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September 08, 2006
Yay, Torture!
Although there is a lot that goes on that I'd like to post here to make sure people reading this blog know it's going on, I usually don't. This is a blog about Mexico and our Mexico experience, and I try to keep it focused on that positive stuff.
However, this story caught my eye and made me think, "man, I'm sure glad I'm out of the United States." It's from an article in the New York Times, but you can read about it all over the place. I'm sure most people in the United States are not, though.
Interrogation Methods Rejected by Military Win Bush's Support
By ADAM LIPTAK
Published: September 8, 2006Many of the harsh interrogation techniques repudiated by the Pentagon on Wednesday would be made lawful by legislation put forward the same day by the Bush administration. And the courts would be forbidden from intervening.
The proposal is in the last 10 pages of an 86-page bill devoted mostly to military commissions, and it is a tangled mix of cross-references and pregnant omissions.
But legal experts say it adds up to an apparently unique interpretation of the Geneva Conventions, one that could allow C.I.A. operatives and others to use many of the very techniques disavowed by the Pentagon, including stress positions, sleep deprivation and extreme temperatures.
That the executive branch wants to give themselves more flexibility in violating human rights does not surprise me. What really gets me down is the continuing chorus of Americans that keep spouting meaningless jingoistic clichés and vague doublespeak to convince themselves and other Americans that our long-valued concept of due process is simply outdated and worthless.
John C. Yoo, a law professor at the University of California, Berkeley, and a former Justice Department official who helped develop the administration's early legal response to the terrorist threat, said the bill would provide people on the front lines with important tools.
“When you're fighting a new kind of war against an enemy we haven't faced before,” Professor Yoo said, “our system needs to give flexibility to people to respond to those challenges.”
In June, in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, the Supreme Court ruled that a provision of the Geneva Conventions concerning the humane treatment of prisoners applied to all aspects of the conflict with Al Qaeda. The new bill would keep the courts from that kind of meddling, Professor Yoo said.
Heh. "Meddling."
Do none of the rest of you find that creepy?
Posted by crispy at September 8, 2006 11:15 PM
Comments
While I am a longtime opponent of the administration, I must note that:
Constitutional protections don't apply to non-Americans.
The courts are kind of nutty with the way they usurp the law.
Both of those lead to the fact that the Constitution basically doesn't apply to anyone, any longer.
That is what I find creepy.
(Being in Mexico won't save you from the coming storm. Nice try, though!)
[crispy says: To usurp is to take by force or without right. Judges are given the right to give their interpretation to the law and the majority can be ousted during elections if the people don't like them. The problem is, Americans usually don't get that worked up about it enough to do anything about it.
Lawmakers often draw up laws based on the whims of the majority, which are often unconstitutional. That too is their right, but I find it disgusting how often they ignore what they know to be the spirit of the law to win votes.
I realize that constitutional protections don't apply to non-Americans. Yet if the American government goes around boasting about what a great system they have and how they're spreading American-style democracy throughout the world, isn't it something they should apply even with non-citizens? If not, what are they saying about the value of those protections? That citizens of our country in effect only buy them with their taxes?
If this passes, Americans believe that it's okay to use torture on people. It not only has been shown as ineffective in gaining accurate information, but it is inhumane. We're not talking about someone not being allowed to call their attorney, we're talking about people being tortured.]
Posted by: Mark Allen at September 10, 2006 05:53 PM
While I agree that Constitutional rights do not apply to non-US citizens, the prisoners that would be affected by the law would not qualify for any rights since they are in all likelihood outside the realm of the Geneva convention as prisoners of the vaguely defined "war on terror". In most cases applying the "human rights" policies of the home country would negate any limitations on the CIA, so what to do? I believe that some kind of policy has to be put in place to protect those who are only PRESUMED guily until such time as they are PROVEN guilty. It is one of the most beloved "rights" we US citizens enjoy in our far-reaching democracy. If we truly want to spread democracy we should practice a more legitimate version at home and that includes extending at the very least human diginity rights to those we choose to take into custody and investigate. Otherwise, our democracy is nothing more than the joke it is proclaimed to be throughout the Muslim world.
An additional aside, the courts usurp the law? Hmmm, I wonder what Congress is doing then whereby laws are not passed that represent what the true majority (now silenced in most states thanks to radical conversative blowhards claiming to represent the majority) wants nor complies with any semblance of what is a Constitutional right.
Posted by: Anonymous at September 14, 2006 11:17 AM
Chris - I sent the big long diatribe about 10 minutes ago but forget to identify it from me. Maybe you knew, maybe not but please don't autodelete because I am a nimrod. Now if you don't agree, feel free!
Posted by: Gim at September 14, 2006 11:23 AM
This policy is destroying the lives of innocent people.
Most recently, "Canada falsely accused torture victim." This story tells about a Canadian software engineer that was whisked away from JFK Airport because of a suspected link to al-Qaida and tortured for a year in a Syrian prison. Guess what? That suspicion turned out to be wrong!
Posted by: Chris Coen at September 19, 2006 08:22 AM