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TechnoratiSeasonal Forgiveness Has a Limit. Bush and His Cronies Must Face a Reckoning
Heinous crimes are now synonymous with this US administration. If it isn't held to account, what does that say about us?
'Tis the night before Christmas and the season of goodwill. The mood is forgiving. Our faces warm with mulled wine, our tummies full, we're meant to slump in the armchair, look back on the year just gone and count our blessings - woozily agreeing to put our troubles behind us.
As in families, so in the realm of public and international affairs. And this December that feels especially true. The "war on terror" that dominated much of the decade seems to be heading towards a kind of conclusion. George Bush will leave office in a matter of weeks and British troops will leave Iraq a few months later. The first, defining phase of the conflict that began on 9/11 - the war of Bush, Tony Blair and Osama bin Laden - is about to slip from the present to the past tense. Bush and Blair will be gone, with only Bin Laden still in post. The urge to move on is palpable.
You can sense it in the valedictory interviews Bush and Dick Cheney are conducting on their way out. They're looking to the verdict of history now, Cheney telling the Washington Times last week: "I myself am personally persuaded that this president and this administration will look very good 20 or 30 years down the road." The once raging arguments of the current era are about to fade, the lead US protagonists heading off to their respective ranches in the west, the rights and wrongs of their decisions in office to be weighed not in the hot arena of politics, but in the cool seminar rooms of the academy.
Not so fast.
Yes, the new year would get off to a more soothing start if we could all agree to draw a line and move on. But it would be wrong. First, because we cannot hope to avoid repeating the errors of the last eight years unless they are subject to a full accounting. (It is for that reason Britain needs its own full, unconstrained inquiry into the Iraq war.) Second, because a crucial principle, one that goes to the very heart of the American creed, is at stake. And third, because this is not solely about the judgment of history. It may be about the judgment of the courts - specifically those charged with punishing war crimes.
Less than a fortnight ago, in the news graveyard of a Friday afternoon, the armed services committee of the US Senate released a bipartisan report - with none other than John McCain as its co-author - into the American use of torture against those held in the war on terror. It dismissed entirely the notion that the horrors of Abu Ghraib could be put down to "a few bad apples". Instead it laid bare, in forensic detail, the trail of memos and instructions that led directly to the then defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld.
The report was the fruit of 18 months of work, involving some 70 interviews. Most of it is classified, but even the 29-page published summary makes horrifying reading. It shows how the most senior figures in the Bush administration discussed, and sought legal fig leaves for, practices that plainly amounted to torture. They were techniques devised in a training programme known as Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape or SERE, that aimed to teach elite American soldiers how to endure torture should they fall into the hands of pitiless enemies. The SERE techniques were partly modelled on the brutal methods used by the Chinese against US prisoners during the Korean war. Yet Rumsfeld ruled that these same techniques should be "reverse engineered", so that Americans would learn not how to endure them - but how to inflict them. Which they then did, at Guantánamo, Abu Ghraib and beyond.
The Senate report cites the memorandums requesting permission to use "stress positions, exploitation of detainee fears (such as fear of dogs), removal of clothing, hooding, deprivation of light and sound, and the so-called wet towel treatment or the waterboard". We read of Mohamed al Kahtani - against whom all charges were dropped earlier this year - who was "deprived of adequate sleep for weeks on end, stripped naked, subjected to loud music, and made to wear a leash and perform dog tricks". Approval for this kind of torture, hidden under the euphemism of "enhanced interrogation", was sought from and granted at the highest level.
And that doesn't mean Rumsfeld. The report's first conclusion is that, on "7 February 2002, President George W Bush made a written determination that Common Article 3 of the Geneva conventions, which would have afforded minimum standards for humane treatment, did not apply to al-Qaida or Taliban detainees". The result, it says, is that Bush "opened the door" to the use of a raft of techniques that the US had once branded barbaric and beyond the realm of human decency.
For this Bush should surely be held to account. And yet there is no sign that he will, and precious little agitation that he should. A still smiling Cheney denies the Bush administration did anything wrong. Note this breathtaking exchange with Fox News at the weekend. He was asked: "If the president during war decides to do something to protect the country, is it legal?" Cheney's answer: "General proposition, I'd say yes."
It takes a few seconds for the full horror of that remark to sink in. And then you remember where you last heard something like it. It was the now immortalised interview between David Frost and Richard Nixon. The disgraced ex-president was asked whether there were certain situations where the president can do something illegal, if he deems it in the national interest. Nixon's reply: "Well, when the president does it, that means that it is not illegal."
It is no coincidence that Cheney began his career in the Nixon White House. He has the same Nixonian disregard for the US constitution, the same belief that executive power is absolute and unlimited - that those who wield it are above the law, domestic and international. It is the logic of dictatorship.
But Nixon was forced from office, his vision of an unrestrained presidency rejected. If Bush and Cheney are allowed to retire quietly, America will have failed to reassert that bedrock principle of the republic: the rule of law.
