Gen. Hayden: Torturer in chief

* kleiman:

"Torture is fundamentally evil.
"Waterboarding" — simulated drowning — is torture.
Gen. Hayden refuses to renounce it, even in the face of a clear mandate from Congress to do so.
Ergo, Gen. Hayden intends to keep committing fundamentally evil acts if confirmed as Director of the Central Intelligence Agency.
Ergo, voting to confirm Gen. Hayden means being complicit in fundamental evil.
Every Senator who voted for the McCain anti-torture amendment and now votes to confirm Gen. Hayden — including, of course, Mr. Straight Talk himself — ought to be asked whether he (or she) meant it the first time, or whether he (or she) merely voted against torture before voting for it."

* arianna:

"Question of the week: which was met with more derision from critics, The Da Vinci Code or President Bush's proposal to use the National Guard to help secure our border with Mexico?"

* SSRI's Kill. who knew?

"Buried in the FDA/GSK release is an astounding fact: Depressed people are 6.4 times more likely to become suicidal while taking an antidepressant than while taking a sugar pill.
No other antidepressants were mentioned in the FDA's warning but all SSRI antidepressants share a common profile of adverse mental and behavioral effects, including Paxil, Prozac, Zoloft, Celexa, Luvox, and Lexapro. Several other relatively new antidepressants have also been implicated in producing similar psychiatric abnormalities, including Wellbutrin, Effexor, Serzone, and Cymbalta. All of the newer antidepressants can produce stimulation or activation with the potential for increased agitation, anxiety, mood instability, disinhibition, irritability, aggression, hostility, mania, and crashing into depression and suicide. They can also cause a flattening of emotional responses, including a loss of caring, that can unleash dangerous actions"

murderers. they nearly killed me.

* "If Saddam Hussein had been a right wing brutal dictator, one with military, royal, or religious right wing credentials, would he still be in power today? The answer, I think, is clear. Not just still in power but praised, encouraged, armed, and above all, funded, by western governments representing corporate interests. The reason is that corporations find that they can do very good business in countries where the population is kept in check by a religious edicts or the traditions of monarchy or the brute force of the army." (link)