There’s been a lot of talk about torture lately. No, Eunice, I don’t mean having to listen to your brother talk non-stop for three hours at Sunday dinner. I mean the US military torturing “suspects” at Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib and who knows where else, as well as all those unlisted secret airplane flights to other countries where that’s the preferred method of criminal investigation.

Recently I wrote a little bit about it. Last night the US Senate met and voted on disapproving torture as a means of fighting Mr Bush’s alleged “global war on terror.” Senator McCain, who put his personal honor into escrow in order to suck up to the Bush family, put forward an amendment to a $440 Billion with a B military spending bill. Mr Bush, who used to blow up frogs with firecrackers when he was a child, believes the proper exercise of power requires unspeakable cruelties to those lower down on the ladder than he is. He even got one of his apparatchiks, Abu Gonzalez, the Inquisitor General, to write him up a nice bit of legal-looking words to justify his baser instincts. Mr Bush declared he would veto this spending bill if it came to him with a declaration of basic humanity.

The Senate voted, 90-9 to treat captives, foreign and domestic, with some basic level of decency. These are the US Senators who believe torture is justified. Note carefully that they seem to believe it’s all right to torture Americans if Mr Bush determines hat American to be an “enemy of the state.”
Allard (R-CO)
Bond (R-MO)
Coburn (R-OK)
Cochran (R-MS)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Roberts (R-KS)
Sessions (R-AL)
Stevens (R-AK)

These are all senior Senators. Among this group are Chairmen of the Intelligence, Defense Appropriations, Environment and Public Works, two major Judiciary subcommittees, and the Transportation subcommittee of the EPW committee.

Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, said he was concerned that McCain’s legislation could inadvertently endanger the lives of people who work in classified roles. He said he hoped to fix the potential problems during negotiations with the House. This, coming from a leader in the malAdministration that justifies outing an American covert agent for domestic advantage.

UPDATE: Steve M connects dots, and asks the question "JUst who would Jesus waterboard?"