Author: latanawi

    Conservatives who thought the president had leaped over the edge with his post-election bipartisan spew think they can relax. Controversial judicial nominations which had been nixed before have been resubmitted. Bush biz as usual.  

   Why controversial?  
   (1)  They can’t be trusted to be fair;
   (2)  They have no judicial experience; and/or
   (3)  The Senate is being rushed to approval without time for a proper review.
Sent to the Senate:

• Terrence W. Boyle of NC, U.S. District Judge nominated for the Fourth Circuit.  
     Sen. Leahy stated in March 2005 about Boyle’s nomination

   Judge Boyle has the distinction of being so controversial that his was the only circuit court nomination of President Bush on which the former Republican leadership balked at a hearing.    

     [As Sen. Edwards] wrote to Senator Hatch in 2003:

     … Judge Boyle’s decisions have been reversed or vacated more than one hundred times. … Judge Boyle’s record on civil rights is particularly troubling.  In numerous cases he has inaccurately interpreted the law in a way that undercuts basic civil rights protections.

• William G. Haynes II, nominated to be circuit judge in the Fourth Circuit.
     Haynes’ previous nominations were strongly opposed on account of his role, as DOD general counsel, in developing policies of detainee torture and cruelty.  The July 2006 statement of Sen. Leahy about Haynes included letters of opposition from former military leaders.  Human Rights First was devoted to opposing Haynes, as well.

• Michael B. Wallace, nominated to be circuit judge in the Fifth Circuit.
      Wallace is in private practice in MS.  As Chair of the board of Legal Services Corporation (appointed by Reagan when he couldn’t abolish the LSC altogether) Wallace’s tenure is marked by outright hostility to the LSC and more, according to the opposition of civilrights.org.

  Republican Senator Warren Rudman [accused] Mr. Wallace and the rest of the Board of acting with “absolutely bad faith” explaining, “There is absolutely no trust in the present Board. They have adopted regulations that hinder legal services, they have held secret meetings, and they have done audits [of LSC grant recipients] that were actually harassment.”

    The ABA’s federal judiciary committee unanimously rated him unqualified.

   Lawyers and judges stated that Mr. Wallace did not understand or care about issues central to the lives of the poor, minorities, the marginalized, the have-nots, and those who do not share his view of the world.

• William G. Myers of ID, to be circuit judge in the Ninth Circuit.
     When Sen. Feinstein opposed his 2004 nomination, she wrote

   This nominee has little litigation experience in either state or Federal court. By his own account, he has taken only a dozen cases to verdict – and six of those occurred before 1985 when he was a newly minted lawyer.  He has never served as a counsel in criminal litigation.  Even as Solicitor of the Department of Interior, Myers took no hand in writing legal briefs.
      Mr. Myers has spent a large part of his legal career as a lobbyist for cattle and grazing interests.

   
     After his nomination was blocked in 2004, Myers was renominated in 2005.  Nothing had changed to make him acceptable.  Sen. Durbin wrote

   Mr. Myers’ nomination has been opposed by the National Congress of American Indians, the first time this organization of 500 tribes has ever opposed a judicial nominee.

     In addition, he has been opposed by virtually every major environmental group, including the National Wildlife Federation, which has never opposed a judicial nominee in its history.

• Peter D. Keisler, of Maryland, to be circuit judge for the District of Columbia Circuit.
     The National Employment Lawyers Association opposed Keisler’s nomination based on his lack of judicial experience, the lack of any scholarly writing [available] to illuminate his philosophy, and his strong connections to “radical conservative activism.”
      The Coalition for a Fair and Independent Judiciary, representing some twenty-four public interest and civil rights organizations, wrote its concern at the unusual rush treatment the nomination was receiving — especially since the vacancy was not one of the “judicial emergencies” cited by the U.S. Judicial Conference.  The ABA had not yet provided a peer-review rating.  His record has not yet been collected and reviewed.

•  James E. Rogan, nominated to be district judge in CA.
      Rogan was the House manager at Clinton’s impeachment trial.  Appointed in 2001 to the Patent and Trademark Office, Rogan subsequently practiced intellectual property and public policy law as counsel in Preston, Gates, Ellis (Abramoff’s firm).  He recently joined the board of the Nixon Library. Only last month, Gov. Arnold S. appointed him to the superior court bench in Orange County CA.  Bush selected him, then, even without a judicial record.
    Strange timing…
   

• Benjamin H. Settle, nominated to the bench in WA.  
     In private practice since 1977 Settle represents public utility districts, a hospital, a school district, and private businesses. He has no judicial experience from which to make any conclusions about his philosophy, fairness or judicial temperament.

• Norman Randy Smith, of ID, nominated to be circuit judge in the Ninth Circuit.
      Since 1995, Smith has been an Idaho state court judge.  His previous nomination failed, along those of Boyle, Haynes, Myers, and Wallace.  Civilrights.org reports that his public record is not readily accessible, as Idaho trial judges do not publish their decisions.  Before becoming a judge, Smith represented some of Idaho’s biggest corporations.

   As Sen. Leahy explained, Bush has continually undermined the judicial nominations process.

 The President’s re-nomination of divisive nominees is a repeat of last Congress and last year, when the Administration and the rubberstamp Republican Senate created a massive confrontation over controversial nominees.

    An enormous pool of superior candidates exists.  The choice of these nominees for lifetime appointments cannot be justified. Bush’s disdain for the importance of the Bench, his attempt to foist such people on the public with the powers of a Federal judge, exceeds recklessness.  It turns the stomach.  

