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Torture Eats Away at the Soul of This Nation
Anniversaries can be important. This Friday marks the 22nd anniversary of the U.N. Convention against Torture, ratified and signed under President Reagan. Last Friday marked the 150th day of the presidency of Barack Obama, who is trying to put a definitive end to the torture approved by the Bush-Cheney administration.
That Obama has not been able to do so is our collective shame. Worse still, the president has apparently concluded that he lacks the support to deter future abominations of this sort by launching a proper investigation and holding to account those responsible.
Something evil has seeped into the soul of our nation. Those many years when we looked the other way, choosing to ignore the abuse of detainees in U.S. custody, eroded our morality.
Americans who claim to believe in human dignity and the law do not seem scandalized by this inhumane and illegal activity. Many people of faith appear willing to tolerate unspeakable cruelty. Christians who follow one who himself was tortured by the powers of his time evidently are now ready to justify our own government's use of torture.
It is reminiscent of Germany in the 1930s, when - with very few exceptions - neither Catholic nor Lutheran pastors found their voice. A more recent example: in April 2008 when the pope visited the U.S., the involvement of our most senior government leaders in approving torture dominated the headlines. He ignored the issue entirely.
Surely the deafening silence of the institutional church - again, with a few exceptions - accounts in part for the recent Pew survey showing that a majority of Americans who go to church regularly believe torture can be justified.
As faith leaders, we find this shocking and shameful. There is no counterweight to the demagoguery and politics of fear that hold sway, none to speak to the morality of the issue. None but us.
If you think the torture has stopped, you are wrong. Because of the sad state of our corporate media, it takes extra effort to find out what's actually going on.
Check out, for example, international human rights attorney Scott Horton's June 15 piece in Harpers. Horton describes as "residue of the Bush-era torture system" a "force-feeding" program of the kind formally banned by the World Medical Association in 1991. Guantánamo prisoner Abdullah Saleh al-Hanashi, one of the "force-fed" inmates, was pronounced dead June 1; an "apparent suicide," according to the camp commander.
It will be interesting to see whether Obama administration officials will react in the callous way their predecessors did to the June 10, 2006, suicides of three Guantánamo prisoners. Then-prison commander Rear Adm. Harry Harris described the suicides as "an act of asymmetric warfare committed against us." Colleen Graffy, a deputy assistant secretary of state, called the suicides "a good PR move."
President Obama has apparently decided he has stuck his political neck out as far as he can. Against very strong opposition, he did release the "torture memos" - the most shameful prose ever printed under Department of Justice letterhead - but has been reluctant to move beyond that.
Perhaps he hoped that we would read those memos, be appropriately outraged and create countervailing pressure to help him face down the torture aficionados still in his entourage.
Conference on torture (for those in the Bay or Palo Alto areas)
"Torture is a Moral Issue" panel and conference will be conducted Friday and Saturday in Palo Alto. Programs are 7:30 p.m. Friday at First Presbyterian Church and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday at First United Methodist Church. For more information, see www.councilofchurches-scc.org/notorture or call 408-297-2660.
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25 Comments so far
Show Allhttp://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/
Obama is Bush with a higher IQ and an innate ability at public speaking. This alone makes him more dangerous than his predecessor and with the MSM treating him as the Messiah, we are in big trouble folks...BIG trouble.
To not seek justice for the past admins criminality is a travesty beyond comprehension. And, re-investigating 9/11 is a necessity, not an option.
Torture is just one element in a complex of US evil.
How is Obama 'trying to put a definitive end to the torture approved by the Bush-Cheney administration.'?
He (and the Congress) are not investigating the abuses, he's not ordering the CIA to stop these practices, he's escalating the war in Afghanistan, which is exactly the type of conflict that encourages these practices.
Until the US stops being an empire with military bases all over the world, and stops supporting regimes like Saudi Arabia's, Egypt, Kazakstan, etc. etc. these terrible practices will continue and anything Obama says is just more lip service.
Sioux Rose
GK: Right on! Another set of intelligent writers who mistake Obama's rhetoric for actual policy decisions. It makes Obama look good to SEEM to oppose torture, or SEEM to want health care reform, or SEEM to want to rope in the nation's banking speculators. In every instance (and there are so many more), he just goes along with the worst offenders like water seeking its own level. Either there is no fight IN the man, principles were sold out long ago, or he is OK with being the front man for a number of acts and agendas that would be tantamount to treason were the offenders NOT the ones with ultimate control over our government. A lot of intelligent thinkers have been deluded, and I think it's mostly the drug of hope. They see what they HOPE to see emerge in this president, all against the very vocal odds of far too many sell-outs 150 days into his reign to suggest the work of mere coincidence. How 'bout that McChrystal, now there's a guy you want on the front lines of your "peace" initiatives. Or Summers, efficient when there's no bank left to rob, that is, rob the citizens to fill the coffers thereof.
