Posted this morning at Electric Politics, a podcast interview with Dr.
Darius Rejali, author of Torture and Democracy. As Darius puts it, he
didn't set out to write a book that refutes the rationalization for
torture. And he thinks that the parts of his book of most interest to
policy-makers may be of least interest to academics (a pity, if true).
Despite all that, he's produced a landmark work that provides context
and several cleanly analytical ways of *****sing the practice and
impact of torture.
The bottom line is that not only does torture almost never work, but
that it almost always produces serious, unintended negative --
practical -- consequences. Quite apart from torture's lack of any
moral standing whatsoever, the practical implications are interesting,
not least because they raise anew the question of why, when
governments torture, they keep their practices secret.
If you have time to listen please forward the link along as you like.
http://www.electricpolitics.com/podcast/2008/05/of_tongues_and_ticking_time_bo.html
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