Commentary’s Abe Greenwald is Pro-Torture
I had the opportunity over Passover to reflect a bit on the humanitarian tradition in Jewish thought. And then of course there’s Commentary where Abe Greenwald defends himself against charges of being pro-torture with the quip “anything to which Christopher Hitchens is willing to submit himself in pursuit of a Vanity Fair article is not torture. This covers, among other things, back-waxing, exercise class, and waterboarding.”
Over at the Wonk Room, Matt Duss reminds us that Hitchens’ conclusion after having been waterboarded was that “if waterboarding does not constitute torture, then there is no such thing as torture.”
As Jay Bybee wrote in a memo that concluded that waterboarding is legal, “You have orally informed us that this procedure triggers an automatic physiological sensation of drowning that the individual cannot control even though he may be aware that he is in fact not drowning.” Basically the idea is that if you would like to torture someone by holding them under water until they nearly drown, but your lawyer tells you that you’re not allowed to run the risk doing permanent physical harm to the torturee, “waterboarding” is a nifty method of producing all the relevant torture but without the chance of accidentally drowning the guy you’re torturing. The only reason anyone could ever reach the conclusion that this isn’t torture is that they (a) want to torture people, and (b) don’t want to admit that they want to torture people. Since Bybee, along with George W. Bush and other Bush administration officials, wanted to torture people but didn’t want to face the legal consequences of admitting that they were torturing people, the sophistry makes perfect sense. It’s not entirely clear to me why Greenwald feels the need to follow suit — he can just shout loud and proud that he likes torture.
37 Responses to “Commentary’s Abe Greenwald is Pro-Torture”
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April 20th, 2009 at 8:40 am
Yeah, the issue of whether the people who like “harsh interrogation” but don’t like “torture,” based on certain legal definitions of torture are actually against “torture” is interesting. Are you for waterboarding but against the deliberate amputation or poisoning of people’s bodies (approaching but not equivalent to death by organ failure)? Do you think that the former should be legal for the authorities but the latter should be a possibility in extreme ticking time-bomb circumstances (while not being allowed by the law because that would only encourage its use)? The whole attitude of “Har! Har! It’s not a big deal!” is a little too cute for such a serious issue so worthy of Moral Panic.
April 20th, 2009 at 8:41 am
Obama needs a bit of cover for his “Torturers and Murders All Go Free” policy. Maybe he could extend tax breaks to Disneyland and Disneyworld if they added Waterboard rides to their midways? Or have hourly contests where you guess how many pounds of poop are in the diapers of the clowns and jesters manacled to the ceiling in hall of mirrors? Mickey and Minnie could roam the park in padded suits, inviting guests to throw them to the ground and kick them into submission. Make it fun for the whole family. After a few years such brutality will be no more alarming than the occasional school massacre.
April 20th, 2009 at 8:55 am
The White House’s Obama is Pro-Apologizing for Torture. Here is the problem: torture for a lot of people like me on the Left is like what abortion is for pro-life advocates. You deviate from that position, and we’ve had it with you. It’s the third rail. Obama is going to lose a lot of people over this decision. Here you have good reason to believe that people were actively urging ignoring treaties and conventions that were agreed to and you’re telling me you don’t get held accountable for that? I’m sorry, but that’s just no change we can believe in.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:00 am
this article, which asks why we’re outraged about torturing a potential terrorist but don’t mind blowing one up, i found very interesting. i couldn’t think of a good answer.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:00 am
The optimist in me thinks they are making jokes because at least a part of them recognizes the evil of what they are defending.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:02 am
Of course, media accounts and Bush lawyers like to call waterboarding “simulated” drowning. A waterboarding victim is, in fact, drowning and will die if the torture doesn’t stop in time.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:02 am
This is false naiveté on Matt’s part. Like all of us, he understands the real passions governing this debate. As much as right-leaning intellectuals like the idea of torture, their attraction to the idea is vastly exceeded by their pure and disinterested love of sophistry for sophistry’s sake.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:03 am
We will also have a portion of our population convinced that exorcism is not only effective, but required for the safety and soul-purity of our citizens.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:03 am
There are various ways to “waterboard”. One method is to put a bag or stocking over the head of the subject and then to pour water over the cloth. The skein of water makes the cloth impermeable and the subject cannot breathe. If the procedure goes on long enough the capillaries in the lungs will hemorrhage. Long enough of that and the subject can drown in his own blood. Even if the torturer stops short of death, the pain is unbearable (drowning is an extraordinarily painful way to die) and the lungs will be weakened and susceptible to infection for long after the fact.
