Justice Is as Justice Does

Clearly the Bush Administration condones torture, and when they say they do not, they are lying. As Alberto Gonzales continues to convince congress to make Americans exempt from international law, (easy explainer here), it's clear that this is what they want to do. They think it is OK to do what the entire rest of the world has rejected, and has done so for 500 years.

Because it should be obvious to everyone, the moral argument against cruel and degrading treatment usually goes unstated. But in section 28 of his first encyclical, Pope Benedict XVI reminded us of something:

"The just ordering of society and the State is a central responsibility of politics. As Augustine once said, a State which is not governed according to justice would be just a bunch of thieves. … Justice is both the aim and the intrinsic criterion of all politics. "