Lachlan Markay writes this in a March 29 NewsBusters post:
With the recently announced end of Fox's hit series “24,” many liberal pundits are parading the show as a false depiction of the notion that “torture works.” Contrary to their accusations, the Jack Bauer interrogation methods bear exactly zero resemblance to any actual interrogation techniques used by American military, law enforcement, or intelligence agents.
Say what? Haven't conservatives been the ones who spent the past several years using 24 to justify “enhanced interrogation” on suspected Muslim terrorists and to serve as a blueprint for how the “war on terror” should be fought? Why, yes they have:
- Fox's Wallace on waterboarding: "[L]isten, I'm with Jack Bauer on this"
- Hannity guest Morgan Brittany: “I believe in the interrogation methods of Jack Bauer”
- To buttress his support of torture, Beck airs clips from 24, Ollie North's 1987 testimony
- Fox & Friends hosts, Beck cite fictional congressional testimony by 24's “Jack Bauer” in defense of torture
- Conservatives continue to use Fox's 24 to support hawkish policies
- Cal Thomas's higher authority for criticizing new Army interrogations manual: counterterrorism agent Jack Bauer on Fox's 24
Markay's revisionist claim also goes against what his fellow NewsBusters have written:
- Noel Sheppard wrote in January 2007 that “folks that consider the series as anything more than good entertainment see the show as posing possible downsides to inaction and complacency.” This was in response to Newsweek asking if the show was a “neocon sex fantasy.” (Sheppard was also offended when a Time magazine columnist asked if 24 was a “conservative show.”)
- Sheppard again, on the 24 season premiere that concluded with a nuclear explosion: “As folks on the nation's airwaves continue to downplay the seriousness of terrorism, and undermine virtually all of the current Administration's efforts to thwart conscienceless aggression against Western civilization, have they really pondered the unthinkable? Or, have they all grown complacent as we move continually further and further away from that fateful day in September 2001? Regardless, this video should be required viewing for all media members who question what's at risk, and whether there really is a war on terror.”
- Mark Finkelstein wrote of Keith Olbermann's criticism of said episode: “Is it possible that Keith Olbermann has forgotten 9-11?”
24 may have nothing to do with real life, but let's not pretend that conservatives didn't want it to.