Making Sense of Cheney's Madness

~

The seeming irrationality behind the George W. Bush administration’s “against the grain” (and the law) policies on torture, warrantless domestic surveillance, and now notification of Congress about CIA covert operations was not irrational at all.

Most experts say that torture is counterproductive because the subject will tell the interrogator what he or she wants to hear to stop the pain and because many military people say that it merely revs up the opposition, gives them no incentive to surrender, and gives them every incentive to torture U.S. military personnel.

Yet in the face of this mountain of authoritative opinion and the policy’s clear violation of international law and a U.S. criminal statute against torture, the Bush administration gleefully did it anyway.

~