Corey Robin: If you think Donald Trump poses an unprecedented threat to civilized values, how do you understand this? The man ultimately responsible for this, by the way, was last seen getting a hug from Michelle Obama.
“The C.I.A. flew Mr. Salim to a United States base in Djibouti. He was blindfolded and stripped, and an object was inserted in his rectum while the Americans photographed him … The Americans routinely hauled him from his cell to a room where, he said, they hanged him from chains, once for two days. They wrapped a collar around his neck and pulled it to slam him against a wall, he said. And they shaved his head, laid him on a plastic tarp and poured gallons of ice water on him, inducing a feeling of drowning. … At one point, a cast that a prison doctor had put on his hand — a finger had been broken by the Somali gunmen — became waterlogged. The doctor cut it off, and the water dousing continued. … Mr. Salim described other grisly practices by his jailers: placing him in a coffin-like box, his arms stretched and chained, on top of cleaning chemicals; strapping him to a gurney and injecting him with drugs that made him woozy; bringing dogs into a room to threaten him.” More here.