Well Said

I was in the process of getting revved up about the Bush Administration's torture policies and the Obama Administration's lukewarm response when I read Paul Krugman's blog post on the topic. He says it much better, and more concisely, than I could.

Maybe now I can let it go for a while.

Just Following Orders

The Obama Administration released the much anticipated/dreaded Bush Administration torture memos yesterday. They were as bad as anyone’s worst fears.

Jay Bybee’s responses to the CIA’s request for guidance weren’t just legalistic fairy dust. They amounted to a manual on how to torture. Bybee—now a federal court judge, which should make anyone’s blood run cold—permitted eleven days of sleep deprivation. Waterboarding could last twenty to forty seconds. (Summaries, as well as the memos themselves, are here.)

The Obama Administration, which deserves commendation for releasing the memos, then made a shameful bow to the intelligence community by declaring no one who used the opinions supplied by Bybee as a justification for torturing a prisoner would be prosecuted, and the government would provide legal assistance in proceedings brought by other parties. The door was left open as to whether anyone higher up might some day face prosecution.

This whole business appalls me on so many levels, it’s hard to know where to start, so I’ll work my way up from the bottom. Are CIA personnel so badly trained, so morally deficient, that they don’t know depriving a man of sleep for eleven days is torture? Simulating drowning for twenty minutes? Slamming his head into a wall? A good, practical, definition of torture is, “How would you feel if this was being done to one of your guys?” Well? The CIA interrogators weren’t asking for guidance; they wanted permission, and Bybee gave it to them.

Did Bybee get an erection while he wrote the memos? Did he write much of them with only one hand? Did he sit back with a cognac on cold nights and wonder what it would be like to actually be there, instead of just imagining? We don’t know as I can find no media outlet that asked himt. Not that I’d expect a comment, or that he’d even answer the phone. I can’t even find a reference to a “No comment,” or, “Judge Bybee’s office did not return calls.”

The Bush Administration was little more than a junta, often operating outside the rule of law under the auspices of jefe Cheney. Some career-advancing toady without scruples could always be found to write an opinion to justify whatever they wanted. Warrantless searches. No habeas corpus. Long-standing treaties and accords ignored. As I noted before, they treated the United States like Tony Soprano treated David Scatino’s sporting goods store.

And now the Obama Administration has officially endorsed the supposedly discredited “I was only following orders” defense. Not only will Obama, acting in our name, allow a free pass to torturers, we’re going to pick up their legal bills on the assumption they acted in good faith. No further investigation required. I wonder what the response would be if they had learned some seersucker-wearing cracker DA wrote an opinion for some Mississippi redneck sheriff that said it was okay to take them Nigras out back and teach them some manners.

Of course, you probably don’t care. A recent poll showed only 38% of Americans want criminal investigations of the torture allegations; 35% want nothing done at all. Bush and Obama anger me. The poll is saddening and disappointing. We should all be ashamed for what was done in our names, whether we approved of it or not. Our lack of that shame only makes it more deserved.

Two Faces of a Candidate

Let's start with the disclaimer: I voted for John McCain in 2000. Twice. I crossed over and voted in the Virginia Republican primary, then wrote him in for the general election. I read his biography and loved it. I'm too cynical to get into hero worship, but he was as close as anyone, right up there with Chuck Yeager and John Glenn. It pains me to oppose his candidacy as strongly as I have come to, but the man whose honor I once considered unquestionable isn't running in 2008.

I would gladly pay $1,000 to the charity of the moderator's choice if someone had the nerve to ask him, politely, to describe why the treatment he received in North Vietnam was torture, when the exact same acts performed by the CIA against terrorists is not.

For a well reasoned and concise comparison, click here.

What Game are They Watching?

Waterboarding is in the news again, now that Attorney General Mukasey has declared the Justice Department will not investigate individuals who followed DoJ directives, even if those directives were based on dubious or non-existent legal reasoning; nor can those who created, endorsed, or propagated these questionable rulings be held accountable. (To catch up on this week’s comedy, click here.)

First, no whining from any senators who voted for Mukasey; he said he was going to do this, and he has. No surprises. It’s your fault.

The United States of America (remember them?) prosecuted Japanese soldiers as war criminals for waterboarding American prisoners. The current administration’s position is that it might be illegal, unless some mid-level functionary in the Justice Department wants to make points with the White House and writes an opinion no one but Dick Cheney agrees with to say it’s legal. Then it’s legal. Honest to God.

I don’t understand how some employees can walk into the Department of Justice building and not get sick to their stomachs just reading the sign. DoJ has done little, if anything, for the cause of justice since Shrub took office. All departments of the Executive Branch serve the president; that doesn’t mean they’re his lackeys, toadying up to spread a see-through veneer of legality to whatever he wants. Torture? Warrantless searches? Renditions? Denial of habeas? Whatever Shrub and Darth Cheney want, someone at the Department of Injustice can be found to justify it.

This is not the United States of America I was taught about, and it’s not just the government that sickens me. Polls show 61% of all Republicans think Shrub is doing a good job. Obviously no one else does; his current approval rating overall is 30%. My question is, who in their right mind can possibly look at his record and say he’s done a good job?

Witnesses for the prosecution:

• Ignored warnings in August of 2001 that al-Qaeda planned to fly planes into buildings.
• Invaded Iraq with no evidence they had anything to do with 9/11, the UN (accurately) said they had no WMD program, and we had nothing resembling a plan for what to do when Saddam was gone.
• Destroyed America’s reputation abroad with our “you’re either for us or a terrorist sympathizer” rhetoric.
• Preached fiscal restraint while increasing the budget by over 63% since taking office. This does not include the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Including those expected “emergency requests” would hike the increase to 74%.
• His brand of fiscal conservatism has increased the national debt 60% since he took over. This is impressive, considering we were running surpluses and paying down the debt when he took office.
• The disparity between the richest and poorest among us continues to grow to historic levels.
• Not even during the Red Scare and the height of McCarthyism have our civil liberties been so badly eroded.
• Torture is now condoned by the Executive Branch, as it feels necessary.
• Long-dismissed legal theories are trotted out as fact. (Unitary Executive, signing statements, ignorance of checks and balances.)

Yet well over half of all Republicans think he’s doing a hell of a job. Let’s see what they might point to:

• We haven’t been attacked in this country since 9/11. (Of course, we’ve now lost more killed and many times more wounded through our misguided responses than terrorists have ever killed here.)
• Their taxes are lower.
• He talks tough.

Shrub will leave office next year with this country improved in no way since he took over, other than relative incomes for those already in the top percentiles. For that, 61% of Republicans approve. A few conclusions can be drawn:

• They’re selfish. (I got mine, and I’m keeping it.)
• They’re cowards. (I don’t care what rights I sacrifice or who else has to die to make me 0.0001% safer.)
• They’re bullies. (Do it our way, or else.)
• They’re mouth-breathing, inbred idiots. (Self explanatory.)
• All of the above. (These are not mutually exclusive.)

If this pissed you off, I guess we know where you fall on the approval rankings. Suck it up.

The Truth Hurts

The mainstream media may finally have a clue. Read Frank Rich's dead-on column about our conduct in Iraq and at home. I will gleefully debate anyone who disagrees, so long as you don't do it anonymously.