Tag: George W. Bush

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Water-Boarding

Up is down and right is left and water-boarding is not torture.

And we have this from the White House:

Dana M. Perino, the White House press secretary, said Democrats were “playing politics” with the waterboarding issue, noting that Mr. Mukasey had not been briefed on classified interrogation methods. “I can’t imagine the Democrats would want to hold back his nomination just because he is a thoughtful, careful thinker who looks at all the facts before he makes a judgment,” Ms. Perino said.
– New York Times, October 31, 2007.

Ah! If only Mr. Mukasey were briefed on the facts, he would be able to render an intelligent opinion on the subject of torture. But until he gets that briefing, he’s not too sure. Did any Democrat think to ask him how he felt about truncheons or cattle prods? Would he have said, “well, I personally would find it unpleasant to zap a prisoner in the genitals with a cattle prod, but I can’t say whether it would actually be illegal or not until I have all the facts.” So once Mr. Cheney assures him that this bad guy has important information that can save American lives– by golly, give me that cattle prod, I’ll do the deed myself.

I refuse to waste even a single punctuation mark on the question of whether or not torture of any kind is morally wrong. I refuse to accept that we have entered an era– only 60 years after the defeat of the Nazis– in which such questions are seriously debated.

On the other hand, the depressing fact is that many Democrats– not most, and not all, but many– have voted in favor of legislative fig leaves to cover the potential liability of high ranking government officials should a future administration actually come to the shocking, devastating, astounding conclusion that torture should be illegal.

On the other hand, be it noted that the Department of Defense has issued an official directive (in the Army Field Manual) that instructs soldiers not to use water-boarding, and the CIA has apparently asked Bush for permission to not have to use it. Why? Did these officials suddenly acquire a smidgeon of decency and humanity? Or did they suddenly realize that a new administration may some day start investigating crimes committed by officials of a previous administration?

It must be acknowledged– hallelujah– that Republicans John McCain, Lindsay Graham, and John Warner, have publicly expressed the wish that Mr. Mukasey will, after confirmed, declare water-boarding illegal. If he does, there will be a lot of itchy hemorrhoids in the Bush Administration. But then, isn’t that what presidential pardons are all about? Just wait for it– that last month before leaving office– Rumsveld, Cheney, Bolten, Wolfowitz– everybody gets pardons for crimes they may or may not have committed.

And maybe this is why John McCain scored at the bottom of the straw poll taken by “Values Voters”, sponsored by Family Research Council. These “Christians” think that God is more concerned with gay marriage than torture. McCain was also high on campaign finance reform– something Jesus was distinctly against, don’t you know.

What happened to soldiers accused of water-boarding in Viet Nam?

In 1947, a Japanese Officer was convicted by a War Crimes tribunal of using water-boarding– torture– against a U.S. soldier.

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Amazingly, when threatened with physical torture, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed confessed to numerous crimes. Wow. That’s efficient and effective. Let’s use it all the time. We’ll get more truth that way.

Vice President Dick Cheney says that using water-boarding is a “no-brainer”. In his case, that’s exactly right.

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It was Always Really About the Oil

In a rather stunning disclosure, Alan Greenspan, former head of the federal reserve, admits that he urged Bush to depose Saddam Hussein for the simplest of all possible reasons: the oil.

Greenspan insists that nobody in the Bush administration agreed: they were only concerned about WMDs and democracy and human rights. But they also told him that nobody here talks about the oil. They knew that if there was the slightest suspicion of it, the other Arab countries, and the rest of the world, would go ballistic. It is quite possible that they never talked about the oil because they didn’t need to. Everyone understood it absolutely perfectly. Except George Bush who, to this day, seems to believe that it was about democracy and the safety of American citizens.

Keep in mind that America doesn’t have to actually hold deed to the oil to take possession of it. They merely have to ensure that whoever controls the oil is friendly to American dollars and technology, like Saudi Arabia.

