It is interesting to compare the coverage so far of the US’s torture bill in Gazeta Wyborcza with that of those radical firebrands at the New York Times. GW (page 7, today) says it’s a key law in the fight against terrorism (this presented as fact, not as Bush’s or Cheney’s position), whose purpose is to “limit the application by special services of such methods as waterboarding.” Bush, GW goes on, compromised on his original position, agreeing to the law’s direct invocation of the Geneva Convention. From now on, those fearless defenders of human rights at GW point out, prisoners will have access to nearly all the evidence against them. Nearly all – and not a trace of irony.

Here’s the NYT’s verdict: “a tyrannical law that will be ranked with the low points in American democracy, our generation�s version of the Alien and Sedition Acts.” The editorial is reproduced in full at Common Dreams.