This is why there must be a reckoning. Bush will do all he can to avoid it: and it is wholly possible that one of his last acts as president will be to cover himself, his vice-president and all his henchmen with a blanket pardon. Even if that does not happen, Barack Obama is unlikely to want to spend precious capital pursuing his predecessor for war crimes.
But other prosecutors elsewhere in the world should weigh their responsibilities. In the end, it was a lone Spanish magistrate, not a Chilean court, who ensured the arrest of Augusto Pinochet. A pleasing, if uncharitable, thought this Christmas, is that Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush will hesitate before making plans to travel abroad in 2009. Or indeed at any time - ever again.
70 Comments so far
Show AllHOW DOES ONE GRANT FORGIVENESS WHEN NO ONE HAS ASKED FOR IT?
I'm for accountability, but apparently the people who I've voted for aren't. This must be the reason why I never vote for the same guy twice.
People as craven and immoral as Bush and Cheney don't deserve forgiveness.
It is ironic that the world's ranking authorities on war crimes and crimes against humanity come from the USA.
Sophie Scholl-The Final Days
"Heinous crimes are now synonymous with this US administration."
I beg to differ, heinous crimes are synonymous with the USA. USA and Israel have taken up where the German Nazi party left off.
Sophie Scholl-The Final Days
(Re)volution is the only redress. Peaceful, massive, non-cooperation, nonconsent. Sure, $10 a month to fund litigators to pursue war criminals if you wish--but even better, just get people together to agree to STOP PAYING TAXES to a criminal government. Get one million people to sign onto a pledge of NONPAYMENT OF TAXES by January 1, 2010. Some of course would start not paying right away. You have a list of demands, including prosecution of Bush, Cheney, et al for war crimes, repeal of the PATRIOT Act, etc., Military Commissions Act, etc. Make your aim a snowballing movement of non-cooperation, starting with withholding tax monies.
It could have started right here on Common Dreams, but it won't.
We used to say in the 60s: If you aren't part of the solution, you are part of the problem.
THAT reality has not changed one whit.
What's lacking here are the twin Cs: Commitment and COURAGE.
Yes. Voluntary simplicity, even eating right and taking the bus/bike are effective forms of non-participation until our system turns away from violence and exploitation.
Ever read "Blessed Unrest" by Paul Hawken? A (non-religious) look at the real grassroots numbers of the movement today.
hey! i am so encouraged to see someone speaking of VOLUNTARY SIMPLICITY. it culd be the most effective fight we can wage against imperialism. all it needs to work, to take down capitalistic pig empire, is popular particiipation--kina like democracy used to be talked about.
He is already reading more daily security briefs than Bush and beginning each day with a barrage of fearful intelligence, hinting at dangers that largely never materialize. Submersion in that flow of intelligence will wrenchingly change his sense of the world's risks."
Dismantling the Imperial Presidency is going to be a monumental task of legal motions supported by the supreme court.
I say this because there are many agency's that have been given unconstitutional powers by the Patriot Act.
I am talking about the Nation Wide Warrant less Surveillance network built by Bush/Cheney cronies.
If you go no further than investigating Infragard, the International Association of Firefighters, and EMS first responders and their connections to one another for conducting Warrant less surviellance using community watch groups, you would soon uncover the depth,scope,and participants of illegal imperialistic warrant less surviellance .
Its 23000 companys all toll in Infragard, and 1 million IAFF members coupled with community watch groups across the county and world.
Can you say police state?????
Why is it going to be difficult to dismantle the imperial rulers?
Because the people guilty of this police state imperialism are the whos who in every community.Doctors,lawyers,police men, EMS responders,Firefighter, elected officials, community watch leaders, business men, Verizon,Cable company's, service company's,teachers, principals,bankers,etc..
In a rush to provide community and national security, your trusted community servants bought into the Bush/Cheney doctrine of no constitutional rights or civil liberties exist. " Your either with us or against us" , "Freedom isn't Free".
We own you.
The problem is that absolute power corrupts absolutely. These very same trusted servants are guilty of creating suspects to grow their power, and worse yet, employing Gang Stalking Torture Tactics with their unchecked power of electronic surviellance to destroy their enemy's or unwanted citizens.
The internet is filled with accounts of abuse of power by community gang stalkers.
If the lawyers and judges are involved in community warrant less surviellance , how are we going to stop the police state imperialism that is in full force nation wide.
President elect Obama must repeal the Patriot Act, and unfortunately , give these organizations and trusted servants immunity for their illegal behavior.All should become accountable to constitutional law going forward.
The only exception to immunity is in the case of severe psychological torture committed by community watch groups conducting gang stalking and slander campaigns. People might not go to jail, but damages should be paid to victims.
The only way to kill Imperialism is to slay it with Constitutional Law. And our Supreme court and Lawyers at large must wield the sword of justice and stab Imperialism through the heart.
