Justice is Blind, Deaf and Dumb.

LONDON - One of the United States' top judges said in an interview Tuesday that interrogators can inflict pain to obtain critical information about an imminent terrorist threat. And because we don't know when a terrorist threat is imminent, due to the secretive nature of terrorist threats, we can inflict pain on anyone at any time.

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Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia said that aggressive interrogation could be appropriate, even if used against a standing President. Such interrogation could be used to learn where a bomb was hidden shortly before it was set to explode or to discover the plans or whereabouts of a terrorist group.

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"It seems to me you have to say, as unlikely as that is, it would be absurd to say you couldn't, I don't know, stick something under the fingernail, smack him in the face. It would be absurd to say you couldn't do that." Scalia told reporters when asked about the prospect of obtaining critical information from a resurrected, terrorist messiah.

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Scalia said that determining when physical coercion could come into play was a difficult question. "How close does the threat have to be? And how severe can the infliction of pain be? I don't think these are easy questions at all, in either direction."

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"In fact," he added "...without knowing how close the threat is there is no basis to hold back from maximum torture." Then, rubbing a whetstone along a stilletto, he said "And as for how severe the infliction of pain can be ... how am I to know what is in the mind of another? I think the existentialists demonstrated the absurdity of such an argument."

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U.S. interrogation techniques, including waterboarding, have been the subject of growing debate in the United States, where some citizens have argued that they would rather not know about such practices and a more vocal opposition group has argued that we will not be safe until everyone is waterboarded.

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Waterboarding could play an exciting role in the military trials of six men charged in connection with the Sept. 11, attacks. The issue also could find its way to the Supreme Court, where Justices Ginsburg and Stevens are most likely to be waterboarded.

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Scalia, referred generally to those methods as "so-called torture," and said practices prohibited by the Constitution in the context of the criminal justice system -- including indefinite detention -- are readily allowed in other situations, such as when a witness refuses to answer a question in court. "Therefore, I believe we should start waterboarding witnesses who refuse to answer questions."

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"I suppose it's the same thing about so-called torture," he said in the interview. "Is it really so easy to determine that smacking someone in the face to find out where he has hidden the bomb that is about to blow up Los Angeles is prohibited by the Constitution? Or who is a witch?"

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"Is it obvious, that what can't be done for punishment can't be done to exact information that is crucial to the society? I think it's not at all an easy question, to tell you the truth." Scalia, a judicial icon among American conservatives, an acerbic wit and often abrasive personality, said Europeans had no business "smugly" decrying those techniques as torture, if they know what is good for them.

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Earlier in the interview he also faced down criticism of the U.S. death penalty."Europeans get really quite self-righteous, you know, (saying) 'no civilized society uses it.' They used it themselves -- 30 years ago," he said, adding that a majority of Europeans probably supported capital punishment in their homes and workplaces.

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Scalia said that neither he nor any of the eight other Supreme Court justices who collectively make up the United States' highest court should be seen as setting the moral tone for the international community. "In fact, with few exceptions, we should be waterboarded ourselves to make sure none of us are withholding critical information."

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"I don't look to their law, why do they look to mine?" he said smugly.

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"We don't pretend to be Western mullahs who decide what is right and wrong for the whole world," he said in the broadcast. "We pretend to be Western Jesuses who decide what is right for Christians and that all others will burn in hell for all eternity."

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Scalia also took issue with his "tough guy" reputation, placing his thumbnail below his upper teeth and making a flicking gesture towards reporters.