This is sad and depressing stuff. It appears that the abuses described at Guantanamo are comparatively benign compared to the horrors uncovered in this report. A nugget or two will give you the excretory flavor of this, if you can’t stomach reading the full report, your correspondent will quite understand.
U.S. abuse of detainees was routine at Afghanistan bases
The intended substance of this debate is centered on response: what, if anything, can we do? Who do we hold responsible for this desecration of our “reputation”? Are legal sanctions appropriate, and to what level? We have brutally abused and, arguably, murdered innocent people.
I doubt anything can be done till next January at least. Bush opened the door to this stuff and has given it his wretched blessing.
One can only hope that the next President will stop this and then set in law/UCMJ unequivocal and irrevocable prohibitions on this sort of behavior by any US citizen regardless of position or circumstance.
Huh…didn’t know that. One would also think as CIC he has something to say about it. But power of the Bully Pulpit and all that. I’m sure if a President really wants to push for a more clear and stronger “no torture” amendment to the UCMJ it shouldn’t be too hard to sell to Congress.
That’s right. It’s Title 10, Subtitle A, Part II, Chapter 47 of the US Code. But the president isn’t subject to the UCMJ anyway, according to Paragraph 802, Article 2. And there’s nothing in it, besides, that would prevent him from ordering an end to these Soviet-style practices in the form of a DOD directive or even a direct military order. It is the Commander in Chief, and no one else, who is responsible for these things.
I got the creepy feeling that the tortured reasoning would be something along the lines of if he didn’t have the authority, then he could not have committed the act. Therefore, he didn’t, because he couldn’t.
(I spent about six hours at law school, when we occupied the building. That may have been too long…)
It’s kinda funny - in the Kucinich impeachment thread, some (right and center-right) posters are absolutely, thoroughly convinced that the Dems would take any remotely decent case for impeachment, and ram it down Bush’s and Cheney’s throats. And since they haven’t, there must not be much of a case.
I don’t know what the Dems have done in recent years that would give rise to such a view, but it sure isn’t the one I’ve got.
Just yesterday, the Dems finally found the fig leaf they’d been looking for to roll over on FISA and telecom immunity. They didn’t even have the guts to run out the clock on this one, and that really wouldn’t have taken much courage.
He believes he has unlimited authority. Like Nixon before him, he believes anything the president does is inherently legal. His people at Justice are willing to back that position. Nixon was proven wrong. Mr. Bush is unlikely to be taken to task until after he leaves office.
One can only hope that the next President will remember that the US is *already * bound by both the Geneva Conventions and by the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.
Well, one could hope as well that the “it wasn’t technically a violation of this other law because Gonzales wrote a memo saying it wasn’t, and besides, they were terrorists anyway” argument would no longer be brought up on this board except to be derided. But it would be only hope.
If I understand the argument, correct me if I’m wrong, the only recourse legally acceptable is to charge those who committed crimes in Afghanistan responsible, but not their superiors in Washington, & now Bush wants those who are only following his orders to be protected by law as he is protected by…something.
And despite this, despite their explicitly admitted contempt for the rule of law over FISA, there is no force on earth nor in heaven that can persuade Pelosi to allow [del]her love muffins[/del] Bush admin officials to be impeached–ever.
There is such a force - one which currently is pushing in the opposite direction. That is, the force of political calculation. Pelosi, and the bulk of the Democratic leadership, have calculated that impeachment would hurt their party’s chances in the next election. Given that the Reps discredited it as the tool of statecraft it was intended to be, that calculation is probably correct. It also encompasses the value of proceeding with a prosecution once the conspirators have left office, unfortunately, even if it weren’t going to be precluded by last-minute pardons.
What, you think the Dems aren’t political animals too?
And I can see the point, as disappointing as I find it. An impeachement would suck up all the oxygen in the room, the Pubbies would be screaming their heads off and chewing the rug every step of the way.
(I lived through the Nixon impeachment hearings, I saw most of them (worked in a TV store - don’t ask…) and the agony of the pace, Lord a mercy, the agony! The Pubbies would insist on a diversion that could not possibly effect the outcome, but would drag out the proceedings. For. Weeks.)
This would divert attention and energy from what appears to be an excellent opportunity. I must admit, it is more important to gain the future than to clarify the responsibility for the past. Yuck-o-rama!
Plus, God Forbid, but there is also the possibility that such a thing could actually foster sympathy for the nasty little cocksucker! Americans are amongst the most sentimental people in the world, and they can pivot on a dime. Think of “Checkers” and recoil in horror. Be nauseous, and afraid. Very.
No, goddamit, they’re right. Shit. Fuck. Piss. I wish I didn’t love democracy so much so’s I could just go ahead and hate it.
It’s not even that grand a calculation. Preventing Congress from getting anything else done, considering what has been accomplished instead in this term, can’t really have been the point.
Not letting the GOP and its partisans dismiss impeachment as simple retribution for their use of it against Clinton, not letting it appear to be (or be spun as) simply vindictive and petty instead of statesmanlike and responsible, just matters more. Consider that Bush became a lame duck in 2006, with far less power to damage the nation and therefore making his removal far less urgent, and there you have it.