It's probably no surprise Dick Cheney is still defending waterboarding as legitimate. Of one thing we have become certain - Cheney is a dangerous man. Only 10 more days, then to the scrapheap of history.
In the recent presidential election, thankfully John McCain and Barack Obama were in full agreement on at least one thing: America does not torture. Decent Americans - Republican and Democratic alike - all agree on this point. And make no mistake: waterboarding IS torture, despite Cheney's, Bush's and John Yoo's (author of the infamous DOJ torture memo) lame protestations to the contrary. If it walks like a duck & quacks like a duck....
Cheney's ends-justify-any-means brand of neoconservatism is scarily reminiscent of that of the Nazi political theorist Carl Schmitt, whose theories on broad executive power paved the way for the fascist Adolf Hitler to lead a civilized, highly-cultured nation into committing the most egregious human rights violations in human history. In interpreting the Weimar Constitution, Schmitt argued that the president's power to declare a state of emergency granted him broad, virtually-dictatorial authority. Schmitt justified this expansive executive power as much more efficient and effective than resorting to the comparatively slow processes of legislation. Sound familiar?
Good riddance to Dick Cheney.
