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With all of the debate on whether this country had an official policy to torture detainees or not, none of the debate has been more ridiculous than whether the act of waterboarding constitutes torture. Well, we finally have on video one of those folks who thought that it was only a form of "dunking" in a pool:

After a measly 6 seconds of this torture, he bails on the experiment, catches his breath and says,

"It is way worse than I thought it would be, and that's no joke." He added: "Had I known that it was that bad I wouldn't have done this ... I don't want to say this: absolutely torture."

Could it be as simple as what Josh Marshall says?

The upshot is that the guy goes into it in cocky Hannity mode and then after maybe 5 or 6 seconds he struggles up and he's converted, claiming it's "absolutely torture", that he never realized it was that bad, etc.

Now, here's the thing. I'm genuinely surprised that he was was surprised that it was that bad. I'm not saying that for effect. Muller really seemed to think it was like getting dunked by your friend in a pool or something. Just factually, everyone who knows anything about this says that it's horrific and you pretty much instantly feel like you're drowning and at the edge of death. And it's a physiological response. So even if you've gone through it ten times and know rationally that you don't die, it doesn't matter. You're instantly put back into the mental space of drowning and being at the edge of death.

I must confess that when I see Hannity or the rest of these guys saying it's no big deal and it's not torture, I kind of figured they're playing semantic games and essentially saying 'I don't care what we do to evil Muslim terrorist bad guys.' Hang them from them toes, waterboard them, whatever, who cares? I don't agree with that. It's hideous. But I understand it. But here it turns out they're just completely ignorant, just haven't been paying attention. Just in the purest factual sense have no idea what they're talking about.

So, can we please just move on and accept that this country had an official policy of torture from 2002 - 2008 and move on? Granted, coming right after 9/11 it might have been easier to look the other way, since our gut feeling is that torture works (it doesn't). But there is, nonetheless, the little issue of bringing to justice those who made torture the official policy of the USA.

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