Trump, CIA, and torture: surrendering our moral authority | Editorial

The free world once regarded the President of the United States as a beacon of humanity. He was merely mortal, but when applied properly, his governance could obliterate tyranny and shake empires. FDR called the job "pre-eminently a place of moral leadership. All our great presidents were leaders of thought, at times when certain historic ideas in the life of the nation had to be clarified."

To our everlasting bewilderment, the moral leadership has fallen upon a man who admires dictators, undermines allies, empowers bigots, devalues truth, demonizes immigrants, ignores atrocities, punishes the weak and debases women.

And now Donald Trump, moral barometer to the free world, seeks to appoint a sadist and likely war criminal to run the CIA, which further degrades America's standing as the world's champion of human rights.

His designee is Gina Haspel, who ordered the torture of detainees such as Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri when she ran a CIA dark site in Thailand.

And to make sure that she'd never be held accountable for her role in one of the most disgraceful episodes in our country's history, Haspel ordered the destruction of the videotapes of these enhanced interrogations in 2005.

It's unclear whether there are 50 votes in the Senate to confirm her pending nomination, but this is clear: The 525-page report from the Senate Intelligence Committee summarizing the CIA's post-9/11 detention program said Haspel's crew used waterboarding, walling, rectal rehydration, close-confinement, and other depraved forms of torture.

Since then, CIA whistleblower John Kiriakou said that Haspel tortured because she "enjoyed doing it....just for the sake of torture, not for the sake of gathering information."

And even though the CIA cables showed she was clearly in charge, her defenders use the "Nuremberg defense," suggesting that Haspel was merely following orders just like the best Nazis did. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky) was the first to torpedo that argument: "There's a point (when) someone asks you to torture someone that you should say no," he said.

Yet all that matters little to Trump, who said during the 2016 campaign that he would "absolutely authorize" torture, even beyond waterboarding, "and believe me, it will be effective." Nor does it matters if results of torture were inconsequential, because "even if it doesn't work, they deserve it."

Trump learned the laws of war during his five years at a military academy. They were included in the Geneva Conventions and the Convention against Torture, which imposed unconditional bans on all forms of cruel and inhumane treatment of enemy combatants and categorized any such conduct as a war crime.

Clearly, the lessons didn't take, because he thinks someone who practices cruel and inhumane treatment is qualified to run the world's most powerful intelligence agency.

This sends a dangerous message to the rest of the world, which already knows what Trump represents.

A Gallup poll from January hung a lantern on it: Median approval of U.S. leadership is now 30 percent, down from 48 percent before Trump took office. Approval of the U.S. has dropped by double digits in 65 countries, including by 40 points in Canada, Norway, and Belgium.

Haspel's confirmation will neither reverse those numbers nor comfort our allies.

Sometimes a nation's leaders are so blinded by adversaries they cannot see that our moralism casts a long and dark shadow. As Kurt Vonnegut wrote toward the end of Vietnam, "our illusion of purity has become our curse today."

Now we have a president who is fine with torture, even promoting those who practice it. It is a sign that we have abandoned our moral authority, and the Senate confirmation vote will determine whether we have any interest in its restoration.

Bookmark NJ.com/Opinion. Follow on Twitter @NJ_Opinion and find NJ.com Opinion on Facebook.

If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.