When it comes to torture, consider the source

On election night in 1986, when John McCain won the U.S. Senate seat in Arizona long held by Republican incumbent and 1964 GOP presidential nominee Barry Goldwater, who had served as McCain’s campaign chairman, the two men had a private chat.

Goldwater, McCain recalled, got “a little nostalgic” and said: “You know, John, if I had beaten Lyndon Johnson in 1964 and been elected president, you would not have spent all those years in that North Vietnamese prison camp.” McCain, mindful of Goldwater’s hawkish positions, answered: “You’re right, Barry. If you had been elected president in 1964, I wou...