BornFreeMen
Community watch,gang stalking warrant less surviellance torture victim,Bradenton Florida since DEC 2006.
PRIVATIZE NUREMBERG.
Who would chip in $10/mo to a fund that would bankroll litigators to pursue these mobsters, if the agencies of our gov't which are charged with doing so, won't??
Five million people? $50MM/mo?? Support Bugalosi's case? Incentivize law firms to recover public money stolen by fraud and abuse??
If the Pentagon and State can out-source to contractors, why can't the People?
on the part of all of us who can barely find the courage to even read the horrible truth about what we have allowed to happen, thanks for the constant reminders that this poor country will need a complete overhaul of public and private opinion if we are to survive......and yes it is obvious that only private groups will ever have any luck reforming the juggernaut of death which the usa has become......but who will pay the lawyer fees? the almighty?
I am moving to New Zealand. NO constructive justice will happen here in the USA to bring the war criminals to trial.
This country has become a rouge nation with a stupid, docile population of fools.
Anyway, this country is bankrupt, and will suffer for its economy criminality, too.
Your comment is spot on, but it is very difficult to become a New Zealand resident unless you have professional skills that they desire. My Nephew moved there as he was so disgusted with Nazi Amerika and its foreign bribery, war, politically, dumbed down citizens, and assassinations. He says he loves it, but told me that they are very strict about accepting new citizens.
the paragraph that said:
rumsfeld instructed ....the use of the techniques learned from others....NOT so that US military personnel will learn how to EVADE them but how to INFLICT them-----------
is the PRECISE example of "becoming your enemy"....being as bad or even WORSe -- for you should have KNOWN BETTER than to BE the supposed "dark forces" you are fighting. you BECOME the dark force you are fighting.
and gives final truth to the saying of Pogo:
"I have met the enemy and ...........he is US".
Exterminate all the brutes...... and have a nice day....
… perhaps I can forgive bu$h!t for his seasonal abuse of too much salt in our wounds …
but forgiveness as a vehicle of bypassing gov't's reprehensible behavior is WRONG, because of:
our desperately mandated, cleansing, and intrinsically necessary reactions
( for re-growing our Democracy's health & well being ), and
reconciliation of inequities and reparations of illegalities
absolutely NOT.
Namaste
Start with the towers!!!!!!
Over a year ago the the Dublin Ireland city council voted to arrest G W Bush and turn him over to the World Court on criminal charges.Think of it ,one of our staunchest allies figured it out some time ago that the USA had criminals running the Country.What does that say about our elected officials and other persons in positions of power.I don't recall reading that in any of our national press or seeing that addressed on national TV or radio.The only reason I know about is because I was in Ireland at the time and read it in the Dublin press.
Obama has to create a "justice commission" with a special prosecutor and let investigations take their course.
Even if major Democratic senators fall, so be it.
Most important, Cheney, Bush, Rumsfeld, and the generals that allowed it to happen, have to be brought to justice for America.
But the stupid Congress granted a state of war for the Bush admin which has not ended even today. And Cheney has a legitimate legal case by saying that in a state of war, the presidency can do anything. There is a great deal of precedence going back to the Adams administration.
The question may be the nature of the 'state of war' being inconsistent with past war declared on an actual nation for a limited time, while the Bush declaration was a perpetual, virtually unending war against a nonstate actor.
Essentially, 19th century constitutional thought was used to create the 21st century American global empire, and the American people are too weak to change.
We need to . . . we need to . . . we need to ... if only we could . . . maybe somebody will . . . let's try to . . . it's imperative that we . . . we can't afford to let them get away with . . . now is the time . . . now more than ever we must . . . And so on. And sadly, "we," or whomever is in a position to, never does whatever it is that must be done. But we can sure keeping "hoping."
Since Bush is thankfully leaving office, it would be nice to think that the next administration would call upon the members of congress to bring this whole ugly 8 years into the light of revelation. But since so many of the Democratic powers within the House and Senate have granted Bush the power to accomplish the destruction of the Constitution and voted in lock step with him and his Neo-Con scum, that I'm afraid our government would not stand a really close scrutiny of the past 8 years, therefore, I would plead with any other nation on our planet to bring these jokers to The Hague should any of them wish to travel to their countries and put them in the Dock!!!! Merry Christmas, its a pleasant Christmas wish to have them arrested and convicted!!!
"A pleasing, if uncharitable, thought this Christmas, is that Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush will hesitate before making plans to travel abroad in 2009. Or indeed at any time - ever again."
Sure. There are a lot more size 10 shoes lined up for launching.Next time they may find their targets.
Heads of state of the past that were unbound by the laws of their own nations, were, none the less, limited by external factors. So monsters like Hitler and Stalin could not destroy all that was true and beautiful. Bush and company were likely limited only by a lack of imagination. What might some future US regime even less challenged - intellectually, imaginatively, ethically - than Bush/Cheney/Rumfeld/Bolton/Wolfowitz/et al accomplish if not held to be subject to the law. By us. There is no one else that can oppose them. They have greater power than ever, and we greater responsibility.
