Shocking vote

President Bush vetoed a bill that would have explicitly prohibited the agency from using interrogation methods like waterboarding.

Waterboarding is a form of torture that consists of immobilizing a person on their back with the head inclined downward (the Trendelenburg position), and pouring water over the face and into the breathing passages. Through forced suffocation and inhalation of water, the subject experiences the process of drowning and is made to believe that death is imminent.

The United Nations' Report of the Committee Against Torture (Thirty-fifth Session of November 2006) stated that state parties should abolish any interrogation techniques, such as waterboarding, that constitutes torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment. All nations that are signatory to the United Nations Convention Against Torture have agreed they are subject to the explicit prohibition on torture under any condition.

Moreover,Steven G. Bradbury, acting head of the US Department of Justice (DOJ) Office of Legal Counsel, on February 14, 2008 testified:

“There has been no determination by the Justice Department that the use of waterboarding, under any circumstances, would be lawful under current law.”

Moreover, the Third Geneva Convention and Fourth Geneva Convention agree not to torture protected persons (POWs and enemy civilians) in armed conflicts.

Nonetheless, Senator John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, who has been an outspoken opponent of torture, supported the administration’s position, arguing as Mr. Bush did Saturday that the legislation would have limited the C.I.A.’s ability to gather intelligence.

One has to ask again, what give President Bush the right to be above the law?

Doesn’t his action make the United States less save? Terrorist will now argue, if the most powerful country in the world does not have to obey international laws, why should we restrain ourselves in our actions.

Moreover, through this veto President Bush who said, "We have no higher responsibility than stopping terrorist attacks,” provoked actually terrorists such as Al Qaeda even more. His action proves to Al Qaeda that the United States is out to dominate the world under any circumstances.

Torture is counterproductive on all fronts