I have had the privilege of reading Glenn Greenwald’s new book, “How Would A Patriot Act” and I can’t recommend it highly enough. It is not just a litany of the gross abuse of power, the novel unconstitutional theories or the excessive fear mongering of the Bush years, although he lays them all out in frightening simplicity. This book is about how these actions debase our national character. I would submit that in this unpredictable era of global change, an immensely powerful nation like the US cannot lead, or even participate in any positive way, if the world believes it to be crassly amoral.
I’m not naive about American history. I know that the last two hundred plus years are rife with examples of our government failing to live up to its ideals. But for many of us who have grown up in the post World War II world of American dominance, watching our country casually discard its hard-won moral authority in favor of a childish insistence on “might makes right” is beyond disturbing. It hurts.
This is an issue with which every American, regardless of party, should be concerned. The founders knew that relying on the good will of men in power is stupid and we are seeing their predictions come true before our very eyes. The modern Republican leadership may currently have a monopoly on authoritarian impulses, but they are by no means the only people in this country who could be seduced by this Republican notion of executive authority. The constitution is what protects all Americans from the dark side of human nature when it has power over others, regardless of party or political philosophy. Those of us who worry about this usurpation of the constitution and degradation of the Bill of Rights know that this is not a passing fashion that will easily be tucked back into its former shape. Once you allow powerful men to seize power it’s awfully hard to persuade their successors to give it back.
As we go into this election season we are going to be talking a lot about what we stand for, what we believe and who we are as a party and as a country. This book is, in my view, necessary reading for everyone in the party who is working on our message. Unless we insist upon accountability for what these people have done, I fear that the country will not be able to recover. People need to see that our system of government can not only survive such assaults on its integrity, but that justice and the rule of law will reassert themselves under responsible leadership. It must be publicly demonstrated that this doctrine of unlimited presidential authority is unacceptable and Unamerican.
A distorted, authoritarian undemocratic view of American government has persisted now for more than a generation among certain conservatives. This philosophy has taken us from Watergate to Iran-Contra to Impeachment to the supreme court deciding a presidential election and the last five years of unprecedented assaults on the constitution in the name of a war that has no end. We need to drive a stake through the heart of this philosophy once and for all before it kills us. Greenwald’s book is one of the first stabs at doing that and it’s vital that the rest of us do our part.
If you believe as I do that this is the issue of our time, this book lays it all out in stark, clear prose. Send one to your Senator or congressman. They need to read it.
Bush = Lincoln? Sure. Like Dan Brown = Walt Whitman
In case you’re not yet convinced, Arthur Schlesinger explains why Bush ain’t Lincoln, and for the helluva it tosses in good reasons why Bush ain’t Truman, Eisenhower, or Kennedy either. Also, notice how Schlesinger cleverly disses Bush by pointing out that these three were war veterans, not drunken, promiscuous fratboys who used their fathers’ good name to avoid military service:
The issue of preventive war as a presidential prerogative is hardly new. In February 1848 Rep. Abraham Lincoln explained his opposition to the Mexican War: “Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion and you allow him to do so whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such purpose — and you allow him to make war at pleasure [emphasis added]. . . . If, today, he should choose to say he thinks it necessary to invade Canada to prevent the British from invading us, how could you stop him? You may say to him, ‘I see no probability of the British invading us’; but he will say to you, ‘Be silent; I see it, if you don’t.’ “
This is precisely how George W. Bush sees his presidential prerogative: Be silent; I see it, if you don’t . However, both Presidents Harry S. Truman and Dwight D. Eisenhower, veterans of the First World War, explicitly ruled out preventive war against Joseph Stalin’s attempt to dominate Europe. And in the Cuban missile crisis of October 1962, President Kennedy, himself a hero of the Second World War, rejected the recommendations of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for a preventive strike against the Soviet Union in Cuba.
It was lucky that JFK was determined to get the missiles out peacefully, because only decades later did we discover that the Soviet forces in Cuba had tactical nuclear weapons and orders to use them to repel a U.S. invasion. This would have meant a nuclear exchange. Instead, JFK used his own thousand days to give the American University speech, a powerful plea to Americans as well as to Russians to reexamine “our own attitude — as individuals and as a nation — for our attitude is as essential as theirs.” This was followed by the limited test ban treaty. It was compatible with the George Kennan formula — containment plus deterrence — that worked effectively to avoid a nuclear clash.
The Cuban missile crisis was not only the most dangerous moment of the Cold War. It was the most dangerous moment in all human history. Never before had two contending powers possessed between them the technical capacity to destroy the planet. Had there been exponents of preventive war in the White House, there probably would have been nuclear war.
