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The Daily Dish - 2006-2011 archives for The Daily Dish, featuring Andrew Sullivan

The Logic of Kaus

By The Daily Dish
Jun 16 2007, 1:02 AM ET

A reader writes:

Can't we also apply the ticking bomb scenario to regular criminals?

Let's say you have a father/son serial killer team.

You have the son in custody. The father is out there. He has kidnapped N children and is going to torture, rape and then kill them in a secret location. How big does N have to get before you start torturing the son to find out where he is? It works just fine for regular US citizens too, you see.

Now imagine the guy has TWO sons. One of them knows where Dad is, but the other doesn't, and has nothing to do with the crime. Only you don't know which is which. How big does N have to get before you torture them both?

Now imagine the innocent son is Mickey Kaus.

The point of torture is always torture.



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