by Lynnell Mickelsen

Hey Folks:

As an American citizen, I can't believe I'm writing this, but the U.S. Senate will soon vote on whether or not to make torture legal. The House just passed a bill making it legal about 30 minutes ago. Now the bill goes to the Senate and Bush is hoping to sign it into law as soon as possible.

Republicans voted in favor of the bill by 219 to 7. Democrats voted against the bill by 160 to 34. (And yeah, I know. I wish those 34 Democrats had voted against it. But still, most Democrats ARE are speaking out against torture.)

Forget all the spin about how "moderate" Senators put in "safeguards." The fine print is pretty bad. Torture and indefinite detention will be legalized for any one that the President or Secretary of Defense declares "an unlawful enemy combatant." And wait---it gets worse---the President or Secretary of Defense gets to decide who is an unlawful enemy combatant using any criteria that they choose.

This proposed law doesn't just apply to Al Qaeda or the Taliban. It's not even limited to aliens. It covers U.S. citizens as well. There's no time limit either---peace time or war time. You can read more about it here, here, and here.

And to make matters even worse, neither of my Senators in Minnesota, Mark Dayton (D) or Norm Coleman (R) has taken a stand on this bill. I guess they're still trying to make up their minds about whether waterboarding is good for the kids or family-friendly enough. I just called both of their offices and was told that neither Senator had formed an opinion about the torture legislation yet

So give if you're from Minnesota, give them a little help.

Sen. Mark Dayton: 1-202-224-3244, local 612-727-5220

Sen. Norm Coleman: 1-202-224-5641; local:651-645--0323

If you're from other states, call your Senators now.

I mean, Jesus Christ (who BTW was tortured to death), if you can't figure out whether torture is wrong or not, you shouldn't be in public office.