Stop It, That Tickles
You can argue about what constitutes torture. Then, it turns out, you can dicker about whether you’d do it or not. The Corner:
This morning, both Rich and the Wall Street Journal recount these comments by Sen. Chuck Schumer in 2004:
I think there are probably very few people in this room or in America who would say that torture should never ever be used, particularly if thousands of lives are at stake. . . . It is easy to sit back in the armchair and say that torture can never be used, but when you are in the foxhole it is a very different deal. And I respect, I think we all respect the fact that the President is in the foxhole every day.
In the Weekly Standard last week, Gabe Schoenfeld noted the nuanced position of Barack Obama and the flip-floppery of Hillary Clinton:
At the September 26 Democratic presidential debate, the moderator, Tim Russert, posed a stark question: “Imagine the following scenario. We get lucky. We get the number-three guy in al Qaeda. We know there’s a big bomb going off in America in three days, and we know this guy knows where it is. Don’t we have the right and responsibility to beat it out of him?”
Barack Obama responded by declaring that we cannot “have the president of the United States state as a matter of policy that there is a loophole or an exception where we would sanction torture.” He then shifted, in the very same breath, to state that “there are going to be all sorts of hypotheticals, an emergency situation, and I will make that judgment at that time.” In other words, he wants to preserve the very same loophole for which he lambastes President Bush.
Topics: pols
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 8:54 pm on Friday, November 2, 2007
5 Responses to “Stop It, That Tickles”
Leave a Reply
Trackback URLYou must be logged in to post a comment.
November 2nd, 2007 at 11:18 pm
Obama is in no way ready for prime time. He probably thinks the Comfy Chair will be enough to get information out of the toughest Jihadist. Hey, it worked for the Spanish Inquisition didn’t it?
November 3rd, 2007 at 1:28 am
Today, Obama made a statement that he would invite Ahminmypajamas to tea for a face to face. I’m sure he will speak to him harshly as he throws carrots at him.
This is not a serious person.
November 3rd, 2007 at 1:43 am
But Saltydog, he’s as serious about running for the Democratic nomination as anyone can be. Unfortunately he’s not as serious about the defense of this country as he should be, but neither is any of his peers. We exclude Lieberman because he’s not running for the spot. We exclude Scoop Jackson because he’s dead and no longer showing himself as an example for the party.
November 3rd, 2007 at 2:27 pm
Oh, MikeH, I know he’s serious about running. Running is everything. Regardless.
One of my very favorite things about Free Speech is that people are perfectly free to stand up in front of everybody and show themselves for who they truly are. Most of them don’t realize this is what they are doing, of course, since they’ve gone to great pains to hide the character of their souls, while ignoring what that says about their character.
November 4th, 2007 at 11:12 pm
But Mike H, Lieberman is no longer a Democrat, having been purged from the Party for excessive loyalty to the United States of America.