tom_thinks

As time goes on Americans are slowly becoming aware that there has been systematic and widespread abuses concerning military prisoners. The indefinite detentions, lack of legal counsel, sexual humiliation, and even torture have forced many Americans to question the acceptable boundaries for the governments power. Many people, including some in my office, have tried to claim that torture could be justified under certain circumstances. Hypothetical questions arise like "What if there was a nuclear bomb in New York City, set go off and only this terrorist knew how to stop it. Could you torture him?" The guy in my office who asked that question of me obviously said the answer was yes. Fred Hiatt writes in the Washington Post

It's a useful challenge to critics of the administration. There is a danger of complacency as Sept. 11 recedes, and anyone who pretends that the answer on torture is easy probably has never borne the burden of protecting the nation from attack.
But I think something more than the passage of time has happened since we asked ourselves the is-torture-ever-justified question nearly three years ago. We're beginning to see that it may not be possible, once you accept the moral legitimacy of torture, to limit it to those rare circumstances that we may have had in mind. And this is not because there will always be a few sadists or bad apples who push the limits. It's because there will be many good apples, true patriots, who believe they have an obligation to take every step legally available to them to fulfill their duty and protect their country.
Imagine, for example, that you are a general in Iraq, watching as several of your soldiers are killed or maimed every day by roadside bombs. You are frustrated by how little you know about the enemy and by how little you are learning from prisoners you have captured. In the old days -- that is, before the second Bush administration -- you nonetheless knew that you could not subject prisoners to 'force, mental torture, threats . . . [or] inhumane treatment of any kind,' as a Defense Department analysis of interrogation law explained a year ago. But if, suddenly, the old rules do not apply, can you responsibly not threaten your prisoners with dogs or shackle them to bedposts, if there's a chance it may save American lives?

And so the cycle of violence continues. The victims become the perpetrators once again. The policies, guidelines and actions of the Bush Administration have not only allowed for, but encouraged abuse.
Hiatt goes on

After Sept. 11, many of us might have answered the letter writer's question by saying: Yes, there may be a time, an exceptional case, when the president should assume responsibility and give an order to torture a prisoner to save thousands of lives. It would be an awesome responsibility, and maybe it would be wrong, but those are the choices leaders must face.
Instead, we see a president who ducks responsibility and gives lawyers' answers. And the difficult choices are kicked down the chain of command, where they do not belong.

While I've never been in such a situation and I'm unlikely to ever have to make a decision authorizing torture, I believe the key phrase in that statement is "assume responsibility." Assuming responsibility means accepting the consequences of authorizing an illegal action. If the president were to indeed authorize torture he should assume responsibility and resign, possibly serving prison time. If the president truly felt that the benefit of saving lives justified committing torture, then surely resigning from office and standing trial before a court would also be justified. This does not appear to be the way Bush & Co. are handling this. I agree with Hiatt that they are ducking responsibility; but they also seem to have authorize illegal treatment and possibly torture in many more instances then the 'exceptional case.' Further, these policies have eroded the moral character of the military forcing them into a situation where not performing these techniques of abuse translates to not doing all they can to protect American lives.
For more on the torture scandal read this. It includes links to the memos and the testimony of the ever-dodgy Attorney General, John Ashcroft (who should be held in contempt of congress for his refusal to release these memos).