The Axis of Evil would like to welcome its newest member...

Well, Congress has passed and very soon George W Bush will sign the absolute worst piece of legislation this decade (if not ever) - and after six years of Republican control of the nation, that's quite an accomplishment.

Now, in the name of national security, the government can round up suspected "terrorists", put them in secret prisons indefinitely without trial, without access to legal representation, and without the right to challenge their detention. Furthermore, these detainees can be "interrogated" (that's fancy talk for TORTURE) by any means that the President authorizes, since this bill gives the President the sole authority to interpret and apply the Geneva Conventions.

Now, it looks like the really awful stuff might be off-limits... rape, murder, amputation, and the like. But minor mutilation, waterboarding, bamboo slats under the fingernails, sexual abuse... those are OK if Mr Bush says so. And it's hard to imagine that Christian Warrior having a problem with a few A-rabs getting abused. Never mind that torture has never been shown to provide useful information, and never mind that it is dehumanizing - not just to the detainee, but to the captors as well. In fact, just a few years ago, some of us might have scratched our heads about this bill. Surely the Presiden't can't really authorize torture, because our soldiers wouldn't go along. They'd refuse to participate in any really heinous acts against detainees. Of course, that was before we heard of a little place called Abu Ghraib.

And speaking of Iraq - pretty much everyone in America agreed that Saddam was a bad guy. Sure, some of us opposed invading Iraq on the grounds that it was a sovereign nation which posed no imminent threat to the United States. But we could agree that we'd rather see Iraq under the rule of law instead of under a tyrant. You know, the kind of guy who puts his enemies in SECRET PRISONS and TORTURES them. Then when the majority of Americans were misled into thinking that Iraq was still seeking weapons of mass destruction, it seemed that everyone was ready to march off to war to get rid of Saddam.

Well, let's look at some facts here. The U.S. has the world's largest stockpile of weapons of mass destruction. We are the only nation to have ever used a nuclear weapon in combat - killing an almost unimaginable number of civilians instantly. Twice. And Bush has never made any bones about the fact that they're still "on the table" for use in The War Against Terror. And now, we also officially have secret prisons and torture available to the President at his discretion. What's left that distinguishes us from Iraq, or Dubya from Saddam?

We have become our enemy. The terrorists hate us for our freedoms, but they must be liking us more each day, as we throw those freedoms away and sink slowly into tyranny.

RIP America - land of the free, home of the brave.