Waterboard Congress

Ray McGovern, a former CIA Analyst with 27 years experience, the man who directly challenged Donald Rumsfelds lies and also testified at the original Downing Street Forum with Cindy Sheehan and Joe Wilson has an idea.

A real good idea.

Waterboard Congress until they tell us the truth about Iraq (and Afghanistan, and Global Warming, and Abstinance Only Sex Ed and.... you get the picture.)

A Modest Proposal: Waterboard Congress
Maybe White House-favored interrogation techniques would coax lawmakers to tell the truth about U.S. anti-terror policies
by Ray McGovern

In response to the Supreme Court's June decision in Hamdan vs. Rumsfeld, the Bush administration has proposed a new Enemy Combatant Military Commissions Act. If passed by Congress, this act would revolutionize American jurisprudence.

The White House wants military tribunals hearing the cases of terrorism suspects to be able to use "coerced" confessions. As Acting Asst. Atty. Gen. Steven Bradbury helpfully assured Congress last month, "there are gradations of coercion much lower than torture."

Because many in the administration and Congress feel strongly that coerced confessions constitute the "best practice" to get truth from people suspected of bad things, then, under the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment, American citizens should be permitted to use the same method to pry the truth out of their elected representatives.

The "Best Practice?" Is that why everything we tortured out of Ibn Sheik al-Libi about Saddam being connected to Al Qaeda was totally bogus?

One such method is waterboarding: strapping someone to a board and pushing him underwater to make him feel like he's drowning. Since then-CIA Director Porter Goss assured Congress last year that this was a "professional interrogation method," not torture, citizens should be permitted to bring splintery planks, leather straps and water tanks to expedite discussions with any member of Congress who continues to insist that things are going swimmingly for the U.S. military in Iraq.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has during his tenure approved the use of a dozen extreme interrogation methods above and beyond those previously permitted by the Pentagon, including, but not limited to, hooding, disrobing, placing detainees in stress positions and exploiting their "fear of dogs." When the resulting Abu Ghraib photos leaked out in 2004, Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) declared that he was more "outraged by the outrage" than by the actual evidence of detainee abuse.

So: Inhofe should be blindfolded, put in a straitjacket and left in a room full of crazed chihuahuas until he explains why he believes that the U.S. military should not be constrained to follow the laws of the land, such as the Anti-Torture Act.

Sounds good to me, I got an ironing board and a bathtub all ready to go. In fact, I think this would be a great demonstration to have several thousand people show up on the capital mall with big buckets and splinters of wood.

Just to make a point, because it's pretty obvious that Congress isn't getting the point - yet.

It's been pretty clear to me for some time that the entire "secret testimony" argument that scuttled Hamdan, isn't about protecting our sources and methods of intelligence gathering, it's about protecting the Chimp in Chief's ass from War Crimes Prosecution under 18 USC § 2441. They don't want the defendant in the room for certain testimony because illegal methods may have been used to gather that evidence. This was the original impetous for denying Geneva Conventions to detainees, long before the Bybee Memo which essentially redefined torture into "organ failure" - which in plan english means death. Anything short of that - is just fine.

It's long past time certain Congress Critters, especially Senator Lindsay (Sure, we've banned torture, except that no one that's actually been tortured can sue over it) Graham, got a taste of their own medicine.

Vyan