Torture for fun and profit
Last week, Coulter expressed support for torture. On a September 20th broadcast of The Jon Caldara Show, Coulter said:
I'm for torture… We need a referendum in America on whether Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the mastermind of 9-11… I want a referendum among Americans on whether or not he should be tortured. I think he should be given waterboarding on days that he's good. And I think Americans would agree with me.
Coulter apparently feels qualified to not just rewrite the Geneva Convention but — even worse — ignore it completely so she can exact a revenge that establishes her as the kind of person who made the Convention necessary in the first place.
The depth of what Coulter said may not be immediately clear. Consider that this week, Congress and the White House are trying to work out an agreement on rules for what "harsh interrogation methods" the CIA can use when questioning captives. Whether these harsh methods constitute torture or not is part of the debate. Coulter seems to think that these methods, at least waterboarding, does constitute torture. In this exchange with Caldara, she supports its use.
But what the torture bill covers is whether the CIA can use these methods to interrogate prisoners, to force them to give up (and even fabricate) information to make the pain stop. Coulter is talking about using it as a form of punishment. That's where the true moral depravity of what she is suggesting lies.
Although no less deplorable for it, using torture to extract information for the sake of a "greater good" is understandable. Using torture just to make someone scream is sadism.
Source:
- "Coulter to Caldara: 'I'm for torture.'" Colorado Media Matters. September 25, 2006.
[...] Coulter continues to advocate torture of American prisoners. This is a viewpoint she has held previously, calling for its use a few weeks ago on the Jon Caldera Show. In her column this week [LINK], she criticizes Matt Lauer for questioning President Bush about waterboarding. While normal people would be happy if we were using cattle prods on the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, Lauer was testy about the possible use of waterboarding against him. [...]
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