According to information provided to the media at a press briefing by the Department of Defense, the new Army Field Manual 2-22.3 for human intelligence collector operations bans eight controversial interrogation techniques:
† Forcing a detainee to be naked, performing sexual acts or posing in a sexual manner;

† Placing hoods or sacks over a detainee's head, or duct tape over his eyes;

† Beating, electrically shocking or burning him, or inflicting any form of physical pain;

† "Water boarding" (which simulates the sensation of drowning);

† Hypothermia or treatment which will lead to heat injury;

† Mock executions;

† Withholding food, water and medical care; and

† Using military dogs in interrogations.

Based on "battlefield lessons learned," three new interrogation techniques were added:
† Good cop, bad cop;

† False flag (pretending to be someone other than an American interrogator); and

† Separation of unlawful enemy combatants to prevent collusion and coordinating answers to the interrogators’ questions, which will be used on a case-by-case basis.

The Field Manual applies to all of the armed services, but not to the CIA.

Since the new Field Manual does not specifically forbid forcing Islamofascist prisoners to convert to Scientology at the point of a sword, The Stiletto advocates using this technique to add teeth to the lame good cop, bad cop charade.

The Brits Ration Healthcare, But Somehow Find Money For Burka-Style Hospital Gowns

On November 1^st, the Royal Preston Hospital in northwest England will provide female Muslim patients with a burka-like hospital gown that covers the body from head to toe. The right-wing Daily Express newspaper took umbrage at what it terms "political correctness," skewed priorities and providing special treatment for one group of people. "If people want to live in Britain," the paper harrumphed, "then they must accept British standards and the British way of life... The standard hospital gown is surely good enough for everyone."

While The Stiletto agrees with the Daily Express on principle, there is a larger issue to consider. The gowns cost £12 ($23 or €18) each, which is an extravagant luxury for a country that has nationalized medical care and must meet the government’s obligation to provide sub-par treatment to one and all by rationing access to medical specialists, emergency rooms – even second opinions.

Stem Cell "Breakthrough" Less Than Advertised

A couple of weeks ago, scientists at Advanced Cell Technology Inc., of Alameda, CA, announced that they had extracted a single cell from an embryo with a technique used by in vitro fertilization clinics - pre-implantation genetic diagnosis – and then created new stem cell lines from the one cell. The news was welcome for scientists, policy makers and anyone else who seeks to bridge the gaping divide between ethical concerns inherent in research involving embryos, and the desire to find novel therapies for incurable, debilitating disease.

The current method to obtain embryonic stem cells is to remove as many cells as possible from five-day old embryos – which kills them – and then to culture them so that they multiply.

It turns out that the media – beginning with a press release put out by the journal that published the study, Nature – erroneously described the methodology the scientists had used. The journal since released other press releases to correct the record, but the media has been slow on the uptake to backtrack from its original reporting.

The fact is, none of the 16 embryos the ACT scientists used survived, in large part because more than a single cell had been extracted from them. Five to seven cells were removed from each eight to 10-cell embryo – but one at a time.

The Wall Street Journal reports that Robert Lanza, ACT’s vice president for research and the lead author of the research paper, insisted that "roughly half of the embryos … would have survived if researchers had allowed them to grow, instead of discarding them" and that "the results - they successfully derived two new stem-cell lines from multiple individual cells extracted from early stage embryos - prove it is possible to produce stem cells without harming embryos."

But this is a leap of faith that many scientists are not willing to make:

The Stiletto believes that the reason so many people – including normally skeptical science and medical writers – eagerly embraced the initial reports is that deep down in their hearts everyone knows it is morally wrong to extinguish one life in order to save another. For a day or so, those who are vocal in their objections to using embryos as stem cell factories and those who have squelched their moral qualms in the name of "scientific progress" found common ground in the profound relief that it just might be possible to create embryonic stem cells without destroying embryos.

This goal is worth pursuing further – but only if more embryos will not be killed in the process.