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Your president has just admitted to the federal felony crime of conspiracy to commit torture… and you’re upset that a Sprint service representative referred to a customer as “nucking futz.”

Please understand that I’m referring to “you” in the collective, national sense. I know that you personally care about the issue of American torture from a moral or policy perspective or possibly both. But unfortunately you are part of a small minority.

This past Thursday, April 10, we discovered that just about all of the most powerful members of George W. Bush’s cabinet had met to specifically approve of the use of waterboarding in interrogation. And as I wrote that day, according to federal law, this places these administration officials felony participants in a conspiracy to commit torture:

Federal law, specifically 18 USC 2340, includes in its definition of torture the threat of imminent death. Waterboarding, which creates the threat of imminent death in the person subjected to it, is therefore an act of torture under federal law.

Furthermore, the same federal law specifies that U.S. citizens, U.S. nationals, and individuals on U.S. soil who commit torture whether here or overseas “shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both, and if death results to any person from conduct prohibited by this subsection, shall be punished by death or imprisoned for any term of years or for life.”

Finally, the same federal law stipulates that “A person who conspires to commit an offense under this section shall be subject to the same penalties (other than the penalty of death) as the penalties prescribed for the offense, the commission of which was the object of the conspiracy.”

Is the United States of America a nation governed by laws, or is the United States of America a nation government by people unaccountable to the law?

In a nation of laws, Dick Cheney, Condoleeza Rice, Donald Rumsfeld, Colin Powell, George Tenet and John Ashcroft would be charged with the felony crime of Conspiracy to Commit Torture.

On Friday, George W. Bush came right out and admitted to an ABC News reporter that he was not only “aware” of this meeting but that “I approved.”

In other words, George W. Bush has placed himself in the middle of this felony conspiracy.

Where is the investigation by the Justice Department? Where is the enpaneling of a grand jury? Where are the calls for impeachment proceedings to parallel criminal proceedings? After all, there was a multi-million-dollar investigation and impeachment of a president ten years ago for the crime of lying about a blowjob, and this, THIS is the admission by top administration officials including the President of a conspiracy to inflict torture in direct violation of federal law! I don’t get it. Where is the outrage?

Don’t just blame the media for this. Blame your fellow citizens. This story, this admission of criminal conspiracy by our own president, is nowhere in the list of top Digg results — the stories recommended by your fellow citizens to their coworkers, fellow students, family members and friends. Instead, Americans are talking about the time a Sprint service representative called a customer “nucking futz.” The story of Bush’s admission isn’t just off the first page of Digg results… the story is sitting down at the bottom of the barrel with just 5 diggs.

Spoonerist swearing. Conspiracy by the president and his cabinet to engage in water torture. To Americans, the former is ever so much more compelling than the latter.

How depressing. But I won’t wallow in my depression. I’ll share that neglected news story with others as much as I can. I hope you do the same.