A thrilling, beautiful description of the new science of evolution. Ostensibly a review of three books, the authors have written a succinct lay-person’s introduction (more like a toenail in the water) to the theory of “evo-devo,” the function of HOX genes, and other fascinating contemporary science. Don’t miss it.
Amid all the partisan rancor of congressional politics, the softball league has for 37 years been a rare case of bipartisan civility, an opportunity for Democratic and Republican aides to sneak out of work a bit early and take the field in the name of the lawmaker, committee or federal agency they work for.
This year, the league will be missing something: a lot of the Republicans.
During the off-season, a group of Republican teams seceded from the league after accusing its Democratic commissioner, Gary Caruso, of running a socialist year-end playoff system that gives below-average teams an unfair chance to win the championship.
The league “is all about Softball Welfare — aiding the weak by punishing the strong,” the pitcher of one Republican team told Mr. Caruso in an email. “The commissioner has a long-standing policy of punishing success and rewarding failure. He’s a Democrat. Waddya’ expect?” read another email, from Gary Mahmoud, the coach of BoehnerLand, a team from the office of Republican Majority Leader John Boehner.
Is every Republican in Washington the emotional age of seven? The rules require that some of the lesser teams get a chance to participate in the “playoffs” so the manly he-men who have shed their blood and sweat throughout the grueling season are angry that it denies them their rightful place atop congressional softball Olympus. After all, they deserve the glory:
The congressional league is a relaxed affair: No umpires call balls and strikes, so batters don’t have to swing until they get a pitch they like. Fields are open to the public, so most teams dispatch an intern or junior aide to reserve a field several hours before game time.
Can someone tell me why these awesome GOP athletes aren’t in Iraq instead of measuring their dicks in a slow-pitch softball league that a junior high girls team could easily dominate? Could it be because they are a bunch of pathetic, bedwetting chickenshits? I thought so.
Thanks to reader Samela for pointing out this incredible series in the Chicago Tribune outlining contractor abuses in Iraq. It’s rather surprising that no other papers or any of the networks have bothered to report the story (at least that I’m aware of) but I can understand it. The sheer volume on inhumane activity that the Bush administration has endorsed or perpetrated is so huge that it’s hard to keep up.
The top U.S. commander in Iraq has ordered sweeping changes for privatized military support operations after confirming violations of human-trafficking laws and other abuses by contractors involving possibly thousands of foreign workers on American bases, according to records obtained by the Tribune.
[…]
The State Department launched an investigation and promised other actions earlier this year in response to a series published Oct. 9-10 by the Tribune, “Pipeline to Peril,” that detailed many of the abuses now cited in the memos.
The stories disclosed the often-illicit networks used to recruit low-skilled laborers from some of the world’s most impoverished and remote locales to work in menial jobs on American bases in Iraq.
Although other firms also have contracts supporting the military in Iraq, the U.S. has outsourced vital support operations to Halliburton subsidiary KBR at an unprecedented scale, at a cost to the U.S. of more than $12 billion as of late last year.
This issue with contractors and human trafficking is not unique to Iraq. We experienced problems with them in Bosnia, too:
…[he] witnessed coworkers and supervisors literally buying and selling women for their own personal enjoyment, and employees would brag about the various ages and talents of the individual slaves they had purchased.”
…women and girls were handed over to bar owners and told to perform sex acts to pay for their costumes.The women who refused were locked in rooms and withheld food and outside contact for days or weeks. After this time they are told to dance naked on table tops and sit with clients. If the women still refuse to perform sex acts with the customers they are beaten and raped in the rooms by the bar owners and their associates. They are told if they go to the police they will be arrested for prostitution and being an illegal immigrant.”
This problem is compounded by the fact that there are a lot of questions as to whether or not there is any legal remedy. The military appears to be saying they will require contracts to include protections against human trafficking and abuses, but there’s no word on how such contracts can be enforced or whether they fall under under US or Iraqi law.
Q Thank you, Mr. President. It’s an honor to have you here. I’m a first-year student in South Asia studies. My question is in regards to private military contractors. Uniform Code of Military Justice does not apply to these contractors in Iraq. I asked your Secretary of Defense a couple months ago what law governs their actions.
THE PRESIDENT: I was going to ask him. Go ahead. (Laughter.) Help. (Laughter.)
Q I was hoping your answer might be a little more specific. (Laughter.) Mr. Rumsfeld answered that Iraq has its own domestic laws which he assumed applied to those private military contractors. However, Iraq is clearly not currently capable of enforcing its laws, much less against — over our American military contractors. I would submit to you that in this case, this is one case that privatization is not a solution. And, Mr. President, how do you propose to bring private military contractors under a system of law?
