104 Articles

Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Psychologist complicity challenged: APA members file complaint on procedural irregularities for abusive interrogations
(2 comments) Dissidents within the American Psychological Association launched a new initiative against the association's complicity in detainee abuse. Four members have filed an official protest of procedural irregularities used to defend complicit policies.

Friday, October 16, 2009
Refusal to investigate Guantanamo psychogist ethics complaint appealed
(3 comments) The Center for Constitutional Rights has appealed the refusal by the Louisiana psychology licensing board to investigate ethics charges against Dr. Larry James for his activities as chief intelligence psychologist at Guantanamo in 2003. James is now a Dean at Wright State University in Ohio.

Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Spreading Hysteria about Swine Flu "Hysteria": Public Health Preparedness in the Face of Uncertainty
(10 comments) Recent commentaries on the swine flu threat have ignored the need for public health policy to be made in conditions of incomplete information.

Monday, September 7, 2009
Psychologist accused of war crimes opposes torture investigations
(1 comments) Psychologist Col. Larry James (Ret.) joins those accused of war crimes who are opposed to war crimes investigations.

Friday, August 14, 2009
Boycott Whole Foods; CEO against healthcare, and food and shelter, as a right
(6 comments) The Whole Foods CEO used a Wall Street Journal op ed to attack the concept of healthcare as a right. Instead, he advocated personal responsibility. Perhap its time for Whole Foods customers to responsibly boycott the chain.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009
UN Special Rapporteur Calls on American Psychological Association to Withdraw Psychologists from Guantanamo
UN Special Rapporteur on Torture, Manfred Nowak, wrote the American Psychological Association asking them to act on their member-approved policy and request withdrawal of psychologists from Guanatanamo.

Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Military letter to the APA: Drop the Nuremberg Defense from psychologist ethics code
(2 comments) Military figures ask the American Psychological Association to drop the Nuremberg Defense from the APA ethics code.

Wednesday, July 29, 2009
The American Psychological Association and the Missing Ethics Investigation
(3 comments) In 1999 noted Constitutional law professor Jonathan Turley filed an ethics complaint with the American Psychological Association against Navy psychologist Michael Gelles for allegedly participating in the abusive interrogation of Navy Petty Officer Daniel King. The APA refused to investigate the complaint, even ignoring a crucial videotape. Later they appointed Gelles to a task force on interrogation ethics.

Sunday, July 26, 2009
Will the American Psychological Association finally renounce the Nuremberg Defense?
(3 comments) In 2002, the American Psychological Association added the Nuremberg ["just following orders"] Defense to its ethics code for psychologists.This ethics standard allows ignoring professional ethics when they conflict with law or orders, as in systematic detainee abuse. Conflict over removal of this defense has been ongoing since 2005. The APA just postponed any decision for another six months.

Friday, July 10, 2009
US officials blocked Afghan mass murder investigations
(3 comments) Bush administration officials blocked investigations of the mass murder of thousands of Taliban prisoners by Gen. Doshtun's forces in 2001 Afghanistan.

Monday, June 29, 2009
Open Letter in Response to the American Psychological Association Board
(3 comments) Today a number of psychological, health, and human rights organizations released the following statement criticizing the American Psychological Association (APA) Board of Directors failure to accept responsibility for the APA's role in facilitating psychologists' participation in abusive national security interrogations.

Thursday, June 18, 2009
Former American Psychological Association President had long time CIA connection
(2 comments) Jane Mayer recently revealed that former American Psychological Association President Joseph Matarazzo has had a long-term CIA connection.Matarazzo had previously been tied to Mitchell Jessen & Aoocites, the CIA's torture firm. Interestingly, other evidence suggests that Matarazzo's CIA involvement was pre-911.

Monday, June 15, 2009
Psychologists for Social Responsibility praises Bermuda government
(2 comments) Psychologists for Social Responsibility [PsySR] has issued a statement in support of the Bermuda government's willingness to take in four of the Uighers who have been wrongfully imprisoned at Guantanamo for many years.

