The Stain of Torture

This is an excellent column by the former physician to Bush 41...

Our medical code of ethics requires us to oppose torture wherever it is inflicted, for any reason. Guided by this ethic, I served as a volunteer with the international group MEDICO in 1963, taking care of people who had been tortured by the French during Algeria's civil war. I remain deeply affected by that experience today -- by the people I tried to help and could not, and by their families, which suffered the most terrible grief. I heard the victims' stories, examined their permanently broken bodies and looked into faces that could not see me because of the irreparable damage done not only to their senses but also to their brains. As I have studied reports of torture throughout our troubled world since then, I have always found comfort in knowing that at least it did not occur here, not among Americans.

Now that comfort is shattered. Reports of torture by U.S. forces have been accompanied by evidence that military medical personnel have played a role in this abuse and by new military ethical guidelines that in effect authorize complicity by health professionals in ill-treatment of detainees. These new guidelines distort traditional ethical rules beyond recognition to serve the
interests of interrogators, not doctors and detainees.

The last paragraph is perfect:

America cannot continue down this road. Torture demonstrates weakness, not strength. It does not show understanding, power or magnanimity. It is not leadership. It is a reaction of government officials overwhelmed by fear who succumb to conduct unworthy of them and of the citizens of the United States.

Go check out the whole thing.

Side note: as a part of a fellowship I held, I was a participant in a medical ethics seminar. During one session, I was assigned to present from the standpoint that military medical personnel should be a part of the intelligence-gathering apparatus. I did so as best I could, but I felt... I guess "slimey" would be the word... during the entire thing. As a result of this incident, I can't imagine folks in the government who shill for things they are utterly opposed to, either ethically and/or intellectually... the soulless whoring that would be required is beyond me.