And, of course, not an external mark on the body.
The voluntary waterboarding demonstrations are, of course, bullshit. In practice, the subject is jostled and frog-marched to the session and cannot get set to try to hold his breath and wait out the session. A little electric shock can also empty the lungs. The subject is not only fearful of drowing: the subject is in unbearable pain, and the menace of death is real.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:09 am
Yes, but lungs can hemorrhage for all kinds of reasons, and besides there was this doctor who says the body was dead of a heart attack just before the bullet hit, and one time I voluntarily watched a TV show about lung surgery, so this is not torture.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:11 am
War is indeed terrible, and with very rare exception the only moral excuse for making war is that you are trying to prevent even more war from happening.
But the special evil of torture isn’t the violence or the pain involved, and in fact torture need not be violent or painful. The special evil of torture is the deliberate attempt to take a human being and turn them into something less than human. I won’t say that as such, torturing a person is necessarily worse than killing them, but it is certainly different, in the same way that rape is different than murder.
Which leads me to a final point, which is why not ask as well if we are willing to authorize killing people in wars, why aren’t we willing to authorize raping people in wars? Answer that question, and you will be a long way toward understanding why we shouldn’t authorize torturing people either.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:11 am
I’m consistently amazed to the degree to which torture advocates are not only moral monsters, but moral cowards.
They won’t even accurately name or describe the horrors they argue for.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:12 am
In Obama’s America, truly anything is possible.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:30 am
You do realize that the CIA waterboarded THREE–count them, THREE terrorists murderers, including Kalid Sheik Mohammed.
According to reports, KSM sang like a bird after a 2 minute session…
You also realize that the democrat leadership in congress was fully briefed on the interrogation techniques from the beginning.
And that both Tenet and Hayden have stated repeatedly that the information gathered shut down plots and saved lives.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:39 am
You do realize that the CIA waterboarded THREE–count them, THREE terrorists murderers, including Kalid Sheik Mohammed.
No, we don’t, as a matter of fact. We realize that the accounts of torture of three individuals have been made public to date.
We – most of us, apparently, but not all – also realize that torturers and covert agencies tend not to publicize every action they take.
According to reports, KSM sang like a bird after a 2 minute session… And according to other reports, all of the useful information he provided came before they began torturing him, and the “singing” he did after being tortured was worthless.
You also realize that the democrat leadership in congress was fully briefed on the interrogation techniques from the beginning. Nope. What we realize is that anonymous Bush administration officials have asserted that the Congressional leadership was briefed, without anyone willing to go on the record. The Democratic leaders themselves, on the other hand, have gone on the record denying it.
And that both Tenet and Hayden have stated repeatedly that the information gathered shut down plots and saved lives. What’s that? People implicated in criminal behavior said they had a good reason?
You’re a remarkably gullible person.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:40 am
Gee, if your “reports” claim KSM sang like a bird after 2 minutes, why did we waterboard him 183 times in March 2003?
April 20th, 2009 at 9:40 am
Re: Here is the problem: torture for a lot of people like me on the Left is like what abortion is for pro-life advocates.
Good. Now you know how pro-lifers like me feel about the fact that we live in a society that doesn’t give a f*ck about our values.
Let’s make a deal: I’ll support getting rid of waterboarding if you support getting rid of abortion.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:43 am
And that both Tenet and Hayden have stated repeatedly that the information gathered shut down plots and saved lives.
If they said so, then it must be true.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:46 am
Hector,
While I feel for you, the situation is different for us. Most Americans oppose torture.
Ergo, we don’t need your quid pro quo. The president got rid of waterboarding months ago, to thunderous applause.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:52 am
No deal. Besides, I don’t think papal edicts count as Geneva convention and international law standards.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:53 am
Here is the problem: torture for a lot of people like me on the Left is like what abortion is for pro-life advocates. You deviate from that position, and we’ve had it with you. It’s the third rail. Obama is going to lose a lot of people over this decision.
And, just like the hardcore pro-life people, this is an utterly meaningless statement. What exactly are the consequences of Obama “losing” you? You’re going to say you disapprove if you get polled? Wonderful. You’re going to vote for a primary challenger in 2012? How very productive. You’re going to vote for Romney in 2012 if he decides to say he wants to prosecute Bybee? Yeah, I bet you are.
