The "Unitary Executive" theory of torture

Last winter, I made a prediction:

Why is Bush insisting on the prerogative to torture, to wiretap anyone whenever the notion strikes? For the worst possible reason: Just because he can. Just to demonstrate that he really is beyond the reach of mere federal law.

If I'm right, there'll be an easy way to tell: It won't stop. He'll continue to stage demonstrations that the law doesn't apply to him, not because whatever act he wants to commit (torture, wiretapping, gulags, etc. are only the beginning, if I'm right) matters much in itself, but because he wants to establish the principle that he and his circle are a law unto themselves.

It's a well-worn trope that power can get to the best of us by bringing out the worst of us. With Clinton, the dark perk of power was about sex. With Bush, it's about an angry, resentful man who sees a way to settle the score, once and for all, with anyone who ever dared suggest he didn't measure up.

Other than the company it lets me keep for a little while, there's not much satisfaction in reading this observation by Paul Krugman eight months later:

I’m ashamed that my government does this sort of thing. I’d be ashamed even if I were sure that only genuine terrorists were being tortured — and I’m not. Remember that the Bush administration has imprisoned a number of innocent men at Guantánamo, and in some cases continues to imprison them even though it knows they are innocent. […]

So why is the Bush administration so determined to torture people?

To show that it can.

The central drive of the Bush administration — more fundamental than any particular policy — has been the effort to eliminate all limits on the president’s power. Torture, I believe, appeals to the president and the vice president precisely because it’s a violation of both law and tradition. By making an illegal and immoral practice a key element of U.S. policy, they’re asserting their right to do whatever they claim is necessary.

And many of our politicians are willing to go along. The Republican majority in the House of Representatives is poised to vote in favor of the administration’s plan to, in effect, declare torture legal. Most Republican senators are equally willing to go along, although a few, to their credit, have stood with the Democrats in opposing the administration.

How did we get to such a point in just a few short years? Heaven help us if the Bush Supreme Court is the only check left on this.