First they shut down an Iraqi newspaper “because of an article that U.S. occupation authorities and Iraqi officials considered an incitement to violence and a threat to human rights in Iraq,” and now 500 Iraqi detainees have been held incommunicado from families and 90 percent of them have not been allowed to consult a lawyer.

Best of all, they are being housed in one of Iraq’s most notorious prisons.

Iraq’s desaparecidos may simply be a cost of maintaining order before the civil justice system is up and running, U.S. authorities say.

Good thing Dubya’s against nation building.