victim is suffering definitely and in front of one right NOW--- well, there's literally a "moral" there too, no?

We’ve been so traumatized by 911 and subsequent events, that we believe demonizing and de-humanizing those who hate us is the appropriate response?

Anyone who sings the National Anthem with hand on heart and tears in eyes while justifying torture, should ask himself who now are the brave and who really are the free.

Only cowards and prisoners of their own fears resort to such a brutal, immoral philosophy of self-preservation.

[reasonshouldrule]

Very well said.

[BluestateGuyInTX]

Terrorism is like a virus that infects the host (USA) and gets it to churn out terrorists (torturers). Think of this as being how evil reproduces.

[pjburke]

Precisely. Torture, to a society, is akin to ocean water -- under pressure -- to a submarine: the tiniest leak can kill the boat.