The “harsh method” that dare not speak its name:

The May 13 article, headlined “Harsh CIA Methods Cited in Top Qaeda Interrogation,” described “coercive interrogation methods” endorsed by the CIA and the Justice Department, including hooding, food and light deprivation, withholding medications, and “a technique known as ‘water boarding,’ in which a prisoner is strapped down, forcibly pushed under water and made to believe he might drown.”

The article quoted no one who said that the CIA methods described were, in fact, torture. Yet it would have been easy to find human rights experts who would describe them as such. The website of Human Rights Watch (www.hrw.org) reports that “the prohibition against torture under international law applies to many measures,” including “near drowning through submersion in water.” Amnesty International U.S.A. (www.amnestyusa.org) names “submersion into water almost to the point of suffocation” as a form of torture, and emphasizes that torture “can be psychological, including threats, deceit, humiliation, insults, sleep deprivation, blindfolding, isolation, mock executions…and the withholding of medication or personal items.”

Salman Rushdie:

The oldest Indian rivalries of all have resurfaced in this election, as they also did in 1977. Then as now, much of the urban bourgeoisie voted for the government, while the impoverished Indian masses, in particular the rural poor, mostly voted against it. The Indian battle for centrality in the debate about the country’s future has always been, to some degree, a battle between the city and the village. It is between, on the one hand, the urbanized, industrialized India favored by both the socialist-inclined Jawaharlal Nehru and the free-market architects of “India Shining,” the new India in which a highly successful capitalist class has transformed the heights of the economy; and, on the other hand, the agricultural, homespun India beloved of Mahatma Gandhi, the immense countryside India where three-quarters of the population still lives and which has not benefited in the slightest from the recent economic boom.

It’s no accident that the ruling alliance lost heavily in Andhra Pradesh and in Tamil Nadu, precisely the states that wooed information technology giants such as Microsoft to set up shop, turning sleepy “second cities” such as Madras, Bangalore and Hyderabad into new-tech boom towns. That’s because while the rich got richer, the fortunes of the poor, such as the farmers of Andhra, declined year by year. The gulf between India’s rich and poor has never looked wider than it does today, and the government has fallen into that chasm.

In today’s Hartford Courant, Phoebe Robeson Rounds schools the Yale administration in diversity:

Why don’t we have a say about who teaches us? Last semester, a group of undergraduates at Yale met with Nina Glickson, the assistant to President Richard Levin. She assured us that the Yale administration was doing everything in its power to promote diversity among the faculty. In a meeting last week, Deputy Provost Hamilton told me that Yale is not renewing the contract of Professor Allen – one of the few black women professors in the sciences at Yale.

As does Mary Reynolds:

Deputy Provost Andy Hamilton argues that Yale does not respond to student demands. Yet, history shows that Yale can listen to its students. In the 1960s, the newly formed Black Student Alliance at Yale demanded an African American studies program.

In 30 years, will we look back and see the inauguration of a new generation of women scientists and scholars of color, or will we see Yale’s missed opportunity to provide the best teaching and mentorship for all students?

Another as-yet missed opportunity for the Bush administration to demonstrate a sustained commitment to ending torture by American troops:

Human Rights Watch called on the United States to immediately release the results of past investigations into misconduct by U.S. personnel in Afghanistan, including information about two Afghan detainees who were killed in U.S. custody in December 2002 and another detainee who died in June 2003.

“Afghans have been telling us for well over a year about mistreatment in U.S. custody,” said John Sifton, Afghanistan researcher for Human Rights Watch. “We warned U.S. officials repeatedly about these problems in 2003 and 2004. It’s time now for the United States to publicize the results of its investigations of abuse, fully prosecute those responsible, and provide access to independent monitors.”

Lest we thought the torture scandal would bring lasting change in American policy:

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld defended military interrogation techniques in Iraq on Wednesday, rejecting complaints that they violate international rules and may endanger Americans taken prisoner. Rumsfeld told a Senate committee that Pentagon lawyers had approved methods such as sleep deprivation and dietary changes as well as rules permitting prisoners to be made to assume stress positions.

Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, also noted that the rules require prisoners to be treated humanely at all times. But Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill. said some of the approved techniques “go far beyond the Geneva Convention,” a reference to international rules governing the treatment of prisoners of war.

The USDA under Bush: Who are we to say whether your product is organic if you say it is?

The decision made by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Organic Program on April 14 is “literally opening the door for unscrupulous companies to put bogus organic labels on products such as fish, body care products, pet foods, fertilizer, and clothing,” writes the Organic Consumers Association on its website, which also includes a “Take Action” petition that readers can send to Anne Venneman, the USDA’s Secretary of Agriculture.

As if this isn’t scary enough, the USDA announced controversial new directives on national organic standards on April 28 that basically state: “ignorance is bliss.” The Organic Consumer Association reports, “as long as the farmer and the organic certifier don’t know the specific ingredients of the pesticides applied to the ‘organic’ plants, the crops can be sold as ‘organic.'” When it comes to “organic” cows, the 12-month stay on milk from Bessie after she has been injected with synthetic growth hormones still applies. But, the website states: “Many of these drugs build up in the body fat and are released in the milk and meat from these animals. If this new directive is allowed to stand, organic milk could potentially contain residues of drugs and hormones.”

A stunning electoral victory for the Indian National Congress in early elections called by the incumbent Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s Bharatiya Janata Party, and a telling rejection of the social and economic conservatism of the BJP:

the Congress emerged as the single largest party in the poll results announced today. The party, led by Sonia Gandhi, the Italian-born widow of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, therefore appeared poised to form the country’s next government with the likely support of its electoral allies and the country’s Communist parties…the verdict represents a totally unexpected resurrection for the Congress Party of Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi, which governed India for 45 of the 57 years since independence but had floundered so badly in recent years that it was being written off as an historical relic…

The resentment of the B.J.P. and its efforts to peddle the “feel-good factor” was almost palpable today among a small knot of working-class men gathered to watch the results on a news ticker in New Delhi. Many expressed dismay, common among Indians nostalgic for the quasi-socialist economy of India’s first 40 years, at the economic reforms with which the B.J.P. had proudly identified itself. “Basically it is the anger of the working class,” said Sawali Rai, 34, who works in a public sector bank. “Privatization, no government jobs, prices rising. On the pressure of the World Bank they are pressuring the common man.”

The ACLU castigates the Pentagon for stonewalling its Freedom of Information Act request for information about abuse of Iraqi prisoners – seven months ago:

The Defense Department argued that the material was not “breaking news” and that the failure to expedite the request would not “endanger the life or safety of any individual.” Full compliance with the request, the ACLU said, would have required the Defense Department to release records related to the emerging scandal at Abu Ghraib. It would also have required the release of records describing any measures taken by the Defense Department to prevent torture and abuse.

“It’s obviously in the Pentagon’s self-interest to withhold information that could damage its reputation, but America’s reputation is damaged more by cover ups and a lack of transparency,” said ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero. “This is just further evidence that ‘trust us’ simply isn’t an acceptable response to public concerns in a constitutional democracy like America.”

Wal-Mart Watch: Yet another kind of standard Wal-Mart got caught pushing down:

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the nation’s largest retailer, will pay a $3.1 million fine to settle a Clean Water Act violation stemming from excessive storm water runoff from its construction sites, federal officials said Wednesday. Wal-Mart also agreed in the settlement with the Environmental Protection Agency and Justice Department to improve runoff controls at the more than 200 sites each year where the company builds stores, including Sam’s Club outlets.

A new report on labor conditions at The Gap says, according to Reuters, that

…forced labor, child labor, paying below minimum wage, physical punishment and coercion are some of the widespread workers’ rights violations occurring at many of its factories worldwide.

Says who? The Gap.

Looks like they figured out that those glossy letters that they sent those of us who’ve written them protesting their sweatshops over the years weren’t particularly convincing.