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Is Texas Harboring Torture Decider?
Editor’s Note: Prior to giving a series of talks in Texas later this week, the author offered the following op-ed to the Dallas Morning News and the Fort-Worth Star-Telegram. Both newspapers in George W. Bush’s home state turned it down.
Seldom does a crime scene have so clear a smoking gun. A two-page presidential memorandum of Feb. 7, 2002, leaves no room for uncertainty regarding the “decider” on torture. His broad-stroke signature made torture official policy.
This should come as no surprise. You see, the Feb. 7, 2002, memorandum has been posted on the Web since June 22, 2004, when then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales mistakenly released it, along with other White House memoranda.
The title seemed innocent enough – “Humane Treatment of al Qaeda and Taliban Detainees” – but in the body of the memo President George W. Bush authorized his senior aides to withhold Geneva Convention protections from suspected al-Qaeda and Taliban detainees.
Like Shakespeare, the media seem harshest on the lawyers, including Texans Gonzales and William J. Haynes II (Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s lawyer), who later outdid themselves trying to make torture legal.
What gets lost in the woodwork is this: Banal as their ex-post-facto “justification” for torture was, the lawyers were not the deciders.
After the decider-in-chief, the key decision makers were the eight addressees of the Feb. 7 memorandum: Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Colin Powell, Rumsfeld, Attorney General John Ashcroft, White House chief of staff Andrew Card, CIA Director George Tenet, National Security aide Condoleezza Rice, and Joint Chiefs Chairman Richard Myers.
During the Q & A after a recent Myers talk in Washington, I asked him what he did after he had read the President’s memo on ignoring Geneva. The tone of his non-answer was this: If the President wanted to dismiss Geneva, what was a mere Chairman of the Joint Chiefs to do?
In his memoir, Eyes on the Horizon, he tries to blame the lawyers: “By relying so heavily on just the lawyers, the President did not get the broader advice on these matters that he needed.”
Myers and the other seven addressees might these days be called derivative deciders — or, more simply, accomplices. There is not a shred of evidence that any of the Gang of Eight gave the slightest consideration to resigning, rather than carry out the President’s decision.
They elected to “just follow orders,” a defense dismissed out of hand at the post-WWII Nuremberg Tribunal on war crimes. Together with the lawyer-advisers, the derivative deciders provide abundant proof that the “banality of evil” did not die with Adolf Eichmann and other functionaries of the Third Reich.
But the buck stops — actually, in this case, it began — with President Bush. Senate Armed Services Committee leaders Carl Levin and John McCain on Dec. 11, 2008, released the executive summary of a report, approved by the full committee without dissent, concluding that Bush’s Feb. 7, 2002, memorandum “opened the door to considering aggressive techniques.”
Here is Conclusion Number One of the Senate committee report: “Following the President’s determination, techniques such as waterboarding, nudity, and stress positions…were authorized for use in interrogations of detainees in U.S. custody.”
It is essential that those responsible for torture be held to account. This is not about “policy differences.” It is about crimes. More important still, it’s about holding fast to our Constitution and enforcing accountability in the executive branch.
There was a time when we regularly looked to folks from Texas to defend the law. What would we have done, for example, without the late Barbara Jordan, African American jurist and member of the House Judiciary Committee, who spoke out with memorable eloquence in arguing that President Richard Nixon had to be held to account. He could not get away with placing himself over the law.
Jordan and most of her committee colleagues voted out articles of impeachment against Nixon, leaving him little choice but to resign or be impeached. Speaking to the House, Jordan described Nixon as a President “swollen with power and grown tyrannical.” She added:
“My faith in the Constitution is whole; it is complete; it is total. I am not going to sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminution, the subversion, the destruction of the Constitution.”
Barbara Jordan was a Texan through and through. She was also, above all, an American patriot. I suspect she may be rolling over in her grave at the prospect of a chief executive escaping accountability for approving torture.
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46 Comments so far
Show AllThat the 2 Texas newspapers rejected this demonstrates perfectly how the Fourth Estate has become a moral cesspool.
