"These Are People Who Want to Kill Your Families"

Little Green Footballs has a video post of Matt Lauer interviewing President Bush, in the Oval Office, on Friday, September 8, 2006.  Lauer essentially blows a once in a lifetime chance to allow the President of the United States to explain to the American people exactly the what and why of the  GWOT.  Lauer, who is given the opportunity to stand face to face with the President, blows the whole interview because he gets hung up on whether or not "alternative methods to extract information from a suspected terrorist" is "within the law".  Essentially, Lauer uses this  opportunity for such a rare interview to worry about the rights of the likes of Khalid Sheik Mohamed.  Lauer, who - I repeat- is interviewing the leader of the free world, is most concerned about whether there can be a "blurring of the lines between ourselves and the people we are trying to protect ourselves against" if some terrorist thug and possibly the biggest fish captured in the GWOT is treated to a little non-lethal coercion. 

This video is the pinnacle of the "Gotcha Journalism" of today. Lauer acts like he is trying to play cross examining prosecutor with some petty criminal. "I don't want to let the within the law issue slip," is the best line of questioning that he can come up with.  What a joke! All of it is topped off with the fact the the source of his "violation of the law" is Amnesty International. Well, there is a non-biased group for you! President Bush actually scoffs when Lauer mentions this.

The interview is worth watching just to see President Bush get fired up.  Frankly, I would run it as a campaign video. As President Bush explained and Lauer and others just don't get, "These are people who want to kill your families." President Bush states that he is doing everything within the law (that is our law) to extract information from the people who are trying to kill us and Lauer is worried that a little water boarding of a mass murderer may ruin the Republic. Get a life. I sleep better at night knowing that harder men than Matt Lauer are guarding our freedoms.

Attitudes, like those held by Lauer, are why every single American who watched the towers collapse, whether they admit it or not,were silently thankful that we did not have a President Al Gore. I hope that when we catch other mutts like Khalid Sheik Mohamed that we do more than water boarding to protect our citizens. What kind of "holier than though" attitude would the Matt Lauer's of the world have if Mohamed Atta had been caught on 9/10/01 and the federal government knew that there was some  plot in the making but did nothing "coercive" to get the information?

Actually, I am glad that President Bush didn't tell Lauer what we do to the prisoners because the thought of what we do is probably a lot worse than what we actually do.  In Afghanistan the threat of sending a prisoner to GITMO was one of the greatest coercive tools they had until the terrorist learned that they were not being thrown into the pits of hell. The terrorist adapted to the various techniques that were used and the interrogators had to change tactics.  Often these men that we capture have actually tortured, killed, and otherwise beaten the crap out of those opposed to them.  They know first hand the definition of torture because they have meted it out to others.  The threat of torture, as they understand it, is a lot worse than anything that we would ever do.  If President Bush actually told Lauer the limitations placed on our acts it would probably make getting caught by the US seem like a pleasure cruise to many of the Johnny Jihads. 

Regardless, Lauer, whom I am sure is very smug and thinks that he asked the tough questions, actually allowed his distaste for the policies of President Bush and of the Iraq war to ruin the chance of a fine and worthwhile interview. President Bush, on the other hand, handled him up just fine.

Comments

[seapal]

A President is doing secret stuff. We know it's legal because _he says_ that _lawyers_ looked at it. It's secret "so the enemy can't adapt" to waterboarding. You said this is protecting our freedom? Our freedom is from our rights. This kind of action is conducive to eroding those rights, to a government doing whatever they want, and we having no choice but to trust them and submit. I'm sure people like Saddam also said what they were doing was legal, and necessary to protect people from dangers. But that's not freedom they're protecting. Secrecy will only erode real freedom.