If you didn’t read Joseph Lelyveld’s article on torture in the New York Times Magazine this past Sunday, you really should take the time to do so. Print it out and put in the bathroom or something. Here’s a snip related to Abu Ghraib:
However strong the outcry, it wasn’t enough to yield political results in the form of a determined Congressional investigation, let alone an independent commission of inquiry; the Pentagon’s own inquiries, which exonerated its civilian and political leadership, told us a good deal more than most Americans, so it would appear, felt they needed to know. Members of Congress say they receive a negligible number of letters and calls about the revelations that keep coming. ”You asked whether they want it clear or want it blurry,” Senator Susan Collins, a Maine Republican, said to me about the reaction of her constituents to the torture allegations that alarm her. ”I think they want it blurry.”
Clearly, we need to do more.
I haven’t read that article yet.
Do you think the new Abu Ghraib photos coming soon will help?
I’m still PO’d with The New Yorker/Seymour Hersh for deciding that some of the photos they had were too upsetting to publish.
Excuse me, but we need to get upset. Really upset.
that’s why I recommend printing it out.
It’s an excellent piece. He visited Israel and interviewed a lot of their veteran interrogators, and then compared their history and recent reforms, with the totally disorganized and unprofessional way we are doing interrogations.
He also gets into the effectiveness of different tactics, what torture-lite is, and when it might be acceptable, or not.
I fine piece of journalism.
I’d sell my body for a printer. That is, if anyone would buy it.
It may be long but doesn’t seem that way. It’s an easy to read piece, completely accessible and understandable to any general reader. Not some esoteric think piece that will bore everyone.
Now that’s the kind of reporting(forgotten what real reporting looks or reads like) I wish there was a lot more of. Well written, researched and thought out without emotional pandering to any points of view of this subject. It is an article everyone should find the time to try and read.
I wonder how many other countries have legal guidelines/laws like Israel does?
I don’t agree that Americans don’t want to know.
Republicans are in a semi-panic over the ACLU report on torture at Guantanmo Bay and elsewhere. Dick Cheney disconnected himself from his EKG monitor long enough to denounce the ACLU report–and if something is important enough for Cheney to worry about, it’s BIG.
James Sensenbrenner shut down Judiciary Committee hearings on the renewal of the Patriot Act rather than allow it to be used as a forum to air concerns over torture at Guantanmo Bay and in America’s other gulags around the world.
Sensenbrenner has denied Representative Conyers the use of House chambers to hold press conferences/forums on the Downing Street Memo and/or torture.
Now, why would the Republicans go to such great lengths to denounce and deny the truth if they didn’t think that a large segment of the American public would be appalled and shocked at what is being done in their names?
One of the great mistakes Senator Kerry made in his campaign was not to bring up the issue of abuses and torture at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay–probably because some “consultant” advised him that raising the issue would tar him as “unpatriotic” (hah!) or raise the issue that he was somehow not “supporting the troops” (again, hah!). I believe that had Kerry raised that issue, it would have put Bush on the defencive and given Kerry the right of moral indignation.
Let’s look at some poll results, however–some of which contradicts what I have just said. I would prefer to present the evidence and let other people make up their own minds.
“Thinking about the war on terrorism, how much, if anything, have you heard about reported mistreatment of prisoners held by the U.S. at Guantanamo Bay: a lot, a little, or nothing at all?”
A LOT 49%
A LITTLE 40%
NOTHING 10%
UNSURE 1%
My comment: “A little” or “nothing” about torture is the way Republicans would like to keep it. Half the American public knows little or nothing by their own admission–and those who know “a lot” may not realise that they have incomplete information.
“Do you think these reports of prisoner mistreatment represent isolated incidents, or do you think they represent a wider pattern of prisoner mistreatment?”
ISOLATED INCIDENTS 54%
WIDER PATTERN 34%
NEITHER 1%
UNSURE 11%
My comment: The burden is on those who oppose torture as un-American and immoral, as well as illegal, to prove that there IS a wider pattern–but remember, half of all the people in this poll based THIS assessment on LITTLE OR NO KNOWLEDGE–so we must EDUCATE them.
“Based on what you’ve seen or heard, do you think the press is giving too much, too little, or the right amount of attention to these reports?”
