Torture Yay!

I like to think that not all that long ago this country wasn't so goddamned scared that a presidential candidate who wrote a column promising to use torture would have been rejected overwhelmingly and immediately. But if that was so, it isn't any longer.

Donald Trump promises to use torture:

"I have made it clear in my campaign that I would support and endorse the use of enhanced interrogation techniques if the use of these methods would enhance the protection and safety of the nation. Though the effectiveness of many of these methods may be in dispute, nothing should be taken off the table when American lives are at stake." And he added, "I will do whatever it takes to protect and defend this nation and its people."

And the other Republicans aren't far behind him - they just haven't written columns yet.

At a time like this, I think of Sarah Vowel's words:

Whenever I hear the president mention, oh, every 12 minutes, that his greatest responsibility is "to protect the American people," the insufferable civics robot inside my head mutters: "Actually, sir, your oath, the one with the Bible and the chief justice and the Jumbotron, is to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. For the American people are not mere flesh whose greatest hope is to keep our personal greasy molecules intact; we, sir, are a body politic -- with ideals."

Because once we adopt Trump's position, how are we different from our enemies? Things aren't Good® because We do them and Bad® because They do them.