Sunday, June 7, 2009
NY Times ignores evidence of White House pressure behind torture memos
(7 comments) The New York Times, in another of its infamous failures to challenge the interests of the insiders, distorted the meaning of leaked emails from former Justice Department lawyer James Comey on approval of the 2005 torture memos. The Times ignored that the memos demonstrated the intense White house pressure for approval of torture, which undercuts any claim that the memos reflect a dispassionate legal analysis.

Sunday, May 24, 2009
Spain copies US practice of universal jurisdiction
(3 comments) The US objects to Spanish judges' investigations of US officials allegedly responsible for torture. But Spain, in asserting universal jurisdiction, is only following US precedent.

Monday, May 18, 2009
Mental Health professionals' letter asks Michelle Obama to investigate diagnostic abuse of veterans
I recently published an article - Diagnostic abuse of veterans and the dilemmas of health professional ethics - on Army pressures for mental health clinicians to not diagnose post traumatic stress disorder [PTSD] in returning soldiers. A group of approximately 130 psychologists and mental health professionals responded to my article by writing Michelle Obama and asking her to look into these charges.

Sunday, May 17, 2009
APA ethics policy-maker clarifies defense of torture; reveals American Psychological Association - Pentagon collusion
(8 comments) Bryce Lefever, a military psychologist who participated in the American Psychological Association's ethics task force on psychologist participation in interrogations again defended US torture tactics and provided further evidence of collusion between the APA and the Bush administration in order to keep psychologists aiding US interrogations.

Monday, May 11, 2009
Torture increases terrorist attacks, political scientists find
(4 comments) Daurius Rejali, in his book "Torture and Democracy," argued that the efficacy of torture was incorrectly argued at the level of the individual torture victim. The tortured will talk, and some of what they say may be true, just with the non-tortured, he argued. The right level to discuss this issue is at the level of entire torture programs.

Sunday, May 10, 2009
'Sleep deprivation': Euphemism and CIA torture of choice
(1 comments) "Sleep deprivation," as used by the CIA in its enhanced interrogation program included being shackled to the floor and ceiling for days on end, adding to the torment. Sleep deprivation has long been recognized as torture, especially useful for generating false confessions. We must recognize sleep deprivation as psychological torture, so that its use does not return.

Wednesday, May 6, 2009
New article elucidates military psychologists' complicity in detainee abuse and "ethics" coverup
(1 comments) A new story on Salon and ProPublica provides further details of military psychologists' complicity in US torture. Despite any personal reservations, they helped implement the administration plan to reverse-engineer SERE-based torture techniques. The American Psychological Association then appointed the same military psychologists to formulate its "ethics" policy on interrogation support.

Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Coalition for an Ethical Psychology Calls for Investigation of American Psychological Association Torture Collusion
(8 comments) Recently released emails raise concerns about American Psychological Association collusion with the Bush administration Pentagon in formulating ethics policies legitimizing psychologists aiding abusive interrogations. The Coalition for an Ethical Psychology calls for an independent investigation of potential APA-DoD collusion.

Monday, May 4, 2009
American Psychological Association ethics policy-maker endorses torture
(7 comments) Military psychologist Bryce Lefever tonight endorsed the military and CIA's use of torture techniques developed by the military's SERE program. Lefever's ethical opinions are especially important as he was one of the military psychologists the American Psychological Association turned to to formulate its "ethics" policy regarding psychologist participation in interrogations.

Monday, April 27, 2009
Bioethicist Steven Miles joins call for investigation of American Psychological Association ties to military
(3 comments) Bioethicist Steven Miles joins the call for an investigation of the American Psychological Association's ties to the military-intelligence establishment that led to its continuing to support psychologist participation in US national security interrogations long past the point where it was obvious that psychologists had designed, conducted, standardized, and legitimated US torture.

Saturday, April 25, 2009
Two former top CIA officals on the efficacy of torture
(3 comments) Two former top CIA officials discuss the lack of reason to believe that torture is effective.

Monday, April 20, 2009
Obama, Blair, and Panetta praise the moral cowards, ignore the true heroes
(2 comments) In their statements accompanying the release of the Justice Department torture memos Thursday, President Obama, Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair, and CIA Director Leon Panetta praised the CIA's torturers as heroes. This is an insult to the true heroes, those who fought, and often suffered, for their opposition to state-sponsored torture.