TOO MUCH 39%
TOO LITTLE 24%
RIGHT AMOUNT 32%
UNSURE 5%
My comment: Good news, because 56% said press coverage was “too little” or “right amount” on this issue…and half of the respondents in the first question knew “little” or “nothing” about the issue. I would discount the answers to this question, though, because people NEED to hear about the reality of the gulags created in their name, by THIS President, whether they want to or not.
Source for poll: http://pollingreport.com/terror.htm
One further comment: Ask the American people THIS question: “Do you approve of torturing terror suspects? Yes or no?”
Then there’s THIS poll from USA Today, taken in the wake of the revelation of the scandal at Abu Ghraib, which asks Americans if they approve of torture. The results are encouraging:
The poll’s findings suggest that the public wants the administration to reclaim “the moral high ground” in the war on terrorism, as Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., has urged, by drawing a line between acceptable interrogation tactics and torture.
Ann Beeson, associate legal director of the ACLU, said the poll reveals “a total disconnect” between the public and the administration.
Source: http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-01-12-poll-interrogation_x.htm
Other results: 62% of respondents thought it was wrong to threaten to transfer prisoners to a country known for using torture and 69% thought it was wrong to threaten prisoners with dogs.
In other words–the American people are more less decent people who strongly disapprove of torture. Now the key is to keep up the outcry, don’t back down in the face of Republican bullying and mainstream media attempts to bury the issue, and LET THE PEOPLE KNOW THE TRUTH.
And trust that, given the facts, the American people will do what it is right.
but the key is this:
Americans do not approve of these tactics, but they accept that some of them (not all) are somehow inevitable.
Therefore, they like to be kept in the dark about the sordid details.
Meanwhile, the government, and by this I mean any government, doesn’t want to come out and publicly declare what is off limits. They don’t want detainees to have any sense of security or of knowing what the limits are.
So, they maintain a certain ambiguity on purpose. Even if we stopped torturing people, or doing torture-lite, we would want to maintain the fiction that we sometimes do resort to it.
Now, this administration is an entirely different animal. They kill people.
Yes, the Cheneyists wish to inculcate a culture of fear. They’ve taken a page from The Prince: Machiavelli advised that it’s “safer” for a prince to be feared than loved because men who merely love a prince but don’t fear him will abandon him when the going gets rough. Machiavelli wrote: “Love is preserved by the link of obligation which, owing to the baseness of men, is broken at every opportunity for their advantage; but fear preserves you by a dread of punishment which never fails.” The prince must not go so far that he becomes hated, for hatred is to be avoided at all costs.
The omnipresent threat–we MAY imprison you without trial or charge and we MAY torture you–is intended to be a cloud that hangs over everyone’s head, whether they are Americans or not.
As a great American once said: “The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself.”
But I simply don’t agree that the American people accept that torture is inevitable; but if it is permitted to be done over a period of years, people’s resistance to it will gradually soften. We must strike now, while people are still capable of being horrified by what is being done in their name.
Never, ever, EVER give up on this issue. The soul of the nation is at stake.
Thanks for the pointer to this, BooMan. Definitely worth reading.
From near the end of the article …
This pretty much the way I feel. If someone is so damned convinced that torturing someone will save lots of lives, they should be willing to break the law and face the consequences. If they’re not willing to risk prosecution and possible punishment, then obviously they’re not really sure enough that torture is necessary.
“It has been more than a year now since we (and, of course, the region in which we presume to be crusading for freedom) were shown a selection of snapshots from Abu Ghraib”
It’s been more than a year; and the best that Joseph Lelyveld can lead with is “let’s for argument’s sake put aside the most horrific, shameful cases, those of detainees who died under interrogation”
and
”I think they want it blurry.”
So Joe and Senator Collins, I guess for argument sake, it stays blurry.
Whitewash, and for arguments sake, obfuscation Journalism.
Torture is not debatable. Ever.
Most think they live in the greatest country in the world, have the greatest people, the greatest political system, the greatest freedom bringing military, the greatest leaders, the greatest constitution, the greatest god etc etc.
While all of these beliefs are ridiculously arrogant and demonstrably wrong, it still does not get us away from the way that most still believe this.
Now these people who have such faith in their belief of the above are not going to listen to or believe claims that go against this unless our SCLM thrusts it down their throats on a daily basis over a prolonged period. the chances of that happening are basically zero. That is the tragedy of Amerika today.