Cross-posted at Daily Kos

Yesterday, the news that Rick Warren would deliver the invocation at President-Elect Obama's inauguration sent flames down the progressive blogosphere.

But that was nothing compared to two other news items of this week.

On Monday, Vice President Cheney admitted he was involved in authorizing torture.  From the LA Times:

"I was aware of the program, certainly, and involved in helping get the process cleared," Cheney said in an interview on ABC News.

Asked whether he still believes it was appropriate to use the water-boarding method on terrorism suspects, Cheney said: "I do."

And today, my government issued one of the most dangerous orders against women's reproductive rights I can imagine.  From the Washington Post:

The controversial rule empowers federal health officials to cut off federal funding for any state or local government, hospital, clinic, health plan, doctor's office or other entity if it does not accommodate employees who exercise their "right of conscience."

Forgive me if I'm a lot more outraged by these other two stories than by the Rick Warren news, but this is f***ing crazy.  I hate Rick Warren and his support of Prop 8.  Rick Warren may be a bigot, a religious zealot, and an asshole.  But he's not a war criminal.

Cheney, on the other hand, is.  More from the LA Times:

Cheney's comments come on the heels of disclosures by a Senate committee showing that high-level officials in the Bush administration were intimately involved in reviewing and approving interrogation methods that since have been explicitly outlawed and that have been condemned internationally as torture.

Soon after the Sept. 11 attacks, Cheney said, the CIA "in effect came in and wanted to know what they could and couldn't do. And they talked to me, as well as others, to explain what they wanted to do. And I supported it."

Waterboarding involves strapping a prisoner to a tilted surface, covering his face with a towel and dousing it to simulate the sensation of drowning.

CIA Director Michael V. Hayden has said that the agency used the technique on three Al Qaeda suspects in 2002 and 2003. But the practice was discontinued when lawyers from the Department of Justice and other agencies began backing away from their opinions endorsing its legality.

Cheney has long defended the technique. But he has not previously disclosed his role in pushing to give the CIA such authority.

Cheney's office is regarded as the most hawkish presence in the Bush administration, pushing the White House toward aggressive stances on the invasion of Iraq and the wiretapping of U.S. citizens.

Asked when the Guantanamo Bay prison would be shut down, Cheney said, "I think that that would come with the end of the war on terror." He went on to say that "nobody can specify" when that might occur, and likened the use of the detention facility to the imprisonment of Germans during World War II.

"We've always exercised the right to capture the enemy and hold them till the end of the conflict," Cheney said.

The administration's legal case for holding detainees indefinitely has been eroded by a series of court rulings. Obama has pledged to close the facility, which still holds 250 prisoners.

As if anyone actually needed any more convincing evidence that Cheney is a war criminal who should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law, let me present as evidence this little document I found online....oh, what's it called?  The United States Constitution?

Amendment 5:

Amendment 5 - Trial and Punishment, Compensation for Takings. Ratified 12/15/1791.

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Amendment 6:

Amendment 6 - Right to Speedy Trial, Confrontation of Witnesses. Ratified 12/15/1791.

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.

Not only did Cheney authorize a system of brutal, inhumane treatment of war prisoners, but he was complicit in the dual crime of torturing them AND holding them in detention without a right to trial.

************************

As for the other terrible news for the day, the Bush Administration issued a new order that allows doctors and hospitals to refuse providing services to patients if if such services violate their "right of conscience."

The language of the rule, which will cost more than $44 million to implement, stressed that it is primarily aimed at making sure that federal laws on the books since the 1970s are enforced and that nothing in the regulation would prevent any organization from providing any type of care.

"The ability of patients to access health care services, including abortion and reproductive health services, is long-established and is not changed in this rule," it states. "Instead, this rule implements federal laws protecting health care workers and institutions from being compelled to participate in, or from being discriminated against for refusal to participate in, health services or research activities that may violate their consciences. . . . "

I'm sorry, what about protecting the rights of the patient?  Where did those get lost in translation?  If a woman is forced to carry a child because she was raped, does this give the doctor the right to allow the rapist to choose parenthood for the victim?  Does this give politicians the right to refuse treatment for that woman because she was physically abused?  It sure looks like it.

Here's another gem:

[Health and Human Services Secretary Mike] Leavitt has said the regulation was intended to protect workers who object to abortion, but both supporters and critics said the rule remains broad enough to protect pharmacists, doctors, nurses and others who do not wish to dispense birth control pills, Plan B emergency contraceptives and other forms of contraception. While primarily aimed at doctors and nurses, it offers protection to anyone -- including ultrasound technicians, nurses aides, secretaries and even janitors who have any role in the service.

Leavitt said he requested the new regulation after becoming alarmed by reports that health-care workers were being pressured to perform duties they found repugnant. He cited moves by two professional organizations of obstetricians and gynecologists that, he said, might require doctors who object to abortion to refer patients to other physicians who would provide them.

So it wasn't just abortion that Leavitt had a problem with, it was also with women who wanted to prevent unintended pregnancy.  You know, so those women would NEVER NEED AN ABORTION IN THE FIRST PLACE.

Meanwhile, the religious right wants to chime in, too:

"This is a huge victory for religious freedom and the First Amendment," said Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, a socially conservative group that opposes abortion. "No one should be forced to have an abortion, and no one should be forced to be an abortionist. These regulations will ensure that conscience protection statutes will be strongly enforced by the government in the same manner as our other civil rights laws."

Good GOD.  Does nobody know what the First Amendment actually says?  Again, here is our old friend the Constitution:

Amendment 1 - Freedom of Religion, Press, Expression. Ratified 12/15/1791.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Wait a minute, wasn't this new anti-choice rule established on the grounds that doctors could refuse to provide services which violate their "moral or religious beliefs"?  Isn't that codifying into law a religious doctrine?

Oh, I get it.  We have freedom of religion, wherein the government cannot establish a national religious practice.....but if a woman seeks a medical service that goes against religion, we have to put in a law to stop it.  At least, that's what Tony Perkins and the rest of the fundamentalists would have us believe.

************************

The Bush Administration's decision to undermine existing laws on women's reproductive rights was justified as protecting a doctor's "rights of consccience."

Let me tell whose conscience needs protecting.  MINE.

My country's Vice President admitted that he helped establish an interrogation that was against the law, and he defended his unlawful actions as though he were protecting our freedom.

My Constitution has been under vicious attack from right-wing, ideological nutjobs whose corrupt lust for power has shattered our country's moral standing.

My conscience tells me something is very, very wrong here.

Forget Rick Warren.  Stand up, fight for the country that was brutally taken away from you, and bring the criminals to justice.