The Washington Post reports on a new poll under the header: “Some Call It Torture. In One Poll, Most Call It Justified.”

The headline alone raises a flag: Most call what justified? Torture?

No, as it turns out, the poll does not find that most people say torture is justified. It finds that most people think “harsh interrogation techniques of detainees” is justified. I'm sure if you conducted a poll that called it “safe, legal, and humane treatment of detainees,” you'd find even higher approval. But that isn't what it was; it was torture.

Eventually, in the fourth paragraph, the Post gets around to mentioning that the poll in question was conducted by Resurgent Republic, which, according to the Post, is “made up of Republican strategists.” That's a bit of an understatement; Resurgent Republic is a Republican organization founded by former RNC chairman Ed Gillespie for the purpose of “shaping the debate over the proper role of government.”

Shaping the debate, not measuring it.

Here's how Resurgent Republic summarized the pro-torture position:

Congressman B says that, while harsh interrogation techniques of detainees should be used only rarely, they may be necessary in exceptional situations to protect the country. Those techniques are justified when they are the only way to stop the murder of another 3000 innocent Americans in another 9/11.

Not only did Resurgent Republic use the euphamism “harsh interrogation” rather than torture, it pretended torture was used only rarely, and only to stop the murder of 3,000 innocent Americans. Had Resurgent Republic asked if people supported the use of torture in order to elicit a false confession of a link between Iraq and 9/11, I suspect public support would have been quite a bit lower. Had Resurgent Republic noted that, according to Bush administration officials, that torture could include crushing a child's testicles, support probably would have been lower still.

But the Post didn't mention any of that; it just pretended that most people think torture is justified.