   Is it 2008 yet?    
   

   I once knew someone from judo dojo who was Jewish, from Cairo.  Following the Six Day War a campaign was instituted there against all Jews, or at least, all Jews with assets.  No one was allowed to emigrate with more than $25.  The government seized this guy’s family jewelry business and bank accounts.  His father and older brothers were imprisoned, never to be seen again, and he was the next likely target.  So, at age 15 he escaped as a stowaway.  
   When the Yom Kippur War started, he wanted to enlist in the Israeli military.  Instead, Israel hired him as a guard over Egyptian war prisoners.  He had no qualms about kicking or hitting them, he told me, in vengeance for what happened to his father and brothers.

   That abuse, while not excusable, is at least understandable.  His assault on prisoners was personal.  It was not at anyone’s direction, not part of national policy.  It wasn’t like American policy, the one shoveled under heaps of Pentagon dung.  

   The Pentagon has only itself to blame if its lack of credibility translates into poor public support.  Look at its “investigations.” Can you see any substantive results?

   Despite the Pentagon’s twelve-plus investigations into prisoner abuse in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Guantanamo Bay, only one commander was reprimanded: Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, demoted. Frontline offered more in “The Torture Question: Who’s to Blame for Abu Ghraib?” Author Mark Danner commented on investigation conclusions:

 But none of the people in actual positions of responsibility — I’m talking about [Lt. Gen.] Ricardo Sanchez; … I’m talking about Col. Mark Warren, people who actually were in positions of responsibilities — have in fact not been punished. So we have several times people using the phrase “failure of command,” but the interesting question is, how can there be a failure of command if none of the commanders failed?

   Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights, agreed, pointing to how Gen. Miller and Gen. Sanchez, as well as Gonzales and Rumsfeld, were rewarded.

 … the Bush administration wants to at least give up some…less important people to at least make it appear as if there’s a real investigation going on here and we’re really disciplining the right people…
  But the people who actually put this policy in place have gotten promotions.

   Who are they and what are they doing now?  Maybe somebody, ahem, wants to subpoena them.

   Human Rights First has a list.  HRF changed its name from “Lawyers Committee for Human Rights” to reflect the breadth of professions involved in its advocacy, research and analysis.  It joined the ACLU earlier this year in suing Rumsfeld on behalf of five Iraqis and four Afghans who were tortured and abused. The organization has an “End Torture Now” campaign featuring a where-are-they page.

   Unless publicly identified, they slip under the radar.  So, I’ve turned them into face cards. We already know who the Joker is.

• Donald Rumsfeld, King of Spades
   

• Alberto Gonzales, King of Hearts
   

• General Dan K. McNeill, King of Diamonds;  he oversaw operations in Afghanistan when detainees were tortured to death and disclaimed abuse despite autopsy reports of severe trauma; promoted to Commanding General U.S. Army Forces Command.
   

• Maj. Gen. Geoffrey D. Miller, King of Clubs; commander of detainee operations at Guantanamo and credited with instituting the use of dogs at Abu Ghraib; made senior commander in charge of detention operations in Iraq.  Not disciplined despite an investigation recommendation.  Retired August 2006.
   

• Jay S. Bybee, Queen of Spades; former Assistant Attorney General and principal author of the memo defining torture so narrowly as to require organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death; Bush nominated him for the Ninth Circuit, where he now sits. Read Russ Feingold’s opposition to the nomination here.
   

• William J. Haynes II, Queen of Hearts; a Texan, Harvard Law; Defense Department General Counsel who recommended many of the most abusive tactics used at Guantanamo, then at Iraq; Bush nominated him to the Fourth Circuit, withdrew it, renominated him, then pulled it again last month;
   

• Maj. Gen. Barbara Fast, Queen of Diamonds; so far, the highest-ranking intelligence officer connected to Abu Ghraib; now in charge of the Army’s interrogation training facility at Fort Huachuca, AZ.
   

• Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, Queen of Clubs;  he oversaw detention facilities in Iraq and authorized abusive interrogation techniques, writing that he wanted to exploit the Arab fear of dogs;  not punished despite Pentagon reports he allowed torture to continue. Retired November 2006, claiming his career a casualty of the scandal. Residing in the San Antonio area.
   

• Col. Marc Warren, Jack of Spades;  provided legal advice to Lt. Gen. Sanchez supporting the use of dogs and stress positions; delayed notifying superiors of Red Cross reports of detainee abuse;  nominated to be a brigadier general.
   

• Maj. Gen. Walter Wojdakowski, Jack of Hearts;  oversaw military police and intelligence units responsible for operations at Abu Ghraib;  although criticized for weak leadership that led to the abuses, he is now in charge of the Army’s infantry training school at Fort Benning.
   

• Capt. Carolyn Wood, Jack of Diamonds;  in charge of the 519th Military Intelligence Battalion, whose members were involved in the killing of two Afghan detainees; assigned to Abu Ghraib where she drafted abusive interrogation rules authorized by Lt. Gen. Sanchez; reportedly an interrogation instructor at Fort Huachuca.
   

• Timothy E. Flanagan, Jack of Clubs; formerly in the Department of Justice, now General Counsel for Tyco International; selected by Gonzales to be Deputy White House Counsel; withdrew his nomination for Deputy Attorney General in October 2005 after questions arose over his involvement in crafting the rules on detainee treatment;  I found a picture of Brother Flanagan, still trailing his buddy, Gonzales, when he addressed a conference of LDS lawyers in Washington, D.C.