In Greenspan’s eyes, it is right and good that the U.S. should take oil from where ever it can be found and use it to generate prosperity and a high standard of living for America and Americans. He is a former (?) disciple of Ayn Rand. America must be strong. It must do whatever serves its own interests. It can take the oil. If you’re too weak to take the oil away from America, then that’s just tough.

There is a pretty kind of logic to this spirit of individualism. It is very, very pretty. It is elegant and slim, because strategic decisions are unfettered by moral or ethical considerations, and should be guided strictly by questions of efficiency. How soon can we get rich? How many bodies do we step over to obtain our goals?

To believe in the myths of individualism and capitalism, you have to believe in “finders-keepers”, for there is no way to justify the possession of oil or air or water on any basis other than “might makes right”.

Or you can believe that we are all in this world together and nobody in particular has any kind of magical title to the world’s resources.

Or, like George Bush, you can believe your own spin: God commanded us to destroy Iraq because Saddam Hussein was a great sinner.

The disadvantage of Ayn Rand’s brand of individualism is that eventually someone stronger comes along and knocks you off the pony and takes it away. And you really have no moral grounds upon which to complain. You can only hope to make yourself strong enough so that you can take it back. And to make yourself strong is to make yourself cruel. The suicide bomber is Ayn Rand’s ultimate legacy: not strong enough to take the oil back, but fully comprehending that the world is really about raw power, individual fanatics are easily convinced that there is meaning in flailing against the machine. In George’s Bush’s gentle dreams– which are not Ayn Rand’s dreams– there can be no comprehension of individuals who give up the possibility of enjoying the fruits of raw power. The only explanation is the lamest one: they must be jealous of our affluence and prosperity and freedom.

Patriotism, in the case of Iraq, is an attempt to convince most people– who do believe we are in this together to a great extent– that the war on Iraq is a moral cause. It is a lie. It can’t be anything but a lie because the war on Iraq is about nothing more than “finder’s keepers”. We found your oil. Now it’s ours. Just try to take it from us.

Ayn Rand had nothing but contempt for religion.  Which is odd, because most of Evangelical America believes in Alan Greenspan.

 

The bizarre thing about Ayn Rand’s philosophy, and those backroom fascists who believe in it, is that even the most hard-core capitalist doesn’t practice it when it comes to neighborhoods and families and churches and schools. Everyone knows how long a family would last, or what a neighborhood would look like, or how children at school would behave, if we all actually practiced Ayn Rand’s version of enlightened self-interest. There would be no need to do chores, or clean up your garbage, or keep it quiet after 11:00 at night, or do your homework– if the world works better if I only do what is in my own self-interest.

She is consistent in one respect: there is no need of a god in her scheme of things either. We are quite enough.

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Bush-Libby

In 2001, George Bush Jr., following his Christian principles, and his instincts for justice and integrity and honor, appointed Reggie B. Walton to the Federal bench. No more molly-coddling criminals under my administration! Walton was known for his tough as nails approach to sentencing– the only way to stop crime in this country is to make sure that criminals pay the full penalty for their offences! By Golly, America wanted frontier justice and George Bush delivered!

When the U.S. sent Mayer Arar to Syria for some good, old-fashioned torture, and it was later revealed that it was all a mistake– no apologies! We are tough even on uncommitted crimes!

Until… until Dick Cheney’s good friend “Scooter” appeared before Reggie B. Walton and Reggie B. Walton did exactly what George Bush Jr. appointed him to do– deliver a tough sentence.

And then George W. Bush commuted his sentence (note: but he did not pardon him, which would have allowed Libby to continue practicing law).

Since then, Republican apologists have been performing the kind of verbal acrobatics that would make even George Orwell blush. Bush doesn’t want to undermine the judge, according to his White House Spokesflunky Tony Snow: “The point here is to do what is consistent with the dictates of justice”.