Moral cesspool indeed. One can only conclude that those two newspapers are attempting to protect Bush from that awful commodity called accountability. They may remember how Ray McGovern dared to question Rumsfeld in Atlanta and they could not have that happen to Bush. Ray McGovern does indeed speak truth to power while doing the job which the Dallas and Fort Worth papers have ignominiously refused to do.
The Dallas Morning News is on its last legs. They just doubled their subscription rates. We quit taking the DMN last year. The FWST is at least better.
It's time that more of us progressives and liberals actually had an open heart for Texas. There's plenty of room for progressive growth in that state as there is in states like NY and CA. Barbara Jordan had what pee brains like Nancy PeeLowSick lack, courage and conviction. People can blame Texas for everything all they want to but I have met friendly people and sweethearts in that state myself as I visited my relatives and friends from a few various locations of the state. If anyone wants to blame Texas, I dare them to tell me what the US reps and sens from CA and NY were doing in Washington while all this was going on. TX may have ended up releasing crooks like Dubya and his gang to Washington but Hitlery and PeelowSick are just as bad and what about Obama? Why isn't he using his powers to reverse the damage never mind that he's abusing it to stifle dissent ?!?
Thank you Jennifer for your responsible defense of my home state. I agree that a huge part of the state is truly bassackwards in their thinking,, but then, a large portion of the state consider themselves conservative "Christians." In most areas, the folks here are very friendly, in fact, that is what the state name means. Tejas is an indian word for friend. Additionally, Austin/Travis County, where the University of Texas is located, is both one of the most highly educated and liberal cities in the nation.
Again, I won't deny that the general population of the state is conservative. A large part of the state is also rural, and in these areas, change comes slowly. In fact, the part of the state I live in had another "Tea Party" over the July 4th weekend, but what they were protesting the most was the huge give away of taxpayer dollars to the mega-banks of Wall Street. We have such personalities such as Jim Hightower at present, and in the past have had people such as Barbara Jordan, Molly Ivans, Ann Richards, and of course from the music world Willie Nelson, who supported Dennis Kucinich both financially and through word of mouth. Even in conservative East Texas, where I currently live, about 1/4 of the voters in this area supported Obama, hoping for a change over Bu$h policies.
So come on folks, don't condemn the entire state because of a few bad apples (well, that may be an understatement). Califoria gave us Nixon and Raygun, and the conservative slugs in congress come from all over the U.S. We did provide LBJ, who although did escalate Viet Nam also passed huge legislation for civil rights, dealt with povery the best he could, and created Medicare.
Every state has its bad/ and or corrupt politicians, Texas maybe more than most, but that doesn't reflect on the people of this state in general, it reflacts on the power of the wealthy people in this state. Please don't blame the entire population. Oh, BTW...the Bu$h family are NOT from Texas. The moved here way back when from Connecticut so as to exploit the oil trade, which at the time they moved here was booming. Now they are mere parasites.
Cheers all!!!
I thought it was New York that gave us Nixon in 1968. I remember from uselectionatlas.org that Nixon's home state was CA in 1960 but NY in 1968.
Of the 4 locations I'd visit my relatives, Lubbock was my most frequent one when I was younger. The only place I visited ever since I moved to St Louis to work and live the city life was El Paso where one of my companies business customer client was at.
I don't hate any state but the way I see it, every state has its bright and dark sides and we all have to just put our feet down and admit it. :)
PS:
When the Bush family left CT, my guess is Joe Lieberman somehow took after him but was even worse given that he more than even Dubya pushed this bloody war in Iraq.
JenniferBedingfield
Let me join aussidawg in thanking you for taking the ignorant to task about our state. (We are sorry we let GWB out though) I am getting fairly sick of the predictable sterotyping by idiots here.
Thank you agin!
