Thanks for this. A passionate defense of the rule of law against the shallow manipulations of an apologist like Cohen.

The Past, as Cohen so cavalierly writes, includes among many similar episodes, an innocent taxi driver in Afghanistan named Dilawar who was pulled off the road and sent to our Bagram prison on 'suspicion' of support of potential terrorist activity (he was rounded up by the Northern Alliance --our 'allies'-- who were paid for their captives). He was beaten so badly by our forces that his thighs were effectively pulverized--all of this was permitted under our so called 'enhanced interrogation' techniques.

His wife didn't know where he was. His family didn't know where he was. He was kept locked up and beaten for nearly a week in a US base in Bagram, Afghanistan with no charges brought against him. He screamed his innocence which only made the beatings that much more fierce (in a film about his death, Taxi to the Dark Side, the US military men explain that they beat him because he was so loud) He died when a blood clot from the beating finally stopped his heart.

Dilawar, a 22-year-old taxi driver from the poverty-stricken village of Yakubi in eastern Afghanistan, by US military forces at Bagram Air Base in December 2002. Dilawar and three of his passengers were captured by the Northern Alliance who falsely accused the men of firing rockets at the Camp Salerno military base.

Five days after being handed over to American forces, Dilawar was dead, killed by US Army interrogators who shackled him to the ceiling by his wrists and subjected him to sleep deprivation and savage beatings for hours on end. The initial official military report claimed that Dilawar had died of "natural causes". A subsequent autopsy revealed, however, that his legs had been reduced a pulp and that even if he had survived, it would have been necessary to amputate them.

This is what Richard Cohen is defending. Let him go and explain the problems with understanding 'our Past' to Dilawar's wife and children.

I'm sure they'll be happy to enlighten him.