The next governor of Texas, author and musician Kinky Friedman said recently that he wasn't against the death penalty; he was against executing the wrong man. That's exactly the way I feel about torture. I'm not against torturing vicious terrorists who have plotted and or killed innocent people; I am against torturing innocent people.

If you've ever thought that torturing alleged terrorists is a good idea, you need to consider the case of Maher Arar. Mr. Arar, was born in Syria but is now a Canadian citizen, was abducted by the Bush administration while changing planes at JFK Airport on his way home to Canada. Arar was flown to Syria, and then kept in a tiny cell for the next 10 months, where he was beaten and tortured on a regular basis. After a 2 year investigation the Canadian government has issued a report that concludes "categorically that there is no evidence to indicate Mr. Arar has committed any offense." According to published reports the report also found that the American government and the Syrian government lied to Canada about Arar's whereabouts because they knew the Canadians would object to their citizen being brought to Syria to be tortured.

Now that the Canadian government has fessed up to their role in an innocent man being held against his will for a year and tortured, one might think our own government would take responsibility for their role in this tragedy. You would be wrong. The NY Times reports that Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez's refused to even admit the Justice Department played a role in this case or that Mr. Arar was indeed tortured during his confinement. A day after the denial a Justice Department spokesperson recanted saying, "Mr. Gonzales had intended to make only a narrow point: that deportations are now handled by the Department of Homeland Security not the Department of Justice." Oh, please. The Republicans and the main stream media had a field day with President Clinton's equivocation of the word "is" during his sworn testimony about the Lewinsky matter but this rhetorical tap dance is apparently an acceptable language clarification to them based on their stony silence on this matter.

So you're saying to yourself well, that was just one instance of a mistaken identity, miscommunication of bad intelligence, stuff happens. Then consider the case of German citizen Kahled al Masri, who was reportedly held by the CIA for five months in Afghanistan. Masri is suing former CIA director George J. Tenet and ten other CIA officials as a result of his 2003 mistaken arrest and five-month confinement. According to the Washington Post, German investigators have since confirmed most of Masri's allegations of wrongful imprisonment. Instead of admitting their role in this case however, for the fifth time in the past year, the Justice Department recently invoked the state secrets privileges to argue that the lawsuit should be dismissed without an airing.

I don't want to live in a country that is willing to sacrifice hard won civil rights because of prejudice and fear, unfortunately the current power structure does and the easily led American public apparently does.