Henry8, don't worry about letting GWB out. Things were going to suck Gore or Dubya. I may be disgusted with what Dubya did but he sure knew how to exploit the weak and corrupt nature of our entire Congress just like Ronnie in the 80s. The Democrats even got a chance to win a majority in 2006 and look what they did for Dubya. Nader was right that there's not a dime's worth of difference between these two parties with notable exceptions of a few in both parties. And given Obama copying Dubya and even getting worse, I'd say that by the time Obama's done further screwing this nation and betraying the progressive/liberal base and smashing their values and ideas by 2013 or 2017, I wonder how many in IL will feel completely remorseful for allowing Obama to be a slick one. I'm already getting scared to watch Obama being like Dubya but more of a slick and smooth one and even more seductive in nature. At least with Dubya, we all knew what to expect. There's so much to love about TX and yes, it's like a whole other country in many more good ways than bad. Once Thomas More told us that the economy in TX has been growing and somewhat stable unlike CA and NY. CA is in such an economically dangerous and unstable status that I believe that like NY, the population will significantly decline in the coming years and decades. Isn't the population of Texas more spread out unlike NY and CA where most of the population is on the coasts?
Each state has it's share of historical infamy to live down. My state, California, has Nixon & Grandpa Caligula (Reagan). Texas has the Bush crime family.
California is also harboring one of Dubya's know accomplices...Nancy Pelosi
True, though they are really from up North. We are perfectly willing to send them out to ya'll in California, then you'd have a great collection!
Only by hanging the war criminals known as the Bush/Cheney administration, can the US rejoin the world of civilized nations.
Only after the last of the Bush/Cheney administration is dead will I ever consider voting for a Republican.
Don't do it, even then. The well of mediocrity and depravity from which the Republican party draws its candidates is as deep as the Mariannas Trench. They keep going down and down and down into the depths to select whatever monster glows most brightly and weirdly in the dark. Next stop, Glenn Beck or Michelle Bachmann.
I would not vote for a Rethuglican even then. I thought Goldwater was a whacko in 1964. It only got worse since then.
@ Uncle Ho July 8th, 2009 11:10 am
Only by banning capital punishment can the US JOIN the world of civilized nations.
This, and Derrick Jensen's piece, also appearing on CD today, are just EXCELLENT.
Until Bush & cabal are brought to justice (hanging at Nuremberg?), I see no reason for average Americans to obey ANY law they can break and get away with. Sauce for the goose.
Obama is just as much an accomplice and obstructionist as republicans on this now. His embrace of state secrecy, protecting Cheney's secret testimony, support of Bush's FISA, censorship of evidence of detainee abuse, and the entire "looking forward" charade is a clear record of the continuation of executive abuse of power.
There is one law of the land now.
If the president does it, that means it is not illegal.
A fundamental question is this: "what is there in the so-called 'torture report' that causes CIA director Panetta to postpone its publication over-and-over again"?
I do not know the answer. I have only a hunch.
I believe that the number of persons, victims and "boarders", that were involved in "water boarding" was small.
I further believe that a very much larger number of persons might have been involved in "enhanced interrogations" derived from the results of Dr. Cameron's experiments at McGill University in Canada. Was electroshock used at Guantanamo, Bagram, and Abu Ghraib?
I do not know whether these methods are "legally" torture. However, judging from the Senate's Select Committee on Intelligence hearings into MKultra and Kubark these methods seem to be borderline torture.
My hunch is that we will not see the "torture-report" during the current or potentially future Obama administrations because too many Democrats in Congress, perhaps including Senator Obama, knew what was done and remained silent.
The non-publication is a powerful deterrent. Potential victims may wonder: "is it that horrible"?
And what does President Obama mean when he states: "we do not torture"? He has never been asked: "Sir exactly what do you allow"?
Starting the process with the prosecution of the Bush administration members who participated in the approval of torture is only the beginning.
All of the crimes committed by all of the players should be addressed, and prosecutions should be allowed to run the needed course of due process.
In the same respect, the USA will remain the most dangerous rogue nation on the planet until every single member who participated in the illegal wars of aggression, answers for it. This of course should include the torture, the civilian casualties the destruction of the entire infrastructure of Iraq, and much of Afghanistan; and should include the military high command, and any other who 'followed orders'---most of them knowing full well after the first year that the 'wars of terror' were illegal.
