©Reuters

The face of evil.

You've probably heard the story, or at least one like it. Husband kills wife and child, seemingly without remorse, then attempts to pass it off as a murder/suicide. And, remarkably, people believe him. The latest such example is Neil Entwistle, a British computer programmer, who murdered his American wife and 9-month-old daughter in 2006. He was recently sentenced to life in prison.

The trial made for a fascinating and disturbing spectacle. Aptly described by jurors as a complete narcissist, Entwistle put on quite the display during the presentation of a video of the bloody crime scene. But before we see his reaction for ourselves, let's see what the media tells us we see.

Another scary week with oil rising 4% in dollars and the Dow falling almost four and a half percent. As Nouriel Roubini points out, until recently it was possible for some to think that the worst of the financial crisis was past. Now few could say that.

With energy and food prices rising rapidly, average people feel the crisis in their gut. But should we be so pessimistic? Maybe a change in perspective will help us. A couple of weeks ago we quoted Ran Prieur who said that we should think of "corporate rule" when we hear the term "the economy." We should interpret "expansion" as a "contraction." So if we hear that the economy is crashing, can we think that really the rule of psychopathic corporations is crashing?

What more can be added to the debate over U.S. interrogation methods, and whether waterboarding is torture? Try firsthand experience. The author undergoes the controversial drowning technique, at the hands of men who once trained American soldiers to resist - not inflict - it.

©Gasper Tringale

The author catches his breath after undergoing his first waterboarding session.

Does the president of the United States have the right to order a detainee buried alive?

Oddly, this grotesque question was posed at a U.S. Congressional hearing last week. Even odder was the answer - from John Yoo, former deputy assistant attorney general in the Bush administration, now a law professor at the University of California.

"I don't think that I've ever given the advice that the president could bury somebody alive," Yoo told a judiciary subcommittee hearing into detainee interrogations.

Well, I guess that's comforting to know. But it was striking to watch Yoo evade answering whether he considered there was any treatment so vicious and inhuman that it would be beyond the president's power to inflict it on a detainee, in the interests of national defence.

Apparently there isn't. In a public debate in 2005, Yoo was asked if he thought it would be lawful for the president to authorize crushing the testicles of a detainee's child.

It would seem like a simple "no" would suffice. But here's how Yoo responded: "I think it depends on why the president thinks he needs to do that."