Ted Cruz thinks Bush torture memo is US law: [View all]

[yurbud]

To set up an interview with a former Abu Ghraib interrogator who wrote a confessional book, Amy Goodman on Democracy Now played clips of Donald Trump and Ted Cruz answering whether waterboarding is torture.

Trump, as usual said he would do much worse.

Ted Cruz' answer surprised me, not in that he approved of torture, but that he used the Bush era torture memo definition of torture as if it were the law of the land.

SEN. TED CRUZ: Well, under the definition of torture, no, it’s not. Under the law, torture is excruciating pain that is equivalent to losing—losing organs and systems. So, under the definition of torture, it is not. It is enhanced interrogation, it is vigorous interrogation, but it does not meet the generally recognized definition of torture.

http://www.democracynow.org/2016/4/7/a_torturer_s_confession_former_abu

From John Dean's article on the torture memo:

The memo defines torture so narrowly that only activities resulting in "death, organ failure or the permanent impairment of a significant body function" qualify.

http://writ.corporate.findlaw.com/dean/20050114.html

The Army's own Interrogation Manual has a pretty simple rule of thumb for figuring out if something is torture:

If your contemplated actions were perpetrated by the enemy against US Prisoners of War, you would believe such actions violate international or US law.

http://fas.org/irp/doddir/army/fm34-52.pdf

You would think the son of a pastor might be familiar with the concept of "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."