There you go. To do “what is consistent with the dictates of justice”. One of the fundamental principles of justice, of course, is equality under the law. So if a judge sentences Scooter Libby to two and a half years in jail and that turns out to be about average for obstruction of justice, then — then…. well, let’s not be coy here: nobody ever thought George Bush or his gang wanted the law to apply equally to themselves. Don’t forget that none of those raging militarists in the White House ever served in a wartime army either. Other people do that stuff. When they come back, we slash their veterans benefits. It’s the Republican way.

So when other people commit crime, the Republicans want the law to be merciless, uncompromising, and relentlessly destructive. But not, of course, for our crimes.

What Bush has done is absolutely the opposite of the “dictates of justice”: he has applied the law unequally. He has over-ruled a judge and jury. He has short-circuited due process. Don’t buy all the whining about a “conviction” being sufficient punishment– they don’t believe that about any other criminal– why should we think they really believe it about Libby?

But it doesn’t even matter if Bush agreed with the verdict or the sentence at all. It is completely irrelevant, if a country has a constitution and an independent judiciary. What Bush just did, from the point of view of any one who believes in constitutional government, was despicable.

He has done a favor for his friend. He has offered compassion and clemency to someone who did him a favor by taking the brunt of the Valerie Plame scandal and not implicating his superiors.

There are two ways Bush could have made things right. He could have advocated understanding and compassion for every single person who comes before Judge Walton.

Or he could have let Libby serve his full sentence, just like everyone else.

If you’re not outraged enough, consider this: as Bush was giving speeches about how “harsh” and “unfair” the Libby sentence was, he was simultaneously advancing new legislation that would make it even more difficult for judges to give more lenient sentences to any criminals, after taking into consideration special circumstances.

There’s a point at which it’s hard to even muster a fresh feeling of outrage at an administration this bad. This is raging hypocrisy. This is vindictiveness, spite, hatred, and stupidity, on a scale I could not have imagined 20 years ago, when even Nixon had more common sense than anyone in the Bush White House.

Why is there no scandal? Why is there no move to impeach Bush? Because most people believe what they see on TV?

Why not just pardon him? Now.

Yes, now– because Bush will indeed pardon Libby when he leaves office– no question about it. He’ll also pardon the rest of his friends after they are indicated, charged, and whatever. He’s got nothing to lose now– Bush is probably becoming dimly aware of the fact that his administration is going to go down in history as the worst ever.

I was surprised that Giuliani and Romney both endorsed the commutation. I think they may come to regret this. But then again, there is an important message here that they may wish to send out to their supporters and colleagues and campaign workers, and that message is: We will take care of you! If you have to do something of “borderline legality” on behalf of the campaign– don’t worry. We will take care of you.

[2022-05-07] As you probably know by now, I was wrong.  Bush, I think because he had become dimly aware of how Dick Cheney and others had mis-used him and led him down a garden path of quagmire and mediocrity, did not pardon Libby, to the consternation of Dick Cheney who fully expected Libby to be rewarded for taking the fall for his (Valerie Plame) scandal.

This is probably the most honorable thing George W. Bush did.  Then, to highlight the fact that it was honorable, Donald Trump came along and gave Libby the pardon he craved.  Bush never looked more honorable.

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William Wallace: Braveheart

The irrational affection with which the movie “Braveheart” is embraced by it’s fans deserves some consideration. (The film is rated #82 in the IMDB top 250.)

All right. I’ve considered it.

These fans are idiots.

How on earth could any sane person like this film? It’s completely, wildly, insanely inaccurate. It glorifies violent behavior that makes the hero of “Patton” look like Gandhi. It indulges in the most offensively masochistic scene of torture and dismemberment ever filmed. And to top it all off, it tries to convince you that it was all about “freedom”, as if William Wallace, had he won, would have imposed democracy and and freedom of conscience and a free press on Scotland. When he screams “freedom” at the British at the top of his lungs, he means, “freedom for you peons to work for me instead of them”.

But it’s a great shtick. Soldiers then and now buy it entirely, every time. “I’m fighting for freedom”. Not for Exxon or Boeing or the Bush family connections to Saudi Arabia– no, no, no: “Freedom”. Freedom. That heart-gushingly platitudinous everything and nothing that we feel every time they run our flag up a pole or sing the national anthem in a sports stadium in front of 15,723 advertisements.