Saturday, April 11, 2009
Obama and human rights: Shame on me
(24 comments) Unlike candidate Obama, President Obama finds few human rights he is bound to respect.

Thursday, April 9, 2009
Diagnostic abuse of veterans and the dilemmas of health professional ethics
(8 comments) Salon has reported evidence that the Army is pressuring mental health professionals not to give diagnoses of post traumatic stress disorder. This abuse requires systemic and ethical reform.

Wednesday, April 1, 2009
John Brennan and the administration stalling on Bush torture memos
(7 comments) Last November we opposed John Brennan for CIA director because he was insufficiently critical of CIA abuses, including its "enhanced interrogation" torture program. He withdrew his name, but was rewarded with another top counterterrorism position. Today we hear that Brennan is one of the administration figures leading the fight against releasing the Bush administration torture memos. We cannot let him succeed.

Sunday, March 29, 2009
Torture of Abu Zubaida, designed by psychologists, yielded nothing
(4 comments) The first of the CIA's "enhanced interrogations," that of Abu Zubaida,led to nothing other than tens of thousands of investigatory hours wasted chasing fairy stories he told to get the pain to stop, the Washington Post reports today. The CIA torture program that failed so miserably was designed by psychologists. The American Psychological Association invited these very psychologists to a 2003 CIA-APA Conference.

Thursday, March 26, 2009
Is parents' rally in Boston a harbinger of wider protests?
(2 comments) Hundreds of parents in Boston rallied at the state legislature to protest school cutbacks. are movements like this occurring throughout the country? Might these movements be harbingers of a new democratic revival?

Monday, March 16, 2009
New Doubts Regarding the Lancet Iraq Mortality Study
(4 comments) The sanction by his university of the lead author of one of the Lancet studies of Iraq mortality raises questions as to how closely the study's methodology was followed. Unless additional details are provided, this study can no longer be counted as a reliable estimate of Iraqi deaths since the war.

Monday, March 9, 2009
Wikileaks Alert: Murder in Nairobi
Wikileaks reports that two human rights workers associated with Wikileaks have been murdered in Nairobi. These killings are apparently connected to Wikileaks' exposure of thousands of "disappearances" and extrajudicial killings by Kenyan police. Urgent assistance, including financial, is requested.

Friday, February 13, 2009
Less effective is best! Drug and medical equipment manufacturers attempted hijacking of stimulus bill
(4 comments) The drug companies, medical equipment manufacturers, and disease advocacy groups joined forces to attempt to gut the stimulus bill's money for research on the comparative effectiveness of treatments. Those groups don't want us to know whether some expensive treatments are worse or no better than cheaper treatments.

Wednesday, January 14, 2009
The Attorney General Designee Must Make A Clear Statement Against Torture
The Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing regarding Attorney General nominee Eric Holder. We must pressure members of the committee to ask him to take a clear stand against torture and other cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment.

Monday, November 24, 2008
Open Letter to President-Elect Obama: Break With the Dark Side. Do Not Nominate John Brennan for CIA Director
A group of about 200 psychologists and allies has created an Open Letter to President-Elect Obama expressing concerns regarding his rumored consideration of John Brennan to be Director of the CIA.

Sunday, October 12, 2008
Public at Last: Guantanamo SERE Standard Operating Procedures
(1 comments) One of the most important documents of the U.S. torture program -- the JTF GTMO "SERE" Interrogation Standard Operating Procedure -- has just become publicly available for the first time.

Friday, October 10, 2008
Fabulous new film showing on Public Television: Torturing Democracy
Starting tonight, Public Television will be viewing the fabulous new documentary Torturing Democracy, which is a new film relaying the history of U.S. torture in the war on terror.

Monday, September 22, 2008
Psychologists Reject the Dark Side: American Psychological Association Members Reject Participation in Bush Detention Ce
(5 comments) Members of the American Psychological Association decisively rejected psychologists' participation in U.S. Detention centers. By a vote of 59% to 41% they voted to bar psychologists from participating at the centers unless they work directly for the detainee or an NGO. After years of struggle, this constitutes a decisive change in APA policy ad a turning away from the dark side.

Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Petition for dropping charges against "child soldier" Mohammad Jawad
(2 comments) ohammad Jawad - arrested when he was 16 or 17 on highly questionable charges of throwing a grenade at US troops - has been imprisoned at Guantanamo for 5 1/2 years. Now he is up on war crimes charges. His defense attorney has launched a letter-writing and petition campaign.

Sunday, August 10, 2008
Vote Against Torture Collusion: Psychologists Vote on Referendum Against Participating in Bush Regime Detention Centers
(2 comments) The American Psychological Association has been racked with controversy over the role of psychologists in Bush regime detainee interrogations. Psychologist opponents of the APA position have, for the first time in APA history, organized a referendum to change APA policy. They ask the APA membership to reject psychologists' participation when such sites are in violation of international law or the Constitution.

Friday, August 8, 2008
Systematized sleep deprivation at Guantanamo persisted far longer than previously admitted
(1 comments) Guantanamo officials claimed their brutal "frequent flyer" sleep deprivation program ended in early 2004. But the program continued for many months after this. Again, US denials of detainee abuse are proved false.

Tuesday, June 24, 2008
The Torture Trainers and the American Psychological Association
(7 comments) Recent revelations on US torture and detainee abuse provide further evidence that psychologists were central to developing the abusive tactics. Despite numerous links between torturers and the American Psychological Association, the APA still refuses to take action to break, or even comment upon these links.

Sunday, June 8, 2008
Accountability for Torture At Last?
(10 comments) Recent developments suggest that accountability for US torture may be on the horizon. The Homeland Security Inspector General is reopening an investigation of how Canadian Maher Arar was sent to be tortured in Syria. and nearly 60 Congresspeople have urged appointment of a Special Counsel to investigate Bush administration responsibility for torture. The health professions also need accountability for abetting US torture.

Thursday, May 15, 2008
Involuntary Drugging of Deportees: Part of a Pattern of Misuse of Health Professions
Recent reports that the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE) has been systematically administering psychotropic drugs to immigrants in the process of being deported are part of a larger pattern of misuse of the health professions by the Bush administration.

Saturday, April 26, 2008
Isolation driving Guantanamo detainees insane: Will the American Psychological Association act?
(1 comments) The total isolation for most detainees at Guantanamo is driving many of these detainees insane, the New York Times reports. The American Psychological Association says that use of isolation is unethical, yet it has failed to condemn conditions at Guantanamo or follow its policies and forbid psychologists cooperating with the abusive conditions there.

Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Involuntary Drugging of US Detainees: A Crisis for the Health Professions
(7 comments) recent reports on involuntary drugging of US detainees adds to the evidence that health professionals are key actors in US detention and interrogation abuses. This involvement poses a crisis for the health professions. We need a Truth and Reconciliation process for these professions to come to terms with US abuses.

Sunday, March 16, 2008
On the Fifth Anniversary of the Iraq War
(2 comments) Reflections on the fifth anniversary of the Iraq war.

Thursday, February 28, 2008
Wikileaks responds to Bank Julius Baer lies
(2 comments) In the battle against the totally unprecedented judicial censorship of the entire Wikileaks.org web site, Wikileaks (still available at Wikileaks.be) has issued an editorial rebutting a number of false claims (i.e., lies) contained in press release issued by Bank Julius Baer & Trust, the bank that asked the judge to shut Wikileaks.org down.

Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Update on Wikileaks censorship. Costly mistake for bank?
(3 comments) Late last week, the whistleblower site wikileaks.org was wiped out by court order requested by lawyers for Bank Julius Baer. This article updates the story, including that the bank was preparing to issue a $1 billion IPO, an offer that maybe scuttled from the torrent of publicity from their lawyer's actions.

Monday, February 18, 2008
US court attacks web freedom; enjoins Wikileaks.org out of existence
(17 comments) The Wikileaks web site has been an invaluable source for releasing formerly secret materials revealing wrongdoing of the powerful. In an unprecedented step, a California court has enjoined them Wikileaks.org, their primary web identity in the US, out of existence in response to a request from a Cayman Islands bank. This attack on internet freedom is a threat to us all.

Monday, February 4, 2008
US Iraq Rules of Engagement leaked; Raises question about Rumsfeld authorizing war crimes
(1 comments) The just leaked Rules of Engagement for the Iraq occupation suggests there may be a documentary record of Defense Secretary authorizations for attacks with potentially significant civilian casualties. Congress should demand access to this record.