Until this is answered America will remain the rogue nation that is is now. How much longer they remain such, if not answered by the Americans---- will be answered by the world.
Arrogance made the German and Japanese Governments believe they were 'untouchable'---and they may have been had they won. And that is the key phrase, 'had they won'. The US economy is in a 'hard spiral--downward', they are deeply involved in world debt with little or no productivity --outside of war productivity---to off set their daily growing debt. They are deeply involved in two illegal wars of aggression, and they cannot even take adequate care of the 'new vets' much less the 'old ones' or for that matter many of their other, needy citizens. Shortly now the unemployment benefits of millions will run out and they will shortly after that become homeless in many cases---and there seems to be little relief on the horizon-----and America brought all of this and so much more---upon its self.
Immediate trials would be a very good step toward change.
The world might even step in and help America.
Or, they simply can call in all of the debt, when that cannot be paid, they can 'cut off' the debt-----and the americans will very shortly after that---- devour themselves.
After that, Texas will 'go back to Mexican ownership'----and Mexico can use the 'extra cash'.
Good Luck America, you really need it.
Pipe dreams and fairy tales...
You seem to imply that you want not only the Bush Administration and pentagon leadership but also all the troops in the field to be charged. Unless of course i'm misunderstanding the line,
"This of course should include the torture, the civilian casualties the destruction of the entire infrastructure of Iraq, and much of Afghanistan; and should include the military high command, and any other who 'followed orders.'"
If the US is a rogue nation to the world like you imply then explain why we are invited to practically every international conference?
With regards to Texas falling back in to Mexico...How in the world would that happen?
Mexico's GDP is SMALLER than Texas's GSP!
Explain to me how a poorer territory will swallow a wealthier territory?
Put down the peyote.
"If the US is a rogue nation to the world like you imply then explain why we are invited to practically every international conference?"
I don't see the contradiction. Germany under the Nazis also got invited to lots of international discussions as do plenty of unsavory regimes today. I suppose somebody's gotta serve as a bad example.
Only fools would claim the US is a rouge nation. Stupidity squared.
People that know nothing about military matters really shouldn't comment on them. It simply displays an ignorance of reality.
Yes, you're absolutely correct. Only a fool would consider the possiblity of the U.S. being a "rouge" nation -- or even a pink one, for that matter.
definitely still red.
the blues were only an illusion.
Blood Red
Blood Red
@ NativeSon July 8th, 2009 1:27 pm
"and should include the military high command, and any other who 'followed orders'---most of them knowing full well after the first year that the 'wars of terror' were illegal."
Damn straight on the first part.
ALL OF THEM DOWN TO THE LOWEST PRIVATE.
As for the second - any intelligent person who has read the constitution knows these "wars" were illegal from day one.
The POTUS is only commander in chief when the armed forces are "in actual service" - ie after congress has declared war.
Congress has no authority to authorize "necessary military actions" other than to declare war. Any order into battle without such a declaration is illegal.
All service personnel are required to disobey illegal orders. All who don't are remiss in their sworn duty to uphold the rule of law.
There has never been any proof that the WTC crime went down as bush's say-so has it.
Bring America Back !!!!..........!..Not only Torture my dear Ray VIPS McGovern...............but more importantly 9/11!
**Team Bush knew their cave dwelling boogieman bin Laden would not hold the blame for long, so they needed Patsies--Islamists who would take the blame for 9/11 after the fairy tale of bin Laden wore out its rug. Torture, e.g. waterboarded Muslims at Gitmo gave the Puzzle Palace their Patsies===taking credit for masterminding, and begging for martyrdom to become heros and join their 40 virgins in heaven.
**Team Bush and his war criminals have taken the blame for Torture, but with this Torture distraction==guys like McGovern let them avoid, non focus on the mother of all attacks on US Soil---Sept 11, 2001 ! Hiding in Texas also!
