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Tortured Logic: In The Government’s Own Words
The torture memos produced by the OLC were never meant to be seen and parsed by the public.
These memos used incredibly tortured logic to justify acts which, in prior wars, the United States prosecuted as war crimes.
The ACLU has put together a video of these words of tortured logic being read aloud. Watch it.
The words you are hearing were written by and for the US government. As guidance for governmental agencies acting in all of our names.
The ACLU is asking that you send these words to Attorney General Eric Holder. Ask for accountability on torture. You can do so here.
These OLC memos, along with a wholesale disregard for the rule of law, have led the US to what Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly recently said in a memorandum opinion in the Al Mutairi case (full opinion here in PDF format):
Taking this evidence as a whole, the Government has at best shown that some of Al Mutairi's conduct is consistent with persons who may have become a part of al Wafa or al Qaida, but there is nothing in the record beyond speculation that Al Mutairi did, in fact, train or otherwise become a part of one or more of those organizations, where he would have done so, and with which organization. While Al Mutairi's described peregrinations within Afghanistan lack credibility, the Government has not filled in these blanks nor supplanted Al Mutairi's version of his travels and activities with sufficiently credible and reliable evidence to meet its burden by a preponderance of the evidence. Accordingly, the Court shall grant Al Mutairi's petition for habeas corpus.
The flimsy, insufficient evidence question has come up time and time again in detainee habeas cases, where the government has only tangential-at-best information about someone we have held for years.
Honestly, Al Mutairi doesn't exactly sound like a completely innocent "babe in the woods." Especially when you see how many problems Judge Kollar-Kotelly has with his version of events. He has that feel that I used to get from every skeezy defendant who wouldn't have known the truth if it hit him in the ass. But just because someone was skeezy doesn't make them guilty of every crime.
You are supposed to prosecute in the name of justice, not just because you can.
As the judge says pointedly, it is not up to Al Mutairi to prove his innocence. It is up to the government -- as it is in all such cases -- to demonstrate by a preponderance of the evidence the defendant's actions point to, in this case, an association with al Wafa or al Qaeda.
There must be a connection sustained by evidence to justify prosecution.
What is baffling? Al Mutairi was apprehended by the Pakistanis and turned over to US custody on or around November 21, 2001. He filed his habeas petition on May 1, 2002, making his the oldest habeas petition for any US detainee.
During these many years of detention, and all the subsequent hearings, proceedings, filings, defense evidentiary challenges, and up to and including demands directly from Judge Kollar-Kotelly -- no newbie to intel proceedings, having just finished a term as the head of the FISA Court -- for particulars on evidentiary issues of questionable detail and firmness? That evidence still isn't there.
That evidence, after all these many years, has neither been firmed up nor been corroborated by additional intelligence gathering or other investigative means. We have bupkis.
Who are we and what have we done with competence and a commitment to justice?
ACLUblog quotes a human rights lawyer who gets this exactly right:
[P]rinciples don't really matter much in times of peace. It's easy to maintain your ideology when everything is stable and life is good; it's during times of conflict that holding fast to your values really matters. It is conflict that truly tests your beliefs.
We have failed -- and continue to fail -- that test. And we will continue to do so unless and until we hold those at the top levels of government responsible for the actions taken at their direction.
- Posted in
23 Comments so far
Show AllWhat the hell is/are 'bupkis"?
Yiddish slang for "nothing."
It means "beans", literally. The Jews use it to mean nothing or even less than nothing. Obama is bupkis. He's a paskudnyak. Look that one up. Okay, I'll save you the effort; it means a MoFo.
Literally, "goat turds".
Torture AND killing.
"The Senate report's disclosure of a hit list for drug traffickers may lead to criticism in the United States over the expansion of the military's mission, and NATO allies have already raised questions about the strategy of killing individuals who are not traditional military targets."
This paragraph from the 8/10/09 New York Times is further illustration that any American who even faintly supports our war in Afghanistan has a brain full of mush.
If we are going to tackle drugs in Mexico, Colombia and Afghanistan (but never in the United States through better education), why not go for penguins in Antarctica? I've heard they're getting high.
Let's follow this train of thought in Afghanistan, which badly needs an improved space program, new malls to replace the ten-mile-long bazaars, an infusion of MacArthur fellowships, more town meetings in which the Republicans can vent their hate, high fluorescent lights for Friday night football games, regular talk shows and Big Lots stores, windmills and heavy water research, an Environmental Protection Agency and national health plan, not to mention an annual Miss Afghanistan contest and national shooting galleries and bomb-launching emporia with real Afghans for targets.
These problems mostly have to do with a lack of roots. Americans have come to believe that if you can't be found guilty, as in a court of law, then what you are doing is not only okay, but right. Scoundrels find it easy to be elected in a country where the leaders of major corporations agree with the above mentioned belief, and where election outcomes are determined by the amount of money spent on television advertising. The rule of law has been twisted. Law has two aspects: the letter of the law and the spirit of the law. In modern America, loopholes in laws are exploited to obviate the spirit of the law, and the people believe that is acceptable because it is 'legal'. Americans have always had a strong tendency for fear, fanaticism and violence. This tendency has been seriously exploited by corporate use of television programming and advertising. As the major corporations control more and more of our media, this exploitation has increased. People are unable to see through the hoopla, buzz words and hysteria partly because they are so inundated with these by television, and partly because their education system has so systematically failed to teach them to think. Money has poured in for technical training, for training low end students [special education teachers make much more money than regular teachers do], and has been drained from broad educational goals to support these programs. The result of these rather rational goals has been a diminution of education in favor of training. Training does not teach a student to truly think about humanity, life and the values of integrity and honor. Training bypasses all that. These values have been relegated to 'home life', where they are taught, not by parents, but by the family television set. The result is corporate control of what passes for thinking. The inability of the people to think clearly results in severe ignorance about the world we live in. That ignorance is fertile ground for hysteria, for fear, and for violence. In such circumstances, every one wants the one word, simple answer. The buzz word, the one liner from the talking heads, passes for 'thinking'. There are a number of ways out of this dilemma, but until we eliminate television, none of them will work. The chances of that, I fear, are somewhere between slim and none.