   Enough with rewarding war crimes and whitewashing reports.  Let this not be a casualty of public overload because so much about Iraq has gone so wrong.      

   Because Germany allows universal jurisdiction, a complaint against Donald Rumsfeld for torturous abuse of detainees will be lodged there Tuesday by the Center for Constitutional Rights.  The Center represents a Saudi detained in Guantanamo Bay and eleven Iraqis held in Baghdad.  Rumsfeld, it charges, personally approved torturous treatment.  Prosecution is also sought against Alberto Gonzales (whose role in detainee abuse alone should have prevented his confirmation) and George Tenet.

   The Center for Constitutional Rights is a group of lawyers which litigates in such areas as international human rights, government misconduct, and corporate accountability.  Last week the Center’s president, Michael Ratner, received a prize from the Democratic Lawyers of Germany and the European Association of Lawyers for Democracy for his pioneering work on international human rights.

   It’s about time for German prosecutors to act.  In 2004, the Center for Constitutional Rights had made a similar request for prosecution, but German prosecutors dropped the case, given assurances that the U.S. military would deal with it.  As long ago as late September 2001, German intelligence agents, according to a report leaked to Stern magazine, personally witnessed detainee abuse at a secret U.S. prison in Europe.  

The leaked report asserts the German agents saw US interrogators beat a 70-year-old terror suspect with a rifle butt, requiring the man to receive 20 stitches, and that they viewed documents that were smeared with blood. This information was reportedly turned over to German federal prosecutors. If the leaked report is true, it contradicts the official German position that the German government did not learn of alleged secret US prisons in Europe until media reports surfaced in 2005.

    Currently Germany is conducting five formal investigations related to Iraq and detainees.  Gonzales, in Berlin last month, defended American policies on the “rights” afforded detainees by military commissions.  He whined at the lack of assistance from European allies despite calls for the close of Guantanamo Bay.  

   Rumsfeld’s investigations sound more like damage control. Condoleeza Rice once met with human rights activists who pled for a 9/11-style commission to investigate detainee abuse.  She assured them that “major investigations” were going on to “fully understand the scope and nature” of the abuse.
 

Some critics say Donald Rumsfeld’s Defense Department is doing its best to stop potentially incriminating information from coming out, that it’s deflecting Congress’s inquiries and shielding higher-ups from investigation. Documents obtained by NEWSWEEK also suggest that Rumsfeld’s aides are trying hard to contain the scandal, even within the Pentagon. Defense Under Secretary Douglas Feith, who is in charge of setting policy on prisoners and detainees in occupied Iraq, has banned any discussion of the still-classified report on Abu Ghraib written by Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba, which has circulated around the world. Shortly after the Taguba report leaked in early May, Feith subordinates sent an “urgent” e-mail around the Pentagon warning officials not to read the report, even though it was on Fox News.

   The Taguba report was issued March 2004.  In May of 2004 Pres. Bush publicly apologized for the abuse. At the same time, he insisted on keeping Rumsfeld in his cabinet, regardless of calls for Rumsfeld’s resignation.

  Read the Taguba report here (.pdf). General Taguba found a multitude of specific cases of torture and abuse and suggested changes which would force actions to be consistent with the Geneva Conventions.  His first recommendation:

Immediately deploy to the Iraq Theater an integrated multi-discipline Mobile Training Team (MTT) comprised of subject matter experts in internment/resettlement operations, international and operational law, information technology, facility management, interrogation and intelligence gathering techniques, chaplains, Arab cultural awareness, and medical practices as it pertains to I/R activities.  This team needs to oversee and conduct comprehensive training in all aspects of detainee and confinement operations.

    Taguba criticized B. G. Karpinski for an unwillingness to accept that many of the problems were caused by her poor leadership at the prison.  As we know, Gen. Karpinski was made the scapegoat — demoted for dereliction of duty. In August 2005, Karpinski told of a memorandum signed by Rumsfeld authorizing a short list of cruel and degrading interrogation techniques.  Karpinski’s testimony is sure to be heard again.

    The National Lawyers Guild will be joining the Center for Constitutional Rights in seeking a criminal investigation against Rumsfeld from a German prosecutor.  The Guild’s president, Marjorie Cohn, wrote in more detail here about the war crimes case.

  Under the doctrine of command responsibility, a commander can be liable for war crimes committed by his inferiors if he knew or should have known they would be committed and did nothing to stop or prevent them.
…
    Although Bush has immunized his team from prosecution in the International Criminal Court, they could be tried in any country under the well-established principle of universal jurisdiction.

    Seymour Hersh was the keynote speaker at an ACLU conference in June 2004 in beautiful San Francisco.

 “What we had was a series of massive crimes, criminal activity by the president and the vice president — hold on — by this administration anyway. … The only way to look at this is as war crimes. …
   [He] said some of the most heinous actions by American soldiers had yet to be disclosed by the government…. the undisclosed evidence includes videos of young male prisoners being sodomized.

    “I’m not saying it’s there yet. It’s not there yet, but that’s where it has to go.” Hersh said at the time.

    The wait is over.  The time is now. The place is Germany.  I hope it’ll be at Nuremberg.

    There are so many Democrats around the country to applaud for hard-run races even if they ultimately lost. Congratulations go to those whose states are now to be headed by Democratic governors, too.

   Then there’s California. Gov. Schwarzenegger prevailed big-time over his Democratic opponent, Phil Angelides, 56% – 39%.