**If you still think a cave dwelling dragon and 19 airline pilot school flunkouts pulled off the genius that was 9/11, then McGovern is not looking for Sanity at all !! Patsies, just like the Anthrax patsies !
The truth of 9/11 has yet to see sunshine. We will never forget that day, nor Building 7 and its occupants. There lies the smoking gun.
TruthKnoller
If I may say, do not be so quick to assume that Ray McGovern accepts the fairy tale that the Bush administration had put forth regarding the events of Sept. 11, 2001. In a blurb to the very well written "9/11 and American Empire: Intellectuals Speak Out Vol. 1" which is edited by David Ray Griffin and Peter Dale Scott, the perspicacious Ray McGovern notes that:
"It has long been clear that the Bush-Cheney administration cynically exploited the attacks of 9/11 to promote its imperial designs. But the present volume confronts us with compelling evidence for an even more disturbing conclusion: that the 9/11 attacks were themselves orchestrated by this administration precisely so they could be thus exploited." He ends his thoughts on these essays by saying:
"I give this book, which in no way can be dismissed as the ravings of 'paranoid conspiracy theorists', my highest possible recommendation."
This country needs more people like Ray McGovern who recognize that those inside the government would have stopped at nothing in order to achieve their diabolical and vile objectives.
odoco
Let's not forget that people were actually killed during some of the 'enhanced interrogation' sessions, in fact, a few dozen I believe. Could this be the smoking gun? Could there be direct connections between these murders and people further up the political food chain? Yes, I said murders: no due process, no legal rights, no lawyers, no witnesses. Notice that not one MSM outlet has ever reported that detainees were actually killed while undergoing these tortures.
Another question: how many registered psychologists, psychiatrists were present? How many hired mercenaries - and what company(ies) were they hired by?
This country is a cesspool. The leadership is the worst I've ever seen; the collective intellect of the populace is an embarrassment; the gap between rich and poor grows larger (by design) every day - AND THE MASSES STILL FALL FOR THE DOGMA!
Educate your children, your friens' children - IT IS THE ONLY WAY WE WILL SURVIVE THIS MESS. Raise the next generation to understand that if we allow those who would abandon and disregard human dignity for anyone, then everyone is at risk.
Yea Ray--don't you ever let up on this crime--keep up the good true reporting untill the message soaks in--it will and eventually we will get the rats. They will pay for their murder and torture or their disrespect for the lives of so many human beings. And you world readers out there--help this just cause so that we can once again have our nation back to the true America that once was--a long time ago. Thank you France for all you have done to make American Freedom a reality--please help us again. Everybody who cares about others--please help us now. And may JUSTICE prevail on Earth this year.
Unfortunately -- the way America is "structured" right now -- from political, economic, community, cultural and historical standpoint --
as far as having the war criminals stand real trial goes - there is virtually ZERO chance of that happening.
America as A WHOLE can not confront it. if that were so -- the population would ITSELF drop everything for that very purpose alone:
"to regain our credibility and moral right"..........
but americans are FAR TOO INURED to such corruptions. americans are ONLY TOO AWARE - behind the facade of "lack of information" .
something like this can NOT exist UNLESS an ENTIRE culture - -quietly - studiously "innocently" , CULTURALLY is PREDISPOSED to justifying such acts for the sake of keeping its perceived "identity" as a "great country".
so - imo - personally -- america - at least from this kind of behavior CAN NOT be extricated or "saved".
it is FAR TOO DEEPLY involved in this kind of culture of CRUELTY
which is OPENLY practiced through its OWN patriotic obsessions with "security" ...
whether it is on the community level, the state or federal level or in terms of what americans think is the "role of america" in the world.
america IS a Police Security War STate
and Americans SUPPORT IT - always have to one extent or another for their "safety" and to "preserve freedom" IRONICALLY ENOUGH - and for that reason -- such things , torture, war crimes, lies, etc...
were really flowering in an atmosphere TOLERATED by americans themselves, in fact, CReATED by americans themselves through their own cultural MYTHS.
it was really just a matter of time before american practices it OPENLY
it will also just be a matter of time before americans ALSO openly tolerate it..if for nothing else than to "be secure" so that one day
TORTURE, WAR CRIMES are NO LONGER UNacceptable -- but actually --
"THE AMERICAN WAY" and americans say to the world "SO WHAT?"
the old Roman Empire saying by its citizens and leaders went about its subjugated lands and peoples:
"LET THEM HATE US all they want..........so LONG as they FEAR US".
that is already what America has become.