It brings everyone together. We don’t all agree that George Bush Jr. should make sure the Saudi’s don’t lose control of their vast oil wealth, but we all agree on “freedom”. Freedom is everything. That is precisely because, as it used by our leaders, and William Wallace in “Braveheart”, it means nothing.

People should not make the mistake of believing that the inaccuracies imposed on the story by the author, Randall Wallace (a descendent, allegedly, of the hero) serve the purpose of improving the story. In fact, the story, what little we know of it, was better without the improvements. (Gibson dispensed with the famous bridge at Stirling and filmed the battle on a plain instead, because it was too difficult to recreate those stirring scenes of head-to-head confrontations that never happened. What happened was, Wallace’s army waited until a large chunk of the British army had crossed the narrow bridge, and then cut them off and slaughtered them, and then simply slaughtered each new group of soldiers as they rushed over the bridge to aid their comrades. Not as glorious, quite, is it?) The real purpose of the alterations are to convince you that what was, in fact, tawdry, violent, and complicated, was actually pure and noble, inspiring, and lovely. How many men died, leaving their families impoverished, starving, because of this romantic delusion that somehow their lives would be fantastically better if they were exploited and oppressed by their own upper classes, instead of the Barons and Lords of England?

Both sides killed and tortured and maimed. The leaders of the Scots would rouse their followers with great speeches, and then sell them out to cut side deals with King Edward, hoping to outflank competing Scottish interests and seize real power. To his credit, Wallace did not– from what little we know. But he was sold out instead by other Scots. His sin was the delusion he presented to his followers, that they could trust their own leaders. The lie in “Braveheart” is that there was something noble about Wallace’s delusion.

Wallace was, in truth– though you wouldn’t know it from the film– a member of the Scottish nobility.

You must watch this film and then join the army, and you will look at George W. Bush and Stephen Harper and wonder how any fool could fail to see that they have nothing in their minds and hearts except the immortal welfare of the souls of young American and Canadian men and woman who wish to die in glory in the service of Walmart and Boeing.

When the Americans withdraw from Iraq, as they inevitably shall, they will, perhaps, leave a little Arabic William Wallace behind, who will be sold out and captured and tortured, and will scream from his tiny little filthy cell somewhere, “freedom!”

How much of “Braveheart” is made up? Pretty well all of it. There is no real historical record of Wallace– just a wildly inventive 15th Century poem by “Henry the Minstrel”. Could it have been real? Yes, if you believe in fairies, and boogey men, and the international communist conspiracy to poison our drinking water with fluoride.

The point is, that the events in the film are not even likely, or, in many cases, possible. The Scots did not paint themselves blue or wear kilts (at least, not in this era, not remotely). The English did not exercise the droit de seigneur (first rights to deflower a new bride) anywhere in the British Isles, Robert the Bruce– of whom we do know plenty– was the real hero of the Scottish fight for independence, and so on and so on and so on. So it’s not the case that Gibson merely fudged a few facts to make a better story: he simply completely and ruthlessly ignored every possible fact about the entire historical era– because he doesn’t care about facts: he is promoting patriotism and religion.

And he does adore flagellation, blood-letting, and eviscerations.

Oh heck, just read THIS.

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Iraq: The Return on Investment

The United States is pouring billions of dollars into Iraq. It has decided that of all the things in the world it could spend billions of dollars on, it will spend these billions on making life better for the average Iraqi, by removing an evil dictator and turning their country into a thriving capitalist democracy.

The result of all this, as reporters have long noticed: the average Iraqi hates America. When U.S. soldiers drive down the streets on patrol, they are greeted with fearful faces. When the Americans react to a bomb attack by shooting everyone on the street, including a just married 16-year-old, an infant, and an old man, and then declares that they behaved exactly as they were trained and would do it again…. The average Iraqi, if he was in a generous mood, could be excused for thinking to himself, “well, they’re not very good at this are they?”

