Torture: We Must Keep Our Eye on the Ball
We've all seen issues like this before: It starts-out vaguely, eventually crystalizes into a finite form, and then goes vague again as the counterattacks mount. Next thing you know, the original straightforward issue is all but lost in an incomprehensible flurry of documents, exposes', charges, countercharges, lies, truths, half-truths, and irrelevancies. I knew we were heading for trouble when I started hearing Roosevelt, Truman, and Churchill turning-up in this discussion.
So far, I'm sure of just ONE thing: The Bush people are scared to death. One suspects a potential universe of Pandora's boxes - 'waterboarding' perhaps among the least of them, conveniently trotted-out like Brer Rabbit's briarpatch to divert attention from even graver and more obvious abuses. They never imagined that they would be in this position (ie, bunkered-in against a hostile Congress and White House, public opinion floating slowly and inevitably against them). It went sour for them so quickly, that the speed itself is frightening. Underneath all this extraneous desperate mud, one REAL question continues to sit - solid as a post, and undismayed: WERE CRIMES COMMITTED? Everything else is secondary, and may matter more as mitigation in a potential 'penalty' phase down the road than it matters now.
Keep our focus on LAW in spite of all distractions, and we will eventually break thru to a workable semblence of the untidy truth.
"So far, I'm sure of just ONE thing: The Bush people are scared to death"
- I'm pretty sure it's Pelosi, Rockefeller, Roberts who's scared to death.
These Democratic leaders have been complicit in approving torture as the ranking Democrats on the intelligence committee of congress that controls the budget and has the power to impeach a sitting president.
All of them should be impeached and sent home.
Ooops, that will change plans on filibuster-proof majority.
So we'll ignore the little inconvenient truth....
May 9, 2009 11:04 AM | Reply | Permalink
Lalo,
You misread my point: If something illegal was allegedly done, follow it, find it, and appropiately punish it. Period.
The more I try to say beyond that simply draws me more deeply into the very trap I'm suggesting we avoid.
Politics is what it is, law is what it is.
May 9, 2009 11:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'm with you!
May 9, 2009 11:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think to do what you suggest will require the following:
1. Find out what exactly was done
2. Determine if what was done was illegal
2. Punish what is illegal
If that's what you're advocating, I'm with you.
But I'm not sure that's what you're advocating, because, as your post clearly suggests, you have already decided that #2 was illegal without following the proper legal course. Why do you insist on rule of law for #3 and not #2?
Secondly, the inevitable political/ideological calculations have already entered the picture, again as shown very clearly in your post.
So do you REALLY believe that Democrats will postpone healthcare reform and fillibuster-proof majority to follow the rule of law?
May 9, 2009 11:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
Should read 1, 2 and 3, obviously
May 9, 2009 11:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
Lalo,
Your sequence is exactly correct.
I've 'decided' nothing, in any legal sense. I say that the Bush people are scared because they and their defenders in the media, on the hill etc. ACT scared. They seem to me like people who think they have something to hide. Other areas where I've speculated are simply my own best educated guesses, and I think clearly described as such.
Others are free to see it differently, and none of that proves anything one way or the other. All the more reason for formal legal investigations.
May 9, 2009 11:53 AM | Reply | Permalink
"I've 'decided' nothing, in any legal sense"
- but then you are admitting that the entire "torture scandal" is not based on legal reality - for you. In other words, it's a political theater - for you. Right??
May 9, 2009 12:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
false dichotomy and red herring alert
May 9, 2009 4:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Lalo,
Huh? Let's let it go - we're getting off the rails.
May 9, 2009 5:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
There is that damn "Rule of Law" thingy raising its ugly head again.
Oh how I bet that many in DC (especially near Langley, VA) and a couple of folks (maybe one in particular) near the SMU campus in Dallas and another dude in an undisclosed location wish that this "Rule of Law" thingy would disappear.
How about a Rule of Man: You don't torture another person.
May 9, 2009 11:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
"They never imagined that they would be in this position"
I disagree strongly.
I agree that the chaff machine has been geared up to test the will a and resolve of Congress, Obama, and the people. So far it looks pretty impotent except for bloggers who spend their time attacking strawman notions and red herrings.
It isn't really a question of whether crimes were committed. Crimes clearly were committed but not all questionable conduct was criminal in the legal sense, and not all can be prosecuted soundly. It's a question of distinguishing which conduct was criminal in which specific ways. The kind of investigation done will tend to frame the kinds of conduct which can be found and examined. Special prosecutor, Congressional Committee, Truth Commission, ... these all have their own frames.
It also transcends questions of particular transgressions of law. There are moral and ideological issues here too.
May 9, 2009 5:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
Translation: even if it's not a crime under law,
even if one's presumed innocent until proven otherwise - crimes clearly have been committed. Talk about false dichotomy and red herring...
You are worse than the worst social conservative.
Whatever you cannot legally prosecute by the rule of law, you will compensate by playing up morality and ideology.
Liberals finally found their own version of abortion and gay marriage....
May 9, 2009 5:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
Your perversion is merely childish.
May 9, 2009 8:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
eds,
This will be my last comment on this thread, but I think it's important to repeat this point: In my opinion, we MUST stay with LAW. When we get into morality and ideology, we muddy the waters in exactly the way I discussed originally. These are inherently subjective areas, not easily reconciled to fundamental conclusions. It's fairly obvious that a thorough investigation will reveal facts tending more toward embarassing to certain parties than toward 'illegal', but it's also fairly likely there will be some of both. The public is entitled to whatever judgements it wants to make on the first, but the law should make its' own objective judgements on the second.
May 9, 2009 5:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
Law is fine, but don't ignore that law exists in a larger setting and law does not equal justice.
May 9, 2009 8:03 PM | Reply | Permalink