Atrocity after atrocity

Knight Ridder reports a bit more on the FBI memos that the ACLU obtained through a FOIA disclosure request:

WASHINGTON - Military interrogators posing as FBI agents at the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, wrapped terrorism suspects in an Israeli flag and forced them to watch homosexual pornography under strobe lights during interrogation sessions that lasted as long as 18 hours, according to one of a batch of FBI memos released Thursday.

FBI agents working at the prison complained about the military interrogators' techniques in e-mails to their superiors from 2002 to 2004, 54 e-mails released by the American Civil Liberties Union showed. The agents tried to get the military interrogators to follow a less coercive approach and warned that the harsh methods could hinder future criminal prosecutions of terrorists because information gained illegally is inadmissible in court.

Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, who was in charge of the prison at the time, overrode the FBI agents' protests, according to the documents.

The memos offer some of the clearest proof yet that the abuses and torture of prisoners in U.S. military custody weren't the isolated actions of low-ranking soldiers but a result of policies approved by senior officials, the ACLU said.

I just don't get why the American public (and the press) isn't more up in arms about this. It's just disgusting. Torture of detainees seems to be the rule rather than the exception, and it clearly emanates from the top down.

Unfortunately, we've heard so much of this that it's almost becoming passé. The administration seems to be trying to exhaust our capacity to be outraged. Atrocity after atrocity, outrage after outrage. It's just wearing us down.