Never was less achieved with more money. Really– I can’t think of anything that cost more but achieved less. The closest second I can think of is the former Shah of Iran’s coronation party, which helped lay the foundation for the overthrow of the Shah, the taking of American hostages, the revolutionary government in Tehran, war between Iran and Iraq, U.S. assistance to Iraq (yes, to Saddam Hussein), the invasion of Kuwait, and so on and so on. Now: here we are.

The average 10-year-old could do better with this money than George Bush did. The average 10-year-old, given billions of dollars, would buy everyone in Iraq a flat-panel TV screen and a Play-station. And everyone in Iraq would love America. They’d all be watching American Idol. They would, like American Christians, pay outward respect to their religion, bow and pray and mumble the sacred verses, and then get back to the Mario Brothers as quickly as possible.

We took away their government and police forces and started a civil war between two different religious groups which, under Saddam Hussein, had been getting along fairly well.  (Even Christians were tolerated under Saddam.)  We smacked the hornet’s nest and can’t control anything. We’ve installed a government that is quietly complicit with Shiite death squads and can’t wait for us to leave so they can finish the job properly.

Yet Richard Perle stumbles along in a bizarre documentary shown on PBS the other night insisting that all is well. Didn’t you know it would take ten, twenty years to stabilize Iraq? Oh– sorry, we forgot to tell you. Actually, there was no need to tell you– it is necessary for the survival of America that certain leaders who understand the true nature of the world occasionally need to exercise leadership in undemocratic fashion, in order to preserve our incredibly precious freedoms and liberties.

John McCain, George Bush, Condoleeza Rice– all still on board. Rudolph Giuliani? Invading Iraq was a great idea! It was so great, I’d do it again.

In an sane world, I would add here: I am not making this up.

The Americans are building the biggest embassy in the history of the entire world in Baghdad. Yes it is. This is something the government of Iraq badly wants: a great big hulking U.S. embassy in the middle of Baghdad, full of all kinds of rooms and offices and who knows what, just waiting to offer friendly assistance to any weary American traveler who might have lost his visa or immunization records.

This investment is a little bizarre. Iraq is free, in theory, to elect any government it wants. One would think that a rational person might conclude– especially given the poor performance of the American military in pacifying Iraq– that the chances of the population of Iraq electing a pro-American government are at best 50-50. What if the next democratically, freely elected government of Iraq decides it doesn’t want a big role for the U.S. in it’s affairs, and doesn’t want this hulking embassy sitting there…

What the heck is going on with PBS? Who is in control there? Why are they showing these absolutely bizarre fake documentaries on Richard Perle? Why, in heaven’s name, are they censoring words like “shit” out of movies like “All the President’s Men”? God help us– the inquisitors seem to be in charge!

[2022-05: probably explanation:  PBS, constantly under criticism by Republicans and conservatives, wished to make a gesture of non-partisanship by running a flattering documentary of a right wing Republican bureaucrat.]

They really should have put Karl Rove in charge of Iraq. He would have found a way to get the Shiites to overthrow Saddam, put the Sunni’s back in charge, then slaughter them all and blame it on the Kurds. Someone some where would have profited from this.

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Blue Like Putin

For all of the lovely, lovely speeches about liberty and democracy and freedom and all those great American values those unreasonable Iraqi’s simply refuse to thank us for, George Bush stands by, completely oblivious or ignorant or just plain complicit as Russia slides back into dictatorship.

Under Putin, the Kremlin has steadily been increasing its ownership or control of television, radio, and internet news outlets. It just took over the Russian News Service (through proxy), and called a meeting with the journalists employed there. From now on, they were told, no coverage of the opposition. No bad news about the economy or politics within Russia. The United States is our enemy. And at least 50% of the newscast will be devoted to “happy news”.

And George Bush stands by and smiles and appears completely uninterested.

How on earth can Bush continue to declare that the goal of the war on Iraq is to bring freedom and democracy to that nation, while clearly conveying utter indifference to the state of democracy within Russia, or Egypt, or Libya, or Saudi Arabia?

