Boston Globe: Saying nothing is torture in itself

Behold the compunctions of Jeff Jacoby, a long time Right-Wing apologist:


As regular readers know, I write as a war hawk. I strongly support the mission in Iraq. I voted for President Bush. I believe the struggle against Islamist totalitarianism is the most urgent conflict of our time.

But none of that justifies the administration's apparent willingness to countenance -- under at least some circumstances -- the indecent abuse of prisoners in military custody. Something is very wrong when the Justice Department advises the president's legal adviser that a wartime president is not bound by the international Convention Against Torture or the US laws incorporating it. Or when that legal adviser tells the Senate, as Alberto Gonzales did last week, that ''there is no legal prohibition under the Convention Against Torture on cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment with respect to aliens overseas."

If this were happening on a Democratic president's watch, the criticism from Republicans and conservatives would be deafening. Why the near-silence now? Who has better reason to be outraged by this scandal than those of us who support the war? More than anyone, it is the war hawks who should be infuriated by it. It shouldn't have taken me this long to say so.

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2005/01/30/saying_nothing_is_torture_in_itself/



Too little, too late, too lame, too sad, Jeff. Enjoy the little circle of hell you helped create.

Sometimes I feel like a blue crab taken out of the water and put in a bucket; They snap claws in fury at their tormentors and bubble and froth from their maws. Later they become lethargic and eventually lay perfectly still. When you open them you discover that they are completely empty, having spent their last ounce of life venting their rage.

That's how I feel; spent and emptied by rage.