Last night I came home late-ish and got sucked into the Republican debate just as Brit Hume essentially asked the candidates "what would you do as President on an episode of 24?" From the transcript:
"The questions in this round will be premised on a fictional, but we think plausible scenario involving terrorism and the response to it. Here is the premise: Three shopping centers near major U.S. cities have been hit by suicide bombers. Hundreds are dead, thousands injured. A fourth attack has been averted when the attackers were captured off the Florida coast and taken to Guantanamo Bay, where they are being questioned. U.S. intelligence believes that another larger attack is planned and could come at any time."
I have to admit I was genuinely frightened by the responses.
Hume--"First question to you, Senator McCain. How aggressively would you interrogate those being held at Guantanamo Bay for information about where the next attack might be?"
McCain--"If I knew for sure that they had that kind of information, I, as the president of the United States, would take that responsibility. That is a million-to-one scenario. But only I would take that responsibility.
The use of torture -- we could never gain as much we would gain from that torture as we lose in world opinion. We do not torture people..."
Later, after follow-up question, McCain called bullshit on the parsing of "enhanced interrogation techniques", (see below) and pointed out that there was a "sharp division" during the debate over the detainee treatment act between those that had served in the military and those that had not, with those having served being essentially unanimously opposed to torture.
McCain is wrong about a lot of things, but he is on the side of the angels on this one. What was truly disturbing was the chorus of answers from basically everybody else:
Giuliani--"I would tell the people who had to do the interrogation to use every method they could think of. It shouldn't be torture, but every method they can think of (Hume interupts: "Water-boarding?") and I would -- and I would -- well, I'd say every method they could think of, and I would support them in doing that..."
Romney--"...you said the person's going to be in Guantanamo. I'm glad they're at Guantanamo. I don't want them on our soil. I want them on Guantanamo, where they don't get the access to lawyers they get when they're on our soil...Some people have said, we ought to close Guantanamo. My view is, we ought to double Guantanamo." (He later said he supported "enhanced interrogation techniques".)
Hunter--"Yeah, let me just say this would take a one-minute conversation with the secretary of Defense. (Laughter.) I would call him up or call him in. I would say to SECDEF, in terms of getting information that would save American lives, even if it involves very high-pressure techniques, one sentence: Get the information. Have it back within an hour, and let's act on it."
Paul--"I think it's interesting talking about torture here in that it's become enhanced interrogation technique. It sounds like Newspeak. Nobody's for the torture, and I think that's important. But as far as taking care of a problem like this, the president has the authority to do that. If we're under imminent attack, the president can take that upon himself to do it."
This is a great example of why Paul is so abysmally bad at debating. He shouldn't have conceded the high ground to anyone by saying that "nobody's for torture." Giuliani and Romney made it pretty clear that they were, and Hunter didn't exactly back away from the idea. Of course, it gets worse:
Tancredo--"You say that -- that nuclear devices have gone off in the United States, more are planned, and we're wondering about whether waterboarding would be a -- a bad thing to do? I'm looking for "Jack Bauer" at that time, let me tell you." (Laughter, applause.)
Oh that's just great. While we're at it, let's get Dirty Harry, John Rambo, and Batman on the case.
Andrew Sullivan seized on this part of the debate, too:
Some issues really are paramount moral ones. Two candidates opposed [torture] clearly and honorably: McCain and Paul...For me, then, the debate winnowed the field of candidates down to two: McCain and Paul. That was quick."
Which is fine and good, except (and it really, really pains me to point this out) I don't really think that Ron Paul staked out the clear anti-torture stance that McCain did. True, his "newspeak" reply was both admirable and correct (although, probably over the heads of the audience--anyone want to bet on whether as many people got "newspeak" vs. "Jack Bauer"?) But he also said "the president has the authority to do that" which seems to leave things wide-open. I don't know if Dr. Paul meant it that way--he's clearly not a particularly adroit speaker off the cuff--but I think Sullivan (and others) are just assuming Paul is anti-torture because of his libertarian bend.
I read Paul's reply as acknowledging torture for what it is, but also leaving the door open to it in extreme circumstances. I could be misunderstanding him, but if so that is only because he was all over the place. Assuming for the moment that Paul does not actually favor torture, he had an opportunity to separate himself from the field by making that clear, and from McCain by pointing out that we wouldn't even be entertaining these scenarios in the first place but for our belligerent foreign policy, which McCain fully supports and would expand.
Either way, this is disappointing, to say the least.
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