I Hate What You Just Said

The NY Times has an incredible article on the 6-year ordeal of an ex-detainee of a variety of US detention facilities.

It is a catalog of physical violence, illegal detention, sleep deprivation, truth serums, and electric shocks — all just to get Mr. Iqbal to admit that he met Osama bin Laden.

My favorite part of the article comes when CIA spokesman, Paul Gimigliano, states:

“I have no idea what he’s talking about. The United States does not conduct or condone torture.”

For years the Bush administration worked in secret to kidnap, torture, and indefinitely imprison individuals in flagrant disregard of domestic and international law. When discovered, the administration explained that they didn’t need the cloak of secrecy at all; such behavior is perfectly legal. If the president ordered it during wartime, they reasoned, all things are permissible. Further, they claimed, torture can only be said to have occurred with a willful attempt to cause “organ failure” or “death.”

Just imagine for a moment the utter absurdity of people such as this pretending to the moral authority to prosecute other individuals for similar crimes.

Unbelievably, we no longer have imagine such a scenario. Today these paragons of virtue and administers of “infinite justice” have asked a federal judge to imprison the son of Charles Taylor for acts of torture committed during Liberia’s civil war:

U.S. prosecutors want a Miami judge to sentence the son of former Liberian President Charles Taylor to 147 years in prison for torturing people when he was chief of a brutal paramilitary unit during his father’s reign.

Charles McArthur Emmanuel, also known as Charles “Chuckie” Taylor Jr. is scheduled to be sentenced Jan. 9 by U.S. District Judge Cecilia M. Altonaga. His conviction was the first use of a 1994 law allowing prosecution in the U.S. for acts of torture committed overseas.

A recent Justice Department court filing describes torture - which the U.S. has been accused of in the war on terror - as a “flagrant and pernicious abuse of power and authority” that warrants severe punishment of Taylor.

“It undermines respect for and trust in authority, government and a rule of law,” wrote Assistant U.S. Attorney Caroline Heck Miller in last week’s filing. “The gravity of the offense of torture is beyond dispute.”

You see, when someone like “Chuckie” tortures people, he undermines trust in authority, government, rule of law; his flagrant and pernicious abuses of power and authority are so odious that we must sentence him to several lifetimes in prison as an example to all who would attempt to emulate him.

Only other people and other nations would engage in such reprehensible behavior–not “US.” You see, my friends, when the US acts, it always acts legally and with the blessing of God. There is literally nothing in the whole history of our nation’s manifest destiny that merits apology or retrospection or alteration. We are nature’s only exception; there is no law, no covenant, no rule or promise that can bind us.

Seriously consider the gravity of this offense: After all this is over, Charles Taylor Jr. will rot in prison while George Bush Jr. will retire to his ranch and look forward to endless summer days of riding his bicycle, cutting brush, and reaping millions of dollars in speaking fees. And Dick Cheney will return to his fortified bunker and wait for his tired bionic heart to fail, wondering how there is yet a woman who could love him. No jail awaits them. No lengthy trial at the Hague. No sneering public will great them with derision and disgust and a thinly veiled hate.

No, they’ll get away with all of it. And as the sun sets on their last days in office they’ve found time to prosecute others for “flagrant and pernicious” abuses of other human beings. After they leave office, the rest of us who can still make some claim to integrity and sanity will be left to suck on that bitter irony.

George W. Bush is all about “freedom,” and “democracy,” right?

Also - he’s all about this:

He’ll invade your country and destroy it under false pretenses.  He will show little if any concern whatsoever for the civilian dead and wounded in your country.  In fact, his forces will use cluster bombs - considered barbaric by much of the world - which will ensure heavier civilian casualties in your country.  He and his administration will authorize the use of torture in your country.  Then, when he comes to visit your country, and you throw your shoes at him in disgust, he’ll crack jokes while he listens to you being beaten nearby.  Audibly beaten.

From the NYT:

The Iraqi journalist, Muntader al-Zaidi, 28, a correspondent for Al Baghdadia, an independent Iraqi television station, stood up about 12 feet from Mr. Bush and shouted in Arabic: “This is a gift from the Iraqis; this is the farewell kiss, you dog!” He then threw a shoe at Mr. Bush, who ducked and narrowly avoided it

As stunned security agents and guards, officials and journalists watched, Mr. Zaidi then threw his other shoe, shouting in Arabic, “This is from the widows, the orphans and those who were killed in Iraq!” That shoe also narrowly missed Mr. Bush as Prime Minister Maliki stuck a hand in front of the president’s face to help shield him.

Mr. Maliki’s security agents jumped on the man, wrestled him to the floor and hustled him out of the room. They kicked him and beat him until “he was crying like a woman,” said Mohammed Taher, a reporter for Afaq, a television station owned by the Dawa Party, which is led by Mr. Maliki. Mr. Zaidi was then detained on unspecified charges.