Thank you for your post.
I found reading this very useful, but I don't agree with your statement that we cannot be saved.
We have constantly tested ourselves and found a reason to achieve the impossible.
I don't see America trying to save itself and I do agree that we are too involved in our own misery to want to help with this problem.
Well, destruction in the form of revolution has always been the catalyst that has awakened the masses, so I'll grab my pitchfork and you grab your drum and together we'll go down to the State Capital and start randomly attacking anyone that walks in or out of the beuilding until we get shot down.
If we survive and that's doubtful we can look forward to selling the rights to our story so that people can laugh and then watch American Idol.
Sounds like a winning plan for couch potatoes, Huh?
aussie,
although i agree with most of what you say, i'll take exception to part.
hopefully you've spent some time in austin and travis county, where the university of texas is located. if you have, then you know for a fact that austin is not one of the most educated cities in the country, where the university of texas is located. and if you have had the pleasure of driving on i-35 thru austin or on mopac along austin, one of the so-called most educated cities in the country, and where the university of texas is located, then you know that austin is not quite as educated as it fantasizes itself to be. so if austin is so educated, why then are there only two main arteries for traffic flow, one of them being a major interstate and a virtual gridlock for at least 12 hours each and every day? and why do both of these arteries run north-south? that one took some educatin'. why is the city's infrastructure -specifically traffic flow - light years behind its big city neighbor to the south? why does this so-called most highly educated city in the country repeatedly vote down, each time the issue is presented on ballot, any attempt at mass transit? why has city council repeatedly allowed development along the barton creek watershed, even after the citizens have repeatedly said no? why does city council continue to approve developments that allow the developer to raze the site(s) of all native vegetation, including century oaks, only to lay down and pour on and pile up the tons of asphalt and concrete in place of said vegetation? i could go on here, but let's just say that i've not bought the austin chamber of commerce horn-blowing sermon about austin being so self-righteously educated.
this is a long way off topic, and perhaps mcgovern should have provided the readers with a less inflammatory title.
and we'll save willie-more-myth-than-legend-nelson for another day.
I would assume from this post that you are not able to judge what education is or is not. Clearly you are the one fantasizing here. Nor do you seem able to understand that in Texas we don't do things without paying for them, which is why we have a surplus. How about your state??
I have been follwing this since I read about it on this website back in 2004.
The opinions of us "rabble" will not affect the Attorney General or his executive leader to change their position.
I want to do the right thing and demand that these criminals be held accountable.
I have, in fact, written dozens of times to my local Dallas/Fort Worth area newspapers asking for an accounting for these crimes.
I have never gotten published or a response by telephone or email.
I live in the Dallas area and I have to witness these offenses up close.
The public has a right to their opinion and so the opinion of the leaders seems to account for the hiding that the newspapers are engaged in.
Have you noticed how the issue doesn't get any attention in the Media except for private websites like this?
Witness if you will, the public outrage of Senator Patrick Leahy D-Vermont who lobbied for accountability from the new administration but changed his mind after asking the congress for their cooperation in investigating the role of the "Bush 8".
Look at the lack of coverage right now for the hearings in Spain for the role of the "Bush 8" and their role in involving America and it's allies in the War in Iraq.
The blame game doesn't seem to have any effect on these criminals because the attention of the news organizations is not focused on the problem. I consider them to be in collusion to these facts and I propose that we here at this private website engage in discussion about what "WE" will do instead.
The reference to the Nuremberg trial in Germany stated the fact that the trial was begun to prosecute the criminals of a deposed regime.
