The Washington Post has an article in today's paper on how some of the post-Sept. 11 detainees were treated in prison. My heart isn't breaking, and if the Post's reporting describes the worst that they suffered, well, They should be glad they were in America, and not any other country in the world.

Inside the Special Housing Unit of the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, dozens of detainees held for months in connection with the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks have been confined to their cells nearly 24 hours a day.

The lights are always on, making it difficult to sleep. The prisoners are subject to body cavity searches after each meeting with their attorneys. They are transported in shackles, handcuffs and waist chains. In some cases, the detainees have been subject to harassment by prison guards and rough treatment that has left them bloodied.

Someone call a waaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhmbulance!

Lights are always on? So what?

They're transported in shackles, handcuffs and waist chains? So are the vast majority of prisoners.

Subject to harassment? Big deal. So they hurt your feelings. It's not nice, but it's kinda to be expected.

Bloodied? This was disconcerting. I imagined a bloody nose, broken bones, bruised body.

Well, not quite.

[Syed Amjad] Jaffri said he was taken to an INS detention facility in Manhattan. There, he said, he was questioned again by the FBI. When he asked to see an attorney, Jaffri said, the agent swore at him and told him: "You're going to learn the hard way." Jaffri could not identify the agent.

The next day, Jaffri said, he was brought to MDC in a motorcade that included police cars with sirens blaring. With shackles around his ankles and his hands cuffed to a heavy chain around his waist, Jaffri said, he was seized by MDC guards and thrown face first into a wall. The impact, he said, bloodied his mouth and loosened his teeth.

It's not right, but it's not surprising either. If this is the worst that's happening to the detainees, I don't think there should be too many complaints. Even the worst that occurs in our prison facilities is something close to paradise compared to many other countries I can think of, say China or Cuba.