Other Iraqi journalists in the front row apologized to Mr. Bush, who was uninjured and tried to brush off the incident by making a joke. “All I can report is it is a size 10,” he said, continuing to take questions and noting the apologies. He also called the incident a sign of democracy, saying, “That’s what people do in a free society, draw attention to themselves,” as the man’s screaming could be heard outside [bold added].

Compared to the brutality of the Iraq War itself, Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, and extraordinary rendition, this incident is of course relatively minor (unless you happen to be the guy being beaten - then it is quite major). 

But it is also a perfectly fitting way for George W. Bush to end his disgraceful presidency. 

WHILE A MAN WAS BEING BEATEN IN HIS PRESENCE, BUSH WAS CRACKING JOKES AND EXPLAINING DEMOCRACY TO EVERYONE.

George W. Bush knows no shame.

From today’s Boston Globe:

WASHINGTON - A bipartisan Senate report released yesterday says that former Defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other top Bush administration officials are directly responsible for abuses of detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and charges that decisions by those officials led to serious offenses against prisoners in Iraq and elsewhere.

The Senate Armed Services Committee report accuses Rumsfeld and his deputies of being the principal architects of the plan to use harsh interrogation techniques on captured fighters and terrorism suspects, rejecting the Bush administration’s contention that the policies originated lower down the command chain.

…

The report, released by Senators Carl Levin, Democrat of Michigan, and Republican John McCain of Arizona, and based on a nearly two-year investigation, said that both the policies and resulting controversies tarnished the reputation of the United States and undermined national security. “Those efforts damaged our ability to collect accurate intelligence that could save lives, strengthened the hand of our enemies, and compromised our moral authority,” it said [bold added].

The report further asserts that high-level officials not only initiated harsh interrogation techniques [read: torture], but that they “redefined the law to create the appearance of their legality.”  It still appears unclear whether any high-level Bush administration officials will be held accountable for their actions. 

A symptom of the problem:  I am looking at cnn.com and foxnews.com right now.  And I can’t find this story.

Sounds good to me:

The White House isn’t inclined to grant sweeping pardons for former administration officials involved in harsh interrogations and detentions of terror suspects, according to people familiar with the situation.

Some Republicans have been pushing for President George W. Bush to grant pre-emptive clemency to officials who fear being investigated by Democratic critics. White House officials have countered that such pardons are unnecessary, these people say. The officials point to Justice Department legal opinions that supported the administration’s methods of detaining and interrogating terror suspects.

Liberal groups and some legal scholars say they will push for criminal investigations of former Bush officials. The officials in their sights include Central Intelligence Agency interrogators and lawyers at the Justice Department and the White House who formulated or approved tactics that critics labeled as torture.

The AP reports that Obama insiders have stated that there will be no criminal investigations of Bush administration officials for human rights abuses or war crimes.

Instead, it seems that the president-elect favors something in line with a truth-and-reconciliation model:

Obama has committed to reviewing interrogations on al-Qaida and other terror suspects. After he takes office in January, Obama is expected to create a panel modeled after the 9/11 Commission to study interrogations, including those using waterboarding and other tactics that critics call torture. The panel’s findings would be used to ensure that future interrogations are undisputedly legal.

The article quotes Robert Litt, a former Clinton official in the Justice Department, offering the reasoning that is likely to win the day:

“Both for policy and political reasons, it would not be beneficial to spend a lot of time hauling people up before Congress or before grand juries and going over what went on,” Litt said at a Brookings Institution discussion about Obama’s legal policy. “To as great of an extent we can say, the last eight years are over, now we can move forward — that would be beneficial both to the country and the president, politically.”

Opposing this logic is Michael Rater, a professor at Columbia Law school, who argues that

“The only way to prevent this from happening again is to make sure that those who were responsible for the torture program pay the price for it,” Ratner said. “I don’t see how we regain our moral stature by allowing those who were intimately involved in the torture programs to simply walk off the stage and lead lives where they are not held accountable.”

It is a certainty that Litt’s argument will prevail. However, if I were Rumsfeld, Bush, Cheney, Gonzales, Yoo, or Addington, I would not step foot outside of the United States for the rest of my lifetime.

What a great country we have. We’ve decided that it is acceptable that a single person has the ability to order the capture of individuals wherever they might be on the globe, hold them prisoner indefinitely with no access to a legitimate court, and subject them to torture. There is no other word for this than absolute and abject tyranny.

I was really hoping for a war-crimes trial so that I could see Dick Cheney deliver this line from the witness chair:

You can’t handle the truth! Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who’s gonna do it? You? You, Lieutenant Weinberg? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. . . . And my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives! You don’t want the truth because deep down in places you don’t talk about at parties, you want me on that wall! You need me on that wall! We use words like Honor, Code, Loyalty. We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punchline! I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that I provide, and then questions the manner in which I provide it! I would rather you just said “Thank you” and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon, and stand a post. Either way, I don’t give a damn what you think you are entitled too!