I have limited knowledge of the US Constitution (being from Australia), but I understand that the Constitution allows for the impeachment of the President. Therefore, it is possible for the President to break the law (why else would he be impeached?). How can this square with Nixon's statement "if the President does it, that means it's not illegal." The constitution allows for the eventuality that the President can break the law, and applies a remedy.
Impeachment is purely political. It has nothing to do with the law.
It isn't a very good system. It would be better to have some form of recall election, as many states have.
You are correct. Nixon was wrong. However, if Congress is weak, negligent, or corrupt (and lately it's been a strange combination of all three), the Executive Branch (the President) can, and has under Cheney's direction, grab power it should not really have. The other branches (Administrative Branch, a.k.a. Congress, and Judicial Branch, a.k.a. Supreme Court) are obliged to correct this, but have not, leaving us in this shitstorm.
In a meeting with his co-conspirators, George W. Bush in a fit of pique said that the U.S. Constitution is "just a goddam piece of paper." If that is his attitude toward a secular Enlightenment religious document, his attitude toward international law would be? And Cheney's attitude? I think we now pretty much know.
I think I'll try learning to knit. Based on my knowledge of knots.
-30-
Doesn't Congress need to get involved with this? I believe they do.
Seeing that Congress is in on the fix, what recourse do we have as citizens? (and please don't answer none - I don't accept that). I know that history provides for redress, the ultimate being at the hands of the citizens (either singularly or collectively). Does anyone know of a means for citizens, in a class action way, to force Congress to uphold their sworn duty to protect the Constitution? Can we sue Congress as a people for not doing their sworn duty?
If not, I believe it is our duty as citizens to either perform citizen arrests on all members of Congress who refuse to uphold their constitutional duties, or it is our duty to revolt. The buck must stop somewhere, and it looks like it lies completely with us now.
"All Nature's difference keeps all Nature's peace." Alexander Pope
I won't bet on a criminal prosecution of George W. Bush and associates, and the reason why is that the Congress is up to its eyebrows in alligators, by being complicit to the Iraq occupation, in the continued support with the money required to do it.
Mr. Obama voted for supporting the war with the appropriations in the senate, and is as guilty as the rest of them, and I should really say the rest of US, since we have turned a blind eye and allowed these murderers to continue on their killing spree.
We have a representative Government and ALL of us share at least part of the blame and guilt. We gave our tacit approval by allowing the re-election of the Commander in Chief murderer, once we all knew what he was like.
The only hope for justice lays in another country, such as Spain did, with the arrest of Pinochet.
Hint, HINT European friends, if one of these characters as much as shows a nose in your countries, please charge and detain them !
This is yet one more plea for the U.S. to take control of its future, and its destiny. Bringing these war criminals to justice will only be accomplished in the ICJ. The "people" themselves can take the task as theirs. They are not the powerless mass that the politicians would have them to believe. If the deterrent for future, or even worse conduct is to be introduced; the Bush administration must be forced to answer to the "people' and through them the 'world'.
The people can through the force of their numbers file their own complaint to the International Court of Justice, and have it enforced. They would not need the politicians here to conduct 'hearings', or even 'trials' in the United States territory. These were crimes against humanity, and they were committed under 'false color of law', in exactly the same manner as the very same crimes were and have been conducted by others. Pinochet is just one who recently was brought to justice. The members of the Bush administration would be forced to surrender themselves since there would be no place on earth where they could hide, and the 'space station' would not accommodate that many of them. The thought that they would be safe by not traveling outside of the U.S. territory should be comical. They should not be safe 'anywhere'. If the American people wish to assume the position of world leader they are required by common decency to make the example, and take the initiative. No less would ever be an answer.
If the readers here do not believe that the world is watching, and that their lives are tied directly to what the world would do, then they are only fooling themselves; which is exactly what the politicians want you to do.
The fact that these crimes were committed on foreign soil, with foreign assistance makes them of international status. The U.S. cannot legally claim sovereign status here.
Several readers in the past have mocked the idea that the world would 'invade America'. The world would not need to invade American soil, they could simply cut off all credit, and the U.S. would implode. The Americans would turn on themselves then in a force that would make the Civil War look like a picnic.
The recent vigilante activity in New Orleans is but one small example.
Americans have the potential to be the most caring and giving people on earth; and the potential to be the most dangerous; ask any Iraqi. A passive approach will not accomplish the task ahead.
If I had the 'answers', I would write THE book, then sell it, then be wealthy beyond any-one's imagination, (Warren Buffet would be the limo driver). But I do not have the answers, it will require others with other ideas, new ones, fresh ones, and we will need the collective courage to make them happen; but it can be done. And time is not on our side.
Ideas from as many as possible are needed here. Trying those that have not worked is not the answer.
