Maybe they forgot? Or maybe we just don't want to remember.

Okay, first of all, I can understand the impulse to not want to shake the hornets' nest again by showing more photos of U.S. troops torturing, humiliating, and killing Iraqis in their custody. After all, Karl Rove's nuanced thinking on the subject notwithstanding, those images on Al Jazeera should revitalize al Qaeda's moribund recruitment efforts. But to think that U.S. troops will be more "endangered" by their release appears on the surface to be another example of a president hoodwinked by "military commanders expressed concern." Don't ask don't tell didn't improve morale nor make our military any more effective. And Iraqis don't have collective amnesia. They are reminded, pretty much every day, of the humiliation our destruction of their country has wrought.

I think the real reason is a tad more complicated. Releasing more abu Ghraib photos will only serve as a reminder that the psychopaths in the Pentagon and the White House repeatedly told us that the night crew at the prison were only a bunch of "bad apples." In turn, they will remind us that no investigation was really conducted at the time to see if those "bad apples" were, in fact, following orders. And following those orders to their source is an investigation that Obama seems desperate to avoid having to undertake.

UPDATE: Andrew Sullivan sees an additional motivation.