The New York Times reports that recent letters from the Justice Department state that “American intelligence operatives attempting to thwart terrorist attacks can legally use interrogation methods that might otherwise be prohibited under international law, specifically, the Geneva Conventions:

While the Geneva Conventions prohibit “outrages upon personal dignity,” a letter sent by the Justice Department to Congress on March 5 makes clear that the administration has not drawn a precise line in deciding which interrogation methods would violate that standard, and is reserving the right to make case-by-case judgments.

“The fact that an act is undertaken to prevent a threatened terrorist attack, rather than for the purpose of humiliation or abuse, would be relevant to a reasonable observer in measuring the outrageousness of the act,” said Brian A. Benczkowski, a deputy assistant attorney general, in the letter, which had not previously been made public.

“What they are saying is that if my intent is to defend the United States rather than to humiliate you, than I have not committed an offense,” said Scott L. Silliman of Duke University.

Last year, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) backed legislation requiring presidential candidates to pay the actual cost of flying on corporate jets. He also promised not to use his wife’s personal wealth for his presidential nomination. Yet The New York Times is reporting that McCain repeatedly used Cindy McCain’s corporate jet at very little cost to his campaign:

But over a seven-month period beginning last summer, Mr. McCain’s cash-short campaign gave itself an advantage by using a corporate jet owned by a company headed by his wife, Cindy McCain, according to public records. For five of those months, the plane was used almost exclusively for campaign-related purposes, those records show.

Mr. McCain’s campaign paid a total of $241,149 for the use of that plane from last August through February, records show. That amount is approximately the cost of chartering a similar jet for a month or two, according to industry estimates.

The AP reports that according to final results today, conservatives “consolidated control of Iran’s legislature in run-off elections,” but at the same time, opponents of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad also gained strength in the Parliament. Reformists in Iran “favor greater democracy, closer ties with the West, and reducing clerical powers in Iran” and made a “respectable showing even after most of their candidates were barred from running.” The results suggest the “hard-line” Ahmadinejad “is growing increasingly vulnerable ahead of a bid for re-election next year.”

Vice President Dick Cheney headlined a fundraiser for Rep. Jeff Miller (R-FL) on Thursday. While Cheney gave some of his standard lines — “One great lesson of 9/11 is that we have to stop treating terrorist attacks as a law enforcement problem” — only a “small crowd” turned out to hear them. A sponsor of the event blamed the low turnout on the lack of a “more competitive two-party system.”

The newest issue of ESPN The Magazine highlights “bionic athletes” in its cover story, looking “into the lives of athletes who represent the future of sports and prosthetics.” One of the athletes featured on its cover is Iraq war veteran Jerrod Fields of Chula Vista, CA, who “uses a leg prosthetic to play basketball.” The 25-year old Army sergeant, who has been awarded both a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart, was wounded in Iraq in Feb. 2005.

Spencer Ackerman writes, “It confuses me that the actual cover piece doesn’t feature Fields (he’s going to the NBA tryouts? Kind of a good story!) but the cover is awesome.”