   In a state that is “blue” along the coastline, Democrats won every other statewide office except Insurance Commissioner —

• Sen. Feinstein (59%)
• Lt. Gov.-elect Garamendi (48%)
• Sec. of State-elect Bowen (48%)
• Controller-elect Chiang (51%)
• Treasurer-elect Lockyer (56%)
• Attorney General-elect Jerry Brown (57%)

    Democrats won overwhelmingly, as well, in California races for the House of Representatives. Of all thirteen, a Republican won one.

    Given this Democratic sweep, the losses by gubernatorial candidate Angelides and Ins. Comm. candidate Bustamante stand out as reminders that no party should insult the intelligence of the electorate.  These races were not stolen or bought by Republicans, they were picked up like pennies on a grocery store floor.
   The Republican gubernatorial candidate was already known, charismatic if politically young.  Why then, did every big Democrat name in the state — Pelosi, Feinstein, et al. —  settle early on a candidate who looks and acts like the guy who gets sand kicked in his face?

   The state’s insurance commissioner regulates a $119 billion insurance industry and protects consumers from insurance fraud.  With so many winnable candidates for its imprimatur, why did the party choose a candidate who lacked the popularity to match his name-recognition from a lackluster couple of terms as Lt. Gov.? Cruz Bustamante never responded to allegations of accepting donations from insurance companies.  He was easily beaten by Steve Poizner, a political newbee, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur who invested over $13 Million of his personal funds in the campaign.

   A certain amount of blame goes to the candidates, themselves, beginning with misplaced egos.   Angelides micromanaged his own campaign, with unrealistic assumptions and no vision, as analyzed by Democratic strategist Garry South.  

    Running for governor of California is a massive, high-stakes undertaking with myriad moving parts. If you want to be chief executive of the largest state in America and the fifth-largest economy in the world, act like a candidate for governor and leave the minutia to others. Angelides behaved more like the manager of an Office Depot, with the inevitable result.

    It should not have gotten that far, though. These two races were lost from the moment of party endorsement.  The candidates did what they knew best, they pulled in the chits.  The electorate did what they knew best, they sent the Democrats a message: That’s just not good enough.  

    Did the state’s party luminaries receive it?  Why did it have to be sent at all?

    Seeing how other states switched to Democratic governors, I have my nose against the window-pane, wishing I could join the party inside.  I’ll toast you all at the saloon down the street.    

     The beat goes on around the world, even as election fever hogs the news here.

     At a two-day conference this weekend, politicians in a multitude of poor African countries could smile about the coming boost to their respective economies.  A world power has pledged massive development aid in loans promised to be “open, just, fair and transparent.”  It will include the training of 15,000 professionals, construction of schools and hospitals, agricultural expertise, scholarships, export credits, and forgiveness of debt.  

    Of course, that beneficent world power must be our country, you say.  Of course not. It’s China.  Yessiree, the land of impoverished peasants gone industrial.  The land of Tiananmen Square and internet censoring.

China’s state oil companies are expanding in Africa, signing deals in Nigeria, Angola, Sudan and elsewhere. Manufacturers are trying to expand exports to African markets….
   “Chinese companies can become key players by investing in our development processes,” said President Paul Kagame of Rwanda.

    The news caps a crescendo of commercial and political Chinese venturing. The Christian Science Monitor reported last year on increased Chinese activity, from road-building in Kenya and Rwanda to trade with Uganda and South Africa.  Yellow flags are thrown down for China’s political influence, though, particularly in countries chafing under Western conditions of economic and political reform.

    In Zimbabwe, where millions live on the verge of starvation under President Mugabe’s oppressive regime, Chinese businesses have been known to provide a radio-jamming device for a military base to prevent independent stations from balancing state-controlled media. They also began delivering 12 fighter jets and 100 trucks to Zimbabwe’s Army amid a Western arms embargo.  

    In Yale Global last year, Paul Mooney questioned whether China would use its world power responsibly.

  Almost every African country today bears examples of China’s emerging presence, from oil fields in the east, to farms in the south, and mines in the center of the continent. According to a recent Reuters report, Chinese-run farms in Zambia supply the vegetables sold in Lusaka’s street markets, and Chinese companies – in addition to launching Nigerian satellites – have a virtual monopoly on the construction business in Botswana.

   China, the second biggest consumer of oil behind the United States, has forged oil partnerships in Sudan, Chad, Nigeria, Angola and Gabon, and is exploring a potential collaboration in Kenya.
   Thanks to China, Zimbabwe can flip the bird at reform.

 After Americans and Europeans withdrew from the country due to the government’s destructive land reform program and poor human rights record, China stepped in, ready to work with the embattled, and resource-rich, African nation.

   During his recent trip to Africa, Wu Bangguo, chairman of China’s legislature, spent four days in Zimbabwe, leading a delegation of 100 Chinese businessmen who inked joint venture deals in mining, transportation, communications and power generation.

 
    In Sudan, too, China took the place of Western oil companies, helping to develop the oil industry until Sudan became an oil exporter, earning about $Two Billion every year. China’s political support for Sudan has forced the United Nations to abandon strong punishment of Sudan for atrocities in Darfur.

 Still, international pressure is growing for China to use its political influence to pressure Sudan, which critics say is using its oil dollars to fund the military actions against its black African population in Darfur.

   Because of continued oil shortages, China may be reluctant to jeopardize the sweet deals it has now.

  The question is whether or not Beijing is willing to sacrifice oil and its African partnerships to salvage its international image as a responsible global force.

    Twenty months later, there’s no doubt about China’s answer:  No, but we’ll fake it.

