Getting Your Face Wet

by hilzoy

John Hinderaker wows us again with his caring and decency (emphasis added):

"Torture has been illegal for a number of years, and President Bush insisted just as strongly as Obama that the U.S. does not torture. There was a legitimate debate about waterboarding, which does no physical injury, and which I do not believe constitutes torture. But according to press reports, only two or three top-ranking terrorists were waterboarded, none after 2003. And waterboarding has been banned by the U.S. military since 2006. So what was Obama's purpose in implying that until he came along, his own government was engaged in torturing prisoners? His speech was carried live by Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya, broadcast into countries where "torture" doesn't mean getting your face wet. Obama at least impliedly exaggerated the supposed sins of his predecessors and the "change" brought about by himself. Why? For what purpose? Isn't the campaign over?"

Getting your face wet! That's clever. I await with great anticipation Hinderaker's characterization of some of our other interrogation tactics. Holding people in a coffin-sized cell: not giving them the luxury suite at George V. Stress positions: enforced yoga classes. Hitting someone's legs so often that the autopsy report claimed that they "had basically been pulpified": a soothing massage. (So soothing that it sent its recipient to an eternal rest!) Sensory deprivation: just like those nice little eyemasks the airlines give you, only more so!

How on earth could anyone object?

Comments

[J. Michael Neal]

Has Hinderaker ever tried being waterboarded? That might give us some reason to take his opinion more seriously the US military courts martial, or international tribunals.

[Gary Farber]

Hinderaker doesn't like to let facts or history get in the way of his opinions.

And if George Bush or Dick Cheney have said something, it's god's own truth.

[Dan S.]

A Short Lexicon of Torture in the Eighties

By Edward Hirsch

That’s not a man in pain

                                     but a Brazilian phone—

It won’t be making any outgoing calls.

That’s not a woman sprawling on the floor

But an old-fashioned dance,

                                             like the tango.

Pull up a chair with a knotted rope.

Let’s have a tea party with toast

                                                      and hors d’oeuvres.

Let’s take a seat

                           on the parrot’s perch.

Let’s rock to the Motorola with headphones.

Do you want to bathe

                               in the porcelain tub?

Do you want to sing to the little hare?

Let’s stroll over to the guest room.

Let’s take a bus ride

                                 to the San Juanica bridge.

Forget the ovens and smokestacks.

Forge the rack and screw,

                                          the tiger’s cage.

We’re celebrating a birthday party

                                                         in your honor.

We’re lighting candles on your favorite cake.

We’re taking you to a parade

                                                on a sandy beach.

You’re going down in a submarine.

[Warren Terra]

His speech was carried live by Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya, broadcast into countries where "torture" doesn't mean getting your face wet.

Leaving aside the important points that have already been made to the effect that waterboarding is torture and that our government is directly responsible for horrific actions cruder than waterboarding and applied to far more than one or two detainees, the Bush administration doesn't even pass the test Hinderaker sets: we actually kidnapped people for the express purpose of subjecting them to the tender mercies of the countries that even Mr. Hinderaker concedes commit acts of Actual Torture. Maher Arar was taken from an American airport and sent to one of the countries to which Hinderaker alludes to be physically tortured:

"During the more than 10 months he was imprisoned and held in solitary confinement [in Syria], he was beaten regularly with shredded cables.

In another case, that of Binyam Mohamed, we picked him up in Pakistan and sent him to at least three other countries; most relevantly to Mr. Hinderaker's stated guidelines for what constitutes Torture, we consigned Mr. Mohamed to Morocco for a time, where his

genitals were sliced with a scalpel and other torture methods so extreme that waterboarding, the controversial technique of simulated drowning, “is very far down the list of things they did,” the official said.

But hey, whatever lets Hinderaker live with himself.

[Ugh]

It was all just fraternity pranks.

[Model 62]

"Getting your face wet is pretty clever," but not nearly as clever as "impliedly exaggerated."

[Model 62]

Stupid fingers. The " goes over to the left a bit.

[Snarki, child of Loki]

"getting your face wet" : waterboarding :: "hanging around" : crucifixion

Goebbels would be proud of his disciples.

[Gus]

I'm against torture in every cases but one: people who justify torture should have to endure the procedures they defend. Waterboard Hinderaker, Sleep deprivation for Giuliani. Stress positions for Rumsfeld. Sexual humiliation for Limbaugh. On second thought scratch that last one. He might enjoy it.