On Monday I posted a question from a friend and suggested Scott Rasmussen might want to put that question to the American public. Here’s the question as it was emailed to me:
Ask and ye shall receive. Rasmussen releases a poll today showing that 58 percent of Americans “say waterboarding and other aggressive interrogation techniques should be used to gain information from the terrorist who attempted to bomb an airliner on Christmas Day.” My guess was off by a few points, but then again Rasmussen probably framed the question a little bit differently than we did above. Perhaps most startling, just 30 percent of Americans oppose the use of such enhanced interrogation techniques, but among those 30 percent is the President of the United States, who allowed law enforcement to arrest the Nigerian and read him his rights, including the right to remain silent, though somehow we are supposed to be comforted by the fact that even after he was told of his right to remain silent, law enforcement can still try and interrogate him. Not surprisingly, that turns out to be an ineffective approach. As the Washington Post reported yesterday, “Abdulmutallab remains in a Detroit area prison and, after initial debriefings by the FBI, has restricted his cooperation since securing a defense attorney, according to federal officials.” Other interesting numbers from the Rasmussen poll:
Only 22 percent believe that this should be handled by law enforcement! This isn’t even an argument anymore, the Cheney view is now the dominant view among the American public.
