Congress Should Spend More Time on (not in) Sex Rings

Paul Krugman's column tomorrow (via Kos) deploys some interesting statistics on testimony compelled by Congress: "Last year The Boston Globe offered an illuminating comparison: when Bill Clinton was president, the House took 140 hours of sworn testimony into whether Mr. Clinton had used the White House Christmas list to identify possible Democratic donors. But in 2004 and 2005, a House committee took only 12 hours of testimony on the abuses at Abu Ghraib."

Of course, this makes perfect sense when you recall that, as Christopher Shays pointed out the other day, that Abu Ghraib was just a sex ring . . . um, what exactly is a "sex ring"? Well, what does Shays say?

Shays defended his comments yesterday, saying he doesn't doubt that there has been torture at other prisons, but not at Abu Ghraib.

"I mean, I was only talking about Abu Ghraib. I mean, I'm sure there was torture at other prisons, but our TWELVE HOURS of testimony didn't uncover incontrovertible proof of torture or murder at Abu Ghraib. So there wasn't any."

So what was it, then?

"I saw probably 600 pictures of really gross, perverted stuff," Shays said. "The bottom line was it was sex. . . . It wasn't primarily about torture."

Because, you know, sex is never "primarily about torture." Sex is never about power. Sex is never about abusing people, degrading people, humiliating people, or coercing people (Mark Foley will confirm). It's just sex. You know. Sex. And perverts, they do perverted sex. In rings. Big rings, small rings, cock rings. Rings.