Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

December 7, 2011

During a recent town hall-style appearance in South Carolina, Newt Gingrich exploited an opportunity for a cheap applause line by saying: ?Waterboarding is by every technical rule not torture?. [U]nder the normal rules internationally it?s not torture.?

Like nearly every other public utterance that escapes Gingrich?s tax-devouring mouth, this statement  displayed a very poor ratio of knowledge to certitude, and at best an indifference to the truth.

When employed by agents of the Spanish Inquisition, it was called ?El tormento de agua? ? Spanish for ?water torture.? U.S. troops who employed it during the occupation of the Philippines were prosecuted for violations of the laws of warfare. Japanese interrogators who used it were executed after WWII as war criminals. It was used extensively by torturers employed by the Communist Khmer Rouge.  It is banned by international conventions, criminal statutes, the Army Field Manual, the Uniform Code of Military Justice, the Eighth Amendment, and by any reasonable understanding of biblical law.

Gingrich, who insists on describing himself as an historian, should be aware of this academically. If he remains unconvinced, Newt can always opt for the hands-on approach and undergo this supposedly legal procedure himself.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.