Sleepycatz

America’s Dilemma

At some point today Michael Mukasey will, essentially, be confirmed as the next Attorney General of the United States. Mr. Mukasey’s testimony of blatant evasion and obfuscation regarding water boarding and torture should stand as one of the more shameful moments in our history. But those who defend Mr. Mukasey and the act of water boarding –such as Mona Charen, Andrew McCarthy, and Patrick Buchanan– represent a betrayal of our country’s laws and values which boarders on monstrous.

One can almost hear the glee in their voices when they throw out the patented ticking bomb scenario* to justify their desire to torture suspected terrorists. As these pundits are eager to adopt a tactic pioneered by the Spanish Inquisition and honed by the Khmer Rouge, I would like to know what interrogation tactic would be too immoral, or violate our country’s values, in the ticking bomb scenario? To save the hypothetical city from a terrorist attack would it be acceptable to electro-shock the suspected terrorist? On his chest and extremities? On his genetiles? Would it be acceptable to cut off his digits or limbs while he watched? Could one kill his wife in front of him? Or his son? Could one, in order to save a city from the evil terrorist, rape his young daughter in his presence? Just how determined and macho are you pundits?

Over a hundred years ago Fyodor Dostoevsky asked the very question which I posed above. Ivan Karamozov presents his brother Alyosha with the following dilemma: Suppose that in order to bring eternal happiness to the world, it was essential and inevitable to torture to death one tiny innocent creature, only one small child. Would you consent? How we answer this question defines our humanity and therefore the kind of country we wish to have. People cannot abandon their individual humanity and then claim that their nation is in anyway just or moral. To suggest otherwise is is treasonous to the founding principles of our country.

*The ticking bomb scenario is perhaps the greatest hoax perpetrated in the debate on torture. Outside of a concocted television plot, the possibility of the scenario –in which the government captures a single terrorist who has specific location of a ticking bomb which will detonate, causing massive destruction, in a short time– actually occurring is so infinitesimal it should be dismissed as implausible. The scenario, however, provides the crucial exception to the prohibitions against torture for those who seek it. Since this scenario never occurs, the exemption is constantly extended. Instead of torturing only the terrorist with direct knowledge of the plot, interrogators now extend the act to those they believe have second or third hand knowledge. Eventually, they are torturing suspects who know suspects who are related to terrorists who may know the leader of a plot to detonate a bomb in the United States. This is the reality of torture. This is the reality of what the United States is engaged in.

Men of Steel

It has now become apparent that –with the support of Sens. Schumer and Feinstein and the insane hyperbole of President Bush– Judge Mukasey will be confirmed as the next Attorney General of the United States. It is nearly inconceivable that a man who who believes that the President has the right to detain citizens and residents without charge, and who has called for secret courts of prosecution, could be confirmed as the chief legal representative in the United States. Yet, these are the times in which we live: Times filled with fear and uncertainty. It is in these times that an old ideology has risen to prominence: The ideology of authoritarianism.

Authoritarianism should not be confused with fascism –though one may lead to the other and vice-versa. Where the later seeks to unite a country under single cooperative rule lead by a charismatic leader, authoritarianism seeks only the goal of power for its leader, and his small band of loyalists. Where fascism uses nationalism and fear to unite the people into a fasces, authoritarianism primarily uses fear to maintain power, with little concern of uniting people in anything other then fear of itself or its prescribed enemies. Authoritarianism is the poor man’s fascism. It requires little to intellectual honesty, but offers the same ultimate power to its leaders.

The current authoritarian crop is found among the leading candidates for the Republican nomination for the Presidency of the United States. These men are engaged in a battle to prove which is stronger. They argue as to which will more quickly throw off the burdensome weaknesses of law (national or international), or which has the strength of will to incarcerate and abuse more of their enemies. These are men of steel. They argue for the preternatural power of the Presidency. They acknowledge no limits on this power; for they believe that that the next president must expand upon the powers the existing one. This, they suggest, must be done until the Presidency is indistinguishable from the Roman office of Dictator: an office with unlimited power to protect the state.

Among the prospective Duci, John McCain –the only combat veteran– has suggested that America cease torturing its detainees. Mr. McCain has been mocked for his stance in the past, and met with the equivocation argument of “we’re no worse then the evil we are fighting;” an argument used to justify nearly every atrocity throughout history. Mr. McCain has suffered for his beliefs among the base of his party –he is presently polling third or fourth. And though Mr. McCain believes in the authoritarian office of President, this is not enough to satisfy many. His party stalwarts believe that a single iron willed leader is the only thing that can save them from the enemy they have created in their fear. They will trust only a man who has the vision to see beyond law and reason and into the depths of their fears and dreams for order and vengeance.

