This man makes so much sense it just astounds me. We hardly ever see this kind of public integrity anymore.

Waterboarding is torture. It’s not simulated torture, it is real torture.

We live at a time where Americans, completely uninformed by an incurious media and enthralled by vengeance-based fantasy television shows like “24”, are actually cheering and encouraging such torture as justifiable revenge for the September 11 attacks. Having been a rescuer in one of those incidents and personally affected by both attacks, I am bewildered at how casually we have thrown off the mantle of world-leader in justice and honor. Who we have become? Because at this juncture, after Abu Ghraieb and other undignified exposed incidents of murder and torture, we appear to have become no better than our opponents.

With regards to the waterboard, I want to set the record straight so the apologists can finally embrace the fact that they condone and encourage torture.

He goes on to make the following points:

1. Waterboarding is absolutely torture.

2. It’s not a simulation because water really does go into the victim’s lungs. It causes death by drowning.

3. Supporting its use on anyone means supporting its use on Americans.

4. Torture does not work as a means of collecting good intelligence. Victims will say anything to make the torture stop.

Who is this guy?

In a further embarrassment for Mr Bush yesterday, Malcolm Nance, an advisor on terrorism to the US departments of Homeland Security, Special Operations and Intelligence, publicly denounced the practice. He revealed that waterboarding is used in training at the US Navy’s Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape School in San Diego, and claimed to have witnessed and supervised “hundreds” of waterboarding exercises. Although these last only a few minutes and take place under medical supervision, he concluded that “waterboarding is a torture technique – period”.

It appears that Mr. Nance has caused a bit of a kerfluffle in Bushworld, and CIA Director Michael Hayden had to try and tamp it all down by saying that waterboarding has only been used a few times. I mean, come on people. What’s the big deal? But Michael Mukasey, Bush’s nominee for AG, is having to answer for it too. And he refuses to say whether he thinks it’s illegal.

Instead, he called the technique “repugnant to me” and promised to investigate further if he was confirmed in the job. [meaningless] He explained that he could not say yet whether the practice was illegal because he had not been briefed on the secret methods of US interrogators and he did not want to put the CIA officers who used it in “personal legal jeopardy”. [dodge]

Which is simply to say that he has no intention of answering that question because Bush has no intention of stopping torture. Next week we find out whether he gets the job.

Many, many additional links re: torture can be found after Nance’s post.