From Jose Rodriguez, the head of the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center in 2002, after field agents began questioning both the utility and legality of extended waterboarding sessions:
Strongly urge that any speculative language as to the legality of given activities or, more precisely, judgment calls as to their legality vis-à-vis operational guidelines for this activity agreed upon and vetted at the most senior levels of the agency, be refrained from in written traffic (email or cable traffic). Such language is not helpful.
This is, I suppose, not just the banality of evil, but its prolixity as well. Rodriguez, of course, is the guy who would eventually destroy videotapes of CIA torture sessions on the pretense of “protecting” the people who worked for him.
There’s more at the link from the New York Times, which got an advance copy of the Senate torture report and is now releasing it. Along with everyone else in the world, I’ll be posting bits and pieces that stand out as I read them. As much as I have the stomach for, anyway.
