From the Washington Post:
President Bush's repeated insistence that "we don't torture" appeared even more transparently bogus yesterday as the White House threatened to veto a House bill that would explicitly ban a variety of abhorrent practices.
The bill would require U.S. intelligence agencies to follow interrogation rules adopted by the armed forces last year.
What does that mean? As Pamela Hess writes for the Associated Press, those rules explicitly prohibit "forcing detainees to be naked, perform sexual acts, or pose in a sexual manner; placing hoods or sacks over detainees' heads or duct tape over their eyes; beating, shocking, or burning detainees; threatening them with military dogs; exposing them to extreme heat or cold; conducting mock executions; depriving them of food, water, or medical care; and waterboarding."
Administration officials have consistently refused to confirm or deny whether any of those methods have been sanctioned by the White House and are in use. But really all you need to know is this: According to yesterday's formal statement of administration policy, limiting intelligence agencies to the army rules "would prevent the United States from conducting lawful interrogations of senior al Qaeda terrorists to obtain intelligence needed to protect Americans from attack."
The White House then asserted, without a scintilla of evidence (see Tuesday's column): "Such interrogations have helped the United States disrupt multiple attacks against Americans at home and abroad, thus saving American lives."
Read the rest.
President Bush's repeated insistence that "we don't torture" appeared even more transparently bogus yesterday as the White House threatened to veto a House bill that would explicitly ban a variety of abhorrent practices.
The bill would require U.S. intelligence agencies to follow interrogation rules adopted by the armed forces last year.
What does that mean? As Pamela Hess writes for the Associated Press, those rules explicitly prohibit "forcing detainees to be naked, perform sexual acts, or pose in a sexual manner; placing hoods or sacks over detainees' heads or duct tape over their eyes; beating, shocking, or burning detainees; threatening them with military dogs; exposing them to extreme heat or cold; conducting mock executions; depriving them of food, water, or medical care; and waterboarding."
Administration officials have consistently refused to confirm or deny whether any of those methods have been sanctioned by the White House and are in use. But really all you need to know is this: According to yesterday's formal statement of administration policy, limiting intelligence agencies to the army rules "would prevent the United States from conducting lawful interrogations of senior al Qaeda terrorists to obtain intelligence needed to protect Americans from attack."
The White House then asserted, without a scintilla of evidence (see Tuesday's column): "Such interrogations have helped the United States disrupt multiple attacks against Americans at home and abroad, thus saving American lives."
Read the rest.
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