Human Rights, the Law and the Ongoing Threat of Terror

Waterboarding was stopped before the end of the Bush Administration. Humane treatment of prisoners was required by an act of Congress. Rules were laid out in the new Army Field Manual of 2006. Candidate Barack Obama excoriated prisoners' "harsh interrogation" in what George Bush called the "war on terror," criticizing the indefinite detention of suspects that Bush said could not be tried as well as "rendition," sending them to be questioned in other countries. President Obama has proclaimed torture as contrary to America's founding documents and fundamental values. But controversy over so-called "enhanced interrogation techniques" continues. Are the Obama White House and the CIA now embracing both those policies? Is the US still sanctioning torture? We look at the politics and the realities of national security.