Senate's Torture Hall of Fame - the Fuck Geneva Convention 9

Ninety of the 100 members of the Senate (Including Senate Republican majority leader, Bill Frist), voted in favour of Republican Senator John McCain’s amendment (details)which would ban "cruel, inhuman or degrading" treatment of prisoners held by the US military. Nine Senators voted to continue torturing people.

The Pro-Torture members of the Senate are:

Wayne Allard (R-CO)
Christopher Bond (R-MO)
Tom Coburn (R-OK)
Thad Cochran (R-MS)
John Cornyn (R-TX)
James Inhofe (R-OK)
Pat Roberts (R-KS)
Jeff Sessions (R-AL)
Ted Stevens (R-AK)

The amendment, is attached to the $440 billion (£247 billion) Defence Spending Bill and if Mr Bush vetoes the amendment, ( a first in his 5 year Presidency) he would have to veto the entire bill. The Amendment is opposed by the Bush Administration and by Duncan Hunter, who chairs the House Armed Services Committee, must survive a House-Senate conference committee to have even a chance of becoming law.

Senators have pointed out that a Presidential veto can be overturned by a two-thirds majority in both houses.

It looks therefore, as though the amendment’s fate depends on, secretive, closed door, smoky room, late night negotiations between the Senate and the lower chamber, the House of Representatives – which probably means some more pork on the table ... before they run out of money to pay the troops in Iraq next month.

Senator Ted Stevens (see recent posts for his Alaskan fishy porking exploits) is quoted as saying, "that requiring American troops to follow their own field manual is not practical", which is a novel legal concept which the Supreme Court will struggle with.

They might also struggle with dealing with appeals from US military personnel currently in jail for undertaking such activity, which it appears that the Commander in Chief is quite happy with.

Recent blogs on same topic here