Our elected president is just another war criminal.
It's time for all good men to abandon this nation of cruelty, averice and lies.
I though Mr. Obama was supposed to be an intelligent person with a great grasp of history. Hasn't he ever heard of "Afghanistan, the graveyard of Empires" . Maybe he is hoping to be the first to ever fully conquer it so he'll go down in history as "Obama the Great". I feel real bad for our troops having to go into a hellhole like that.
"Ray McGovern, a former Army intelligence officer and CIA analyst..."
When we were being brainwashed in the US after WWII; being told that the Nazis committed war crimes and horrific atrocities - my father, a career-Army officer serving in the ETO and my mother, who lived under Nazi occupation and later served as an English-language translator and teacher - drilled into our heads that such BS was NOTHING BUT PROPAGANDA and that the 'Allies' also committed heinous war crimes, including torture, mass-murder of civilians, and the wanton slaughter of unarmed (disarmed) POWs that had surrendered. We were told, in no uncertain terms, and in horrifically intimate detail, exactly what American and other Allied forces did to their captives, despite the popular German belief that they would receive better treatment from the Western Allies than from the Russians hell-bent on revenge (which indeed was true, overall).
We were told, by the witnesses we trusted most - our own parents - that all wars are evil: that there is no such thing as a 'good war' and that there are good and bad people in every society; that neither ordinary civilians nor ordinary soldiers start wars; that horrific crimes are inevitably committed by all parties in wars; and that the Victors always write the history, blaming the losers and charging them for war-crimes and atrocities while absolving themselves. When I asked my mother about the Germans billeted in her own home and city, she told me they were polite, decent, and treated her well - and that she had met American soldiers who were disgusting 'pigs' as well as the same polite and decent 'kids' of which most conscripted armies are composed.
So my question is this: what did Ray McGovern have to say about war crimes and atrocities - including torture - committed by the American military, CIA, and other branches of the US government BEFORE Bush's open advocation of such heinous policies? I've always sort of admired him for speaking out - as if he just learned about his own share of guilt during his career - but now he's starting to sound an awful lot like a hypocrite. Where was he during WWII? Korea, during the '50s? Cuba? Southeast Asia (where my father drew the line) in the '60s and '70s? Latin America, especially during the '80s? How about the Middle East BEFORE the Bush-Clinton-Bush-Obama years of blatant atrocities and war crimes?
This is a case of the pot calling the kettle black - one hypocrite accusing another. At least my father walked away. What is McGovern's excuse? (I've heard lots of them from others who didn't want to lose their pensions... or their self-styled status-symbol-career) Sounds like just more of the same BS I heard as a child - liars and criminals crying foul, whenever it suits them, as if that will erase their own guilt and responsiblity. I can't help but wonder what McGovern did on the day he actually realized that what he had believed about 'America' was all a lie - what he did when he first realized that the US was the biggest sponsor of terrorism in the world, and had finessed its sophisticated forms of torture and terrorism by employing the best 'experts' - including top psychologists - to enhance all it had learned throughout its own history, as well as from its former enemies...
As for Diana Gibson... nobody is that naieve. Religion - a form of authoritarian government if ever there was one - has always embraced torture, murder, and other egregious moral travesties to subjugate populations. Any 'good' coming from a few decent people (blinded by personal bias) was 'collateral' at best... societies might embrace mythology and humans might need a fantasy life, but organized religion is the worst possible way to satisify those needs.
armybrat...interesting comment there. Religion is many things. It can be anything the one holding the religious beliefs wants. Religion can be a source of injustice. It can also be the root of justice and morality. I think your comment threw the baby out with the bathwater.
The fight to close the SOA (US School for terrorists) was founded by, and still continues under the leadership of a deeply religious person, Father Bourgeois - just one small example.
