What I found particularly depressing that all this was done with an explicit purpose of obtaining a cert. In terms of human level absurdity, I could only think of Brazil movie. It is both ridiculous and absolutely believable.

I agree that the cost of moral high ground is a great loss to the society as a whole. We may never be able to recover from this. Guantanamo Bay is part of normal conversation and barely raises an eyebrow. Without going into details, my boss's kid recently said his dad drone strikes people ( he does nothing of the sort ).

This is the new normal.