Friday, December 12, 2008

The "Bad Apples" are at the Top of the Bushel Basket

A bipartisan Senate report released Thursday concludes that decisions
made by former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld were a "direct
cause" of widespread detainee abuses, and that other Bush
administration officials were to blame for creating a legal and moral
climate that contributed to inhumane treatment.

The report, endorsed by Democrats and Republicans on the Senate Armed
Services Committee, is the most forceful denunciation to date of the
role that Rumsfeld and other top officials played in the prisoner
abuse scandals of the last five years.


The document also challenges assertions by senior Bush administration
officials that the most egregious cases of prisoner mistreatment were
isolated incidents of appalling conduct by U.S. troops.

"The abuse of detainees at Abu Ghraib in late 2003 was not simply the
result of a few soldiers acting on their own," the report says.

-- LA Times, Dec. 12

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