Well, that’s not difficult at all to understand, unless you ever really believed the statements about democracy.

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Viet Nam 20 Years After Indifference

George Bush is about to travel to Viet Nam with a contingent of 200 business leaders, on the occasion of Viet Nam’s probable admission to the World Trade Organization. He will be attending the Asia Pacific Economic forum. Viet Nam hopes to showcase it’s emerging economy at this meeting: we’re ready to join the Asian tigers.

Bush has already met with Viet Namese Prime Minister Phan Van Khai.

It is 2006. In 1973, the U.S.-backed government of South Viet Nam collapsed and the U.S. army fled. Millions of refugees got into boats and ended up in refugee camps. Many were admitted to the U.S. The communist government of North Viet Nam unified the country and established a dictatorship. The U.S. went on it’s way to try to mess up Central America as much as possible, before watching the communist government of Russia implode (thanks largely to their disastrous attempt to foist a communist government on Afghanistan, leading to the triumph of the Taliban).

An objective person could be excused for wondering if there are lessons to be learned. In both cases, Afghanistan and Viet Nam, attempts to impose a friendly government (friendly to Russia, France or the U.S.) on a foreign nation conflicted with the nation’s own sense of identity and independence, and hostile political groups were able to take advantage and establish themselves as the representative of nationalist aspirations. The determination of the occupied to expel the occupiers was beyond the wildest imagination of the invader. Both Russia and the U.S. thought that superior technology and military might would, in the end, triumph.

What if the U.S. had decided, in 1963, to just leave Viet Nam alone?

What if the Soviet Union had decided, in 1979, to just leave Afghanistan alone?

Well, what if the Americans, who were funding the Mujahideen, who later became the Taliban, who later became Osama Bin Laden, had just minded their own business in Afghanistan as well?

And what if America had just stayed out of Iraq?

I think some generals already have come to the conclusion that as long as the U.S. remains in Iraq, they will be the focal point of opposition, and the opposition is always going to be led by the people most hostile to U.S. values and policies.

George Bush and his Republican apologists have been fond of saying that you couldn’t just leave Saddam in power. Well, you couldn’t just leave Viet Nam. And you couldn’t just not invade Cuba. And you couldn’t just not give military aid to the opponents of the Sandinistas. And so on, and so on. Time and time again, history shown that these kinds of grand schemes almost never work out.

Time and time again, the militarists are proven wrong by history, and proven right by their own delusions: they are always ready to enter a new quagmire.

 

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“Al Qaeda a bigger Threat to the World Than Hitler Ever Was” – Manchester Union Leader

The Manchester Union Leader is a newspaper. This is a newspaper that might like to regard it self as sober and rational and intelligent. This newspaper insists that the “war” on terror is “the most difficult and challenging war we have ever faced”.

Okay. The other wars include World War I, World War II, Korea, Viet Nam, and the Cold War. Small potatoes compared to a 2-bit Arab millionaire hiding in the hills of Tora Bora.

The editorial went on to question whether the nation could afford to have a president (McCain) who isn’t willing to torture people. We want a torturer. Can you torture? I will vote for you. Because I want a torturer.

[Note: now that the so-called compromise Senate bill has been revealed, it turns out to be more of a cover-your-ass bill than a genuine concession to the Geneva Accords. No real protections, legal or otherwise, are extended to the prisoners being held in Guantanamo Bay or anywhere the U.S. may have renditioned any person any 2-bit bureaucrat might have decided is a terror suspect.]

This is ridiculous. The U.S. has faced more than a few military opponents over the years, nearly all of which have actually carried out a war against the U.S. All of them were genuine threats in one form or another.

Well, now that I think about it, Viet Nam obviously was never the threat it was sold to us as– it did collapse and the world continued to spin as it did before. No dominos.

Panama.  Oh.  No dice.

