This goes along with Glenn's topic today. A post from the hard left boys at counterpunch:

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Sexual Terrorism

By DAVID ROSEN

The “New York Times’” recently revealed the existence of a little-known executive order issued by President Bush in the summer of ’07 that permitted U.S. intelligence operatives to circumvent restrictions on the use of humiliating and degrading interrogation techniques.

Bush’s order permitted U.S. intelligence operatives to effectively side-step the legal and moral restrictions imposed by the Supreme Court and Congress (and formally approved by Bush) as well as Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions.

Brian Benczkowski, a deputy assistant attorney general, laid-out the rationale for the continued subversion of these restrictions:

The fact that an [humiliating interrogation] act is undertaken to prevent a threatened terrorist attack, rather than for the purpose of humiliating or abuse, would be relevant to a reasonable observer in measuring the outrageousness of the act.

The Bush administration’s argument is that an interrogator can utilize what it calls “enhanced interrogation techniques” if he/she believes such techniques will thwart a possible threat or terrorist act. For the administration, illegal (if not immoral) interrogation techniques are a corollary to preemptive military strikes that was its rationale for the invasion of Iraq.

Much attention has been paid to water-boarding as an immoral if not illegal technique utilized in the so-called War of Terror. Little attention has been paid to the equally physically harmful and likely more long-term consequential technique of sexual humiliation and terror.

Buried deep in Mark Mazzetti’s Times article is an intriguing paragraph:

That order specifies some conduct that it says would be prohibited in any interrogation, including forcing an individual to perform sexual acts, or threatening an individual with sexual humiliation. But it does not say which techniques could still be permitted. [New York Times, April 27, 2008]

Yes, what “techniques” of sexual humiliation can still be used?

[...]

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even more at link ...

http://www.counterpunch.org/rosen05132008.html

When I hear "Red Cross", "Camp Inspection" and "Propaganda" together I feel reminded of that most infamous precedent, the Nazi showcase KZ Theresienstadt that was turned into a Potemkin village for the Red Cross inspection that should "prove" that there was no mistreatment of Jews in German camps. They even made a film about that that became inofficially known as "Der Führer schenkt den Juden eine Stadt" (The Fuehrer donates a city to the Jews). The Jewish film crew was sent to Auschwitz and murdered immediately afterwards. When Bush and accomplices (esp. the media) made much ballyhoo about a Red Cross inspection of Gitmo that paraded inmates playing ball, eating delicious food and denying any mistreatment (guards present of course) the mental connection was there immediately and I joked sarcastically that a movie would be made about it with the title "The president donates a holiday camp to the terrorists". When I read "journalists" writing that they would love to be treated as luxuriously as the terrorists (nothing about "suspected" or the like) that brought up other memories of Nazi soundbites that declared that life in a KZ was nothing but an involuntary summer holiday (implying that the inmates should be grateful for they would deserve much worse).

I would not be surprised at all, if the precedent was on the mind of those that came up with the idea of the propaganda show. There have been suspicions before that they took a look at the 3rd Reich archives due to the similarity of the torture memos and their German equivalents bordering on literal translation occasionally (and leading GOP speechwriters obviously have the collected speeches of Joseph Goebbels on their shelves. There are too many direct adoptions of phrases to be coincidental).

That does not mean that Bush&Accomplices are Nazis ideologically, they just adopted methods that seemed to have worked (the same way that the SS studied the Jesuit Order because that was a model of success).

I have this news headline on my hoem page:

"Specter calls for independent inquiry into Spygate"

It's about time, I say! I want to go read all about it, but the link keeps taking me to ESPN! $%#^@!

Another precinct heard from. Those who have not suffered, even for a few hours, at the hands of the penal system have absolutely NO room to comment. As Conservativeslayer mentions, there are but 2 types of screws; those with a modicum of civility and decency (a minority) and those who get their jollies lording it over the powerless in their thrall.

The sad, sad, truth is that we have become (if we have not always been) a thoroughly retributive society. Several of the 'bad apples' at Abu Ghraib were, in their civilian lives, prison guards here stateside. They merely used the same procedures they used at their stateside occupations...on steroids. Much like the fact that one of the greatest bones of contention the Iraqis have with us are the methods of search, arrest and seizure that have become S.O.P. stateside. I have written a short blog post about this at: http://ruminations52.blogspot.com/2008/05/need-we-learn-from-iraqis-i-know.html

Joe Klein as someone said earlier has always been a joke line.

We have an extremely healthy and Serious Pundit class, particularly its leading war cheerleaders, and I think we should all be proud of our political discourse.

Right. Says the man who comes up with truly bizarre description, "phallic, warmongering eyes."

Ever heard of Dick Cheney?

Ever heard of Doug Feith, Michael Ledeen, Michael Chertoff, hell, the whole Office of Special Plans? Not everyone has to be a Zionist to be on the same road. Critical mass, Glenn, critical mass. There are enough of them present to make one question the concentration. Cheney mongering served several purposes, not just the enrichment of himself and his friends.

And there are plenty of "Zionists" who aren't warmongers and racists.

Name one.

Glenn, with all due respect, don't mistake "simplistic, overly-generalized hostility" with simple clarity. Or will you paint me with the same brush adbusters.org was painted with when they dared to point out the same thing?