Your silence will be your consent.
nurembergrevisited@gmail.com
Sioux Rose
COUNT COUP: I admire your conviction that justice will be done in spite of the obstacles before us. Of course there are the initiatives of Marjorie Cohn and Bugliosi, and at one time, before he caved in, John Conyers. (I would imagine he still has a file on all the info given to him? Makes me think his life or position were threatened to move forward at that time.) There have been some cities that have also voted for impeachment, so a movement of sorts "is out there."
During the Nixon phase, the shame was so overwhelming his own party members forced him to own what he did. Today, both parties are complicit, the media largely a tool of the elites, and thus the means to bring justice thwarted... except for the world court. Can concerned citizens place an ad in a European paper asking for help?
Sioux Rose
FAST EDDIE: I agree. Your points are well taken, and I appreciate the source, as I am compiling material for an eventual book, astrologically-based, on how and why these cycles of repression recur.
Sioux Rose, you might check out Cosmos and Psyche, by Richard Tarnas. I haven't read it yet but it is directly related to astrological influences on great historical events.
Sioux Rose
MEMORY: Thank you for the tip. I am behind in reading, but I'll add it to my list!
I have a hunch you might be interested in two books by Morris Berman, if you don't already know them. They are THE REENCHANTMENT OF THE WORLD and COMING TO OUR SENSES. He's an insightful historian. The former book focuses on the Enlightenment "disenchantment" of the world with the rise of modern science. If I recall correctly, he addresses the fate of astrology at the hands of modern science as well. The latter book focuses on vertical, hierarchical social structures, which I KNOW interest you!
Oh, heck, while I'm at it, also see if Theodore Rozsak's THE VOICE OF THE EARTH interests you...
Not gonna happen. Just not gonna happen folks. You're way, way too naive.
Jonathan Freedland writes "Barack Obama is unlikely to want to spend precious political capital pursuing his predecessor for war crimes."
Fortunately, under the existing Constitutional scheme of things, prosecuting George Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, or any other high officials of the outgoing administration for torture, illegal wiretapping, or other related war crimes, is not a part of Barack Obama's job description.
That responsibility rests squarely with the new Attorney General, presumably career Department of Justice professional Eric Holder, not with President Obama. It is not Barack Obama's decision to make.
I say we urge Attorney General Holder to simply do his job, and let the federal criminal justice system run its ordinary course.
This has nothing to do with spending political capital.
It is all about upholding the rule of law.
Bill from Saginaw
"I say we urge Attorney General Holder to simply do his job, and let the federal criminal justice system run its ordinary course."
I second this. Everyone here likes to write, so let's all write the Atty. Genl. and cc the Prez.
Justice enforces societal mores and values. If Bush/Cheney et al. do not answer for their crimes (whether illegal invasion or torture or both or more), it makes clear that America endorses mores and values that differ from most of the rest of the world. It will mean we were "with him" after all, not "against him." If Obama's Justice Dept. does NOT investigate and, if warranted (just preserving "innocent until proven guilty" here), prosecute, then we will confirm American's burgeoning pariah status. That makes me sick.
And if Obama and the Congress let these war crimes stand, as well as the whole dictatorial toolbox Bush has arrogated to the presidency, doesn't that make them complicit in these crimes? There is no way for Obama to be neutral about this.
Sioux Rose
MEMORY: Ever notice how many legal arguments are made on the basis of an event in the past creating "precedent." There will be future presidents who will try to build on the "unitary executive" protocols of Bush to further their own claims to absolute powers unless the actions taken, in flagrant abuse of established law, are corrected NOW. There will always be hacks posing as lawyers who will use tricks of semantics to bend the actual meaning of law to suit their own falacious desires, not unlike the trick of using Biblical passages to promote savagery. This is why Christ taught that the SPIRIT of the law must be preserved over any letter-of-the law applications. He understood this penchant on the part of the unsavory, to make use of words for their own ends.
Exactly right! Anything less than investigation and, if warranted, prosecution, is complicity. In addition to directing the Justice Dept. to investigate/prosecute, one of the most distinct and powerful acts Obama could undertake would be to abolish the "dictatorial tool box." Given his vote to reauthorize FISA with retroactive immunity to the telecoms for their crimes, I don't think he will do so. In fact, I literally fear he WANTS those powers, which scares me because he's so much smarter than Bush (though probably less corrupt than Cheney, at least for now). In short, if I had to bet, I would bet that complicity will stand.
Quite right!
And to add a tangential thought: this is why I remain so skeptical of the incoming administration's glib and facile use of terms like "tolerance", "reconciliation", "transcending our differences", etc.
Who can fairly reject or repudiate such concepts in the abstract?
One of the many enduringly funny and universally applicable bits from Marx Brothers movies goes like this:
GROUCHO and CHICO arrive at a delapidated rural building.
GROUCHO: Is this a barn or a stable?
CHICO: If you look at it, it's a barn; if you smell it, it's a stable.