For nearly one hundred years, our country had hosted two great political parties, both of which vied for political dominance generally within the framework of our laws and government. Even in the worst days of our republic in which the most heinous decisions were made (such as Lincoln’s suspension of habeas corpus and Roosevelt’s internment of American citizens) the acts were made with the full knowledge of the other branches of our government and with lawful review. But today, one party insists that one part of our government –the excellency of the Presidency– must be allowed to operate in secret, with secret expansive powers which no court nor man can hold to account. The Republican party has chosen an expedient path of authoritarianism in hopes that the fears and desperation of the American people match those of the party’s financiers and base. The other party, the Democratic Party, has showed itself either too afraid or too covetous of these new powers to act against its political adversaries. This party has shown itself to lack any will of leadership, authoritarian or otherwise, and thus struggles for unity and direction. The base of the Democratic party has been clear in its demands, but the leadership has ignored their calls and has pursued appeasement through ‘moderation’. The Republican party has offered a vision of the future, though be it a frightening one. The Democratic party, however, has been able to provide little evidence that it is opposed to the authoritarian ideas from across the aisle, or that it has the will to govern at all.

Our republic is in danger. But it is not threatened from without, but from within. It is threatened by those who seek to use its offices to gain ultimate authority; it is threatened by those pundits and politicians who cynically see all of politics as a win/loose game; and it is threatened by a frightened and apathetic public who seek quick fixes over reasoned understanding. It is only this final element which may be changing. There are growing voices outside of the pundits and politicians calling for introspection and change. It remains to be seen whether those voices will be heard by those threatening our nation.

Why We Torture

Press Secretary Perino: “But the legal opinion of the United States is that we do not torture. The statutes have been interpreted, the committees have been briefed. And I believe that the members that have been briefed are satisfied that the policy of the United States, and the practices, do not constitute torture.”

That the American government has been involved in torture for the last fifty years should come as no surprise to scholars and observers of its foreign policy. America’s techniques were honed in Guatemala, Chile, Argentina, and El Salvador. But what was once done as consultations with foreign security services in the past, has now become overtly practiced by the American government.

When President Bush insists that “We do not torture” it is always with a wink and a nudge to foreign interests and the American people. Historically, governments never admit that that torture prisoners. They will couch their language in professional euphemisms: “enhanced interrogations”, “harsh questioning,” “psychological treatment,” “re-education” are all terms used in the past by governments which tortured prisoners, but denied that they tortured. Even the classification of ‘prisoner’ becomes euphemised: in the Soviet Union prisoners became “patients,” or “dissidents,” in Latin America they were “suspects” or “rebels,” in China “counter-revolutionaries,” and here, in America, they are “detainees” or “enemy combatants”. But this re-defining of language, this euphemization, was never intended to completely hide the fact that all of these governments engaged in in torture. Rather, the language is designed to provide both the highest levels of deniability and justification of tortures use.

As former CIA officer Robert Baer has stated, torture is not an effective or accurate means of acquiring intelligence information. In fact there are well known methods of interrogation which have proven accurate, and which do not involve physical or psychological violence. Around the world, torture is is publicly denounced and decried as inhuman, barbarous, and cruel. So why is torture employed? Partially because it is so publicly reviled. Employing torture signifies a state’s determination and its willingness to protect its interests. For those people who strongly support the state, the act of torture tends embolden their support. For this group, torture — through a state proxy — signifies strength, resolve, and feeds a cathartic need for violent retribution against those they perceive as enemies of the state they support. Torture allows the state transmits the message that it has the ultimate authority over life, death, pain, and comfort. Because of this torture can never be completely hidden. The state must make sure that its ‘enemies’ are aware of its actions. But the state must also maintain the ability to plausibly deny that it utilizes torture. Historically, states have found it nearly impossible to achieve this balance. For years, it was considered monstrously humorous that the Soviets or the Cubans would deny that they tortured prisoners. Today that same sarcastic view is held of America.

Governments which employ torture always claim they need to do so to save the nation from its enemies. But there is no evidence to support this. There is no record of a nation falling because it failed to torture its prisoners. But there is ample evidence to suggest that torture generates fear, which engenders hatred, and which leads to violence against the nation and its people. As President Bush and his supporters have decided that America is to be a torturing nation, they should consider that the terror they try to engender today may be visited upon them tomorrow. They should reflect on the fact that by taking up the banner of torture they have equated America with those nations whose citizens fled to America to escape the horrors of their own torturers. They should remember that history and law always condemns the brutality and horror of torture and those who supported and employed it.

