Kinder, Gentler Treatment of Terrorist Detainees
John Hinderaker

The long-festering issue of how far the CIA can go in questioning terrorist detainees has been resolved, for now at least, with a new executive order that authorizes resumption of the use of some "severe interrogation methods" by the agency, while at the same time accepting the State Department's definition of “humiliating and degrading treatment."

The practical effect of the change is to deny the CIA use of waterboarding and temperature extremes as interrogation tactics. What "severe interrogation methods" remain available has not been made public. ...

And of course that same executive order forbids beheading noncombatants and flying of airplanes into tall buildings. George, did they find your head when they did that colonoscopy?

Below the fold:

• The 9/11 Generation
• Were Gitmo lawyers leaking info to detainees?
• Officials debate sustained Iraq 'surge'

See also:

• The Democrats Want You…to shut your traps
• WHAT was Hillary Thinking?
• Harpers v. the Blogger's Roundtable; The Left v. Petraeus
• Iraqi sects are locked in power struggle
• General: Iraqi forces won't be ready in Anbar for 'couple of years'

The 9/11 Generation
Michelle Malkin: Dean Barnett has a nice piece about our troops in the Weekly Standard. It tells the story of some young American men and women who joined the military after 9/11. I met members of the 9/11 Generation in Iraq much like the ones Barnett features, and correspond with many of them every week who serve our country all over the world. They are brave, smart, dedicated, faithful, and committed to protecting our country’s best interests.  ...

Were Gitmo lawyers leaking info to detainees?
See-Dubya

There’s a new ruling on the Guantanamo detainees and their relationship with their lawyers out of the DC Circuit. Andy McCarthy notes that the NYT has, as usual, spun it as a dramatic rout of the Bush administration when in fact it looks to him (and to me) that both sides won a few arguments.

Skipping the Times’ spin on it, I went straight to the text of the ruling (pdf here). I’ll leave the legal analysis to the specialists in this area like McCarthy, but I found a pretty big news nugget stuffed down on page 18. The Government was seeking to control what information lawyers could communicate to their clients–they wanted to make sure that it was limited to legal filings and documents and not chit-chat and world news. Well, actually, they already prohibited that; now they want to be able to examine the text of documents sent from lawyers to detainees in order to enforce it. Here’s why, emphasis mine: ...

Officials debate sustained Iraq 'surge'
Administration and military leaders haven't decided whether progress would mean ending or extending the troop buildup.
By Peter Spiegel, LAT Staff Writer

WASHINGTON — In Congress, a passionate debate over the war in Iraq ended abruptly in legislative deadlock this week, leaving President Bush free to continue his military buildup into September. But inside the administration, a less visible but no less passionate debate is quietly underway — over whether the "surge" should continue even longer.

Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, the overall commander in Iraq, is expected to present Bush with several options in a key September report, along with an analysis of where each path might lead.

But senior administration officials are far from unified on the question of whether progress over the summer should lead to an extension of the surge — or to an opportunity to declare victory and end the increase in forces.

Evidence is mounting that military commanders favor a continuation of the buildup, which now has the troop level at 158,000, through next spring. On Friday, two senior military commanders in Iraq indicated that efforts to stabilize their provinces will stretch well beyond September. ...