Rohrabacher's Guantanamo Panty Raid

Here's Gitmo as we never imagined it: the Republicans say it's a sort of military Animal House.

from TPMMuckraker | Talking Points Memo | Rohrabacher: Frat Parties Aren't Torture:

Justice Department Inspector General Glenn Fine was on Capitol Hill this morning to testify to the House Subcommittee on International Relations, Human Rights and Oversight, about his report on the FBI's role in detainee interrogations, released two weeks ago.

While some saw the hearing as a long-awaited chance for a serious examination of the torture techniques at Guantanamo Bay, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA), the ranking Republican on the subcommittee, took an almost frat-boy glee in the torture details. In a statement of just 13 minutes, Rohrabacher managed to use the phrase "panties on [someone's] head" eight times.

But perhaps more significantly, he managed to work it into a comical (if this wasn't so serious) jab at Inspector General Fine:

ROHRABACHER: Let me -- I don't know what's -- I have never interrogated someone, either a criminal, which the FBI has to deal with, with the criminals, domestically, nor have I interrogated someone who's a foreign enemy, unless, of course, we include the people who have sat on this side...

FINE: I'll tell you what -- I was going to add that one.

(LAUGHTER)

ROHRABACHER: I won't ask you to wear anything on your head.

(LAUGHTER)

So I don't know what is -- what is effective and what's not. I do see here things that seem to be fraternity boy pranks and hazing pranks that I do not -- they might be unacceptable, but they certainly don't fit into the category of torture, which is the word that's been bandied around here.

More talk of hazing, and some of the numerous "panties on head" references, here...