Digby: Unleashing The Beast

I have written often about how the Republicans are becoming what they railed against for decades: totalitarians. Unsurprisingly I suppose, it turns out that what they really hated about Soviet communism was the economics. The 50 years of ranting about personal liberty and anti-authoritarian government seems to have been mere political rhetoric. Now that they are in power themselves they have adopted certain Soviet values quite seamlessly.

Here's a former Soviet dissident Vladimir Bukovsky, writing in this Sunday's Washington Post:

This is a new debate for Americans, but there is no need for you to reinvent the wheel. Most nations can provide you with volumes on the subject. Indeed, with the exception of the Black Death, torture is the oldest scourge on our planet (hence there are so many conventions against it). Every Russian czar after Peter the Great solemnly abolished torture upon being enthroned, and every time his successor had to abolish it all over again. These czars were hardly bleeding-heart liberals, but long experience in the use of these "interrogation" practices in Russia had taught them that once condoned, torture will destroy their security apparatus. They understood that torture is the professional disease of any investigative machinery.