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Ever since the Obama administration last week released the now infamous "torture memos" that legalized acts of torture by government employees (CIA) on behalf of its citizens, each new revelation creates new questions and commentary:

Eric Etheridge as The Opinionator over at the NY Times has the "Torture Retorts":

A newly declassified Congressional report released Tuesday outlined the most detailed evidence yet that the military's use of harsh interrogation methods on terrorism suspects was approved at high levels of the Bush administration.

The 232-page report, the product of an 18-month inquiry, was approved on Nov. 20 by the Senate Armed Services Committee, but has since been under Pentagon review for declassification.

The Senate report documented how some of the techniques used by the military at prisons in Afghanistan and at the naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, as well as in Iraq -- stripping detainees, placing them in "stress positions"or depriving them of sleep -- originated in a military program known as Survival Evasion Resistance and Escape, or SERE, intended to train American troops to resist abusive enemy interrogations.

According to the Senate investigation, a military behavioral scientist and a colleague who had witnessed SERE training proposed its use at Guantanamo in October 2002, as pressure was rising "to get 'tougher' with detainee interrogations." Officers there sought authorization, and Mr. Rumsfeld approved 15 interrogation techniques.

It goes on and on from there, but suffice it to say that the fact that we're even having this "torture debate" in this country shows you how low down we've sunk. There are still people who are convinced that "water boarding" is not torture.

Firedoglake has been deconstructing the memos here and here, and it's most definitely worth reading through.

It's always helpful to read from across the pond what The Economist is saying about this issue, too.

And finally, we have the following interview by Chris Matthews of former CIA operative, Bob Baer, where he's asked the simple question, "Does torture work?"

Final summation (so far) from the NY Times.

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