    Otherwise, Sudan would have stopped the swarm these past few days by hundreds of uniformed men on eight villages and one displaced person’s camp in Darfur, killing fifty civilians, prompting the U.N. to ask Sudan to investigate.

 At the very least, the attacks demonstrated the government of Sudan’s continued failure to disarm militia in Darfur, and at worst its use of militia forces that target civilian populations…

 
    These most recent attacks in Darfur coincide with China’s announcement of grand commercial plans with African countries.  The Chinese president reportedly had requested that Sudan do something such as accept U.N. peacekeepers.  The response was made public the next day:  

 The Sudanese Government would not relent on its rejection of United Nations peacekeeping troops for Darfur, President Omar al-Bashir said yesterday.

   Mr al-Bashir, in Beijing for a landmark summit between Chinese and African leaders, said that allowing UN troops into the province would lead to more deaths, likening it to the peacekeeping situation in Iraq.

    The horrors endured in Darfur start with the deaths of over 200,000. Sudan expelled the United Nations envoy last month.  China’s president must have winked when he asked Sudan’s president to put a stop to it.  Sadly, then, the tragedy of this genocide may continue.

   Break it, you buy it.  The Fall of 2002 was a critical one for decisions about Iraq. What did Republicans and fiscal conservatives do? You know, the guys who like to pose as reliable stewards of the economy.  They must have demanded realistic cost-benefit scenarios, right?  Disasters were predicted. They must have tried to derail the train, right?

   You’d think they left their brains on vacation.  Nothing makes them any more trustworthy now. A return to red flags of the time, to see the warnings they ignored…    

   Yale economist William Nordhaus wrote The Economic Consequences of a War with Iraq in October 2002.  He noted that the Administration was
silent on the costs of war.  Neither the study from the Congressional Budget Office nor that from the Democratic Staff of the House budget Committee estimated the cost of a protracted war.
 

The reports exclude complete estimates of the total costs of occupation, peacekeeping, democratization, nation-building, and post-occupation humanitarian assistance.

    Nordhaus estimated the occupation for a decade to cost $75 Billion to $500 Billion, reconstruction and nation-building to cost $25 Billion to $100 Billion, and humanitarian assistance to cost $1 Billion to $10 Billion.  

    He itmized early warning signs of economic and political miscalculations:  
 

  The Bush administration has made no serious public estimate of the costs of the coming war. The populace and the Congress are unable to make informed judgments about the realistic costs and benefits…

   The Bush administration has not prepared the public for the cost or the financing of what might prove an expensive adventure…

   [U]nilateral actions, particularly those taken without support from the Islamic world, risk inflaming moderates, emboldening radicals, and spawning terrorists in those countries…

   [S]trategists may be deluding themselves on the reaction of the Islamic world and the Iraqi people to American intervention….

    The war in Iraq threatens to claim the scarce resources and attention of the United States for many years, distracting the country from other troubling spots, like North Korea or the Israeli-Palestine conflict.  The administration concentrates on Iraq, while slow growth, fiscal deficits, a crisis of corporate governance, and growing health-care problems threaten the economy at home….

   Notwithstanding all the warning signs, the administration marches ahead, heedless of the fiscal realities and undeterred by cautions from friends, allies, and foes.

 
   In December 2002 came estimates the cost of the war could run as high as $200 Billion, reported the Washington Post.  

A recent conference by the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies considered three scenarios for a war with Iraq. …

   A worst-case scenario (5 percent to 10 percent probability) envisaged fighting for three to six months, massive political unrest in the Middle East, terrorist attacks against the United States and large-scale damage to Iraqi oil facilities. … [This] would have “serious adverse effects” on the U.S. economy, according to Laurence H. Meyer, a former Federal Reserve Bank governor now with the Center for Strategic and International Studies. The worst-case scenario would likely lead to a global recession.

   More pointedly, Christopher Farrell criticized the lack of candor of the Bush Administration, commenting on the same report in Business Week for conservative readers.  

If the price of war in Iraq starts escalating, however, to $200 billion, $400 billion, $1 trillion, how does the government propose to meet the tab? By borrowing and sending the budget deficit into the stratosphere? By cutting government spending on just about everything else? By rescinding tax cuts and maybe levying a surcharge on the wealthy? By depreciating the currency with that old standby and enemy of the people, inflation?

    James Fallows interviewed a good variety of people for his article in the Atlantic Monthly of November 2002.  He  foretold almost every disaster, both long-term and short-term:

• the immediate humanitarian crisis
• the destruction of infrastructure
• many billions of U.S. dollars for reconstruction and post-conflict security forces
• the hunt for Saddam Hussein
• severe language/communication difficulties
• delay in setting up a plausible new government
• expansion of Iranian influence
• “warlordism” and ethnic-regional feuds

At a Pentagon briefing… Rumsfeld asked rhetorically, “Wouldn’t it be a wonderful thing if Iraq were similar to Afghanistan–if a bad regime was thrown out, people were liberated, food could come in, borders could be opened, repression could stop, prisons could be opened? I mean, it would be fabulous.”

   The transforming vision is not, to put it mildly, the consensus among those with long experience in the Middle East. “It is so divorced from any historical context, just so far out of court, that it is laughable,” Chris Sanders told me. “There isn’t a society in Iraq to turn into a democracy. That doesn’t mean you can’t set up institutions and put stooges in them. But it would make about as much sense as the South Vietnamese experiment did.” Others made similar points.

    Fallows wasn’t taken in by a gushing Rumsfeld.  

