IP: Torture Seeps Into Discussion by News Media

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/05/business/media/05TORT.html


By JIM RUTENBERG


n many quarters, the Newsweek columnist Jonathan Alter is considered a 
liberal. Yet there he was last week, raising this question:
"In this autumn of anger," he wrote, "even a liberal can find his thoughts 
turning to . . . torture." He added that he was not necessarily advocating 
the use of "cattle prods or rubber hoses" on men detained in the 
investigation into the terrorist attacks. Only, "something to jump-start 
the stalled investigation of the greatest crime in American history."
The column — which ran under the headline "Time to Think About Torture" — 
set off alarm bells at human rights organizations. The sense of alarm was 
heightened because Mr. Alter is just one of a growing number of voices in 
the mainstream news media raising, if not necessarily agreeing with, the 
idea of torturing terrorism suspects or detainees who refuse to talk.
On Thursday night, on the Fox News Channel, the anchor Shepard Smith 
introduced a segment asking, "Should law enforcement be allowed to do 
anything, even terrible things, to make suspects spill the beans? Jon DuPre 
reports. You decide."
One week earlier, on CNN's "Crossfire," the conservative commentator Tucker 
Carlson said: "Torture is bad." But he added: "Keep in mind, some things 
are worse. And under certain circumstances, it may be the lesser of two 
evils. Because some evils are pretty evil."
The legitimacy of torture as an investigative


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