John Kiriakou — Trump’s Impeachable Offense

But torture isn’t just bad policy. It’s against the law.

First, the federal Torture Act stipulates that if an American soldier, CIA officer, or anybody else acting on behalf of the government waterboards a prisoner, he risks up to 20 years imprisonment. The McCain-Feinstein Amendment Congress passed last year reiterated the ban on torture, including waterboarding.

Second, our country is a signatory to the United Nations Convention Against Torture. Waterboarding a prisoner is against international law and could subject the torturer — or the person ordering or approving the torture — to international sanctions, including prosecution in international courts.

In the early part of the last decade, torture fans in the George W. Bush Justice Department — most infamously in a legal opinion by attorneys John Yoo and Jay Bybee — twisted the law itself into contortions to argue that certain forms of torture were permissible. Al-Qaeda, they said, was a “non-state actor,” not a country. As such, its members should receive none of the protections of international law.

That argument was specious on its face. Absolutely nothing in U.S. law says that there are two sets of rules — one for countries and one for terrorist groups. The law is the law, whether we like it or not — including international conventions adopted by the United States.

Trump is no the only candidate calling for "taking the gloves off." So have Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Carly Fiorina.

John Kiriakou is the only person imprisoned by the US so far in the torture scandal — for blowing the whistle on torturers. 

This is a national disgrace that has cost the US dearly in credibility and soft power.

Truthdig
Trump’s Impeachable Offense
John Kiriakou