Two orders of magnitude

Here's an interesting insight into the situation in Iraq, from a widely-blogged interview of an Israeli interrogator:

How physical are you allowed to get during interrogations, with permission?

Very low levels. It could be two slaps in one interrogation, or to shake him, but not very strongly, or to put a cover on his head to scare him. We have never insulted a person's religion or humiliated them. There is no torture in the security services.

What do you make of the torture and abuse that took place in Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq?

I don't want to judge the Americans. In Gaza we have one security person for every 1000 people. In Iraq they have one for every 100,000. They have no information or intelligence on their detainees. Information is the beginning of interrogation, and if there is none, if there is no language between you and the detainee, sometimes you will use more power. That I presume is what happened in Abu Ghraib.

One for every 1000, versus one for every 100,000. Quite a difference.

Catching up...

Catching up, as it were - a final political post from Watchblog that's maybe worth sharing with the non-watchblog world. Most of these things are so transient...unfortunately, not all. I also wrote another post, back before 11/2, which was mostly about how Bush has clearly decided to ignore the outrage over torturing accused terrorists. And now Gonzales, the legal eagle behind Abu Ghraib, is being put up for AG - head of the Justice Department. Orwell would love it.

Maybe now that the election's over, I'll finally get back to doing some work. Or maybe not. It's so much more fun to fume about the election results and the news, isn't it?