Piercing tiny holes in the * bubble-ator

White House drops long-standing opposition to torture legislation

· Senate and House force Bush's hand
· United stand against anti-terror tactics

Julian Borger in Washington and Richard Norton-Taylor
Friday December 16, 2005
The Guardian

The White House bowed to international and congressional pressure yesterday and abandoned its opposition to Senate legislation prohibiting the use of cruel, inhuman or degrading interrogation methods of detainees in US custody around the world.

snip...

The bipartisan front by the Senate and the House was one element in a formidable show of defiance by Congress over the White House's conduct of the war on terror. Republican senators also joined Democrats to demand facts about secret CIA prisons abroad, while moderate Republican senators threatened to block anti-terror legislation on the grounds that it infringed civil liberties.

The united stand reflected widespread concern among legislators that the administration's counter-terrorism methods are damaging America's standing in the world. It also represented an assertion of congressional power and a growing reluctance to leave the conduct of "the war on terror" to the executive alone.

snip...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1668768,00.html

+++++++++++++++++

Maybe, just maybe, Congress will stand up to the Executive Branch, calling it's dirty hands before the rest of the world abandons the neocons to their hubris. But then again, maybe all the balls are the glass ones on holiday trees.

sanctioning torture as a policy of our government.

would not be happy to see. For all the ridiculous talk about not having activist judges who might legislate from the bench and take us away from the original vision of the Framers it is just a crock to see the BushCo people acting so high and mighty about protecting their ability to do as they please to torture human beings. Sickening.