Thursday, January 17, 2008
American and California Psychological Associations move to gut bill on interrogations
A major battle is shaping up in California where a coalition is working to remove health providers from participating in military and CIA interrogations. Senator Ridley-Thomas has introduced a resolution that would request the military and CIA to remove all California licenses health providers from involvement in detainee interrogations. Proposed revisions by the American Psychological Association will gut the bill.

Sunday, January 13, 2008
Action Opportunity for California Residents: Get health professionals out of interrogations!
Monday will see an important hearing in the California legislature on a resolution to attempt to stop California licensed health professionals from participating in the interrogation of national security detainees. This bill is a major opportunity to stop health provider collusion with the Bush administration's legally sanctioned torture. California residents are encouraged to support it.

Friday, December 28, 2007
Fallujah, the Information War, and U.S. Propaganda:
A 2006 classified intelligence analysis of the aborted April 2004 Fallujah assault has just been leaked on the Wikileaks site. The document provides insights into the U.S. "information war" and the extent to which "Western reporters" were considered part of that war. It also elucidates the tactics used in the "successful" November 2004 assault. But the document also shows US intelligence blinded by propaganda.

Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Guantanamo staff trashing web sites and spreading propoganda
Staff at the Guantanamo base have been conducting amateurish propaganda efforts, the Wikileaks web site revealed today. Wikipedia reports that a Guantanamo IP addresss has been used to revise Wikipedia entries and to post self-serving propaganda pieces on web news sites.

Friday, December 7, 2007
Did destroyed CIA tapes show psychologists torturing? Did APA dodge a bullet?
Last night we had news that the CIA, in 2005, destroyed videotapes of the "interrogation", aka, torture, of two al Qaeda detainees. One of these detainees has been identified as Abu Zubaydah. Of special relevance is that Zubaydah was tortured by psychologists James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen. If these tapes had come out, would the American Psychological Association have finally spoken out forcefully against these abuses?

Monday, December 3, 2007
The Facts be Damned! Psychologists' President Defends Psychologist Participation in Detainee Interrogations
(1 comments) American Psychological Association President Brehm recently defended her association's policies allowing psychologists to aid the Bush administrations interrogations of enemy detainees from criticism by concerned students and faculty at her campus. Some of her statements i defense of APA policy were at variance with the facts while others were in conflict with fundamental propositions of Brehm's social psychology/

Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Pinky Show interview: Fear, Aggression, & Empire
What can psychoanalysis teach us about how we Americans understand our place in the world? Dr. Stephen Soldz talks with Pinky about narcissism, projection, and an enormous lost opportunity of our post-Cold War era. (

Saturday, November 17, 2007
Leaked Guantanamo Document Confirms Routine Use of Isolation as Psychological Torture. Will APA Protest?
(2 comments) Recently a major 2003 Guantanamo Standard Operating Procedures [SOP] manual was posted on the wikileaks web site. This SOP confirms that all new detainees were subjected to a minimum of four weeks near-isolation to foster detainee dependence on interrogators. Isolation is a highly abusive interrogation technique that causes long-lasting harm. Psychologists were undoubtedly involved in its administration.

Monday, November 5, 2007
American Psychological Association Writes the Administration and Congress Criticizing Torture: Modest Progress
(3 comments) In a recent set of letters to Congress and the Administration, the American Psychological Association has taken a more critical stance towards the Bush regime of torture that has shocked the world over the last several years. While the letters represent an advance in the APA's position, serious problems remain with APA's approach. APA is too tied to the military-intelligence establishment to take a truly ethical position.

Thursday, November 1, 2007
Letter to Senate Intelligence Committee: Psychologists out of Abusive Interrogations
A broad coalition of psychologists sent a letter to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence today. The letter expresses their concerns about psychologist involvement in the CIA's "enhanced interrogations" and other abusive interrogations. It requests the Committee investigate the role of psychologists in abuses and take action to protect psychologists and other health providers from involvement in future abuses.

Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Baiting and killing, one Iraqi at a time
(1 comments) Yesterday the Washington Post reported that American snipers are using weapons to bait Iraqis. They spread various weapons parts around and then killed anyone curious enough about the stuff to pick it up. Juan Cole ponders whether this is a war crime. But it turns out that not just weapons parts are being used to bait Iraqis, but even cameras. As if no innocent Iraqi would pick up a spare camera.

Friday, September 14, 2007
New study: Over one million Iraqis killed by violence since invasion
A new survey by a mainstream British polling firm has estimated that over one million Iraqis have died since the invasion. This provides important independent replication of the findings of a 2006 study, published in the British medical journal Lancet, which estimated 650,000 "excess deaths" since the 2003 invasion. The case is now stronger that many hundreds of thousands have died.

Friday, August 24, 2007
Author Mary Pipher returns award to American Psychological Association
(2 comments) For years psychologists have played a central role in our government's policy of abusive interrogations. . Despite pressure, the American Psychological Association has failed to take decisive action to stop these unethical uses of psychological expertise. Psychologist and New York Times bestselling author Mary Pipher has decided to return her Presidential Citation award from the APA in protest.

Sunday, July 22, 2007
"Enhanced" Interrogation Techniques: The Risk of Criminality
(4 comments) On Friday President Bush issued an Executive Order allowing the CIA to resume its program of "enhanced interrogation techniques", widely condemned as abusive. In response, Physicians for Human Rights and Human Rights First released a summary of their forthcoming report on the criminality of the CIA's "enhanced techniques."

Thursday, July 19, 2007
Psychologists respond to Vanity Fair revelations on psychologists' responsibility for CIA torture
(1 comments) Vanity Fair Tuesday published shocking revelations on the role of psychologists in designing and conducting the CIA's torture regime in the black sites. These techniques then spread to Guantanamo and Iraq. the Coalition for an Ethical APA responds to this report by demanding major reforms in the American Psychological Association.

Friday, June 29, 2007
Torture treatment providers to APA: Its time for action, not words, on torture
(2 comments) Fifty-eight of those who work with torture victims have written an Open Letter to the American Psychological Association protesting the APA's refusal to take action to investigate and stop psychologists' aiding torture and abuse in US detention facilities.

Saturday, June 23, 2007
Response to Colonel Larry James: Letter to the President of the American Psychological Association
A group of psychologists (now numbering over 400) sent a letter to the President of the American Psychological Association protesting the Association's policy allowing psychologists to participate in interrogations at Guantanamo and elsewhere. Military psychologist Colonel Larry James objected to statements in our Letter. We here respond to Colonel James' claims.

Monday, June 11, 2007
Life in a CIA torture center
The Council of Europe released last week a report on the CIA's system of secret prisons in Eastern Europe. Contained in that report was a vivid look at life inside these prisons. This description constitutes one of the most detailed views we have of a regime of psychological torture. I have extracted those sections from the larger report.

Thursday, June 7, 2007
Open Letter to the President of the American Psychological Association
(3 comments) An Open Letter to the President of the American Psychological Association was sent by over 40 psychologists protesting the organization's policies allowing psychologist participation in enemy combatant interrogations. A recently declassified Defense Department report demonstrates conclusively that psychologists were central to the development of our country's regime of abusive interrogations.

Wednesday, May 30, 2007
Defense Department Releases Evidence of Central Role of Psychologists in Guantánamo and Iraq Interrogation Abuse
(2 comments) A recently declassified document demonstrates conclusively the central role that psychologists play in the development of US abusive interrogation strategies. These findings put the lie to the repeated claim of the American Psychological Association that psychologists participating in interrogations help keep those interrogations "safe and ethical."

Sunday, April 29, 2007
Psychologist participation in interrogations at US detention centers: The Moratorium fight goes on
For most of the past year, efforts have been underway in the American Psychological Association to call a Moratorium on psychologist participation in coercive interrogations in America's detention centers. These efforts have been stymied by APA leadership. But efforts by concerned members to change the policy continue.

Tuesday, April 17, 2007
Is prolonged solitary confinement unconstitutional in America and in the Guantanamo gulag?
(1 comments) Two prisoners who have been in solitary confinement for 12,775 days, 35 years, are suing, claiming that prolonged isolation is unconstitutional. In addition to its implications for our criminal justice system, a positive finding would have implications for psychologists being able to participate in coercive interrogations at Guantanamo and other national security prisons.

