US torture bill signed into law

[TehBorken]

 [h3]US torture bill signed into law         [/h3]         Edward Gomez at sfgate.com blogs:   [blockquote]George W. Bush got what he wanted, ostensibly as a tool in his unfocused "war on terror": By signing into law the Military Commissions Act of 2006, Bush has made it legal for the C.I.A. to continue operating torture facilities in undisclosed, foreign countries, and for the writ of habeas corpus to be suspended for individuals who are designated "enemy combatants" against the U.S. (Designated by whom? That question remains unanswered.) The law also "establishes military tribunals that would allow some use of evidence obtained by coercion [that is, torture], but would give defendants access to classified evidence being used to convict them." ([a href="vny!://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2006/10/17/worldupdates/2006-10-17T105552Z_01_NOOTR_RTRJONC_0_-272555-1&sec=Worldupdates"]Reuters[/a])  The provisions of Bush's new torture law mean that Americans have lost the key, constitutional right on which Anglo-American criminal law (and criminal-law procedures in true democracies in general) is founded; that's the basic right of an individual to know why he or she is being apprehended and detained. Now, technically, as in Stalin's Soviet Union, Hitler's Germany, Mao's China or Pol Pot's Cambodia, anyone labeled an "enemy combatant" - again, by whom; by Bush? - can be whisked away and never heard from again. That kind of authority, in the hands of corrupt or untruthful politicians, may or may not be an effective tool in some kind of "war on terror," but it certainly can be a useful tool when it comes to silencing their opponents.[/p][/blockquote][a href="vny!://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/sfgate/author?blogid=15archive/&auth=48"] Link[/a]  

[kitten]

That is disgraceful.  He should be impeached for that.

[Russ]

Heres a story in the sun. One - Fifth of Canadians support torture as a means for terrorism suspects.

  [A href="vny!://www.vancouversun.com"]www.vancouversun.com[/A]

   [DIV class=feed_details] [H4]Don Butler, CanWest News Service; Ottawa Citizen[/H4]Published: Thursday, October 19, 2006

[DIV class=para12 id=article] OTTAWA -- One-fifth of Canadians and more than a third of Americans think governments should be allowed to use torture if doing so could extract information that saves innocent lives from terrorists, says a new poll.

 Overall, though, a solid majority of people around the world oppose the use of torture under any circumstances, according to the poll, done by GlobeScan for the BBC.

 The survey found that 59 per cent of people worldwide agree that clear rules against torture should be maintained because any use of torture is immoral and will weaken international human rights standards.

 In Canada, 74 per cent of respondents oppose any use of torture. Among the 25 countries surveyed, only the Italians, French and Australians more strongly oppose it.

 Still, 22 per cent of Canadians think terrorism poses such an extreme threat that governments should be allowed to use some degree of torture if doing so could save lives.

 The survey found there is more tolerance for the use of torture in countries that have suffered terrorist attacks or political violence.

 In the United States, for instance, fully 36 per cent think the use of torture is justified in some circumstances one of the highest levels in the world. Fifty-eight per cent of Americans are opposed.

 Israelis express the greatest support for torture, with 43 per cent endorsing the practice, though 48 per cent think it should be prohibited. Roughly four in 10 also support the use of torture in Iraq, Indonesia, the Philippines, Nigeria, Kenya, China and Russia.

 India is the only nation where more respondents favour allowing some degree of torture. Thirty-two per cent say it is sometimes permissible, while just 23 per cent are opposed. Nearly half of Indians favour neither position or didn't respond.

 Men are more likely than women to accept some use of torture, and support for a ban on the practice increases slightly with age.

 GlobeScan surveyed more than 27,000 people between late May and early June of this year. The margin of error per country ranges from plus or minus 2.5 percentage points to four percentage points, 19 times in 20. The poll did not attempt to define torture, which of course, is a subjective concept.

 Ottawa Citizen

 [DIV align=center]© CanWest News Service 2006[/DIV][/DIV]