There. Disclaimer plus out of the way.
The idea that we are torturing prisoners at Gitmo is ludicrous. Sure, one can disagree with some practices and just what exactly is allowable is certainly debatable. Some things are clearly torture. Some things not. In the middle it can get fuzzy. And if something goes over the line, it is in the context of a process that tries not to go over the line. It is in the context of a nation--America--that cares very much to play by the rules and play morally.
Lileks has an excellent screed on this subject. In describing a Time article that recounts the horrors of being a terrorist detained by America, Lileks quotes this:
According to the log, his handlers at one point perform a puppet show “satirizing the detainee’s involvement with al-Qaeda.”
The horror. Puppet shows.
This must be one of those practices that Amnesty International wanted to find out about. Gulag, indeed.
This is probably just the tip of the iceberg. Imagine the performance art! Interpretive dance!! Good God, could they be so cruel as to inflict NPR pledge drive week on these lost souls of Gitmo? What about those ribbon-dragging gymnastics? I shudder at the thought. What man could stand that sort of punishing cruelty?
We are truly a confused nation when our reporters have an expose' like this and think that they just struck Pulitzer gold. And did the author really think that "space invaded by female" is a torture? I have to order those vids in the mail, for Pete's sake (just kidding, here).
Read the whole thing, enjoy Lileks' writing and wit, and be very mad at our press for thinking this is a horror show.
Oh, and keep in mind that our enemies have no fuzzy areas. They have torture. And they have beheading. Their middle ground is where to transition from torture to beheading. Remember that, will you? These people are our enemies.
