From the Ministry of Love

Andrew Sullivan, on how Bush's inner circle came to embrace torture:

It is as if neoconservatism came to believe that American exceptionalism also means that America, by virtue of its unique virtue, is uniquely empowered to commit evil and somehow thereby render it good.

Cf. Rudolph Giuliani, upon being told that his friend Michael B. Mukasey, Bush's nominee for Attorney General, said he wasn't sure whether waterboarding is torture (Oct. 25, 2007):

Well, I’m not sure it is either. I’m not sure it is either. It depends on how it’s done. It depends on the circumstances. It depends on who does it .

And George Bush: "we do not torture."

And finally, the the Table of Contents of the "ICRC Report On the Treatment of Fourteen 'High Value Detainees' in CIA Custody":

Introduction
1. Main Elements of the CIA Detention Program
1.1 Arrest and Transfer
1.2 Continuous Solitary Confinement and Incommunicado Detention
1.3 Other Methods of Ill-treatment
1.3.1 Suffocation by water
1.3.2 Prolonged Stress Standing
1.3.3 Beatings by use of a collar
1.3.4 Beating and kicking
1.3.5 Confinement in a box
1.3.6 Prolonged nudity
1.3.7 Sleep deprivation and use of loud music
1.3.8 Exposure to cold temperature/cold water
1.3.9 Prolonged use of handcuffs and shackles
1.3.10 Threats
1.3.11 Forced shaving
1.3.12 Deprivation/restricted provision of solid food
1.4 Further elements of the detention regime [cont.]

"We do not torture." As in, "when we do it, it's not torture."