With patriots like former Air Force interrogator Matthew Alexander (a pseudonym because he is still in the reserves) saying that he has come to the conclusion that torture makes us less safe because he has personally seen that it used as Al Qaeda's number one recruiting tool, it makes no sense when Obama reiterates the "looking forward not looking back" soundbite as he did today, and says things like:
"I do worry about this getting so politicized that we cannot function effectively and it hampers our ability to carry out critical national security operations."
According to someone who has actually interrogated prisoners, airing this out and cleaning house does not "hamper" national security, but enhances it. Alexander says:
"I learned in Iraq that the No. 1 reason foreign fighters flocked there to fight were the abuses carried out at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. "
These are the hardcore who will wind up slipping across the Mexican border to carry out attacks on us.
Obama is implicitly endorsing the "ticking bomb" scenario, which places him in a direct contradiction. If he has banned the use of these methods, which he repeatedly states, but he admits that they have value in carrying out "critical national security operations," then he is open, rightly, to the charge from the Limbaugh crowd that he is disarming America, by his own admission.
He is obviously trying to play it cute and to stake out a middle ground. There is no middle ground to torture. Either it works, and we have to do it, or it doesn't,and we must never do it. There are many issues where it is right and wise to stake out a middle ground. This is not one of them.
Mathew Alexander