Saturday, April 14, 2007
Aid and Comfort for Torturers: Psychology and Coercive Interrogations in Historical Perspective
Psychologists have a long history of aiding the development of abusive interrogation techniques. Understanding this history helps put psychologists' participation in torture at Guantanamo in context. It also helps to explain the American Psychological Association abetting of this torture.

Thursday, April 5, 2007
Michael Gelles condescends to APA critics
Micheal Gelles, the former Navy psychologist who reported to his superiors of abuses at Guantanamo, including abuses involving psychologists, has written a response to recent critics. The response ignores all the critical human rights issues raised by critics.

Saturday, March 24, 2007
"Whistle-blower" Michael Gelles throws in lot with American Psychological Association on interrogations issue
(2 comments) Michael Gelles, a psychologist and formerly in charge of Naval criminal investigations at Guantanamo, is well known as a one of those who called attention within the Department of Defense, to reported abuses occurring during interrogations at Guantanamo. He now uses that moral authority to support the participation of psychologists in interrogations at Guantanamo, disregarding the serious human rights issues thus raised.

Friday, March 2, 2007
Is abetting torture a requirement to be an "expert" on "psychological ethcs"?

Wednesday, February 28, 2007
New Perspectives on the Psychology of Evil; Why Good People Do Bad Things
(1 comments)

Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Aliens in an Alien Land: Iraq Through the Lens of Soldiers' Memoirs
With the Iraq war and occupation, US troops entered an alien land, one in which they could not feel at home. An examination of the memoirs of some of these troops helps understand their experience, as well as the course of the occupation.

Monday, January 15, 2007
Psychology and the cruelty at Guantánamo
(2 comments) A New York Times letter-writer perceives the essential cruelty of Guantanamo. "Capital punishment is often condemned as barbaric. Destroying human beings from within while keeping their bodies alive is infinitely crueler." Unfortunately, the American Psychological Association remains blind to and abets that destruction of human beings from within.

Monday, January 1, 2007
Screams at 3,000
Mélida Arredondo, who lost her stepson Marine Lcpl Alexander S. Arredondo on August 25, 2004, expresses the feelings of many of the 3,000 families today in her poem, Screams.

Tuesday, December 12, 2006
Abusive interrogations: A defining difference between psychiatrists and psychologists
In his Presidential address, American Psychiatric Association President Steven Sharfstein identified participation in coercive interrogations as the defining issue distinguishing between psychiatrists and their rivals, psychologists: "If you were ever wondering what makes us different from psychologists, here it is." It is long past time for the American Psychological Association to ban participation in interrogations.

Monday, December 11, 2006
650,000 dead given voice in Congress
Organized by Reps. Kucinich and Paul,Congress today received a briefing on the recent Lancet study estimating that 655,000 Iraqis have died as a result of the invasion and occupation.

Monday, December 4, 2006
The destruction of Jose Padilla
(5 comments) New evidence reveals the barbarous treatment doled out to imprisoned "enemy combatant" Jose Padilla. His treatment is a textbook illustration of the CIA's decades-under-development program of psychological torture.

Tuesday, November 28, 2006
Letter to the CEO of the American Psychological Association
(5 comments)

Monday, November 27, 2006
Recording street conversation - Another step towards the British Total Surveillance Society
Britain is contemplating another leap toward the Total Surveillance Society with a proposal to install microphones to record "aggressive" street conversation. Integrated with other data, these efforts are leading toward a society in which our every movement and action can be monitored.

Thursday, November 2, 2006
Iraq: Corporate Rats flee as country lurches toward civil war
A few recent ominous reports give a sense of what is really going on in Iraq, as the rats flee the sinking ship and the country lunges into full-scale civil war.

Monday, October 30, 2006
Death in life in Iraq
Two new article shed light upon the death in life that is overtaking Iraq. University professors are overcome with death anxiety. For others, death in life erodes families, community, even the ability to remember and to think.

Thursday, October 26, 2006
The bottled water corporate scam and fantasies of purity and virtue
Bottled water is often no better tasting or safer than tap water. Then why do we buy it? Fantasies of purity and virtue aid the corporate campaign to get us to pay what we could get for free.

