What a sicko.

Cheney Fights for Detainee Policy (Washington Post, today)

Over the past year, Vice President Cheney has waged an intense and largely unpublicized campaign to stop Congress, the Pentagon and the State Department from imposing more restrictive rules on the handling of terrorist suspects, according to defense, state, intelligence and congressional officials...

...Just last week, Cheney showed up at a Republican senatorial luncheon to lobby lawmakers for a CIA exemption to an amendment by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) that would ban torture and inhumane treatment of prisoners. The exemption would cover the CIA's covert "black sites" in several Eastern European democracies and other countries where key al Qaeda captives are being kept.

So, I don't know why I keep blogging on detainne policy and torture. I didn't set out to do it, but this stuff really, really, really, really bothers me. It gets me angry enough to sign in and post. What is the possible rationale for fighting for the right to torture detainees at secret prisons in Eastern Europe? To make us safer? This policy itself is making us infinitely less safe because it angers, provokes, threatens, frustrates, annoys, and insults other nations, and it undermines all that we are trying to do (stand up for freedom and human dignity). You cannot pave the way for human dignity by abusing humans.

I've also been following, to some degree, what's happening at Guantanomo. Have you been reading about Jumah Dossari? Most recent suicide attempt, out of 36 that have occurred. None of the suicide attempts have been successful. Most of the 500 detainees at Gitmo have not been charged with a crime. Many have been held in solitary confinement 24/7 for multiple years.

I am all for upholding justice and cracking down on crime and putting an end to terrorism. But perpetuating injustice makes us very, very unsafe.