McCain Detainee Amendment / Amendment should be passed
From Discourse DB
Position: Amendment should be passed
This position addresses the topic McCain Detainee Amendment.
For this position
"Interrogations that use techniques like waterboarding often produce unreliable information. And they shred America's image abroad, by putting us in the same category as other big bad oppressors, at exactly the moment we're supposed to be carrying the torch of democracy and freedom."
"Once you're in the torture business, what justification is there for banning (as Krauthammer would) the torture of official prisoners of war, no matter how many innocent lives this might cost? If you are willing to torture a "high level" terrorist in order to save innocent lives, why should you spare a low-level terrorist at the same awful cost?"
"If the point of the U.S. Constitution is the preservation of liberty, the formal incorporation into U.S. law of the state's right to torture--by legally codifying physical coercion, abuse, and even, in Krauthammer's case, full-fledged torture of detainees by the CIA--would effectively end the American experiment of a political society based on inalienable human freedom protected not by the good graces of the executive, but by the rule of law."
Against this position
"As a result, failing to provide Miranda rights is sure to be found by many federal judges to be a form of lawless coercive interrogation that fits within McCain’s prohibition against cruel, unusual, and inhumane treatment."
"In other words, Mr. McCain admits that what lies at the heart of his Amendment is moral hypocrisy: We're supposed to ban rugged interrogation in general to make us feel better about ourselves, but only until such interrogation is required; then do whatever it takes."
From Tortuous Progress, by The Wall Street Journal editorial board (The Wall Street Journal, 13 December 2005) (view)
"That is why the McCain amendment, which by mandating "torture never" refuses even to recognize the legitimacy of any moral calculus, cannot be right. There must be exceptions. The real argument should be over what constitutes a legitimate exception."
"Would McCain supporters not have been so harsh to Zubaida? Never made al-Qahtani stand? And do they want to make it illegal for U.S. interrogators ever again to make the choices they did in these two cases?"
From McCain anti-torture amendment is pure political grandstanding, by Rich Lowry (The Salt Lake Tribune, 16 November 2005) (view)
"It is two parts grandstanding and one part suicide — so, naturally, it has commanded a one-sided (90-9) majority of our grandstanding, suicidal United States Senate, including, dismayingly, over 80 percent of the Republican caucus."
From Say “No” to the McCain Amendment, by Andrew C. McCarthy (National Review, 15 November 2005) (view)
"But what's most troubling is that the amendment likely would be interpreted as a zero-tolerance policy against all effective interrogation techniques, which explains the administration's resistance. After September 11, the president rightly determined that terrorists taken on the battlefield are not enemy combatants and therefore are not under the protections of the Geneva Conventions."
From An empty amendment, by The Washington Times editorial board (The Washington Times, 9 November 2005) (view)
"Far more impressive is the near-unanimous opposition to the McCain effort from commanders currently fighting the war on terror. They understand that the amendment will be interpreted as an unnecessary rebuke, and as a huge disincentive to push detainees hard when seeking information on "ticking bombs.""
From 'A Vietnam Moment', by The Wall Street Journal editorial board (The Wall Street Journal, 30 October 2005) (view)
Mixed on this position