Merely itemizing the foreseeable effects of a war with Iraq suggests reverberations that would be felt for decades. If we can judge from past wars, the effects we can’t imagine when the fighting begins will prove to be the ones that matter most.

   Today, Republicans and fiscal conservatives may claim to disagree with the President, transparently for political advantage.  When it mattered, they weren’t there. They ignored warnings of disaster.  They went on vacation rather than work.
   They can go on vacation permanently, and take their laziness with them.  You want respect?  Earn it.

   Today is the fiftieth birthday of the Hungarian revolution.  And as thousands of anti-government protestors marched in Budapest, police fired rubber bullets on them.  

   In 1956 Hungarians were hopelessly outnumbered when they revolted against Soviet rule.  For twelve days they celebrated, burning communist books, dragging Stalin’s bronze body parts through the streets, forming an ad hoc skeletal government, thinking they had succeeded, and that surely help was on the way from western cold war warriors.  

    Since the end of WWII, the Soviets had looted Hungary brutally. The uprising came in a year of pressure for more freedom and a better life, one without food shortages.

 On 22 October 1956, the students at Budapest’s Technical University issued a manifesto of Sixteen Points… in which they demanded increased freedoms and substantial changes in the government. They also organized a protest march to the Parliament for the following day.

    On 23 October, a Tuesday, the peaceful march of several hundred thousand people ended in a blood bath. When the crowd reached the National Radio Building, where the students had gathered to read their newly drafted manifesto, the AVH began to fire [Kalishnikov bullets] into the crowd. Over one hundred people were killed, and many more were injured.

   The massacre on 23 October marked the beginning of a veritable civil war. Hungarian citizens were enraged. Within a very short time they somehow obtained weapons and ammunition – and the battles between the “revolutionaries” and the AVH raged. The fighting spread to other parts of Budapest, and then to the countryside. Gero [general secretary of the communist party], calling the freedom fighters a “mob” in a speech, brought in the Hungarian People’s Army. When Hungarian General Pal Maleter and others realized the nature of the uprising, they refused to act and, instead, joined the revolutionaries.

   A family friend in London told me his story:
   He had inherited the title of “count,” and lived with his divorced mother. When the Soviets took over Hungary he was still a teenager. They arrested him as a “class enemy,” and by 1956 he had been in prison some ten years. Prisons were opened during the uprising and he escaped.  He and his mother and younger half-brother walked all the way to Germany, where they found friends who helped them settle in Europe.

   Were the Hungarians misled into thinking the United States would come to their aid?  Radio Free Europe broadcast encouragement, tactical advice, and implications of aid if the Hungarians established a central military command.  President Eisenhower said “I feel with the Hungarian people.” Secretary of State John Foster Dulles had said (before 1953) “To all those suffering under Communist slavery, to the timid and intimidated peoples of the world, let us say this: you can count upon us.”
     No country interfered when Soviet tanks moved in to crush the uprising. Ike and Dulles were busy with the Suez Canal crisis.

    It was bloody. Among the dead were 2,500 revolutionaries and more than 700 Soviet soldiers. Of the 26,000 Hungarians arrested, 1,200 were executed.

    You would think we’d have learned something. While America is not obliged to save all the oppressed peoples in the world, it should deal with them honestly.  Yet, we reneged on promises to help the Cubans and the Kurds. Genocide in Africa continued as we intervened in Iraq.

   Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the socialist-led government of Hungary faces a new generation. In September protesters began demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Gyurcsany.  As was discovered via a recording, he admitted he lied “morning and evening” about the dismal economy.  Violence begot violence from the Hungarian police.  Teargas. Water cannon.  Rubber bullets.  No serious injuries — yet.  

   And you know what?  Without those clashes, memories of the Hungarian Revolution would barely have made the back page, next to the obituaries.  
   

   If “torture” is somehow or at least sometimes prohibited now, who can take a breather?  Not the detainees.  Cruelty, a step below torture, may continue.

   The John F. Kennedy “Profiles in Courage” award for courageous actions in speaking truth to power went this year, besides to Congressman Murtha, to Alberto Mora for his valiant efforts to stop the abuse of detainees at Guantanamo Bay. Mr. Mora accepted the award with a warning against a policy of cruelty, a crime in many countries the United States needs as allies.

Whatever the ultimate historical judgment, [the] documents justifying and authorizing the abusive treatment of detainees during interrogation were approved and distributed.  These authorizations rested on the three beliefs:  that no law prohibited the application of cruelty; that no law should be adopted that would do so; and that our government could choose to apply the cruelty – or not – as a matter of policy depending on the dictates of perceived military necessity.

 
   Until he returned to civilian life recently, Alberto Mora was General Counsel for the U.S. Navy.  The story is revealed in his internal memo and further described in the New Yorker earlier this year. After first being alerted to the Army’s abusive interrogations by NCIS, Mora met with friend Steve Morello, general counsel of the Army, who showed him a package of secret military documents about the Guantanamo interrogation policy.

It began on October 11, 2002, with a request by J.T.F.-170’s commander, Major General Michael Dunlavey, to make interrogations more aggressive. A few weeks later, Major General Geoffrey Miller assumed command of Guantánamo Bay, and, on the assumption that prisoners… had been trained by Al Qaeda to resist questioning, he pushed his superiors hard for more flexibility in interrogations. On December 2nd, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld gave formal approval for the use of hooding, exploitation of phobias, stress positions, deprivation of light and auditory stimuli, and other coercive tactics ordinarily forbidden by the Army Field Manual.