You do realize there’s a reason every Republican politician ever goes on about how pro-life they are yet never actually does anything about it once in office, right? Because the fundies aren’t actually going to vote for a Democrat no matter what. You just have to show enough support so they don’t stay home in protest. And Obama’s release of the memos is designed to be exactly that, and it will have exactly that effect.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:57 am
It’s hard to fathom the workings of the minds of pro torturers like Greenwald. There’s a tendency in most people’s minds to think that those peoples or classes that have been particularly subject to abuse or worse are somehow more aware of the evil to which men are capable. As Harry Truman told himself this is not always true. At the same time there is an awful lot of hyperbole on the left. This whole process is abhorrent and morally wrong but likening it to the Nazi regime or invoking Nuremburg is totally absurd. It seems to me, Obama and his administration have taken the right steps. All those ranting on about betrayal etc need to remember he has a govt to run and he can’t basically afford to alienate large swathes of the intelligence community. It’s not total justice but it’s a start. I find it hard to believe the careers and reputations of the lawyers who authorised this aren’t going to be damaged. They would also be well advised to avoid foreign holidays. As for Greenwald and the entire Commentary crowd it’s no accident a lot of these people started as Marxists. Basically they have little sense of right and wrong, it’s all about politics and Israel as far as they are concerned. It’s pretty disgusting but they are putting themselves on the losing side of the argument. At the end of the day a comfortable majority of Americans don’t approve of torture although they don’t want to turn a lot of CIA case officers into martyrs either. So I’d say Obama has it about right. He handled it with his usual deftness, did the right thing, forever stained the reputation of Bush and and his administration, but didn’t seriously affect his ability to run the govt.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:58 am
Has Matt written any post about Obama’s despicable decision to let everyone go scott free?
What hypocrisy!
April 20th, 2009 at 10:22 am
The irony of Abe Greenwald defending water torture, called the “toca” by Spain’s Inquisitors, would be funny if we weren’t talking about water torture.
But I guess it’s okay if you’re using it to get really bad people to confess to plots that don’t exist instead of using it to get really bad people to confess to heresy.
April 20th, 2009 at 10:23 am
NIH has just issued a request for proposals to study the response of the human respiratory system to simulated drowning as a part of the plans to spend the stimulus money. The agency is really interested in the mechanics of water flow in a cloth and how the design of the piece of cloth that is put over the subject’s mouth and nose can be Pareto optimized so that the subject’s sensation of drowning is maximized while at the same time the possibility of any physiological harm is minimized.
April 20th, 2009 at 10:24 am
“I had the opportunity over Passover to reflect a bit on the humanitarian tradition in Jewish thought.”
Maybe you can reflect on the significance of the word “passover” as the name chosen for this celebration.
April 20th, 2009 at 10:34 am
I too would like to see the low-level guys prosecuted, but let’s not let the best be the enemy of the good. Releasing the memos was a positive move, and hopefully we’ll see more. If nothing has happened by the end of the year then we can freak out.
April 20th, 2009 at 10:52 am
I am just sickened by defenses being mounted by the likes of Greenwald. I agree with Matt that if Abe is pro-torture (which by all means he appears to be) then just say so.
Chris Buckley’s joshing is repugnant over at The Beast.
And Peggy Noonan just tells us to whistle on past the graves.
These people are utterly immoral and we should stop listening to them. Not in some censorship sort of way, but in the marketplace of ideas, stop clicking on their links, stop giving them page views, air time, bytes.
Let them be in the internet wilderness.
April 20th, 2009 at 11:23 am
People are taking a lot of time to muddy up the issue of whether we tortured or not, but the bottom line is that the defenders of the previous interrogation policy are trying to hold together some incompatible ideas.
1. “Enhanced interrogation” (or whatever you want to call it) works
2. We only did it to the most committed/fanatical people
3. It isn’t torture
So, somehow these techniques are supposed to be mild enough not to qualify for torture but are also somehow very effective at eliciting information from the most hardened of detainees. One could make the case that mild, noncoercive techniques such as persuasion, work, but I don’t understand how coercion could work without actually being torture.
April 20th, 2009 at 11:27 am
Hey Matt,
You should give the Impeach Jay Bybee facebook group some lovin =)
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/group.php?gid=93093458451&ref=mf
Cheers,
HAL
April 20th, 2009 at 1:13 pm
anonymous critic, a dime a dozen:
Has Matt written any post about Obama’s despicable decision to let everyone go scott free?
