The Political Chase

Giuliani on Torture

Last night, Rudy Giuliani was asked in a Davenport, Iowa town-hall meeting if he considered waterboarding to be torture. This is his response.

Well, I’m not sure it is either. I’m not sure it is either. It depends on how it’s done. It depends on the circumstances. It depends on who does it. I think the way it’s been defined in the media, it shouldn’t be done. The way in which they have described it, particularly in the liberal media. So I would say, if that’s the description of it, then I can agree, that it shouldn’t be done. But I have to see what the real description of it is. Because I’ve learned something being in public life as long as I have. And I hate to shock anybody with this, but the newspapers don’t always describe it accurately.

An unbelievable answer.

This guy is a top tier GOP candidate for President of the United States and will not make a simple statement to repudiate torture of every kind instead of attempting to get into a linguist’s spin of words?

This put-off on the media is dodging at its best. The media has not twisted the fundamental aspect of waterboarding. And if it had described multiple methods of waterboarding, which may be true, the end result is the same. This is how the NYT described waterboarding in a January 13, 2005 article.

Among the procedures approved by the [August 2002 "torture memo"] was waterboarding, in which a subject is made to believe he might be drowned.

Does it really matter whether the interrogator has the individual in a backwards-reclining position pouring water over his face from a Bacharach crystal pitcher or has a fire hose shoved up his or her nose? The end result is the same.