The American Spectator

Alan Dershowitz remains the voice of sanity for the Democrats on terrorism. His column in the Wall Street Journal is a plea for Democrats to in essence grow up and face hard choices that are needed in the fight against Islamic terrorists. Among his many fine points, he dispenses with the argument that in no case do extraordinary interrogation techniques lead to valuable results. (This is a common contention which McCain makes-- you only get "junk" and people will say anything so these measures are never "worth it.") Dershowitz points out that factually this just isn't true. He writes: "There are some who claim that torture is a nonissue because it never works--it only produces false information. This is simply not true, as evidenced by the many decent members of the French Resistance who, under Nazi torture, disclosed the locations of their closest friends and relatives." Dershowitz implores Democrats to recognize the hard choices and the need that in certain circumstances extreme measures are needed. Turning the focus on the Democrats who opposed Judge Mukasey because he categorically refused to rule out waterboarding in any circumstance he asks: "Would you authorize the use of waterboarding, or other non-lethal forms of torture, if you believed that it was the only possible way of saving the lives of hundreds of Americans in a situation of the kind faced by Israeli authorities on the eve of Yom Kippur? Would you want your president to authorize extraordinary means of interrogation in such a situation? If so, what means? If not, would you be prepared to accept responsibility for the preventable deaths of hundreds of Americans?" Depite the provocative questions and sage advice, I suspect his words are falling on deaf ears.