What hypocrisy!
Obama faced down the CIA to relase the memos, which is unprecedented or a President. And of course the anonymous douchebags give him no credit. What one trick poneys!!!
The pricks who were against Obama during the primary said he’d never do anything like this. You and your ilk disgust me. Maybe Obama has higher priorites than going on a witch hunt.
Whether it’s bank nationalization or prosecuting the torturers there are bitter people on the left who just want to see some bloodletting, they really don’t care about the consequences.
April 20th, 2009 at 1:41 pm
What’s intresting is that liberal blogs used to tout Joe Klein at Time as an anti-Bush writer, but no one’s writing about him backing the CIA and saying the memoes shouldn’t have been released, that it will hurt CIA morale, etc.
The anonymous douchbags who are criticizing Obama are still consumed with Bush-hate from the years of the Bush Presidency. THEY MISS HIM! They miss the hate they could spew.
April 20th, 2009 at 2:08 pm
Give me a clothespin and a gerry can and I will drown you. To death. Quickly. I won’t simulate drowning. I will drown you. To death.
If I decide to near drown you, and bring you back from the brink of death, and repeat this process, you will beg me to have a thousand thumbnails ripped off.
April 20th, 2009 at 2:14 pm
I believe Obama made the correct political call allowing the actual physical torturers to walk.
But when you drown someone 183 times you are not gathering information. You are having sport. You are a world class sadist.
Perhaps it is better to keep tabs on these people by retaining them. If we cut them loose into society, who knows what the results would be.
April 20th, 2009 at 5:11 pm
The special evil of torture is the deliberate attempt to take a human being and turn them into something less than human.
How does torture “attempt attempt to take a human being and turn them into something less than human?” If torture does this, why don’t things like dropping bombs on civilians, and locking people up in solitary confnement, and sending people to prisons where they are at serious risk of rape, also do it?
April 20th, 2009 at 5:17 pm
Most Americans oppose torture.
No they don’t.
Pew Research Center, Jan 2007
Can Torture be Justified Against Suspected Terrorists to Gain Key Information?
Often Justified: 12%
Sometimes Justified: 31%
Rarely Justified: 25%
Never Justified: 29%
Don’t Know: 3%
Pew has been conducting the poll since 2004 and has consistently found that over two-thirds of respondents believe torture is justified in some circumstances.
Young people are the LEAST likely to oppose all use of torture. Only 25% of 18-29 year olds believe torture is never justified, compared to 36% of those aged 65 and older.
As for differences between the parties, although Democrats are more likely to rule out torture than Republicans, the difference is relatively small. Even among self-identified “liberal” Democrats, only 45% say torture is never justified. For self-identified “moderate” and “conservative” Democrats, only 31% say torture is never justified.
April 20th, 2009 at 11:08 pm
charles: lying, or ignorant?
Polls show what now, Chuckles?
Q. Obama has said that under his administration the United States will not use torture as part of the U.S. campaign against terrorism, no matter what the circumstance. Do you support this position not to use torture, or do you think there are cases in which the United States should consider torture against terrorism suspects?
By a wide margin — 58-40% — Americans say that torture should never be used, no matter the circumstances.
Polls say what now, Chuckles?
By Jill Lawrence, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — Even as Americans struggle with two wars and an economy in tatters, a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll finds majorities in favor of investigating some of the thorniest unfinished business from the Bush administration: Whether its tactics in the “war on terror” broke the law.
Close to two-thirds of those surveyed said there should be investigations into allegations that the Bush team used torture to interrogate terrorism suspects and its program of wiretapping U.S. citizens without getting warrants. Almost four in 10 favor criminal investigations and about a quarter want investigations without criminal charges. One-third said they want nothing to be done.
Chuckles likes to cite that one – one and only – poll because it asks a general question along the lines of “Can you think of a situation when torture would be justified?” Not a question about what people actually want done with actual terrorism suspects, and not a question about what people actually want done about Bush administration torturers. Questions that actually ask those things – rather than asking the equivalent of “If you could go back in time, would you kill Hitler as a baby?” – consistently show large margins opposed to torture, and in favor of investigating the Bush administration for their crimes.
Asking people if they can imagine a situation in which torture would be justified isn’t a reliable indicator of their opinion about whether or not they support torture. People can imagine all sorts of things.
To get an sense of what people actually support, you need to ask them what they actually support. By a wide margin — 58-40% — Americans say that torture should never be used, no matter the circumstances.