To the editor:

According to CNN, 44 percent of Americans have no problem with the use of torture. Of course, that’s about the same percentage of Americans who still support everything we’re doing in Iraq, so that makes sense. OK, so those who supported the removal of an evil, torturing, murderous dictator (ignoring the many leaders doing the same thing as Saddam, but that we support), now support the very actions we overthrew that tyrant for.

For those of us unfamiliar with the term “double think” the idea follows that if you can simultaneously believe two contradictory truths, then you are, in a word, controllable — controllable mentally and physically by those who desire your support. The president required support for invading Iraq largely based on an ethical argument that war supporters now simultaneously repudiate and applaud. That’s double think. Let’s follow through on how this relates to the current controversy about the torture and humiliation carried out against Iraqi prisoners by U.S. soldiers.

For those voicing disgust, such as our president and other war supporters, I have to ask, did you expect that the soldiers you sent to invade and occupy Iraq would think torture and humiliation were worse than invading a nation illegally, killing 10,000 civilians and more than 700 Americans so far? What did you expect, war supporters? That these soldiers should be held to a higher moral code than the wartime president, whose “evidence” of WMD that clinched the need to invade has yet to be found?

Chris White,

Lawrence