Medieval torture rack (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A torture rack, photographed in the Tower of London, England. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Torture in the 16th century (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Goring Bush (Photo credit: jurvetson)

Gore Vidal (Photo credit: Mark Coggins)

Cover of George W. Bush

Our Kind of (Torturing) Town

a riveting play by veteran Chicago journalist John Conroy depicting the police torture scandal that he spent two decades chronicling.

The Impossibility of Rest

The trend of recent political society in the West depresses me to the point of introversion and withdrawal. The state itself has become, ever more blatantly, a mechanism for funneling money from ordinary people and giving it to the very rich, be it in bank bailouts, quantitative easing doled again to the banks, private finance initiative payments (liabilities totalling over £200 billion in taxpayer paid interest in the NHS alone) or “market driven” takeover of public services, or a hundred more ways.

My own professional struggle, which focused on trying to block use of intelligence gained by torture, seems only an attempt to divert a tiny ripple within a tsunami of contempt for morality in public life. The practice of torture exploitation has not ended; the Gibson inquiry into official complicity with torture has been unceremoniously halted as the guilty and directly responsible polish the green leather benches of the House of Lords with their expensively suited rumps, or inhabit their offices as Permanent Under Secretaries, or command large offices in BP.

How he got there

The press corps' war against Candidate Gore:
How George W. Bush reached the White House

Early campaigning: Inventing a liar

Chapter 1: A search for bias: Bush and Gore hit the trail
Chapter 2: In love with Love Story: Inventing a LIAR
Chapter 3: Washington (Post) at war: It was the mainstream press, stupid!

New Hampshire primary: Narrative hardens

Chapter 4: Puffing Bush and jeering Gore: New Hampshire was for Heathers
Chapter 5: A campaign about clothing, a virtual wilding:
The press corps' month of Wolf
Chapter 6: In love with Love Canal: Narrative hardens
Chapter 7: Good-bye, Manchester: "They hate Gore!"

Spring break 2000: Inventing a leader

Chapter 8: Rescued by Elian: Drama restored
Chapter 9: Republican Camelot: Journeys with George
Chapter 10: The uses of substance: Inventing a leader
Chapter 11: The uses of scandal: Gore's temple of doom
Chapter 12: Displaying Gore's fangs: Who's embellishing now?