Europe gets closer to the truth. Meanwhile, a statement on the matter has been issued by a large number of people from a spectrum of religious groups - Jewish, Catholic, evangelical, Eastern Orthodox, and so on. It is indeed astonishing that a presidency declared to be "faith-based" will go down in history as having authorized, condoned and enforced a policy that violates every conceivable Christian principle; and that so much of the religious right has either acquiesced or approved. Maybe they're just reflecting the views of this emailer:
"I take it you've yet to figure out that not only does Abu Ghraib not matter much to J.Q. Public. He actually expects his government to go over and above what would normally be thought of as acceptable, when pursuing information that would thwart terror attacks and protect American lives. Your apparent need to maintain a publicly viewed veneer of outrage is a bore. And quite frankly, one begins to wonder how long we'll continue to suffer through you rhetorically "banging your head against the wall" day in and day out, knowing full well the only people who seriously give a damn are the other members of the flat forehead club. All of whom seem to be primarily motivated by the need to let everyone know they've occupied a plot atop the moral high ground. Great. We're all happy for ya. Sorry bout not joining ya. But you see ... While being full of one's own sense of self-righteousness is appealing, desiring to protect the lives of our fellow countrymen by any means necessary trumps it."
"By any means necessary." We've heard that somewhere before, haven't we? And if it is "self-righteous" to oppose torture, is every campaign against blatant government immorality "self-righteous"? Of course, we have had a public debate. We did have a full Congressional airing. We did pass a law banning such practices. It's just that we have a president who sees himself as above the law. And so the torture continues.