Tortured logic

[struggle4progress]

Democratic senator Dick Durbin, of Illinois, should have engaged his brain before he compared the abuse of prisoners at Guantánamo Bay to the atrocities perpetrated at Nazi death camps, in the Soviet gulag, or on the killing fields of Cambodia. He was right to apologize. But though his analogy was stupid and utterly offensive, he was absolutely correct that the United States has shamed itself — and set back the struggle against terrorism — by engaging in what any reasonable person would agree is torture.

Thus it is even more disturbing that Durbin’s remarks have become the latest cause célèbre inside the right-wing echo chamber. Never mind that, just a few weeks ago, Republican senator Rick Santorum, of Pennsylvania, compared the tactics of filibustering Democrats to those used by the Nazis to gain power in Germany in the 1930s. Within hours of Durbin’s remarks, Fox News, right-wing radio hosts such as Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage, and Jay Severin, and conservative bloggers demanded that he be stripped of his post as the Democratic whip, even subjected to formal censure. Millions of Americans today are convinced that Durbin’s lapse is the most important matter facing the country.

As a lesson for everyone in Congress on what constitutes unacceptable rhetoric, both Durbin and Santorum deserve condemnation for their glib and incendiary analogies. But perhaps what was most offensive about Durbin’s statement was this: he managed to divert attention from human-rights abuses at Guantánamo and other detention facilities. The issue Durbin raised was serious. It should not be obscured by a torrent of mindless right-wing rhetoric.

http://www.bostonphoenix.com/boston/news_features/editorial/documents/04776792.asp