"Yet again, Rivkin starts with a concession and a pivot – torture is unacceptable, but it’s wrong to call American interrogation policy torture (for some reason), and the real question is how much pain and suffering one can legally inflict on a prisoner."

Creating an argument where one didn't exist before, just to take the attention away from where the discussion should be, is a trademark of people like Rivkin and Rove.

But I'm beginning to agree with Rivkin's point of view. I think there are some rare cases where torture is warranted. For example, if Rivkin himself was whisked away in the middle of the night, taken to some undisclosed location and tortured endlessly for days and days and days... I think, instead of rushing in and saving him immediately, we really should have a national discussion on whether it would be feasible to do so. I think it would only be fair to give his torturers the benefit of doubt - just as Rivkin is giving the Bush administration.

I can say with all honesty, if I were in charge of such a scenario, that asshole would be left on his own.

Thanks to bastards like Rivkin, the waters of discourse have been muddied so badly, it will be decades before America can ever again be referred to as that shiny city on the hill.