This is exactly what I said - it is organized religion that is the problem, not a few dedicated individuals that channel their disgust with injustice through a lens of 'religion' - they could just as well do that without being affiliated with any religious denomination, and indeed, most of these people do not have the support of their 'religious' leaders. This was often the case in Latin America, where Catholic priests and nuns challenged atrocities while their overlords sat on their hands or actually sided with the persecutors. Religion is NOT the root of justice and/or morality - these are innate human traits and do not need religon for expression.
armybrat, Thank you for making me feel less alone. Both my parents were German civilians, and they (my mother in particular) saw things happen that are never mentioned in the conventional history. With the aid of various websites and a contact in Germany, I'm discovering more and more about the secret history of the Germano-Anglic War of 1904-1948. The truth is seeping into the public consciousness, despite the vigorous defence of the mythology by its beneficiaries. For example:
James Bacque, Other Losses
Edward McCullough, How the First World War Began
I just received a jury summons. On the portion of the questionnaire where I was asked if there was a reason why I couldn't serve on a jury, please explain, I responded that I was opposed to the "War on Drugs" and also that, until we hold the previous administration accountable for its crimes, I have lost faith in the criminal justice system and would never vote to convict ANYone of ANY crimes.
A so-called "liberal" friend responded that I am way too radical.
I used this same strategy many years ago and they never called me. I would ask that friend to re-assess his/her values. Radicals believe in justice and true liberals do not?? Or is it that government "elites" are above the law?
Not radical enough! So long as the Bush cabal remains unhanged, no United Statesian need obey any law he can break and get away with the "crime."
"the president has apparently concluded that he lacks the support to deter future abominations of this sort by launching a proper investigation and holding to account those responsible."
This is not his decision to make; it is his duty under direction of the Constitution.
(Another Dreamer commented elsewhere that he suspects 0 studied this document only to figure how to get around it.)
"Torture Eats Away at the Soul of This Nation"
nations don't have souls.
souls don't have nations.
This country has a soul??!! Who knew?
Certainly not I, and you would have a hell of a time convincing me of such an absurdity.
Obysmal is Mr. Kurtz in "Heart of Darkness".
Torture is a daily occurrence for Warren Lilly. I have tried in vain to get any media coverage of this horrific treatment of a passive resister. http://www.thedailypage.com/isthmus/article.php?article=26173
I hoped it wouldn't be true, but . . .
President Obama is a Torturer.
His wife says she's proud of him. I wonder if his kids will be when they grow up.
Releasing a handful among thousands of documents looks more like managing publicity against the Republicans than trying to stop torture.
Claiming to ban it and acting like it's banned while it goes on -- hey, isn't that what the last bunch did?
Come on, McGovern, Gibson -- have at these people too!
When you talk about "soul," you don't mean the government, do you? We're going to have to get Dante to design another rung of Hell.
"All governments are evil. Not necessary evils, monstrous evils."
"Governments have not the strength or will or vigor of a single individual, for a single individual can bend them to THEIR will"
H.D. Thoreau
Bring America Back !!!!............Would Gibson and McGovern== esp McGovern please explain to me how Torture is eating away the soul of our Nation, while it's incipient
context=====Sept 11, 2001, fades away into the dust of
a hole at Ground Zero, NYC.
****These writers remind me of Greenwald--when he analyzes torture ad infinitum into an encyclopedia compendium.
****The Torture program was meant to produce Patsies==Fall Guys to take the guise of terrorism , to absorb the blame of the real truth of the 9/11 Attacks. That's exactly what it produced==waterboarded detainee Islamists all admitting to "masterminding the 9/11 attacks"==begging to be made proud martyrs & sent to Islam heaven with their 40 Virgins.
The Gitmo Kangaroo military commission courts gave the Neocons all the Patsies they could handle.
***Of course if Gibson believes a cave-dwelling boogieman and 19 airline pilot school flunkouts pulled off the technical genius that was 9/11==then she's right up there with the Prez==Obama and his present Drone crusades at
Tora Bora. That is the party line==the cover story, the phoney baloney.
**I really do have trouble with Ray McGovern's coverage, for I'm virtually certain he knows better than the al Qaeda fairy tales. What's that Org he belongs to--the Veteran Intelligence Pros for "SANITY" ????
When McGovern comes to his senses, he will explain to Gibson how the occupants of Bldg 7, World Trade Center, up to 9/11, ate away the soul of the Nation, created a War, and twisted the country into what we have today !!!! TRUTH.
PATSIES !!!!
Please support NYC CAN to help bring about a re-investigation of the false flag of 9/11...this is what's behind it all.....
And be careful..they'll ban you from CD for talking about 9/11 too much!