News Outlets Shun Word 'Torture' in Regard to Destroyed CIA Tapes

[DeepModem Mom]

Editor&Publisher: News Outlets Shun Word 'Torture' in Regard to Destroyed CIA Tapes
By Greg Mitchell
Published: December 08, 2007

NEW YORK As the protests surrounding revelations that the CIA had destroyed tapes that showed brutal interrogations by its agents (were reported on), most new outlets refused to brand what the tapes likely showed as "torture."

One Associated Press article refers simply to "interrogation" on the tapes, at one point putting "enhanced interrogation" in quotes. Another refers to "harsh interrogation." Mark Mazzeti in The New York Times uses "severe interrogation methods." Eric Lichtblau in the same paper uses the same phrase.

Dan Eggen and Joby Warrick in The Washington Post rely on "harsh interrogation tactics." They refer to one detainee having been "identified by intelligence officials as one of three detainees subjected to waterboarding," which they refer to not as torture but as "an aggressive interrogation technique that simulates drowning."

James Oliphant at the Chicago Tribune's popular Washington, D.C. blog The Swamp calls them "extreme methods to interrogate." James Gordon Meek in New York's Daily News referred to "rough interrogations."

Greg Miller in the Los Angeles Times notes the CIA's reference to "harsh interrogation techniques" but at least in his lead he observes that Democrats were indeed calling this "torture." And a Washington Post editorial bluntly carries as a headline: "The Torture Tapes."

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003682997

[acmavm]

1. Still afraid to admit that their country is not better than the old Soviet

Union I guess.

[ixion]

5. exactly...

how far we've fallen...:(

[spanone]

2. i've seen it referred to as 'harsh interrogation'

i guess as the voltage is cranked up on your genitals, it's all semantics.

[Solly Mack]

3. Because they're cowards

and not just them

[malaise]

4. Good spot

The deception would be funny if it were not so serious.

[Lasher]

6. Wonder if non-US outlets are using euphemisms too? n/t

[stubtoe]

7. Spinning "torture" on behalf of the administration for whom they work.

Note to MSM: it ain't gonna work. We're so onto you.

[Kurovski]

8. K&R. (nt)

[Perry Logan]

9. If Democrats did it, it would be "torture torture torture."