One does not have to be a minimizer to note that the United States is roiling in hysteria following reports of prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib.

I'm feeling a bit hysterical myself. Each new report is worse than the one before.

Each photo makes us want to avert our gaze. Or take a shower. A nation of Lady Macbeths, we look for ways to cleanse ourselves of contamination by association.

Meanwhile, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld dropped these chilling words during testimony last week before the U.S. Senate:

"There are other photos that depict incidents of physical violence towards prisoners, acts that can only be described as blatantly sadistic, cruel and inhumane," he said. "It's going to get a good deal more terrible, I'm afraid."

We, too, are afraid. Some of those images reportedly capture American soldiers beating an Iraqi prisoner almost to death, having sex with a female Iraqi prisoner and "acting inappropriately with a dead body." A videotape reportedly shows Iraqi guards raping boys.

One photo already published in The New Yorker along with Seymour Hersh's second installment on the prison abuses shows American guards with German shepherds threatening a naked Iraqi man cowering in terror. Hersh writes that other photographs in the series show the same man on the ground bleeding from leg wounds.

Now the debate in Washington centers on whether, when, how and how many of such photographs to release. The Defense Department plans to show more pictures to Congress, but isn't certain whether to release them to the public.

We all cringe at the thought because we know what it means. The potential repercussions are almost unbearable to consider: continued loss of respect in the world; increased risk to our soldiers, especially those who might be taken prisoner; empowerment of insurgents; derailment of our mission in Iraq, and, ultimately, further destabilization in the Middle East.

And, of course, growing hysteria at home.

It comes as little surprise that Bush-bashers have found a degree of vindication in the Abu Ghraib meltdown. By their interpretation, what happened in Saddam's former torture chambers was inevitable, the logical extension of President Bush's "evil" and Donald Rumsfeld's "hubris."

From the hysterical left come comparisons of Bush to Saddam that are too ridiculous to dignify with rebuttal. From the hysterical right come justifications for what can't be justified. My mailbag has included more than a few from people who wrote in so many words : "Grow up, this is war." Or, "We should have shot them all," meaning the Iraqi prisoners. Continued...