Saturday, September 16, 2006
Does McCain realize he was had?
As we witness the amazing spectacle of Washington Post today has an article which suggests that Sen. John McCain may realize that it was a mistake to write the definition of cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment [CID] into his Amendment last year.

Wednesday, September 6, 2006
Protecting the Torturers: Bad Faith and Distortions From the American Psychological Association
(1 comments) The American Psychological Association has gone out on a limb protecting psychologists' participation in abusive behaviors at Guantánamo and elsewhere in America's national security prisons. This article provides additional evidence of the limits to which the Association has gone. Only a full discussion of the links between psychology and the national security state will bring change.

Monday, August 28, 2006
American Medical Association emphasizes interrogation policy differences with APA
The American Medical Association denies claims from the American Psychological association that their positions on members' involvement in interrogations are similar.

Wednesday, August 2, 2006
Psychologists, Guantánamo, and Torture: A Profession Struggles to Save Its Soul
A movement among psychologists is demanding that the American Psychological Association forbid mmbers from participating in Guantanamo interrogations. The APA has pulled out all stops to protect its military ties.

Tuesday, May 16, 2006
Paranoia, depression, or a world of hope:
We live in a nation dominated by fear. That fear arises from the economic insecurity that permeates our society and from the disowned destructiveness of American society, instead ascribed to our “enemies.” We can either continue to fear, be immobilized in self-attack and hopelessness, or acknowledge our destructiveness, accept the world’s uncertainty, and transform it into a constructive force for creating a better society.

Monday, March 27, 2006
Sending mentally ill soldiers back to Iraq:
The Pentagon is sending “mentally ill” soldiers back to combat in Iraq. In addition to being bad for the soldiers, this policy increases the dangers to Iraqis who are subject to split-second life-or-death decisions by US occupation troops.

Tuesday, March 14, 2006
The Avian Flu Threat is Real
(1 comments) As talk of an avian flu threat has spread, so too have various conspiracy theories, based on the Bush administration record of dishonesty. One recent theory is that the avian flu threat is largely bogus and is being hyped to allow government money to flow to drug companies. This article demonstrates that the threat of an avian flu pandemic is not bogus, and is, indeed, real.

Saturday, March 11, 2006
Toward a Society of Equals
Emotions and metaphoric "frames" play a large role in how political messages are perceived. Currently pervasive frames, based on a metaphor of the polity as family, assume inequality. Can alternate frames based on an ethic of equality be imagined?

Sunday, March 5, 2006
Why Leave Iraq
The Irqi occupation has made life worse and more dangerous for Iraqis. Polls show Iraqis want us out and US troops want to leave. It is time to go.

Monday, February 6, 2006
When Promoting Truth Obscures the Truth:
Raises questions about the Iraq Body Count estimate of civilian deaths in Iraq since the occupation. This estimate must be a radical underestimate, a fact obscured by IBC.

Tuesday, January 10, 2006
Narcissism, the public, and the President
(5 comments) President Bush exhibits many narcissistic traits, which may help understand both his strengths and his weaknesses.

Thursday, December 29, 2005
The Sex Lives and Sexual Frustrations of US troops in Iraq
(1 comments) Over 100,000 young adult US troops are in Iraq for long tours of duty. Yet, virtually nothing is known about their sex lives while there. This lack of knowledge interferes with a full accounting of the costs of the occupation to Iraqis and to the occupation troops themselves.

Saturday, December 24, 2005
The 1914 Christmas Truce and the Possibility of Peace
The Christmas truce of 1914 has been brought to screen, proving as occasion to mediate on the psychological requirements for peace.

Wednesday, December 21, 2005
Total surveillance state takes giant leap in Britain
Britain is constructing a system of surveillance cameras that will be able to record and store for years every trip taken by every driver. This step toward the total surveillance state is unwise in light of governmentsÂ’ habitual tendency to abuse whatever tools are available to them.

Tuesday, December 20, 2005
Is prejudice a mental illness?
Certain mental health professionals are attempting to get extreme prejudice accepted as a diagnosable mental disorder. While these efforts may be satisfying to the victims and opponents of bigotry, they are intellectually questionable and pragmatically dangerous.