I wrote earlier today about Eric Holder's decision to "review" whether criminal prosecutions are warranted in connection with the torture of Terrorism suspects -- that can be read here -- but I want to write separately about the release today of the 200 Full Story »
Posted by Derek Hawkins - via Glenn Greenwald, Digg
Greenwald lets the details of "enhanced interrogation" speak for themselves. This is his signature topic, and he has a catalogue of earlier posts to link and cross reference. He got too excited with the title -- "should be made" was a poor choice of words -- and he payed for it, promising in one of his updates that he wasn't proposing legislation to compel citizens to read the IG report.
Manifestly, none of this happened by accident. As the IG Report continuously notes, all of these methods were severe departures from long-standing CIA guidelines (if not practices). This all occurred because the officials at the highest levels of the U.S. Government pronounced that this was permissible, the protections of the Geneva Conventions were “quaint,” obsolete and inapplicable, and the U.S. was justified in doing anything and everything in the name of fighting Terrorists. As stomach-turning as these individual acts of sadism are, it is far worse to consider that only low-level interrogators will suffer consequences while those who were truly responsible — the criminally depraved leaders and lawyers who ordered and authorized it — will be protected. The historical record of what the U.S. did during this period is clear and growing. The only question that remains is what, if anything, we will do now that we are seeing the full picture.
