..nor any other republican so far as I can tell.
One question that actually shook Cheney if mini facial 'tells' mean anything.
Cheney failed to disguise his dissembling when Chuck Todd sort of asked this question of Cheney.
A question has been bugging me since hearing it voiced and after reading this article. I'd heard it asked before of republicans but not very directly and not without escapes provided allowing Cheney or any other republican to worm their way out of the question.
Chuck Todd, unfortunately and not unexpectedly provided the out for Cheney, then allowed Cheney air time to spread his untruths to the nation as he did here September 14, 2003 in an Interview with Tim Russert (MTP full transcript)
Five questions Chuck Todd should ask Dick Cheney on Sunday by Paul Waldman | December 11, 2014
Of those five important questions is this one that needs immediate asking and answering - imo:
Cheney should be asked directly if he thinks other countries should also start using these techniques. That would apply to our allies, but it could also apply to less friendly countries like China or Russia. And of course, the natural follow-up is:
If an American is captured in some conflict and is subjected to things like waterboarding and stress positions, would Cheney tell that person that not only hadn’t he been tortured, but he had been treated in a safe and legal manner?
Here is a link to the full transcript of
Meet the Press. Sunday December 14, 2014
Note: the videos @ the link above and other sites I've looked into have been clipped and do not include this question and non-answer. It is also not the central question that the MSM has chosen to "debate" about"
CHUCK TODD:
So if an American citizen is water-boarded by ISIS are we going to try to prosecute for war crimes?
DICK CHENEY:
He's not likely to be waterboarded, he's likely to have his head cut off. It's not a close call.
Chuck Todd:
If another country captures a U.S. soldier, the Iranian regime, water boards..
Cheney:
Chuck, he..
(OVERTALK)
CHUCK TODD:
--is that going to be an accepted?
DICK CHENEY:
--you're trying to come up now with hypothetical situations. Waterboarding, the way we did it, was, in fact, not torture. Now when you're dealing with terrorists, the likes of Al Qaeda or the ISIS, I haven't seen them water board anybody. What they did is cut their heads off. What they did to 3,000 Americans on 9/11, that was brutal, bloody murder.
It absolutely can't be compared with what we did with respect to our enhanced interrogation program.
And yet Cheney does make exactly that deceptive comparison, after Chuck Todd's questioning took up Cheney's framing of it
So now that Cheney has skirted the issue without answering, Chuck Todd then follows Cheney's diversion (by using Cheney's ISIS and 9/11 as the example and no other instance as a possibility where use of torture could be in question) into more story telling allowing Cheney to take the lead with Todd following, but not before Chuck Todd asks Cheney this:
Now there is an implication here that you, yourself, were misled by the C.I.A.
Which a competent journalist seeking answers might consider a good way to corner a dishonest person being interviewed. But instead Todd let's it go with more soft ball blah blah blah.
# # #
So this is a very important question that we Dems should continue hammering every war crime apologists on the right with - imo - Is torture okay but only if it is done by Americans to the "others"?
The MSM doesn't seem all that interested in forcing republicans, especially Cheney, to answer this question; and when it does get touched upon it is nearly always using the ISIS decapitation with 9/11 (Cheney's false ties/construct) as the "comparison" making way for republicans like Cheney to bloviate and gripe about the 'ridiculously unfair comparison'..
..A comparison/framing, that republicans themselves, including, neo-cons, torture apologists and war mongers, have purposefully set up
How many neo-con war criminals and their apologists would also "do it again in a minute?" unless we Dems hammer this question and demand answers?
Better yet, there should be national and international prosecution for war crimes. let courts decide these questions.