   No limits were placed on the extent or combination of these cruel tactics.  The path to torture had no obstacles.

    Mora went to Gordon England, then Secretary of the Navy, now Deputy Secretary of Defense.  Then he confronted William Haynes, general counsel for the Pentagon and protege of David Addington, Dick Cheney’s secrecy-cum-power czar and promoter of detainee interrogation policy.  At the time, Mora was unaware that similar interrogation techniques were being practiced outside Guantanamo, such as at Abu Ghraib or the Bagram military base in Afghanistan.

    Mora pushed and argued.  He threatened to sign a memo depicting the interrogations as “at a minimum cruel and unusual treatment, and at worst, torture.”  

   Defense Secretary Rumsfeld’s response was

• to suspend his authorization of the techniques and form a special working group of lawyers, including Mora, to develop interrogation guidelines
• solicit a separate opinion from the Office of Legal Counsel at the DOJ, drafted by another Addingtonian, conservative scholar John Yoo;  it effectively superseded the special group — and did not ban cruel treatment of detainees
• sign a report a year later — making it a military order.  The report was from the working group and conformed to Yoo’s faulty legal analysis;  it was created without the knowledge of Mora or other internal legal critics.

Without Mora’s knowledge, the Pentagon had pursued a secret detention policy. There was one version…aimed at critics. And there was another, giving the operations officers legal indemnity to engage in cruel interrogations, and, when the Commander-in-Chief deemed it necessary, in torture.

   The secret detention policy had a secret parallel policy:  con the legal critics within the Administration into believing they were making contributions.  Lull ’em, shut ’em up.  Then blindside ’em.    

   At an ACLU conference yesterday, Mora stressed the need to eliminate cruelty, in addition to torture.  The detention center at Guantanamo Bay is beyond repair from the abusive treatment of its residents. It should be closed altogether, he said.  

   With the signing of the Military Commissions Act on October 17, 2006, our President continues to govern in arrogant secrecy from his know-nothing bubble.  Isolated from clear-headed considerations of national interest, Cheney’s extremist crewmaster and sidekicks may have celebrated prematurely.  The law is certain to be challenged, some portions headed for the head.  

   Which Democrat will lie low, a pragmatic Brer Fox watching Republicans get stuck in the tar baby of electoral politics?  Which Democrat will continue to condemn the interrogation policies fostered by this Administration?  Who will demand closure of Guantanamo Bay?

  Cruelty disfigures our national character.  It is incompatible with our constitutional order, with our laws, and with our most prized values.  … there is no more fundamental right than to be safe from cruel and inhumane treatment.  Where cruelty exists, law does not.

  Alberto Mora said it best, tempered lawyerly passion and all.

[update to diary of Oct. 11, 2006]
   On slow news days, semi-comical stories have provided momentary respites from the thunder of war, about who was interrogated as a suspected terrorist simply because of a coincidence of names on the no-fly list.

• September 2002: Sister Virgine Lawinger, a 74-year old Catholic nun, and nineteen other anti-war members of Peace Action Wisconsin, was escorted by two sheriff’s deputies for questioning, detained overnight in San Francisco;
• August 2004:  Senator Ted Kennedy told the Senate Judiciary Committee of how he had been stopped five times that Spring in East coast airports;  it took his staff three weeks to have his name removed from the no-fly list;
• September 2004: Yusuf Islam, formerly Cat Stevens, was deported rather than allowed to continue his flight from London to Washington for a business meeting.

    The Electronic Privacy Information Center (“EPIC”) collected documents and filed suit under the FOIA in December, 2002.  Because it appeared the watch lists were used to interfere with travel plans of political activists, EPIC’s suit sought the criteria for putting names on the watch lists, but received no clear answer.  
    The watch lists are maintained and shared by the Transportation Security Administration, One more big brother bureaucratically bungled branch of the Department of Homeland Security. Three years and $144 Million later, TSA hasn’t fixed the flaws.  Instead, the list has grown to include 44,000 names, in addition to 75,000 on a selectee list for extra questioning. Many are such common names as “Sam Adams” and “David Nelson.”  Others on the list clearly are not terrorists, such as Bolivia’s president, Evo Morales Ayma. Sister Glenn Anne McPhee, until recently head of the Department of Education for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, struggled for nine months in 2003 and 2004 to have her name removed from the list.  By August 2005, a TSA spokeswoman told a reporter, 89 children had submitted their names to be removed from the list.  

    Journalists Joseph and Susan Trento obtained a copy of the no-fly list and co-wrote Unsafe at Any Altitude.  Interviewed on “60 Minutes” for a show to be broadcast this Sunday, Trento explained that the root of the list was the FBI’s national criminal information list, which was embarrassingly screwed up.

“Air travel is in crisis,” said Joseph Trento. “Our government has spent literally billions of dollars to create a bureaucracy that federal investigators tell us is demonstrably less effective than what was in place before 9/11.” …
   UNSAFE documents, for the first time, how the Bush Administration attempted to deflect the blame for 9/11 on to the private companies then responsible for passenger screening. The Trentos describe the plight of Frank Argenbright, the founder of what was one of the world’s largest aviation security companies, [who was] the only American singled out for blame by the White House and the U.S. Department of Justice for the tragedy of 9/11. The Atlanta businessman, who was then suffering from cancer, no longer owned the company at the time…. “Argenbright was hung out to dry, basically to take the pressure off the Administration.”

    The ACLU has called for discontinuing the list altogether.  Its analysis of FOIA-obtained documents about the aviation watch lists details more mismanagement and ineffectiveness.

