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The United States has the right to incarcerate convicted offenders. But, does it have the right to torment them, drive them insane or impose conditions of confinement that cause extreme physical disabilities?

No, we're not talking about detainees or Guantanamo. We're talking about Supermax at Florence Colorado, often called Alcatraz of the Rockies.

The latest to complain: Eric Rudolph:

Olympic bomber Eric Rudolph laments in a series of letters that the caged atmosphere of the federal prison where is spending the rest of his life is designed to drive him insane.

Rudolph, who hid out from authorities for five years in the woods of western North Carolina before being captured, says in correspondence with a Colorado newspaper that his surroundings at the Supermax prison are getting to him.

The man who overturned Latin America's most stable democracy in 1973 and murdered thousands now meets his maker:

Gen. Augusto Pinochet, who overthrew Chile's democratically elected Marxist president in a bloody coup and ruled this Andean nation for 17 years, died Sunday, dashing hopes of victims of his regime's abuses that he would be brought to justice. He was 91.

. . . Chile's government says at least 3,197 people were killed for political reasons during his rule, but after leaving the presidency in 1990 Pinochet escaped hundreds of criminal complaints because of his declining physical and mental health. Pinochet took power on Sept. 11, 1973, demanding an unconditional surrender from President Salvador Allende as warplanes bombed the presidential palace in downtown Santiago. Instead, Allende committed suicide with a submachine gun he had received as a gift from Fidel Castro.

As the mustachioed Pinochet crushed dissent during his 1973-90 rule, he left little doubt about who was in charge. ''Not a leaf moves in this country if I'm not moving it,'' he once said.

I do not romanticize Salvador Allende. I believe he was creating chaos in Chile and would have had his own coup if he could have. But it was Pinochet who attacked democracy. It was Pinochet who murdered thousands.

The crimes are his. The infamy his. As it should be. Do NOT rest in peace murderer. Of humans. And democracy.

Silvestre Reyes clearly can not do the job of House Intel Chair:

Reyes stumbled when I asked him a simple question about al Qaeda at the end of a 40-minute interview in his office last week. Members of the Intelligence Committee, mind you, are paid $165,200 a year to know more than basic facts about our foes in the Middle East.

We warmed up with a long discussion about intelligence issues and Iraq. And then we veered into terrorism’s major players. To me, it’s like asking about Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland: Who’s on what side?

The dialogue went like this:

Al Qaeda is what, I asked, Sunni or Shia?

“Al Qaeda, they have both,” Reyes said. “You’re talking about predominately?”

“Sure,” I said, not knowing what else to say.

“Predominantly — probably Shiite,” he ventured.

This is a man who does not even know this but pretends to know enough to call on the US to send in tens of thousands of more troops. What a mistake Pelosi made naming Reyes. Disclosure -- I urged the naming of Jane Harman as Intel Chair. h/t - Ezra.

The House ethics committee concludes that misconduct has no consequences:

House Republican leaders failed to protect young pages and interns from sexually suggestive advances by former Rep. Mark Foley and remained "willfully ignorant" of the consequences, an investigative panel of the House ethics committee reported Friday.

No discipline will be forthcoming because "no rules appeared to be broken." What does that say about the need for the next Congress to implement meaningful rules -- starting with a mandatory reporting requirement when members learn about sexually inappropriate behavior?

On the last day of the legislative year, a Republican spoke the truth:

“The breakdown of regular order this cycle — indeed the failure to get our bills done — should be squarely placed at the feet of the departing Senate majority leader who failed to schedule floor time for the consideration of appropriations bills,” Representative Jerry Lewis, Republican of California and the departing chairman of the Appropriations Committee, said in an unusual public attack on a fellow Republican.

The Republican legislature failed to pass 9 of the 11 spending bills that fund the government, leaving responsible governance to the Democrats next year.

With much fanfare, the government indicted Derrick Shareef, described here as "a black Muslim convert accused of plotting alone to set off hand grenades inside a Rockford, Illinois shopping mall a few days before Christmas."

Shareef had no connection to any terrorist organization. He had no hand grenades. He had no cash with which to buy hand grenades, although he had a couple of stereo speakers he hoped to swap for some. Not the most sophisticated of terrorist plots.

Shareef talked of jihad, a word that can describe violent or nonviolent intentions. Shareef's may have been violent, but he seems to have had little ability to carry out his plan.

So Shareef fits a pattern of indicted "wanna be" terrorists with big ideas but no apparent means or backing from our real enemies.

Much about this story, including the state of Shareef's mental health, is unknown. Many of the unanswered questions are explored here.

The Drug Czar's web page trumpets the administration's commitment to effective drug treatment.

Director Walters has overseen the creation and implementation of the "Access to Recovery" treatment initiative announced by President Bush in his 2003 State of the Union address. This innovative approach to drug treatment funding provides vouchers for hundreds of thousands of Americans struggling with addiction.

The program doesn't seem to be helping Travis County, Texas, where probationers wait months to enter underfunded treatment programs.

"It's imperative to get them into treatment early," [pobation officer Julie Vasquez-Martinez] said. "It's imperative so they don't continue to make the wrong decisions. They need these tools and techniques to stay clean and sober." But department statistics show that hundreds of newly sentenced probationers in Travis County are waiting to get into court-ordered substance abuse treatment.

Judges send some offenders to county jails to wait for a treatment slot to open up, exacerbating the county's ongoing jail crowding problem. Others are released into the community to fight their addiction on their own.

As Donald Rumsfeld makes one last secret trip to Iraq (a final desperate search for WMD's?), he is surely comforted to know that his life is at less risk than the troops who served under his watch. At least 2,930 of them have died in Iraq -- so far.

larger version here.

I'm headed back to Telluride today to prepare for a court hearing on Monday. The courthouse is the building with the clock in the picture.

I won't have time to ski, but if you've ever wondered what the slopes there look like, check out these pictures.

For those of you online this weekend, here's a space to chat.

TalkLeft is nominated in the "Best of the Top 250 Blogs." If you'd like to vote for us, we'd appreciate it. Just click here.

Here is another example of the Media marginalizing the views of the American People:

Americans are not necessarily intent on getting all U.S. troops out right away, the poll indicated. The survey found strong support for a two-year timetable if that's what it took to get U.S. troops out. Seventy-one percent said they would favor a two-year timeline from now until sometime in 2008, but when people are asked instead about a six-month timeline for withdrawal that number drops to 60 percent. Public opinion expert Karlyn Bowman of the conservative American Enterprise Institute said stronger support for the longer timetable could reflect a realization that it takes time to change strategy.

60% say out in 6 months and a so called expert says this reflects a realization that it takes time to change strategy (read stay longer). I mean, this is just false. If 60% said stay the course, they would not be rationalizing it away like this.

More.

Today, in federal court, the ACLU and Human Rights First argued its case that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld should be held accountable for the torture and abuse of detainees in U.S. military custody.

Today’s hearing marked the first time a federal court has considered whether top U.S. officials can be held legally accountable for the torture scandal in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Background:

The ACLU and Human Rights First filed the lawsuit in March 2005 on behalf of nine innocent civilians who were detained by the United States military in Iraq and Afghanistan. While in U.S. custody, the men were subjected to abuse, torture and other cruel and degrading treatment, including severe and repeated beatings, cutting with knives, sexual humiliation and assault, mock executions, death threats, and restraint in contorted and excruciating positions. All of the men were released without charge.