Um, outsourcing our torture now?

The lovely Mr. Dennis Hasturt, our Esteemed Speaker of the House, is apparently (any info? I'm busy calling my rep) heading up a posse that has introduced some exciting new provisions into the bill that would implement the 9/11 Commission's recommendations. The language in question would legalize extraordinary rendition of suspected (suspected! oh yay) terrorists, which basically means, as described by an intelligence official who was quoted in the Washington Post, “We don’t kick the sh*t out of them. We send them to other countries so they can kick the sh*t out of them." You know, that bit that goes, Well, we can't torture them here, but we could always send them to, say, Syria, to get beaten with electical cables for a couple-three weeks or something, on the off-chance they might be terrorists. Or be related to terrorists, or have read about them in the paper.

Not in my country you don't, you motherfucking shit-eaters.

Yeah, I'm a little pissed off.

Luckily, Rep. Edward Markey has introduced an amendment to strike the extraordinary rendition bits. But it needs more co-sponsors, and it needs support. Please, please, please, if you live in the US: CALL YOUR REPRESENTATIVE. If you live outside the US, please, please, please consider writing your government representative and asking what can be done to pressure the US on this matter. I've already called my representative, Tom Lantos, and registered my disapproval of HR 10--and my hope that he'll co-sponsor Rep. Markey's amendment.

I got my info from Teresa Nielsen Hayden's blog, Making Light; part of her entry is a direct quote of a blog entry from another source.

Thanks to ginmar for posting about the topic.