Gary Bauer, a former Republican presidential candidate affiliated with several Christian right groups over the years, said the discussion should not come down to "Would Jesus torture?"

"There are a lot of things Jesus wouldn't do because he's the son of God," he said. "I can't imagine Jesus being a Marine or a policeman or a bank president, for that matter. The more appropriate question is, 'What is a follower of Jesus permitted to do?'"

Bauer said the answer is "it depends"—but the moral equation changes when the suspect is not a soldier captured on a battlefield but a terrorist who may have knowledge of an impending attack. He said he does not consider water-boarding—a form of interrogation that simulates drowning—to be torture.

"I think if we believe the person we have can give us information to stop thousands of Americans from being killed, it would be morally suspect to not use harsh tactics to get that information," Bauer said. (emphasis added)

http://tinyurl.com/kspmtz

Your heart string plucking sophistry is weak tea. Maybe the soldiers who did the torturing should have been asking themselves what Jesus would have done then, when they were committing acts of torture and murder, instead of conveniently invoking Jesus' teachings after the fact and applying it to the victims and not the torturers that completely dominated them. It's a little late and a bit more than disingenuous to start quoting Jesus in defense of Empire (of all things). The Empire only crucified him and stuff.

But of course it is easier to ignore Jesus' words when committing amoral acts against others and then opine about the importance of forgiveness from the victims. It is infinitely easier to apply his teachings to others and opine about how others should be forgiving us (like Jesus would!) instead of applying Jesus' teachings to the initial acts of un-Jesus-like torture murder that said forgiveness applies to.

And it's cute how you speak of forgiveness after conveniently giving a moral back door to The Troops. We killed a million Iraqis, and we should expect them to forgive us for it (like the Koreans did, you said), but the soldier that got hit by the IDE occupying and terrorizing a country in the service of the American Empire "can be forgiven not loving their enemies", i.e. are not expected to forgive their enemies like Jesus would, even though the reverse isn't true, i.e. we should expect the Iraqis to forgive us for all we've done.

The hypocrisy of Christian Fakers such as yourself, who fallaciously use Jesus' teachings as an appeal to authority when warmongering, is endless and mind-boggling.

All regulatory oversight for Department of Tarp Czar to be provided by the White House.

But in all seriosity...

Regarding tomorrow's expected release of the C.I.A. report detailing the killing of detainees in U.S. custody...hey, look on the bright side. Maybe at the last minute, our part-time TARP Czar, full-time Presidentialist, and one-time Constitutional professor will step in and suppress the report.

Nothing like a little multi-dimensional chess, after all, to celebrate both the birth, and death, of the idea called America.

As you said before Glenn so perfectly, "Torture is fluid"

The act itself, the reverse engineered rule writings, the appeasement of Congress and the intertwining of the Military and private corporations spreading out the layers of culpability and finally the absolutely feeble, new President beautifully grabbing his ankles. Yeah, Fluid works for me.

"We didn't exterminate them or even try. Let it go."

You know, calamine, the Nazis didn't exterminate your people, either, yet for some reason, there are still some hard feelings.

Have you moved on from that issue? It was a long time ago, should anyone really care anymore?

(Some of the things you post really make me think you're an intentional self-parody.)

If I may put on a homeruk hat for a moment, I'm sure that calling these deaths "natural" makes perfect sense. Labeling them "murder" isn't that important when "natural" works just as well. And sounds better.

After all, if you beat a guy for days and stuff him in a sleeping bag, asphyxiation is a "natural" result. Just like it's "natural" to bleed to death after someone slashes your throat, or punches you in the gut and splits your spleen.

See? There's nothing wrong with calling these murders "natural deaths."

Naturally, murder victims are ALWAYS going to be dead.

Glenn - thanks for your excellent work. The torture scandal must be investigated at the highest levels of government and those responsible (GOP and Democrats alike) must be brought to justice.

This has been coming in the way Americans seem to have accepted waterboarding as not really torture. And if that is not torture, then nothing is, at least that seems to be the way the media, and thus most Americans, look at it.

The whole idea of what torture is has been renamed, smoothed over, accepted, as part of The Way Things Have To Be To Protect Us. It is quite disgusting and disappointing.

I am embarrassed to say that I am an American when this country can treat others this way and then wave it off as though such treatment is acceptable, whether those in custody are criminals or not.

Glenn, I appreciate your writings. They are spot on. They also make my heart hurt for the country that I was once proud of.

http://www.linktv.org/programs/blueprint-for-accountability-working-the-dark-side

I found this worthwhile ... description:

MSNBC host Rachel Maddow launched Culture Project's "Blueprint for Accountability" series on May 31 with a gripping evening on accountability and the U.S. policy of torture in the “War on Terror.” This first episode is titled "Working The Dark Side."

In a multi-media production fusing live theater and journalism, Maddow was joined by Pulitzer-Prize winning author Ron Suskind, Vince Warren of the Center for Constitutional Rights, and Lt. General Ricardo Sanchez, who commanded U.S. troops in Iraq during 2003-2004. The evening, directed by Fisher Stevens, featured performances by Liev Schreiber, John Leguizamo, Noah Emmerich and Julianna Margulies.

A striking bit was that there has been some accountability ... various members of the military have been held accountable. The policymakers? Not so much. Why should some inner city criminal take any grief for breaking the law, when the mighty get away with it? Oh, right. Equal justice is a dream, not a reality.