How Cookie-boarding Works

The latest issue of Time magazine reveals that terrorists have a sweet tooth. Reporter Bobby Ghosh writes, "The most successful interrogation of an al-Qaeda operative by U.S. officials required no sleep deprivation, no slapping or 'walling' and no waterboarding. All it took to soften up Abu Jandal, who had been closer to Osama bin Laden than any other terrorist ever captured, was a handful of sugar-free cookies."

When interrogators discovered that Jandal was diabetic, they knew his weakness. They whipped up a batch of chocolate chip cookies for him, using an artificial sweetener. “We had showed him respect, and we had done this nice thing for him … So he started talking to us instead of giving us lectures,” Ghosh wrote. Yep, in no time, Jandal was babbling pleasantly, proving once again that you catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar.

Cheney should get ten lashes with a wet noodle for being so stupid as to overlook the value of milk and cookies. Rather than wasting our time and money on Byzantine interrogation methods, all we needed to do was send Mrs. Fields or Betty Crocker to soften them up. A Girl Scout cookies seller would have been even cheaper.

This is not rocket science, people. Thousands of years ago when Jacob sent his sons to Egypt to buy corn, he suggested that they “take a little honey” to sweeten the deal. Salty ol’ General George Patton figured it out, too. In speaking about the treatment of prisoners he said, "Hell, there’s no reason to rough ‘em up. You give ‘em a hot meal and they’ll give you Hitler’s address. Give ‘em a beer and they’ll introduce you to their sister."

If Cheney had tried “cookie boarding” he would have screwed it up by forcing prisoners to eat a steady diet of stale, burnt-bottomed, oat bran cookies for 83 days in a row or until their teeth decayed. He would revel in being a Cookie Monster, betting if one cookie loosened the tongue of a detainee, an overdose would make him sing the Star Spangled Banner.

Sadly, with the Time magazine revelation, the terrorists now know our secret interrogation weapon. We are less safe because they can train to defend themselves against “cookie boarding.” It’s best we change tactics. I say give Ted Drew’s frozen custard a try. It works on me every time.