Every time I mention torture on this weblog, I get an e-mail from someone saying, in effect, "We can't fault the Republicans because some Democrats knew about it and gave at least tacit approval." Okay, fine. I think torture is illegal, immoral, destructive to our standing in the world and probably of little use except to extract false confessions. Its supporters seem to think it's useful for gaining information — or at least, it might occasionally be useful. And since it might be, we need to ignore that it might be illegal, immoral or destructive to our standing in the world.
That certain Democrats may have signed off on it does not change anything except that we have an even longer list of people who are ethically and judgmentally unfit to be in government. I dunno how true it is that Nancy Pelosi was briefed on waterboarding and such and then nodded her head in compliance. But if she did, she oughta be outta there along with everyone else who knew about the practices and didn't raise a cuticle to stop them. Nowhere in our system of government is it written that breaking the law can be overlooked if it's bi-partisan.