The NYT "T-Word" Watch

They're still scrambling at the Gray Lady to describe reality. Check this post out. "Brutal interrogation" is now "harsh questioning" or just "interrogation techniques" or "tactics now found to be questionable." The commenters, of course, use the plain English term "torture" immediately, because outside of the MSM, English is still used to mean what it has always meant.

I know there is some dispute about some of the methods used and the NYT is trying to be scrupulous. This is not crazy, and it's fair for some media outlets to lag behind blogs. But we all know and no legal authority has ever questioned that waterboarding someone 183 times is torture. For the NYT to keep denying this, to keep disseminating untruth in the guise of even-handedness is intolerable.

Why not use the inclusive term "torture and abuse" to describe the totality of Bush's interrogation policies? Why is that not even-handed enough?

And when is the NYT going to grow some?