The ability of individuals to receive fair treatment when caught up in this system is still lacking after 5 years. Innocent victims cannot discover if they are a victim of the inaccuracies that riddle government and private databases, have been falsely accused of wrongdoing by someone, or have been discriminated against because of their religion, race, ethnic origin, or political beliefs.

Clearly, placement on the list is a highly subjective process subject to enormous discretion by invisible, unaccountable security workers.

   In February of this year, the ACLU’s legislative counsel, Timothy Sparapani, testified before the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation.  

The problem from a security and civil liberties perspective is that both the No Fly and Selectee Lists, which are at the heart of the Secure Flight proposal, are bloated with names of individuals who have absolutely no connection to terror and do not have the capability of threatening aviation security.  This leads to numerous cases of False Positives, which distract TSA from finding the actual terrorists.

   Mr. Sparapani described four examples of the treatment in 2005 of “false positive” passengers:

Passenger David XXXXX (Aug. 16, 2005) was surrounded by armed police with guns drawn at the ticket counter when he was mistakenly identified as being on the No Fly List.  Moreover, when he arrived at the gate, his checked luggage was brought to him, and he was forced to witness the search of his belongings at the gate, the whole process taking two hours.  

Passenger Gregory XXXXX (May 9, 2005), after having his luggage thoroughly searched, was separated from his five-year-old son who was hysterically crying and escorted into a private room where he was subjected to a cavity search and genital inspection.  Gregory has been wrongly delayed overnight on five separate occasions and whoever is accompanying him is also subject to delays and searches.

Passenger, Mary XXXXX (May 16, 2005) was forced by TSA screeners to be screened with a machine (Smiths Detection Ionscan Sentinel II), which she was told checked “to see if I have a bomb inside me.”  This machine photographed her and TSA denied her repeated requests to view the picture or be provided a copy.

Passenger Hussein XXXXX (July 23, 2005) is a Lebanese citizen who has been a legal resident of the U.S. since 1992.  During his layover in Minneapolis, Minnesota while flying from Lebanon to Seattle, Washington, he was escorted off the plane by five security officers to a room away from the gate.  He was questioned about his family, extended family, how he files taxes, his business, his real estate holdings and so forth. Additionally, the officers demanded he give them access to his computer, which he initially refused because it contained confidential information about his clients. After five hours of interrogation, he was exhausted and delirious so the officers gave him a choice of either being detained overnight and being questioned the following day or having an appeal inspection in Seattle.  He was scheduled to appear at the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Office in Seattle on July 25, 2005.  In the past, he has had similar experiences.  For example, on October 3, 2004, he was stopped in Portland, Oregon on his way to Frankfurt, Germany by U.S. Customs who interrogated him.  He was given no medical attention when he fainted, and security officers laughed at him while they waited until he regained consciousness.

    Someone at the Transportation Security Administration, has a sense of humor:  its logo is “Vigilant, Effective, Efficient.” TSA answers the call for discontinuing the list with a vague catalogue of changes in store for Secure Flight (the formal name for the no-fly list):  a staff will review and scrub the existing list; your personal information will be shared only with those who have a need to know; redress mechanisms are devised.  The TSA website’s links to “redress procedures” and to its “Passenger Identity Verification Program”  go nowhere, just to show they are truly vigilant, effective and efficient.      

   Under Chertoff’s lead, TSA has joined FEMA as joke  material for late-night t.v. monologues.  But we’re kidding on the square.  There is no excuse for inefficient and ineffective bureaucracies which purport to promote public safety — scamming us for  multi-millions, ignoring complaints for years.  

   How long do we have to wait for the Department of Homeland Security to be junked?

   Katherine Harris has changed for the worse since her empty-headed decisions as Florida’s Secretary of State helped Bush into the White House and herself into Congress. Now in a race for the Senate, she is shoveling inane religious muck.  Harris and her ilk are the original public dangers, believing (or pretending to believe to attract votes) they are The Light to Lighten the Gentiles.

    She trails the Democratic incumbent, Sen. Bill Nelson, by 28 points.  Nelson, who traveled on the space shuttle Columbia when he was in the House, is a moderate who has opposed drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and pressed for more affordable prescription drugs.  

     Desperate for evangelical votes, as reported in the Orlando Sentinel Harris has now attacked Sen. Nelson’s faith.  She said he “claims to be a Christian” but votes “completely contrary to what we believe.”

   Interviewed for the Florida Baptist Witness, periodical of the Florida Baptist State Convention, Harris warned of bushels of sins should Nelson be re-elected.  She pointed to Nelson’s votes for stem-cell research, against Judge Alito, against a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage and against banning funding for medical procedures for which the religious right created the erroneous and misleading term “partial-birth abortion.”  Apparently fairness and honesty don’t top her list of Christian values:  she neglected to mention Nelson’s key votes such as those on tax issues, which would have pleased his constituency.

   “I have a 100 percent voting record with the Christian Coalition [and] with the traditional values groups,” she claimed.  She figures she is best suited for the Senate, inasmuch as

• “God is the one who chooses our rulers”
• “if people aren’t involved in helping godly men in getting elected than we’re going to have a nation of secular laws. That’s not what our founding fathers intended and that’s certainly isn’t what God intended.”
• “if you’re not electing Christians then in essence you are going to legislate sin [permissible abortions and gay unions]… then average citizens who are not Christians, because they don’t know better, we are leading them astray…

There’s gotta be a barf bag around here somewhere.
Nunc Dimittis.