Few people pay attention to Canadian politics at the best of times, so it should be no surprise that the U.S. Obama-McCain dustup has utterly overshadowed the October 14 Canadian federal election.

The just-released footage of an interrogation at the US prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba is quite compelling. It remains to be seen whether the video will have the same impact as the photos from Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, but its content certainly does nothing to heal the United States' wounded reputation around human rights.

Captured on cameras hidden in a vent, the footage shows Canadian Omar Khadr, then 16, weeping and in serious distress. The interrogation methods used on him included prolonged, multi-week sleep deprivation.