Get Your Team Torture Cards! Collect and Prosecute Them All!

( – promoted by buhdydharma )

Lets talk about torture for a few minutes, shall we? The Dog hears the groans out there, and yeah, he gets that this is an icky subject, but even in our digital age where it is easy to find content you like and ignore the stuff you don’t, there are some things you should not look away from. Torture is one of them. However just because torture is horrible does not mean there is not a place for mockery in our pursuit of accountability to the rule of law! Follow the Dog below the flip for more details.

“Originally posted at Squarestate.net“

We all remember the deck of playing cards the criminal Bush Administration created for members of the Iraqi leadership when we invaded Iraq. These cards had the pictures of the leadership on various suits and values of cards, with Saddam Hussein being the Ace of Spades. Well the Center for Constitutional Rights has taken that idea and put a bit of a curve ball on it for torture accountability.

They have created what they call their Team Torture cards. Instead of playing cards, these are designed along the lines of baseball cards. There are 20 and they have the great slogan “Collect and Prosecute them all!”

Now these cards are going to be pretty desirable. You can see them all by following this link. The Center for Constitutional Rights and Credo (the liberal phone company) are selling these cards. You can get a pack of 20 for $5.00! Amaze and inform your friends with these cards! However, the expectation is they will run out of them in short order, so you will want to order yours as soon as you can.

Now for the serious part of this post, hands off the mouse! No clicking out! With the death of Sen. Kennedy the Obama Administration got a bit of a break. They got a distraction from the release of the CIA 2004 Inspector Generals report. For those of us who care about the rule of law and accountability to the laws of our nation, this means we have to step up our efforts. The report is a horror show of information, just like every other document about the Bush era torture program.

One of the things the Dog thinks we need to keep in focus is the fact that torture is not only defined as the individual acts like mock executions and Waterboarding. It is also the totality of the treatment of prisoners in custody. What comes across in the IG’s report is the fact that not only were we torturing in individual acts, but the whole system of detentions and interrogations for suspected Al Qaeda detainees was being run in such a  way that it looks as though just being a detainee in this system comes near to torture in the totality of treatment.

Remember, the International Conventions Against Torture also make it crime to treat prisoners in a degrading manner. The Dog is not sure about you, but he thinks sedating, then administering a suppository, then diapering, gagging and blind folding detainees just to transport them to Guantanamo falls in the category of degrading treatment.

But it is worse than that. When President Obama talked about the “Fifth category” of detainees, ones which could not be tried, in that category there were not just those who the primary evidence against them was obtained by torture. There are a whole group of prisoners who are no longer mental fit to stand trial, because of the way they were treated. Basically they were tortured into insanity. Even though Jose Padilla pled guilty to crimes which were different than the ones he was arrested for, there is strong evidence that if he had stuck to a not guilty plea, he would have been found incompetent to stand trial. Even now this is the primary basis for his appeals for release.

We must keep the pressure on Attorney General Holder. He can not be allowed to let the architects of the criminal Bush Administrations state sponsored torture program to go uninvestigated. This is why you need to get your set of Team Torture cards! They are a great way to start a conversation about torture with those who are more content to look away. They are funny, but they serve a purpose, to keep accountability to the rule of law alive.

The other thing to do is please join the Dog every Monday for the Weekly Torture Action Letter series. Every week the Dog gives a letter you can cut and paste and the links to send it to the decision makes (AG Holder, President Obama, Speaker Pelosi, Majority Leader Reid, Judiciary Chair Conyers, Judiciary Chair Leahy and Rep. Nadler) to keep this issue alive. If you have not written to them this week, here is a link to Monday’s letter.

By keeping the pressure up we can make a difference. If you think we have seen all of the horrible stuff the criminal Bush administration did, you are wrong by a long shot. Just ask yourself, where are Khalid Sheik Mohammed’s sons? They were captured at the same time as their father, yet after that time we have no information about them. What happened to these little boys? If the dread of the answer to that question does not spur you to action, then the Dog does not know what will.

So, go to the link, see the cards, you can even post a card of your own in the Justice Team part. Write to the AG and keep talking about accountability to the rule of law. It is not just the right thing to do, it is the American thing to do.

The floor is yours.