Scott Horton of Harper’s has a great piece online on how three detainees at Gitmo were killed during interrogations. The military responded with an elaborate coverup that claimed the three men committed suicide as an “act of asymmetrical warfare.” The military’s story has been blow to bits in large part by former Gitmo guards who […]
Tag Archives | Torture
Doonesbury: Torture Remains Prime-Time Entertainment
Three cheers for Doonesbury! Unfortunately, prominent half-wits take their own values from this TV show. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia told an assembly of judges in the summer of 2007: ““Jack Bauer saved Los Angeles . . . . He saved hundreds of thousands of lives… Are you going to convict Jack Bauer?” I […]
Torture Update: Andy Worthington’s Excellent New Film
Andy Worthington, the author of The Guantanamo Files, is touring the U.S. with his excellent new film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo.” He will be in California later this week. Tour schedule is here. “Outside the Law” does a fine job of blending the legal issues and personal details to burn home the human […]
On Jamaican Radio tonight (8/25) on Torture Prosecutions
I will be on the the Evening Edition, a radio program in Kingston, Jamaica, this evening (Tuesday, 8/25) from 7:45 to 8:00 Eastern time. We will discussthe torture investigations and the high criminals who got away. You can listen live here. [Newstalk 93 FM Jamaica] +*** UPDATE: The hosts were very good but the phone […]
Torturous Betting Odds for Justice?
So the Obama administration is moving forward with a plan to prosecute some CIA agents who went beyond the guidelines the Bush administration authorized for extreme interrogations. This is good news. But will the torture policymakers be exempt from the law? If so, maybe the pimp media will bring West Virginia’s Lynndie England, the star […]
Iran’s Worst Barbarism: Honesty About Torture
The current government is Iran is a bunch of damn rascals and thugs, and there are boatloads of questions about the honesty of their last election. The regime’s brutal crackdown on protestors reveals its true character. (But the Iranian government is not novel in this sense: the Syrians have been as brutal with their dissidents, […]
Torture and Political Science
Amazing how few political scientists responded to the last 5 years of revelations about torture by the U.S. government. But perhaps this merely continues that profession’s perennial habit of ignoring the dark side of Leviathan. British historian Thomas Macaulay noted in his 1837 essay on Francis Bacon that “he who first treated legislation as a […]
