If private contractors were hired to fly victims of “extraordinary rendition” out of the country, to places like Syria– yes, indeed– so they could be tortured– under what legal mechanism have they succeeded in not being arrested and charged with kidnapping?
They were. Some of them were enthusiastic. Some of them were reluctant. Almost all of them complied. They trusted that a lying, scheming amoral government would cover their asses. And pay them well. And they did.
We’ve seen a glimpse of “legal mechanism”. The Federal Government has intervened in court cases begging the judges to refuse to hear the cases because it would “endanger national security”. Most judges– so far– to their everlasting disgrace– have complied. If I was a U.S. citizen I’d be organizing some kind of campaign to have those judges impeached.
I cannot express, in words, my contempt for the judge who accepted that rationale and informed the victim and the victim’s family: all of the most sacred rights you are entitled to as a human being can be disposed of in an instant because Dick Cheney wet his pants at the thought of the Moslem hoards rolling down the streets of Palos Park, Illinois.
Everything that people have fought for for a thousand years, from the Magna Carta to the Bill of Rights and the Constitution and the Civil Rights Act of 1965–everything–is tossed out the window with that simple phrase. National Security.
And all the lying scumbags in the Republican Party with their obscene little flag pins in their lapels and their tearful demonstrations of patriotism and loyalty should be impeached. And the complicit scumbags in the Democratic Party who tsk-tsked the left wing about having to be responsible and after all we can’t be seen as “soft” on terror…. impeach them all.
They won’t be impeached. They will be re-elected to office by a people who do not deserve democracy.
There is no “war” on terror.
There was no crisis. There was no emergency.
There was a dramatic attack and many casualties, but there was absolutely nothing in 9/11 to justify the hysterical, overwrought panic that turned weasels like Dick Cheney into whimpering simpering bed-wedding weasels like Dick Cheney.