Don't Forget The Torture!

Meanwhile, while White House officials are leaking state secrets in a time of war, torture is being committed in our name. Torture -- the evil tool of Castro and Stalin and dictators around the world. Torture -- the cruel, inhuman practice of the bad guys that heros like our World War II and Vietnam prisoners of war endured stoically but all decent people condemned. Torture -- thanks to Bush -- is now the American way.

Actually, it makes sense: the same people who defend torture are the same people defending Karl Rove, a man who endangered national security in a dirty tricks campaign.

The Washington Post details the obvious -- that the same methods used in Abu Ghraib denounced by Bush and everyone around the world began in Guantanamo Bay.

The Post also has an online discussion from Bush Sr's personal physician -- he denounced the use of medical personnel in overseeing that torture in an op-ed column.

And if you haven't picked up the current double issue of The New Yorker, Jane Mayer has a devastating feature on the torture at Guantanamo Bay and the unprecedented and frightening use of doctors. Not that we want to mention the Nazis, but of course it was the horrifying practices of the Third Reich's doctors that shocked the world and led to new standards being set by the international medical community -- standards our doctors are now breaking in Guantanamo Bay. It's a great article for rebutting the people who want to pretend the only claims about torture come from prisoners told to lie in a training manual. Mayer speaks to FBI agents, US military lawyers, former interrogators, soldiers and references the reports filed by the military itself. The article isn't online, but Mayer's q and a about it is available here.