GROUCHO: Let's just look at it.
_____________________________________________
I am increasingly concerned that the messianic and charismatic Obama, who identifies so strongly with Lincoln, sees himself as (at least potentially) a Great Man who-- as a commenter elsewhere put it admiringly-- must "teach us" about tolerance, comity, and social and political unity. Again, these concepts are hard to find fault with in the abstract.
But I fear that he will proceed by merely "looking at" the problems at hand, and, like Groucho, is unable or unwilling to "smell" them.
For all of the lofty, high-minded talk of Obama's radical, even revolutionary approach to politics, I expect that he will employ a rationalization already well expressed and implemented by the Clinton administration in support of its policy to abandon pursuit of any Justice Department and regulatory agency pursuit of crimes and civil wrongdoing arising from both the Iran-Contra and Savings & Loan scandals.
The rationalization has been expressed elsewhere, including by Bill Clinton in interviews, so I need not restate it here. It turns the questions of social justice and moral integrity under discussion on their heads, and simply "disappears" them by smothering them in the Happy Horseshit of "pragmatic" considerations, with the above-cited virtues obscuring the dark cynicism and depravity like a thousand birthday candles on a cake iced with poison.
· Yr Obd't Servant
Thank you. With Bill Mahr and Jon Stewart on vacation, I haven't been able to laugh as readily about current events, and I just concluded an exhausting phone call with one of my brothers arguing about the Rick Warren thing. So, the Marx Bros. dialog was just exactly what I needed to read, and the timing was exquisite. I'm going to take that one away with me now and go alter my consciousness.
Peace to you.
Correct. Forgiveness is complicity.
"Forgiveness is complicity," as is inaction. If we want to claim the rights of citizenship, we must execute the responsibilities of citizenship. As with others in this thread, I have flailed around trying to ascertain what action to take, as I am no expert in the law or the Constitution. I'm probably most qualified to drive the bus that takes them to court! So, we need some lawyers (gasp!) to help funnel our ire into a course of action. Can anyone reading this thread point to any organizations that might stand a real chance of pushing this process forward? The ACLU, perhaps? I'll volunteer time to do whatever I can, including driving the bus!
Sioux Rose
Two thoughts enter my mind in response to this article. First, I wonder what inmates on death row (or those housed in maximum security prisons for homicide) make of this: that it's not THE act, but the SCALE of it that qualifies either as political heroism or cause for punitive measures, like execution.
My second impression involves the very different intellectual atmosphere of the 70's, in no small measure because media was not concentrated in the corporate hands of those that would benefit from a narrowed message, the manufacture of consent added to the purposeful cordonning off of those measures now deemed radical, all those very necessary excluded alternatives.
Sioux Rose:both points are interesting and original. I know that many men in prison are very aware of the double,triple,etc. standards in the criminal "justice" system.
Mumia Abu Jamal writes/speaks commentaries and books from death row. I hear the commentaries on WBAI www.wbai.org, the Pacifica Network station in NYC on "Where We Live" on Thursday evening, 8pm Eastern Time, usually near the start of the hour show. Mumia Abu Jamal has never been removed from death row in Pennsylvania and there is an effort to get him executed. www.freemumia.com for information.
(I saw somewhere's else on CD that you'd had correspondence with prisoners in Angola Prison in Lousiana.) The Pacifica Radio Archives may have material about Angola. I remember someone who was based at WBAI did a documentary on it. www.pacificaradioarchives.org I am certain you will like the Pacifica Radio Archives' website.
The show "Where We Live" is produced by journalist, long time on WBAI, Sally O'Brien, and for a time, the show was cohosted by Rosa Clemente, yes, that Rosa Clemente (the recent V.P. candidate). WBAI has a long history of good, solid, work.
Sioux Rose
NYC ARTIST: As one who gave up television 2 years ago, I can count on you to keep me informed as to what's going on! Thanks for your reports from "the inside."
Sioux Rose:I was unclear. WBAI is Pacifica Radio Network's NYC radio station. www.pacifica.org www.wbai.org I gave up tv over a decade ago. Pacifica has an unbelievable audio archive going back about 60 years or slightly less, and some are transcripts. They were almost destroyed when Pacifica went through a takeover in 2000 but we, the listeners "won". So the archives were saved from the corporateers who wanted to destroy them. www.pacificaradioarchives.org The website is fun to browse.
Future American Governments are either going to prosecute these sadistic war crimes or they themselves will join the war criminals. Who wants to 'pledge allegiance' to genocidal monsters?
Bushites are oligarchy pointmen. How can we bring the ruling crass to justice?
Bring back the guillotine, then learn how to knit.
MS:funny. Not literally, I hope. And I don't mean knitting. Dickens I presume.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB263/index.htm
National Security Archive has posted Nixon Kissinger transcripts.
A call for Bush impeachment or post presidential accounting must stand - being reminded that this is not a one time deal but an ongoing struggle.