Prevailing Wisdom

Peasant #1: We have found a terrorist, may we torture him?
Angry Mob: TORTURE HIM TOOORTURE HIM!!
Sir Gonzales: How do you know he is a terrorist?
Peasant #1: He looks like one!
Sir Gonzales: Bring him forward.
“Terrorist”: I’m not a terrorist, I’m not a terrorist!
Sir Gonzales: But you are dressed as one.
“Terrorist”: They dressed me up like this.
Peasant #2: No! Nooo! We didn’t! We didn’t!
“Terrorist”: And this isn’t my beard, it’s a false one.
Sir Gonzales: [lifts off giant fake beard] Well?
Peasant #2: Well, we did do the beard.
Sir Gonzales: The beard?
Peasant #1: And the turban. But he is a terrorist!
[mob roars in agreement]
Sir Gonzales: Did you dress him up like this?
Peasant #2: NO! No!… Yes, a bit, a bit. But he has got brown skin!
Sir Gonzales: What makes you think that he is a terrorist?
Peasant #3: What, he blew up the white house!!
Sir Gonzales: The Whitehouse?
[pause]
Peasant #3: We rebuilt it.
Angry Mob: TORTURE HIM ANYWAY!!!! TORTURE HIM!!!!
Sir Gonzales: Quiet, quiet! There are ways of telling whether he is a terrorist.
Peasant #2: There are? Are there? Tell us, tell us! Do they hurt?
Sir Gonzales: Tell me, what do you do with terrorists?
Peasant #3: Torture them!
[mob roars in agreement]
Sir Gonzales: And why do you torture terrorists?
Peasant #2: To Get Even! [Gets slapped]
Peasant #1: To get a confession?
Sir Gonzales: So, why do why do terrorists confess under torture?
[pause]
Peasant #3: ‘Cause they’re full of… sin?
Sir Gonzales: Good! So how do we tell whether he is full of sin?
Peasant #1: Sodomize him!
Sir Gonzales: Ahh, but can’t someone be free pf sin before you sodomize them?
Peasant #1: Oh yeah.
Sir Gonzales: Tell me, what else is full of sin?
Peasant #1: condoms.
Peasant #2: Hollywood.
Peasant #3: bananas.
Peasant #1: Ted Kennedy.
Peasant #2: The media.
Peasant #3: corn.
Peasant #1: women.
Peasant #2: New York.
Peasant #3: Carrots!
King Bush: [has been silent in the background] An Atheist.
[pause]
Sir Gonzales: Exactly! So, logically…
Peasant #1: …If he weighs the same as a atheist, he’s full of sin.
Sir Gonzales: And therefore?
Peasant #1: A TERRORIST!
[mob roars in agreement]

With some apologies to Monty Python

Stress Positions

In 1788, Alexander Hamilton, in defending the Constitution, wrote:

The observations of the judicious Blackstone in reference to the latter, are well worthy of recital: “To bereave a man of life, [says he] or by violence to confiscate his estate, without accusation or trial, would be so gross and notorious an act of despotism, as must at once convey the alarm of tyranny throughout the whole nation; but confinement of the person, by secretly hurrying him to jail, where his sufferings are unknown or forgotten, is a less public, a less striking, and therefore a more dangerous engine of arbitrary government.” And as a remedy for this fatal evil he is everywhere peculiarly emphatical in his encomiums on the habeas corpus act, which in one place he calls “the BULWARK of the British Constitution.”2

Hamilton was arguing that America could not nor could ever forgo the basic rights of English common law; thus, there was no need to include a Bill of Rights into the proposed Constitution. Ten score and eighteen years later, we have shamefully betrayed the hope and convictions of America’s founding fathers. Today, our government will revoke the Great Writ, and endorse the practice of torture; all in the name of partisan politics. America has lost the greatness that it once held - the greatness which drew hopeful immigrants from around the world in order to make a better life, and escape tyranny. America’s greatness was never to be found in its shopping aisles, its financial markets, or its factories; it was found in America’s laws, its philosophy, and its rejection of tyranny. When one man, be him president, pope, or king, can deprive anyone of due process and liberty that man must instantly be labeled a tyrant. It is far too easy to blame only our representatives who, out of desperation and fear, acquiesce to such a tyrant. Much of the blame - or responsibility - lies within our own fears and apathy. Our country was founded by men of enormous courage. At a time when most of the world was ruled by kings and potentates, our leaders decreed that our country would not be governed by one man, but by all men; that power would never be concentrated in a single office, but shared among branches of government - that our land would not be subjected to the whims of imperial power. That courage has faded over the years, and today it is nearly invisible in our government and newscasts. Those of us who speak up are shouted down with cries of traitor or go unheard, drowned out by the constant calls for strength and protection. Somewhere we hope that there lives that small still voice in our nation conscious that will cry out against tyranny and fear, but we also know that, by then, it may be too late. Arbitrary imprisonment and torture are self perpetuating engines. A man is tortured until he implicates co-conspirators; another is arrested and tortured, and so on and so on. The soils of Chile, Ukraine, and Cambodia bear the blood of this awful truth. The scratch stained walls in the prisons of Soviet Russia, China, and Iran are the murals testifying to ultimate, arbitrary, state power. America now claims the right to perpetrate what we once condemned. Our greatness is lost. The only question that remains is whether we shall recover it, or shall we follow the history of other corrupt empires.

As always Glen Greenwald has the details