In the five years since the attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon, there has not been a single terrorist attack on U.S. soil. Not one. Not a single one. Not one. None. Zero. If you believe the government– and you know how conservatives just automatically trust the government– they have nipped several conspiracies in the bud. I happen to believe that not a single one of those conspiracies was anywhere near the stage of realization.

Yet the Manchester Union Leader believes that the U.S. is more threatened now by Al Qaeda than it was by Germany or Japan or even the Communist Block at the height of the cold war, with their thousands of missiles pointed right at us.

Remember the communists? Remember the thousands of nuclear missiles pointed at us, and ours at them? Remember the Cuban missile crisis? Not as scary as the “Lackawanna 5”, I guess.

It is a dire threat indeed that does not manifest itself in five years. The Bush administration gingerly tested the idea, recently, that the reason for this is because of Bush’s brilliant successes at rooting out terror. Right. Just as, if the police doing their job well, a large city could expect to have no murders or thefts or break-ins. Seriously.

The real agenda is the oil and the tax cuts and deregulation and running up a deficit so the progressives won’t be able to afford any new programs when they finally do take office.

But since most people eventually become dimly aware of how bad Bush’s other policies are, the only way to sell them on this government is to convince them that there is this horrible war going on out there and if you don’t vote for Bush, they’ll be coming to get you, right there, in Duluth and Peoria and Gary and Orange County and Iowa City.

What they are doing seems contrary to all reason and common sense. It is contrary to all reason and common sense. And it doesn’t seem to matter. We want our government torturers. We believe they are out to get us. We have lost our minds.

When does Bush cross over into “big lie” theory? At a meeting with conservative columnists last week (why mess things up with someone who might ask hard questions), Bush insisted he had absolutely no doubts about the rightness of his decision to invade Iraq. Surely no matter how conservative you are or how loyal to Dick Cheney, you would have a doubt or two when your actions now result in the deaths of 3,000 people a month, and torture, and mayhem, in a nation you thought you could rebuild into a Western-style democracy in a “cake walk”. No regrets?

The theory of the big lie is that if you pretend to have not the slightest doubt that what you are saying is true, a large number of people will assume that it must be true, because it would be inconceivable that someone would lie on such a grand scale. How could they get away with it?

And from the ‘what is, “is” ‘ department, this gem also from the Union Leader:

Let us be clear that we do not advocate torture. We advocate that the law be written to protect CIA officers from criminal prosecution if they use certain techniques that could be interpreted as forbidden under Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions.

“Certain techniques”. “Play rough”?

Just how many more euphemisms do we need before Americans can advocate torture with a clear conscience?  This is a shitty little dodge by the Union Leader to avoid using the more accurate word: torture.

More detail: The Bush administration has authorized six “Enhanced Interrogation Techniques” to be used by the CIA on only a dozen al-Qaida members. The techniques include grabbing a prisoner’s shirt and shaking him, slapping, slapping the stomach (punches are not allowed), extended standing (which might include sleep deprivation), containment in a cold cell, and water-boarding.

Water-boarding? By golly, sounds like surfing! Slapping– no punching– someone might get hurt there, boys. “Extended standing”? That’s easy. You just tell him to stand there. And stand. And if he stops standing, you make him surf, or slap his face, or grab his shirt. Oh, the horror!

Manchester Union Leader Advocates Torture

On September 17, the same newspaper said this: If playing rough with a captured terrorist can save lives — and there is strong evidence that it can* and has — Congress must not forbid it, no matter what the Supreme Court has said.

How nice. Another euphemism for “torture”. They are not torturing anybody– they’re just “playing” rough. Like little boys, wrestling around in the den.

If these editorialists had any guts and any integrity and any morality, they would use the word they do, without any doubt, mean. They want to allow the CIA and the military to torture people. Torture, torture, torture. They want our men to be brutal and violent and absolutely diabolical, because they think that will help us win war on terror.

The editorial writer should publish his name so we all know who is willing to torture.

Aside from the enormous, insurmountable question of morality, history seems to suggest that the long term damage to the west’s credibility and respect will far exceed the benefits of obtaining information that won’t be trustworthy anyway.

