Courting Disaster: How the CIA Kept America Safe and How Barack Obama Is Inviting the Next Attack by Marc Thiessen

Author:Marc Thiessen
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Tags: 21st Century, Political Science, Terrorism, Political Ideologies, Government policy, Political Freedom & Security, Government, Executive Branch, Political Ideologies - General, Intelligence service, September 11 Terrorist Attacks, Current Events, International Relations, National security, Political Freedom & Security - Intelligence, International Security, History, United States, Presidents & Heads of State, Intelligence, General, 2001, Biography & Autobiography, Politics
ISBN: 9781596986039
Publisher: Regnery Publishing
Published: 2010-01-18T05:00:00+00:00

OFTEN: 15 percent SOMETIMES: 34 percent RARELY: 22 percent NEVER: 25 percent

Pew combines the "often justified" with "sometimes justified" to tabulate those in favor, and "rarely justified" with "never justified" to tabulate those opposed. This is standard practice in the polling business, but in this case, it is unintentionally misleading. When someone answers "rarely justified," they are saying that they could envision a circumstance in which they would support the use of enhanced interrogation techniques (in fact, they are saying they would support the use of outright torture). When someone answers "never justified," they are saying there is no circumstance whatsoever in which they would support the use of such techniques.

Moreover, the reality is that enhanced interrogation techniques were used "rarely." Of the tens of thousands of individuals captured in the war on terror, only about thirty terrorists were subjected to enhanced interrogation techniques of any kind, and just three were subjected to waterboarding. So "rarely justified" is the answer that most closely approximates what actually took place.

How can a description of American policy (save the fact that the question refers to "torture" rather than the lawful techniques the CIA employed) be counted as opposition to American policy?

In fact, the Pew Poll actually shows that 71 percent of Americans support the enhanced interrogation of terrorists, while 25 percent oppose such interrogations. Indeed, it appears that 49 percent of Americans would be willing to accept the use of enhanced interrogation techniques more frequently than they were actually employed.

I asked Andy Kohut, the Director of the Pew Research Center, why Pew breaks down the poll the way they do. He told me, "You could argue that that's a typical way you would organize poll questions, but you have to take into account what this question is saying, and that is, if you want to say, `Are you anti-torture?' it's the 25 percent who say, `Under no circumstances."' He adds, "You get 16 percent who say, `Often,' which is a surprising number, but you get only 25 percent who say, `No, never."'

The bottom line, Kohut says, is that "there's been consistent support for the use of torture under some circumstances in dealing with terrorist suspects. It's not that a large percentage of people embrace this, or like it, but there's a willingness to accept it under certain conditions.... The public has not been reluctant to deal pretty strongly with terrorists. "36

The same pattern is clear in other polls. A November 2005 Newsweek/Princeton poll found that Americans said enhanced interrogations should be employed: "often," 17 percent; "sometimes," 27 percent; "rarely," 18 percent; and "never," 33 percentfor a total of 62 percent in favor and 33 percent opposed.37 And a December 2005 Associated Press/Ipsos poll gave three options and found that 23 percent of Americans said enhanced interrogations should be used "sometimes"; 38 percent that is should be used "rarely"; and 36 percent thought it should "never" be used-for a total of 61 percent in favor and 36 percent opposed.36 (It is worth noting that

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