Two examples of token examples of justice in the past 8 years:
1. Walmart successfully sued for $640 million for employee abuse
2. Shoes thrown at bush.
That's it.
And that humble pretzel came so close.
Too bad the reporter who threw the shoes at Bu$h hadn't stepped in a nice big juicy doggy mess first!
It's funny that the article deals with the use of torture rather than the illegal invasion of a sovereign nation as the basis for criminal charges against the out going junta. Don't get me wrong, as torture is a heinous act that should never be practiced anywhere, but the invasion and subsequent death of a million Iraqi citizens would seem to trump any other issue.
If Obama is serious about ushering in a new era of transparency and accountability, then he should immediately sign on to the World Court in The Hague. This would send a terrifying message to all those corrupt corporations and their stooges in Washington that the U.S. will no longer support their illegal and immoral agendas. By handing over our criminal CEO's and politicians to an impartial court of justice, the whole world would be able to watch the proceedings while sending a clear message to everyone that the U.S. is not above the law.
Having said that... fat chance that will ever happen.
As Obama has aligned himself with right-wing warmongers, it (him signing onto the World Court in the Hague and holding the Bush administration war criminals accountable) will never happen. He, in fact, looks forward to more wars to "protect" Israel from imagined threats.
I wish Obama the best and have no ill will towards him at all, but I don't know why people are so starry-eyed about him. I guess that anyone would look good compared to Bush.
War of conquest and lying about the cause of war are American traditions. Torture is not and is specifically forbidden in the Constitution.
[Not a Constitutional scholar but...]
8th Amendment: forbids cruel and unusual punishment.
5th Amendment: Accused may not be compelled to testify against himself. (Confessions through torture)
Also the power bestowed upon the Senate by the Constitution to ratify treaties, Geneva is Law in the US.
Space Cadet, you are correct in the fact that starting the war against Iraq should top the list of war crimes committed by the Bu$h misadminisration. Per my understanding of the Geneva Conventions on war crimes, the most serious of all war crimes is the invasion of a soverign country that poses no threat to the invating nation. After all, if there is no war to begin with, there is no catyist for war crimes to bgin with. That most certainly applies to Iraq. Bu$h, Cheney, Powell, and Rice, to name a few, who insisted that Saddam Hussien refused to allow UN weapons inspectors into the country to look for weapons of mass destruction, which according to Scott Ritter and other inspectors was a blatent lie. They did in fact say that they had been allowed to perform inspections at will and found not evidence wharsoever of any kind of weapons of mass destruction and had in fact determined that Saddam had ceased producton of these weapons many years in the past. So...withuot evidence of these weapons, they did the next best thing, they lied. It was as a result of these lies tht millions of Iraqi civilians, 4000+ American troops (who just happened to be the sons and daughters of Amrican parents who are now grief stricken at the needless loss or maiming of their children) were killed, and thousands of innocent Iraqis (and Afgans) were rounded up by bounty hunters and send to hell holes such as Guantanamo Bay, Abu Garib, and secret CIA prisons to be tortured and imprisoned without charges for an indefinate period of time witout the benefit of legal counsel and with their families left wondering if they were dead or alive.
On the other hand, Bill Clinton had a little fling with Monica Lewinsky (make love not war), perjured himself when questioned about it (I mean cmon, we can't let a sinner continue to occupy the highest office in the land can we, but it's no big deal to kill millions...after they hzve been born of course, is it?) and was impeached for getting a hummer whie on duty. Come on!!! Scooter Libby was convicted for outting an undercover CIA agent, which not only endangered national security, but could have resulted in her death, was sentenced to prison, and pronptly pardoned by the most powerful blithering idiot in the country, Bu$h himself. Now tell me folks, what is wrong with this picture?
Bu$h, Cheney, Powell, Rice, Wolfowitz, Tenet, Rumsfeld, Ashcroft, Gonzales, Yoo, Addington, and a whole slew of other super ccriminals deserve to be not only investigated, tried, and upon convition recieve the maximum sentence allowed by law, and I mean the maximum allowed by law in THIS country, which happens to be capital punishment. Anything less would be a gross miscarriage of justice in the worst possible way!!!
Space cadet, I appreciate your point that the illegal Iraq invasion caused more deaths than torture. From the point of view of an ICC prosecutor however it would seem to be easier to obtain a guilty verdict for abrogating the Geneva accords and subsequent torture. One problem with Iraq is the UN authorized the occupation after the invasion, even though the invasion contravened the UN Charter!
Bush has been guilty of so many high crimes and misdemeanors that he makes the Nixon B&E job look like an amateur indiscretion.
