The End of Torture in Sight

George Bush continually stated that America doesn't use torture, though we learned recently that at least one inmate at Gitmo was tortured. Of course, the rub was in the definition. If you have a loose definition of torture then we probably haven't used it.

Anyway, the word is that President Obama will issue or has issued an executive order that will:

1. Close the Guantanamo Bay facility (Gitmo) within one year and investigate conditions there so as to bring them into Geneva Convention code.
   
2. Close those secret CIA prisons overseas -- ones that the US has little oversight of.
3. Limit the CIA to the interrogation practices listed in the Military Field Manual -- thus no water boarding.
4. Review the existing cases and halt for now further prosecutions until it can be determined how best to proceed.
   

These are just some of the efforts being made from day one to undo the legacy of George Bush and Dick Cheney. The President was clear in his inaugural address that the US would not in the pursuit of security abandon its founding principles. That is good to hear!

And if that was not enough, yesterday Rev. Dr. Sharon Watkins, General Minister of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), at the Inaugural Prayer Service, called on the new President to remain true to his ethical center and not fall to the temptation to "feed the bad wolf."

In international hard times, our instinct is to fight – to pick up the sword, to seek out enemies, to build walls against the other – and why not? They just might be out to get us. We’ve got plenty of evidence to that effect. Someone has to keep watch and be ready to defend, and Mr. President – Tag! You’re it!

But on the way to those tough decisions, which American promises will frame those decisions? Will you continue to reason from your ethical center, from the bedrock values of our best shared hopes? Which wolf will you feed?

If it is true, "tag you're it," then the question President Obama faces is: Which wolf do I feed?