title:  Reporter Gets Bush’s CIA Director To Admit Waterboarding Is Torture Using VERY Clever Trick (VIDEO)
text: George Bush s former CIA director, Michael Hayden, has always had a very uncomfortable position on waterboarding. At times he seems to acknowledge that the technique which, as described by human rights groups, is best summed up as  simulated drowning,  is inhumane and constitutes torture. He recently told Donald Trump (a yuge fan of waterboarding) if he wanted to reinstate the practice that he would have to  bring your own damn bucket  because the CIA  wouldn t go down that road again.  On the other hand, Hayden s tenure as Bush s CIA head meant he oversaw extensive use of the technique on terror suspects. How do you square that round peg? Stunning levels of cognitive dissonance, of course!Hayden was put on the hotseat in an interview with Al Jazeera, in which reporter Mehdi Hasan effortlessly walked through the former intelligence officer s walls of hypocrisy to get at the kernal of truth at the center: Hayden isn t stupid, and he knows that waterboarding is torture.How do you get a man who has spent the last seven years denying he did anything wrong to admit that he did? Flip the question around and ask whether other people should be using waterboarding. Hayden admits in that case it s  completely different. Hayden: I m not giving an answer!Hasan: Okay. If [Syrian] President Assad waterboards Syrian rebels, you will not call that torture?Hayden: Oh, that s completely different.Hasan: Why? So if America does it it s fine, but if Syria does it it s bad.Hayden starts getting very defensive, arguing that Syria wouldn t waterboard safely (there s an oxymoron) and that when the CIA does it, they do it the proper way, which he then describes. Hasan isn t impressed. Good point,  Hasan deadpans.  Series of near drownings, bubbles rising through open full mouth. That is not torture in your view? Hayden concludes by saying the  legal opinion at the time  was no and that America had a right to use the method because they were careful. So for those keeping score at home, the logic is: America s use of waterboarding during the Bush presidency was not torture, but any use of waterboarding by other nations or by a current or future American president is torture. Spoken like a true member of the Bush Administration:  It s never bad when we do it  was their unspoken motto.// < ![CDATA[ // < ![CDATA[ // < ![CDATA[ // < ![CDATA[ // < ![CDATA[ (function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&#038;version=v2.3"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk')); // ]]&gt;Is waterboarding torture? Do you think [waterboarding] is torture?    Mehdi Hasan asks former CIA Director Michael Hayden. Watch the full episode: aje.io/pr2dPosted by UpFront on Thursday, March 31, 2016Featured image via Al Jazeera screengrab