The other night. Keith Olbermann on MSNBC’s Countdown (watch ‘Waterboarding IS torture’) succinctly showed that the torture technique of waterboarding is clearly illegal under federal law.

But let me approach its legality from the back end. What if Al-Qaeda or Iran were waterboarding our captured GIs? Would the United States consider that torture and a violation of international law and the Geneva Conventions?

I think we all know that the answer would be yes. If the perpetrators were captures, you know that our nation would pursue charges against them as war criminals.

And I think this is where Arizona U.S. Senator, Presidential candidates, and former P.O.W. John McCain is coming from. How can the United States complain about treatment of its servicemen and women in captivity if we are doing things to others’ prisoners that we would consider illegal?

And yes, I know there’s the who “combatant” v. “non-combatant” issue.

But should that matter?

Clearly, waterboarding is a violation of the 8th Amendment to the United States Constitution. It is cruel and unusual punishment. We would never allow the police or prisons to perpetrate such torture on convicts or criminal defendants, no matter what their crimes.

In the arc of history, it has become clear that civilized nations and people do not torture, no matter how noble the reasons. The United States used to stand for that proposition as well. And it is not as if our nation hasn’t been gravely threatened before.

What has our nation become under nearly seven years of outlaw Bush rule? A nation that denies its own legacy of civil liberties that has been a guiding force to much of the rest of the world.

(Cross-posted to SD Watch and SDW @ KELOLAND.com.)

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Technorati Tags: torture, waterboarding, Geneva conventions, United States Constituion, Eighth Amendment, Keith Olbermann, Sen. John McCain, Iraq, Al-Qaeda

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