A lawsuit filed by nine former military prisoners against Donald Rumsfeld and military officers has been dismissed on the ground that they are immune from suit when they make decisions about the treatment of prisoners. Here's what the prisoners alleged:

The lawsuit contends the prisoners were beaten, suspended upside down from the ceiling by chains, urinated on, shocked, sexually humiliated, burned, locked inside boxes and subjected to mock executions.

Lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights First had argued that Rumsfeld and top military officials disregarded warnings about the abuse and authorized the use of illegal interrogation tactics that violated the constitutional and human rights of prisoners.

Calling the case "lamentable," Judge Thomas Hogan ruled that "authorizing monetary damages remedies against military officials engaged in an active war would invite enemies to use our own federal courts to obstruct the Armed Forces' ability to act decisively and without hesitation." Obstructing the government's illegal behavior isn't such a bad thing, is it? Holding Rumsfeld accountable wouldn't be such a bad thing, either.