IRAQI POW ABUSE

Republican Senator Jim Inhofe (R-OK):

"I have to say I'm probably not the only one up at this table that is more outraged by the outrage than we are by the treatment. The idea that these prisoners, you know they're not there for traffic violations. If they're in cellblock 1A or 1B these prisoners, they're murderers, they're terrorists, they're insurgents, many of them probably have American blood on their hands, and here we're so concerned about the treatment of those individuals."

A document released ... by the American Civil Liberties Union suggests that President Bush issued an Executive Order authorizing the use of inhumane interrogation methods against detainees in Iraq [PDF download]. Also released by the ACLU today are a slew of other records including a December 2003 FBI e-mail that characterizes methods used by the Defense Department as "torture" and a June 2004 "Urgent Report" to the Director of the FBI that raises concerns that abuse of detainees is being covered up. [ACLU]

"Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted." -- 8th Amendment to the US Constitution.

President Bush has acted illegally in signing an order authorizing the use of torture.

A former top State Department official said Sunday that Vice President Dick Cheney provided the "philosophical guidance" and "flexibility" that led to the torture of detainees in U.S. facilities.
Retired U.S. Army Col. Larry Wilkerson, who served as former Secretary of State Colin Powell's chief of staff, told CNN that the practice of torture may be continuing in U.S.-run facilities.

"There's no question in my mind that we did. There's no question in my mind that we may be still doing it," Wilkerson said on CNN's "Late Edition."

"There's no question in my mind where the philosophical guidance and the flexibility in order to do so originated -- in the vice president of the United States' office," he said. "His implementer in this case was [Defense Secretary] Donald Rumsfeld and the Defense Department." [CNN 11/20/05]

US Code, Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 118, § 2441

Those who order the commission of war crimes, as defined by the Geneva and Hague Conventions in regards to conduct of war, 'shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for life or any term of years, or both, and if death results to the victim, shall also be subject to the penalty of death'.

This may explain why the US Government is trying to block all torture lawsuits, because under US law, those who authorized the torture, which has resulted in deaths, are looking at the death penalty themselves.