From Nate Silver at 538 at the end of April:
Although many people regard torture as a moral absolute, for others (perhaps most others) it is more of a sliding scale: certain types of torture may be permissible against certain types of persons in certain -- presumably fairly extraordinary -- circumstances. A Pew poll released last week, for example, has 15 percent of Americans saying torture is "often justified" against terrorism suspects and 25 percent saying it is "never justified". The majority of 56 percent are somewhere in the middle, saying torture is "sometimes justified" (34 percent) or "rarely justified" (22 percent).
here is a link to a poll from january of this year This salon article quotes a washington Post/ABC news poll of jan 21st 2009 that finds
By a wide margin -- 58-40% -- Americans say that torture should never be used, no matter the circumstances.
Recently, I have increasingly heard pundits report that "Americans are spllt on the torture issue." I can't find the polls they are refering to, but if Nate Silver is correct then, since the January poll, Cheney has succeeded in making torture an acceptable argument.
Yes Cheney is out there to cover his own ass and keep it out of jail, but the way he is doing it is by shifting the overton window - by making the use a torture appear reasonable. That is why he is constantly on television. The ticking timebomb scenario no matter how illogical and "made for hollywood" is now discussed in the MSM as a reasonable proposition. Two years ago when Bush repeatedly said "We do not torture." The idea was universally repugnant. Now it is a defensable side of an argument.
Cheney has succeeded.
For anyone unfamiliar with the term Overton Window
here is the wiki link
Wikipedia attributes the theory to on Overton and describes it as:
a "window" in the range of public reactions to ideas in public discourse, in a spectrum of all possible options on an issue. Overton described a method for moving that window, thereby including previously excluded ideas, while excluding previously acceptable ideas. The technique relies on people promoting ideas even less acceptable than the previous "outer fringe" ideas. That makes those old fringe ideas look less extreme, and thereby acceptable. The idea is that priming the public with fringe ideas intended to be and remain unacceptable, will make the real target ideas seem more acceptable by comparison.
Many people on this site have agued that the GOP has historically had more success at using Overton's theory to change the nature of public discourse.
Despite, Cheney's very low approval ratings, he has succeeded in his goal of changing the parameters of the debate.