Tortured logic

The media have been portraying the issue of torture in simple terms—President Bush and Vice President Cheney support it, and all right-thinking people are opposed. But it's much more complicated than that. The media are either too lazy or too ideological to present the facts.

Part of the problem is, just what does "torture" mean?

Remember that the media had published many stories about alleged "desecration" of the Koran, without making it plain that "desecration" could involve merely touching the Muslim book. Most people would reject the touching of the Koran as a form of desecration. That's how the media distort a controversy by failing to define their terms.

Awwww... you mean our troops aren't using hot irons and boiling oil?

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But how is torture defined? Is it torture to humiliate someone, whether through sexual innuendo or touching a copy of the Koran? Is it torture to deprive someone of sleep, or force them to sit in an uncomfortable position? However one defines it, there have been more than a dozen major inquiries, and none says there has been a torture policy put in place by top civilian and military leaders.

So what about Abu Ghraib and similar incidents?

As noted by the Wall Street Journal, cases of abuse amount to a few hundred out of more than 70,000 detainees. The Journal said this compares favorably with the U.S. prison system, and past wars, including Vietnam and World War II. In the case of Abu Ghraib, it was the Pentagon that released the information about alleged abuse to the news media, and it had already begun prosecuting the violators when the story and the photos were picked up and publicized by CBS and Seymour Hersh.