Sioux Rose
SPACE CADET: Excellent point to which I totally agree. It's easier to get those "small apples" like Cheney, than to take on the entire military-industrial complex. As Nick Turse recently pointed out in an article published on CD, just about every basic U.S. industry profits by supplying the military or its 700 plus bases in products as banal as shampoo. Then, too, to deconstruct the basis for this pre-emptive war (which the Geneva Conventions cite as THE crime against humanity), might in turn force a reckoning of others, equally illegally engineered. Add to this, the fact that a huge segment of the entertainment media revolves around the plot-line, a form of soft propaganda, of American heros ever on their conquests to bring liberty and justice to all... Superman each in his flight (or other) suit. The many myths that have led to this all-out invasion and its sickening number of senselessly-rendered dead will take much to shatter. In fact, I would liken this process to a cultural lobotomy.
Except that lobotomies render the subject docile and manageable, which, on the surface, seems apparant. However, Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning ON KILLING: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society, points out that violent media products are an eerie match to tools used by the military to condition soldiers to become more effective killers. So, I think it's less of a metaphorical lobotomy and more literally a technique to desensitize us, which renders us docile and manageable. Either way, it enables killing.
FastEddie75:I once was in a meeting at a conference center. The caretaker's daughter came into the room. This was in the late 1960s, in the midwest. The young woman had been given a prefrontal lobotomy. Her parents were told it would help with her depression. When I saw her, she was like no one I'd ever seen/heard. She had no facial expressions and spoke haltingly. I am not sure how aware she was. Her parents had deep regret at agreeing to it. The operation is a crime, in my opinion. That's such a crucial part of the brain for thinking. I never made a joke about it after seeing/hearing that young woman.
On armies making people want to kill:Doris Lessing has an essay about the US military was upset during WWII that there was a solid 25% of soldiers who would not fire a gun at anyone to kill. All kinds of psychological thought went into how to get people over the natural urge NOT to kill, so the military could produce killers. It's in a book of her essays. Sorry that I can't give the title, but I read it in the 1980s.
I hope my comment back to Sioux Rose was not construed as a joke. Prefrontal lobotomies were an abhorent and costly mistake in the history of medicine (I'm not aware they are even performed anymore--I think not). Some were well-intended if ill-advised "treatments," as in the case of the caretaker's daughter. Other applications, and this is even worse, were to make institutionalized, mentally ill patients "manageable," as I said ("One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" was based on Ken Kesey's experience working in a "mental hospital," as they used to call them). Sioux Rose offered the lobotomy as a metaphor for social complacency in the face of obvious crimes. My response was intended to redirect from the metaphor to the ACTUALITY of military methods required to decondition soldiers from their natural abhorence of killing, and to point out that violence in media replicates those military methods in society at large. The result is that any and all of us who have "consumed" violent entertainment media, from movies like THE MATRIX to "first-person shooter" video games, have become to some extent desensitized, just like a soldier being desensitized to kill. So Sioux Rose doesn't NEED the lobotomy metaphor given the actual effects of ubiquitous violence in the media. If something about that response triggered a nerve in you suggesting I was making a joke of lobotomies, I retract it and apologize. It sincerely was not my intent. I also understand that your statement, "I never made a joke..." taken literally does not imply that you thought I was making a joke (meaning I jumped to the implication all by myself, and I can even more sheepishly retract my retraction).
Thanks for the Doris Lessing reference. From your summary, Dave Grossman's book seems to be an expansion of the theme in her essay. He opens with a historical survey of evidence indicating just how strong is the natural inclination to avoid killing another human. From the dawn of gunpowder-based weapons, soldiers have profoundly resisted their use, which is a serious problem for military commanders (though it should be some comfort to us). Grossman then details how the military responded to the statistics from WWII and earlier wars by developing new methods of training using modern psychology to break down this innate resistance. The military is still refining these methods with the help of psychologists--it's an ongoing psychological project (along with "psy-ops," which develops methods for torture, shock, and awe). And they are working; the statistics on the lethal deployment of weapons are increasing. Finally, Grossman makes the comparison between military training methods and violence in the media.
Unfortunately for soldiers from the Vietnam era on, the ones trained under these methods and who are more "reflexive" soldiers than those in the past, they are not protected from or "conditioned" to handle the longer term consequences of their reflexive actions. With the horrifying transition to "urban warfare," as represented in today in Iraq, imagine what happens to the mind of a young soldier who, through thoroughly conditioned reflexive action, kicks in a door and deploys his weapon, only to discover he has reflexively killed an innocent family. What does he do with the instant certainty that his training has caused him to commit an atrocity? Is it any wonder that post-combat PTSD and depression have increased with every war since Vietnam? (I ran this by a psychiatrist I know, a man who as a young doctor served on the ground as a medic in the thick of Vietnam and who now works with veterans, fighting for their treatment benefits, and he concurred--the damages in our soldiers are worse than ever; their neglect even more repulsive.)
However, to end on a more positive point, the the data show that humans do not want to kill each other, which pretty well refutes Hedges "Man is a Cruel Animal" thesis.
Sioux Rose
FAST EDDIE: Your come back was legit. Thanks for sharing your profound insights on this subject.