Wreck our economy. Wreck our nation. Wreck our humanity.
One of the most important documents of the U.S. torture program has just become publicly available for the first time. This is the JTF GTMO “SERE” Interrogation Standard Operating Procedure, now posted on the website of the new documentary, Torturing Democracy. This document clearly specifies that the abusive interrogation techniques to be used at Guantamo [JTF GTMO] are based upon the military’s Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape [SERE] program.
The document is notable for its documentation of the extent to which abuse was bureaucratically standardized for routine use. [link to zMag]
Stiglitz, don’t believe a word but read everything he says,
Virtually all the indicators look grim. Inflation is running at an annual rate of nearly 6 percent, its highest level in 17 years. Unemployment stands at 6 percent; there has been no net job growth in the private sector for almost a year. Housing prices have fallen faster than at any time in memory-in Florida and California, by 30 percent or more. Banks are reporting record losses, only months after their executives walked off with record bonuses as their reward. President Bush inherited a $128 billion budget surplus from Bill Clinton; this year the federal government announced the second-largest budget deficit ever reported. During the eight years of the Bush administration, the national debt has increased by more than 65 percent, to nearly $10 trillion (to which the debts of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae should now be added, according to the Congressional Budget Office). Meanwhile, we are saddled with the cost of two wars. The price tag for the one in Iraq alone will, by my estimate, ultimately exceed $3 trillion.
This tangled knot of problems will be difficult to unravel.
Reversal of Fortune.
COME JANUARY, a new president will take charge of a nation diminished, assert the editors of the Boston Globe.
The nation needs a chief executive who has the temperament and the nerves to shepherd Americans through what promises to be a grueling period — and who has the vision to restore this country to its place of leadership in the world.
Such a leader is at hand. With great enthusiasm, the Globe endorses Senator Barack Obama for president.