Scalia Defends CIA Torture Tactics After Torture Report
The conservative Supreme Court justice says sometimes it might be necessary
Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia said in a new interview that the use of harsh interrogation techniques now widely condemned as torture might not be unconstitutional.
The 78-year-old jurist, part of the court’s conservative wing, said the there’s nothing in the constitution that prohibits harsh treatment of terror suspects.
His remarks came during an interview with a Swiss radio station that aired Thursday, the Associated Press reports. They followed the release of a Senate report the faulted the CIA for lying to the Bush White House and to Congress about the methods and their effectiveness.
Scalia pointed to the oft-cited “ticking time bomb” argument, saying it would be difficult to rule out the use of torture to get information from terror suspects if millions of lives were at stake, and said he doesn’t “think it’s so clear at all” that such tactics should be prohibited in all cases.
The conservative Supreme Court justice says sometimes it might be necessary
Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia said in a new interview that the use of harsh interrogation techniques now widely condemned as torture might not be unconstitutional.
The 78-year-old jurist, part of the court’s conservative wing, said the there’s nothing in the constitution that prohibits harsh treatment of terror suspects.
His remarks came during an interview with a Swiss radio station that aired Thursday, the Associated Press reports. They followed the release of a Senate report the faulted the CIA for lying to the Bush White House and to Congress about the methods and their effectiveness.
MORE: What the torture report reveals about Zero Dark Thirty
Scalia pointed to the oft-cited “ticking time bomb” argument, saying it would be difficult to rule out the use of torture to get information from terror suspects if millions of lives were at stake, and said he doesn’t “think it’s so clear at all” that such tactics should be prohibited in all cases.
Denver Nicks, 12 Dec 2014 Taken From TIME
[AP]
Cp4ab0lishm3nt's Blog 
Dick Cheney on CIA Interrogations Order: ‘I’d Do It Again in a Minute’
Former Vice President appears on Meet the Press
Former Vice President Dick Cheney fiercely defended the CIA’s brutal, post-9/11 interrogation tactics on Sunday, days after the release of a controversial Senate report into the practices.
In a Meet the Press interview, Cheney, who has spoken in favor of the so-called enhanced interrogation program more than any other Bush administration official, said he has no qualms about seeing the order given again.
“I’d do it again in a minute,” he told NBC’s Chuck Todd.
The former Vice President was sharply critical of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence’s report, which was concluded in 2012 and partially declassified last week. It found that the interrogation practices were not effective, while the CIA maintains their efficacy is “unknowable.”
“It worked,” Cheney maintained. “It absolutely worked.”
He drew a distinction between the report’s graphic description of “rectal feedings” and other tactics like waterboarding, which he maintained are not torture.
“What was done here was not one of the techniques approved,” Cheney said, adding that he believed it was carried out for medical reasons. At least five detainees were subjected to rectal rehydration or feeding, according to the report. “We made certain going forward we were not violating the law,” he continued.
Cheney said he was unconcerned by the report’s findings that more than two dozen detainees were found to be wrongfully held, including a mentally challenged man: “I’m more concerned with the bad guys that were released than the few that were innocent.”
He lauded the agency’s interrogators, who have come under renewed fire in the wake of the report’s release. “I’m perfectly comfortable that they should be praised,” he said. “They should be decorated.”
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