Outsourcing torture

This morning I killed a squirrel. It ran suddenly in front of my car and I was unable to stop. I was devastated when I saw it in my rear view mirror twitching on the road as I drove on and I prayed that it did not suffer long. It still hurts me to think of the squirrel being in pain and my regret is profound even though I truly could not help the fact that I hit it.

When I contemplate how much I suffered because of the suffering of a squirrel I honestly cannot fathom how anyone could wish pain on another human being. But we in this country now talk about torture almost cavalierly. How have we come to this? What are we doing to the formative consciences of our young people as it becomes more and more evident that we are deliberately using torture on people we detain because we suspect they may know something about possible terrorist activity? We even know that information obtained through torture is rarely accurate: people will say anything to get the pain to stop. And still we do it.

Douglas Jehl and David Johnston have published an article in the New York Times entitled, "Bush signed secret order allowing CIA to outsource torture". I'm giving you the link to the reprint on the Smirking Chimp website because the New York Times requires registration in order to access articles and you might not want to do that. Here's an excerpt:

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration's secret program to transfer suspected terrorists to foreign countries for interrogation has been carried out by the Central Intelligence Agency under broad authority that has allowed it to act without case-by-case approval from the White House or the State or Justice Departments, according to current and former government officials.

The unusually expansive authority for the C.I.A. to operate independently was provided by the White House under a still-classified directive signed by President Bush within days of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the officials said.
...
Before Sept. 11, the C.I.A. had been authorized by presidential directives to carry out renditions, but under much more restrictive rules. In most instances in the past, the transfers of individual prisoners required review and approval by interagency groups led by the White House, and were usually authorized to bring prisoners to the United States or to other countries to face criminal charges.

As part of its broad new latitude, current and former government officials say, the C.I.A. has been authorized to transfer prisoners to other countries solely for the purpose of detention and interrogation.

The covert transfers by the C.I.A. have faced sharp criticism, in part because of the accounts provided by former prisoners who say they were beaten, shackled, humiliated, subjected to electric shocks, and otherwise mistreated during their long detention in foreign prisons before being released without being charged.

Please do what you can to protest this practice. Write your senators and congresspersons and express your outrage that we have allowed ourselves to become barbarians. And whatever you do, don't let the reality of this practice deaden your conscience or numb your sensibilities. It is better that we experience pain ourselves at the thought of others being in pain than it is for us to tune out the awareness and go on as if it doesn't matter. It matters. It matters.