Has The Media's Use Of The Phrase "Alleged Abuse" Been Discussed Yet?

Shouldn't it be "alleged abusers" since technically it hasn't been proven who did what to whom? (Innocent until proven guilty, and all that?)

HOWEVER, the abuse did happen! So why it it "alleged abuse"? Why would Bush and Rice apologize for something that was merely alleged if it didn't actually happen?

Is this an example of media bias? Is the media trying to soften the impact of the fact that the abuse actually happened by deeming it something that's merely "alleged"?

Or is the media on auto-pilot and they use the word "alleged" without even thinking anymore, and without considering what it literally means and what the actual purpose for using the word is?

Just wondering.

-- Allen

Please forgive if this has been hashed out already.

"disappeared" by the occupation.

mistakes have been uncovered.

Nobody does anything apparently. Deaths and mistakes just keep falling out of the sky and landing on Iraqis.

The crew of the "Unfiltered" show on Air America Radio (I think it was Unfiltered, but it may have been Morning Sedition - I tend to have the station streaming all day long and get the various shows a little muddled) discussed it at length. However, they focused instead on the toning down of the allegations to "abuse" from "torture", questioning to what absurd lengths "abuse" must go -- such as sodomy by broomstick -- in order to be more correctly characterized.

By the way, I'm sure it's already been posted, but just in case anyone missed it, here's the classified DoD report on the abuses as posted by NPR:

http://www.npr.org/features/feature.php?wfId=1870746

-- Bustarbusto

foreign media, it is called "torture". It is just the American media that continues to call it 'abuse" since it sounds better. Call it what it is and let the bushistas deal with the word 'torture"

And it's bound to happen soon enough. This Guardian (UK) article has some rather juicy quotes:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1209903,00.html

..including this:

"Major General Antonio Taguba wrote in February that US army intelligence officers, CIA agents and private contractors "actively requested that military police guards set physical and mental conditions for favourable interrogation of witnesses".

The methods included threatening men with rape, assaulting prisoners with broom handles and fluorescent lights, allowing a guard to stitch the wound of a prisoner and using military dogs to terrify detainees.

According to his report, obtained first by the New Yorker magazine on Monday, soldiers were ordered to break the will of detainees before interrogating them."

And just for semantic clarity, dictionary.com provides:

"5 entries found for torture.
tor·ture ( P ) Pronunciation Key (tôrchr)
n.

1.
1. Infliction of severe physical pain as a means of punishment or coercion.
2. An instrument or a method for inflicting such pain.
2. Excruciating physical or mental pain; agony: the torture of waiting in suspense.
3. Something causing severe pain or anguish."

Not too many hairs too split here, although the right-wing media and the Bushies will doubtless do their damndest.

-- Bustarbusto

just cause rumsfield says we should use the word abuse instead of torture, doesnt mean i am going to cave. i looked up both words. it was TORTURE, not abuse