Bush could bypass new torture ban [From the here-we-go-again department. ] When President Bush last week signed the bill outlawing the torture of detainees, he quietly reserved the right to bypass the law under his powers as commander in chief.
posted by Postroad on Jan 4, 2006 - 87 comments

Request for guidance regarding the OGC's EC regarding detainee abuse, referring to “interrogation techniques made lawful” by the “President's Executive Order.” comes from Records Released in Response to Torture FOIA Request.
Smoking Gun ? asks the ACLU--or just another stepping stone from Torture's Path ? As Ex-Military Lawyers Object to Bush Cabinet Nominee, and in Torture begins at the top, Joe Conason suggests that a recently disclosed FBI memo indicates that "marching orders" to abandon traditional interrogation methods came from Defense Secretary Rumsfeld himself and all the while Guantánamo torture and humiliation still going on, says shackled Briton. (more inside)
posted by y2karl on Dec 20, 2004 - 35 comments

"Any further strikes against Americans will thus be a painful reminder that the war has not been won. Sadly, a main reason will be America's reluctance to focus on the political roots of the terrorist atrocity of Sept. 11." opinions on this piece from the original sponsor of the Mujahideen? username: metafilter46 password: metafilter
posted by specialk420 on Sep 1, 2002 - 23 comments

As late as July 4, the US State Department described Malaysia's Internal Security Act, which allows for indefinite detention without trial as preventing people from "exercising internationally recognised rights of free speech, political expression and assembly" and therefore (more diplomatically-speaking) a cause for concern. Yet when it was recently used to detain those connected to terrorism, Bush decides to invite the Prime Minister of Malaysia to thank him for a 'stirring response' in combating terrorism. Eh?
posted by timyang on Apr 20, 2002 - 4 comments

U.S. Tightening Rules on Keeping Scientific Secrets [NYTimes free subscription required] "One White House proposal is to eliminate the sections of articles that give experimental details researchers from other laboratories would need to replicate the claimed results, helping to prove their validity " It's a new monkey to keep See, Hear, and Speak no evil company: Publish no scientifically replicable evil.
posted by srboisvert on Feb 17, 2002 - 7 comments