You are against torture like waterboarding…..until it needs to be used.

And yes, it's illegal. Like Professor Huhn says at the Law Cafe…..we don't spell out in every possible detail what child abuse is, or animal cruelty….but child abuse and animal cruelty are both violations of law.

Would you defend a child abuser because it wasn't spelled out in child abuse laws, specifically, that stuffing a child into an empty refrigerator, for example, was child abuse?

There is NO empirical evidence that says the harsh interrogations didn't work. Such evidence only exists in the imaginations of the left.

I'm also still waiting for you to show me the law that specifically says waterboarding is illegal. I agree the practice shouldn't be used (well, ALMOST never, except on people like Bin Laden or KSM, where it could save thousands of innocent lives), but the illegality of the practice is not definitive, at least not according to the 1994 US adoption of the UN Convention Against Torture and the OLC memos.

Also how many were executed for torture? One. The rest rotted in jail.

When the Japanese waterboarded our soldiers, did we let them off the hook because the Japanese claimed that waterboarding "worked?" No, we executed them for torturing our soldiers.

Torture is a crime in American law. No equivalency-seeking, cul-de-sac ramblings can change that fact. Bush/Cheney institutionalized a criminal practice in violation of American law.

King….did you believe Tenet when he told Bush, "it's a slam dunk?" Tell the truth, did you?

Even if your CIA heads' comments are true, which all empirical evidence suggests is not the case, do the ends justify the means? Is American law optional?

And because the U.S. has done other criminal stuff throughout our history, how does that excuse us from executive branch criminality today?

So, go ahead and ignore it all again, Rev, and just keep telling me how much I LOVE torture. That's what demagogues do.

I thought Democrats were supposed to be the NUANCED thinkers.

Also Rev, this is most definitely NOT the first time the USA has engaged in what you would describe as torture. Again, you're not even close, and in the past it was done with far lesser justification. I'm not justifying it, I'm just stating the facts. I'll even link you to a source you'll like to prove the point.

http://www.alternet.org/rights/132743/the_long_and_sadistic_history_behind_the_cia's_torture_techniques/

So please tell us: Are the actions of al-qaeda also barbaric?

Torture has been defined clearly by the Army Field Manual. There has never been a problem following those guidelines….until Bush.

King….those are lame attempts to justify the unjustifiable…..but think for a minute….

Didn't Bush blab about every freaking rag tag group he had his henchmen round up? The Miami 7 morons….the guys who were going to attack Ft. Dix…..the guys who were going to blow up an airplane by lighting a gas pipe miles away…?

Weren't those plots classified national security plots?

And this….

"…because the Bush admin didn't release classified intelligence secrets documenting everything our CIA learned from the interrogations, thereby comprimising what was learned by informing our enemies, then that proves it didn't work."

Didn't say that. Professionals at SERE and elsewhere said clearly that torture produces "unreliable infromation." It doesn't work. It's simply the icing on the cake proof that Bush never told us about any successful plots being broken up through torture…..the one that he did tell us about, al-Libi, was never true in the first place…but Bush never hesitated in telling us about it, classified national security concerns be damned.

May I point out that you fellows are actually defending barbaric torture methods?

i suppose he may come back and tell us that 1+1=3

Cheney has filed a FOIA request for two memos showing that harsh interrogation tactics worked (after Obama released the "torture" memos). Five current and former CIA chiefs have said the interrogation methods worked. Obama's National Intelligence Director said they worked.

But the Rev's argument is – because the Bush admin didn't release classified intelligence secrets documenting everything our CIA learned from the interrogations, thereby comprimising what was learned by informing our enemies, then that proves it didn't work.

Please tell me you are joking. That is a quantum leap of illogic even for you.

Maybe certain Democrats think classified intelligence is nothing but a partisan weapon to be yielded for political gain. It seems so. I sure hope that sort of thing is nipped in the bud before we all come to regret it. Too many are treating this as some kind of political game. It isn't.