The circumstance that the prosecutors shared is also worthy of mention here because they felt like the verdict was only a matter of time given the evidence against the pro-war German government.
They all said that they felt they were supposed to bring closure to the sentiment of guilt and justice.
The prosecutor for the military tribunal said that the "Blame" was a reason for emotionally crazy people to seek revenge and that the duty for the court was to try and find a way to exonerate anyone that wasn't part of the plan and get them quietly out of the country.
I don't know of anybody like that in the Department of Justice but the cry has been spoken of by no less than former California Attorney General Vincent Bugliosi.
Whom, do you think might make a fair and impartial judge for this kind of hearing?
Who would you like to see as a prosecutor , or a defender?
I'd settle for a 12-person jury made of US citizens who can claim to not have a pre-made opinion of his guilt.
The latter lets me out.
"Barbara Jordan was a Texan through and through. She was also, above all, an American patriot. I suspect she may be rolling over in her grave at the prospect of a chief executive escaping accountability for approving torture."
Quite true. I imagine she is also turning over in her grave to see how low the Speaker of the House has become. She wouldn't allow Nancy Pelosi in the cloak room if she were alive.
This was a woman that would be worth 3/4 of the entire House of Representatives all by herself. We have to make dio with low hanging fruit these days.
I would assume from this post that you are not able to judge what education is or is not. Clearly you are the one fantasizing here. Nor do you seem able to understand that in Texas we don't do things without paying for them, which is why we have a surplus. How about your state??
We get everything in our state without paying for it. Duh.
The most ignorant and worst American president came from Texas. You probably have a surplus of that too.
hey, thomasmore/henry8 or whatever,
if you've been following this site for any length of time, you'd know what state i'm from. crawl back in your cave.
please accept my apology, thomas. the cave comment should have been directed to abe. and abe, since you want to continue a discussion on education, fantasized or realized, take a shot at the questions.
"After the decider-in-chief, the key decision makers were the eight addressees of the Feb. 7 memorandum: Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Colin Powell, Rumsfeld, Attorney General John Ashcroft, White House chief of staff Andrew Card, CIA Director George Tenet, National Security aide Condoleezza Rice, and Joint Chiefs Chairman Richard Myers."
God, what a bunch. Not since the Nazis---
Our constitution is in tatters and any sort of revolt, even a social revolution, would bring the military out against us in full force. You DO remember Kent State I trust?????
No, I was too young for anything but a backward glance glance through the newspaper stories of Kent State.
I did read the stories though, and like the French Revoution I studied the causes as well as the effects of the Kent State shootings.
I have also been following up on the many other peaceful protests in the USA that ocurred that summer and in the following years that resulted in bloodshed and deaths.
Where are the news stories relating to the protests in South Carolina or in Arizona?
Gone, buried under a ton of pro-war editorial opinion and a sickening feeling of telling our citizens that "Peaceful protest isn't a television event".
I read once that their was a civic duty described by Henry David Thoreau in his book "Civil Disobedience" to take a proactive approach to the "uncivillising effects of government", and "it's not too soon for honest men to rebel and revolutionize".
Where are all of the respectable and rebellious men. I think that like me they have tried to mute themselves and to use the tools of the educated man to lobby and petition for change from within the system.
I hope that it might not be too late to begin the assault from without, and set the example that our civillized method of reducing the arguments that are proposed by two opposing factions is to remove the danger and reduce the importance of the problem.
Until someone dies in an accidental shooting like at Kent State, and then it's a newspaper opinion that all of this suffering could have been avoided, after the fact.
These are the same kinds of events that great writers have always used to generate interest in the issues facing our country.
We're a little short of Mark Twain's and Molly Ivins' so we'll have to learn how to understand the appeals to a higher conscience without their guidance and bring our neighbors and friends into the struggle. That's what Mr. Clemens and Ms. Ivins would appreciate, being invited to the dance of the country "Waking up" and taking issue with the political machine, making changes that everyone wants to have happen.