Is it really surprising that the people who eagerly chose to discard the Constitution and international law and pursue torture of enemies captured in the Middle East should now claim that, but for these efforts, Osama Bin Laden would have never been found?
Its an absurd assertion -- something you might expect to find in the archives of the Third Reich or the KGB.
Not that a tidbit of information that might have fallen from the lips of people under torture might have helped, but this was a multi-year effort, with countless resources and efforts. Its not as if but for torture, we would never have known about the couriers.
Perhaps the torture lovers ought to reflect on reports that Osama was living in this house since about the time of Bush's second inauguration, and reflect on why, when he did not move for four years, they could not locate him? If their answer is that they had to cut back on the torture they had been conducting already for 2-3 years, I think we can see how empty of import is their assertion.
Sen Diane Feinstein, chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee asserts that torture was not an aid. Lidsay Graham, one of the few Republican adults in government, agrees.
Rigorous interrogation -- I think that is Osama Bin Cheney's phrase for it -- could have been much more effective had it not indulged in torture. Torture is a bad and ineffective idea, if what you want to get is the truth.
Bin Laden has been around since the early 1990s. Clinton tried to kill him, but failed. I don't know if Bush ever tried. Obama got it done. Maybe that is a comment on the Bush Administation; maybe it is a comment on Bin laden's cleverness. maybe its a comment on how poor we are as a nation at assassinating people -- or should I say confirmation, since the CIA long ago established that we aren't good at it, to which I say Hurray!
FDR took less than four years to get us out of WWII victorious. Wilson took less than two to get us out of WWI. Lincoln took exactly four years to preserve the union. Bush had zeven years in Afghanistan, six in Iraq, and couldn't get it done. Even Nixon did better. Perhaps its because these wars were different -- i.e., Iraq was completely avoidable and discretionary, and Afghanistan was put to the back burner almost immediately -- or perhaps its because of the kind of leadership we had.
But to praise Bush and torture for the result this weekend, give us all a colossal break!
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