MichaelC
MichaelC --- great points. However, your conclusion, that we eliminate television, I find questionable. Television is a technological advancement in communications as are the internet, blackberries and iPhones. These are merely tools. The question is how these tools are being used. A hammer can be used to build a home or destroy one.
When the concept of a 'TV in every home' became a reality, there were many voices who recognized the immense educational opportunities implicit in such a development (i.e. Rod Serling's 'morality-play' "The Twilight Zone"). This has morphed into dumbed-down news info-tainment and a steady rise in mind-numbing advertising.
Meanwhile, oppressive, controlling political/corporate power has long realized that the best way to keep the masses 'in line' is through the age-old process known as 'divide-and-conquer'.
It is becoming obvious to me that the citizens of this country are being forced into a 'fight-or-flight' mode. Since 'fight' (revolution) seems increasingly remote for the reasons you mention and those above... how does Costa Rica look?
We don't torture. Logic has been subjected to enhanced interrogation techniques.
And water-boarding is now an enhanced irrigation technique.
It means eff all.
Truth and justice and the american way!The way is from the Constitution,Bill of Rights,international treaties thru the cesspool of dc politicians and their shitty minions and you come up with american justice.They tell us that we should "make" them do it but I say if your conscience is not sufficient talk will not do it for you.And this is only one pile of shit in this pool!Tony
Well, at least I signed the petition to the Attorney General Holder.
I wonder if anyone else did.
I wonder if any of the posters who think it is important to write opinions here and still avoid telling the powers that be about the truth of torture and other things, can explain how their great conscious against EVIL has excused them from responsibility as a citizen to speak truth to power.
Is it the least we can do on this forum?... I wonder.
Exhortations to bold speech aside, these are "merely" the galling public policies related to interrogation that the previous administration established to guide the ethos and opinions of Military Intelligence, OGA, et cetera.
There are far more disturbing reports of homicides that have occurred during detainment, and these reports are not confined to a single location such as Abu Ghraib.
These policies rely solely on the dubious distinction between pain and stress, and considering that stress itself can cause shock and heart failure, this distinction seems highly irrelevant to the spirit of the doctrine regarding "cruel and unusual" punishment. Perhaps we must amend the statement to include "treatment" so that it does not connote a merely punitive prohibition?
http://www.projectcensored.org/top-stories/articles/7-us-operatives-torture-detainees-to-death-in-afghanistan-and-iraq/
I believe the Geneva Conventions which used to govern War before the USA aborgated it states that prisoners are not to be mistreated.
I telephonically told both my senators staff that the senators were both ignorant and cruel for rubber stamping the Gaza holocaust.
I have written,signed petitions,marched and nothing changed.My conscience is clear in that i do for others what I can and harm none to the best of my ability.The fact that they know what is right from wrong and still do wrong tells me that they have no conscience and stand by what I said above.Tony
Good question. Lots of opinions here; How many are from ACLU members? At least one, anyway.
Freedom can't defend itself, folks.
davedubya.com
I propose an online referendum on prosecuting all torturers.
Is the USA at War with Pakistan?
As things are now USA initiated war will never end.
Our government is fully aware of Right wing Christian community watch vigilante gangstalking torture on American citizens, and they do nothing.
What more can say.
This is Attorney General Eric Holder's call to make - not Barack Obama's.
Federal felony statutes criminalizing torture and criminalizing warrantless electronic evesdropping by American spies on American soil were clearly violated. It is exclusively the responsibility of the Department of Justice to investigate and prosecute these crimes, especially the top decisionmakers and lawyer enablers of the Bush/Cheney White House who conspired behind their security clearances to facilitate commission of these crimes.
Want to restore respect for the rule of law?
Take the case against Dick Cheney, Alberto Gonzales, Donald Rumsfeld, John Yoo, Doug Feith, George Tenet and others to a federal grand jury. Grant immunity as needed to the lower echelon torturers, in exchange for truthful testimony about why they were led to believe that torture - euphemistically rebranded as "enhanced interrogation techniques" - was officially authorized US government policy from above. Then, give the top echelon policy makers and the lawyer enablers their day in court - win, lose or draw.
That's how the American criminal justice system is supposed to operate. I can't wait to hear defendants Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Tenet claim they did what they did in reasonable, good faith belief it was legal, because Gonzales, Yoo, and Feith assured them it was legal. A jury will detect the sweet smell of horseshit wafting up from that defense from a hundred yards away.
All Eric Holder has to do is take a deep breath, pull the trigger, and do his job.
The vast majority of the American public will support a candid, straightforward decision to hold accountable those who conspired and contrived to make torture of detainees and warrantless electronic surveillance of ordinary Americans official US government policy on George Bush's watch.
It's time to call Dick Cheney's bluff.
Bill from Saginaw
Unless the Bush Crime Family stands trial in an independent court I'll never trust the American government again.
Neither will the rest of the world, 'humbaba'.
And they are strong enough and motivated to do something about it.
Good Luck America.