An Oddity

I’m not advocating this– torture is wrong under any circumstance, at any time, and any place, and no matter what you call it. But it is curious that the Bush administration wants the cover of law. Why not do as has always been done: leave the law alone, but know that your men in the field will occasionally take liberties– as they did at Abu Ghraib prison? As they did when they trained torturers for Pinochet in Chile? Those men will understand that if exposed, the government will not protect them. They are on their own. In the meantime, they understand– too well, so it appears– what their superiors really want.

The fact that the Bush administration won’t go this route is compelling evidence that our leadership now consists of true vampires.

In fact, the best evidence is to the contrary.  Firstly, people will say anything to make the torture stop, so you cannot know if what they are telling you is accurate or not.  Secondly, some prisoners become more stubborn and more determined to not cooperate if treated badly.  Thirdly, the pertinent issue is that you will inevitably torture by mistake someone who is innocent and who really doesn’t know anything.  Fourthly, you will have innocent victims because when you torture other people they will volunteer any name they can think of if they think it will stop the torture.  Fifthly, you have no legal defense against any nation that decides to torture American prisoners of war.  Sixthly, your boys will deny that they gave any information away at all under torture.

Well, number 2 and number 6 cannot both be true.

 

 

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Torturing the Pharisees and Scribes

Church Groups Getting Ready for the Election:

Evangelical Christians in the United States, by an overwhelming margin, support George W. Bush and Dick Cheney in this election which means they support their policies which include torture.  They can’t hide from this: evangelical Christians support the use of torture to deal with terrorism.

I think every conservative, evangelical, Hillary-bashing congregation should dedicate at least one Sunday this fall to an in depth discussion of how Jesus would torture the Pharisees if he really, really needed some information from them. Suppose they were holding Mary and Peter hostage somewhere.  Or or the Holy Grail.

So, how would Jesus torture?  Cattle prods? Water-boarding? Sleep-deprivation and beatings? What would Jesus do? The results could be collected into a position paper and presented to George Bush at one of those frequent prayer breakfasts or other meetings

Conservatives love emergencies. That’s when they get to take control. If you let them. They thrive on fear– because they assume that others are prepared to do to us what they are prepared to do to others.

The question Al Qaeda has to ask itself is, “where is America’s oil”.

The answer: right below your feet.

 

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Defending the Invested Policy

Without the slightest doubt, the U.S. invasion of Iraq is a failure. Even if you give the most generous room for interpretation and the most optimistic spin on the future, nobody who advocated this strategy believed that 3,000 people a month would by dying by now in sectarian violence.

The lamest argument in defense of Bush’s Iraq strategy is that, if even more people die and more things are blown up, eventually, there might be a moderately stable democracy. Might. Moderately stable. Like who? Like what? How deeply will the families of dead Iraqi’s appreciate the blessings of their new democracy? Will they ask themselves, what is the point?

So, it is difficult to defend the strategy, if you want to confine the discussion to actual facts and issues. The solution is to describe the brutal sacrifices’ made by individual U.S. soldiers and then argue that it would not be honorable to not sacrifice more in order to ensure that George W. Bush never has to go on TV and say, “our policy on Iraq was foolish and it failed and we have made a bad situation much worse. We are now faced with making very difficult decisions. I am responsible for the wasted deaths of thousands of U.S. servicemen. Life sucks. I suck. I resign.”

Eventually, it Won’t be a Mistake

How the debate has shifted. It should tell you something very important about Iraq policy when the argument for staying is that, if we leave now, it will be an even bigger disaster.

The miracle is that George Bush gets to make this argument while casually skipping over the intermediate step, the one in between “piece of cake” and “cut and run”, and that step is, “we failed”.

The deck here is stacked against prudence. If the strategy of invading Iraq and overthrowing Saddam Hussein was stupid, the only way to not have to admit it is to argue that if we keep making the same mistake over and over again, eventually it won’t be a mistake.