Mukasey

The president of the Uninted States continues to violate the constitution he swore to uphold in torturing prisoners. He has asked congress to replace his former torture-enabler, the embattled Gonzales, with a new puppet, Robert Mukasey. When Mukasey went before the Senate, he would not say that waterboarding is torture. Waterboarding is torture. Mukasey has publicly expressed his willingness to allow Bush to continue torturing, to continue breaking international treatries in violation of the constitution.

Charles Schumer, a senior democrat, is now supporting Mukasey's confirmation based on a private conversation he had with Mukasey. What's his rationale? He says that Mukasey agreed with a hypothetical: if Congress were to pass legistation saying that waterboarding is torture, then it would not be out-of-line with its constitutionally granted powers and the President wouldn't have any recourse (except of course, to veto the bill).

The logic here is tortured. Schumer seems to think this consession is a hat-tip to the separation-of-powers provisions of the constitution. When did the constitution need consessions made to it?

Moreover, its a circuitous consession. It makes congress do much more work than it needs to! Congress does not need to say that waterboarding is torture. Legal precident and human decency defines it as torture. Worst of all, if congress were to legistlate that waterboarding is torture, then it effectively grants immunity to water-boarders up until this point: "Oh, I just water boarded that guy because it wasn't illegal at the time."

Schumer is doing a grave disservice to the anit-torture camp. Why is toture so hard to stand against?