The Guardian Reports:
The US embassy in London was forced to issue a correction yesterday to an interview given by the ambassador, Robert Tuttle, in which he claimed America would not fly suspected terrorists to Syria, which has one of the worst torture records in the Middle East. A statement acknowledged media reports of a suspect taken from the US to Syria.
The Republican Party is the party of abuse. It's theory is that the best way to improve the world is to abuse the people who stand in your way. Torture is not an unfortunate by product of the war on terror but US policy. It is part of the governing philosophy of the Republican Party, and a direct result of their ideology. (Presstitution note: the Washington Post calls his pro-torture writings "a spy study" in the headlines.)
When the Republicans want to deal with a problem, they look for who they can abuse. Even if it doesn't solve the problem, it makes the base of the party, which clearly subscribes to the
wife beating theory of government, feel better. It isn't just terrorism. Consider how they want to deal with immigration, that's right, by punishing the children of undocumented immigrants. Children whose siblings are often citizens.
The Tuttle revelation is already producing an outcry in the UK partially because:
Asked if he knew whether the US had sought permission from Britain, Mr Tuttle said Ms Rice had maintained that rendition would respect each country's sovereignty. His reply would seem to imply the US had sought permission, possibly leaving the British government open to challenge.
Europe takes human rights far more seriously than the US does - Britain, if it was complicit in a torture flight becomes open to sanctions from the EU, and from investigation. Given that the opposition Conservative Party is ahead in the polls, something which could embarass the ruling Labour Party into elections would make them more than happy.
With lawsuits alread flying in the US, and arrest warrants already issued for CIA personnel by Italy, torture is going to end up being a very expensive mistake. Even though few Americans believe that torture should be used "often", a strong plurality believe it should be used "sometimes". Having watched too many cop shows where busting a person's hands gets the location of the little girl that the paedophile kidnapped and suspended over a vat of acide with a complicated timer - Americans fail to realize that torture doesn't yield such information, almost ever. The very circumstance when the average America feels that torture is justified is the very circumstance when it never generates information. If a captive can run out the clock, they do. People will die first, precisely because they know their death will buy the time that is needed.
In short, a slender majority of the American public still thinks that the way to deal with hidden enemies is with Gestapo tactics. This number has been ebbing, and the hard core "often" group is now such a small group as to qualify for "fringe" status. Europe is even more decisive - having suffered under regimes which used torture within living memory. And it isn't just the left - the Times of London calls Tuttle's lie a "gaffe" and the Financial Times notes that this isn't the first time that Tuttle has uttered gross factual inaccuracies in public.
The former used car salesman is finding that torture, war crimes and failure are a harder sell.