What you said would work if we don't have a rich history of prosecuting those "enhanced interrogation methods" as torture. If it is a question of definition, then you'll have to explain how the definition changed sometime in 2001.

You can also ask hypothetical questions to determine what she would call 'torture'. Surely she would think that ripping off someone's fingernails or putting a cage with a starved rat on their face was torture. Then you could try & walk them back as to why they didn't think waterboarding was torture.

I would ask her when NPR might be expected to do a segment on "enhanced intromission techniques".

The DFHs call it "broomhandling" or, when we really slip up, "rape".

the following in Article 6:

This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.

Notice the treaties we sign, like the Geneva Convcention and the ban on torture, are "the supreme law of the land" as stated by our Founders and ratified by the States.

U.S. Constitution - Article VI

Certain debts, ect. declared valid, Supremacy of Constitution, treaties, and laws of the United States, Oath to support Constitution, by whom taken. No religious test.

1. All debts contracted and engagements entered into, before the adoption of this constitution, shall be as valid against the United States under this constitution, as under the confederation.

2. This constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, any thing in the constitution or laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding.

3. The senators and representatives before-mentioned, and the members of the several state legislatures, and all executive and judicial officers, both of the United States and of the several states, shall be bound by oath or affirmation, to support this constitution; but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.

And I guess our leaders are really, really proud of it. Is this a great country or what?

From the site NPR Check, commenter and writer Gopol provided this link: http://www.counterpunch.org/webb212172004.html

describing how a young alicia shepard was sent on a dirt-digging mission to undermine Gary Webb, the journalist for the San Jose-Mercury News who wrote about c.i.a. related crack cocaine in L.A. She was a paid journo-assassin, probably paid by the same folks for whom she's covering now. But then again, npr is full of them. The article is chillingly complete.

If making your way in the world is increasingly dependent on who you know, rather than what you know, then the practice of bringing in celebrities, even if unsuited or mediocre, to teach Ivy League classes makes perfect sense.

"next semester at Georgetown: Karl Rove teaches Civility in a Post-Partisan Age, Bill Kristol lectures on Accountability in Punditry, while David Gregory examines The Role of Intellect in Adversarial Questioning)."

Granted, mine is probably the last generation for which books will have been the primary path to learning. Maybe allow for one more after us, say just before the baby-boomers; I was born in 1940.

And I'm certainly not the only person speculating what shapes the path to wisdom will take in the future. As of today, we can know only that those paths will not look anything like they have for the past thousand years or so, since the invention of universities.

It seems clear too, from the list of instructors and topics above, that even today,the old academic paths no longer represent any sort of human wisdom at all, but only a polysyllabic, ornately intellectualized, rhetorically decorated version of the lowest sort of gutter smarts.

Is that kind of street-wise really wisdom? Does Karl Rove's low tactical cunning really merit being disguised as a college course and passed on to younger generations? Does William Kristol really have anything of (positive) significance to tell us about accountability?

Yuk. Blech. %$*((@$%&)@(^&??!?]

Shit. Talk about being rendered speechless: it's gonna me the rest of the day just to get my language back.

Neil Conan, the host, plays nothing more than a massage therapist to the conservative guests they have on there.

You impugn massage therapists everywhere. Be prepared for them to descend on your blog in the thousands. ;-}

Seriously, what Conan does is more along the lines of a talentless lapdancer (not to impugn that fine profession either).

by terrorists, insurgents, or troops? Inquiring stenographers want to know!

American soldier feared captured in Afghanistan

By FISNIK ABRASHI, AP

2 hours ago

Insurgents have captured an American soldier in eastern Afghanistan after he walked off post with his three Afghan counterparts, officials said Thursday.

Spokeswoman Capt. Elizabeth Mathias said the soldier disappeared Tuesday."

http://www.comcast.net/articles/news-world-asia/20090702/AS.Afghan.US.Soldier.Captured/

This is what happens when you have a big brother government-mandated 'mainstream' media oligopoly--an endless perversion and subversion of language, semantics, and truth foisted upon a government "educated" populace of uncritical thinkers and State-worshipers. Pretty soon, as the current Frontman-In-Chief continues to parrot the propagandistic line that "America doesn't torture", the Proles will begin to adopt this dictionary of Newspeak as they master the paradigm of doublethink and its underlying thought process of blackwhite. One day, calling torture what it is might be considered thought-terrorism.

But we mustn't let all of this get in the way of our phony, coercive, egalitarian "liberal" agenda of asking our government overlords to "solve" our problems (like being any sort of benevolent steward of the environment--when the U.S. government is one of the worst polluters in the world). As stated already by other mindless consumers of the fake left-right paradigm of the War Party, this is all the fault of the "Republican" Bad Guys™ and their "right" wing agenda and so forth. Right?