THE PRESIDENT: I appreciate that very much. I wasn’t kidding — (laughter.) I was going to — I pick up the phone and say, Mr. Secretary, I’ve got an interesting question. (Laughter.) This is what delegation — I don’t mean to be dodging the question, although it’s kind of convenient in this case, but never — (laughter.) I really will — I’m going to call the Secretary and say you brought up a very valid question, and what are we doing about it? That’s how I work. I’m — thanks. (Laughter.)
Despite all the hilarity, this is actually quite an important question. From Guantanamo to illegal wiretapping to military contractors, the law has been twisted or ignored by this administration. In the case of contractors who participate directly in the conflict, the law ironically suggests that they are “unlawful combatants.” If they are caught breaking laws in Iraq, they fall under no enforceable legal system and are merely sent home. Meanwhile, the unlawful combatants we capture, many of whom have now been found to be factually innocent, are held indefinitely in Guantanamo and in secret prisons around the world.
You will all likely recall that strange moment a couple of months ago when General Peter Perfect publicly contradicted Rumsfeld on the issue of whether or not an American soldier or marine was honor bound to stop abuses if he or she saw them happening. Pace said yes, Rumsfeld said they should just be “reported.” Guess what?
…there have been at least six joint U.S.-Iraqi inspections of detention centers, most of them run by Iraq’s Shiite Muslim-dominated Interior Ministry. Two sources involved with the inspections, one Iraqi official and one U.S. official, said abuse of prisoners was found at all the sites visited through February. U.S. military authorities confirmed that signs of severe abuse were observed at two of the detention centers.
But U.S. troops have not responded by removing all the detainees, as they did in November. Instead, according to U.S. and Iraqi officials, only a handful of the most severely abused detainees at a single site were removed for medical treatment. Prisoners at two other sites were removed to alleviate overcrowding. U.S. and Iraqi authorities left the rest where they were.
This practice of leaving the detainees in place has raised concerns that detainees now face additional threats. It has also prompted fresh questions from the inspectors about whether the United States has honored a pledge by Marine Gen. Peter Pace, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, that U.S. troops would attempt to stop inhumane treatment if they saw it.
[…]
The Iraqi official familiar with the joint inspections said detainees who are not moved to other facilities are left vulnerable. “They tell us, ‘If you leave us here, they will kill us,’ ” said the Iraqi official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because, he said, he and other Iraqis involved with inspections had received death threats.
The U.S. official involved in the inspections, who would not be identified by name, described in an e-mail the abuse found during some of the visits since the Nov. 13 raid: “Numerous bruises on the arms, legs and feet. A lot of the Iraqis had separated shoulders and problems with their hands and fingers too. You could also see strap marks on some of their backs.”
“I was not in charge of the team who went to the sites. If so, I would have taken them out,” the U.S. official wrote, referring to the detainees. “We set a precedent and we were given guidance” from the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, “but for some reason it is not being followed.”
Maj. Gen. John D. Gardner, the commander of U.S. detention operations in Iraq, said in an interview, “I would strongly disagree with the statement that Americans are seeing cases of abuse and not doing anything.”
There are other quotes by generals saying that no abuse of any kind has been seen, while other military officers admit that there has been torture including burning with cigarettes, dislocated shoulders from hanging from ropes etc. And the beat(ings) go on.
The US government has lost all moral authority and no longer even theoretically adheres to a consistent set of principles. It indefinitely imprisons citizens and non-citizens alike as non-combatants, some of them innocent, saying the “battlefield” comprises the whole planet, including Smalltown USA. Yet we place our own non-combatants on the real battlefield and protect them by saying there is no legal system that applies them. The taxpayers of this country are paying for human trafficking. The administration created a series of secret prisons for the sole purpose of circumventing American laws. The government advances theories of executive authority that kings and dictators could appreciate. And we are now in the process of enabling the country we liberated from a tyrant to create tyrannical institutions of their own in the name of democratic government.
Every one of those things will make us less safe and yet the perpetrators insist that they are all done to protect us. And they are finally admitting that most of this is done purely for domestic political reasons.
Mark Kleiman finds that the rightwing bigotsphere has decided the secret prison story was an elaborate ruse to trap CIA leakers. There never were any prisons.
I urge everyone to click this link and read Matt Stoller’s post about this threat to your access to Hullabaloo and other blogs if the rapacious greedheads get their way. This is no drill. The internet providers are trying to dismantle Net Neutrality, which is the principle that bars companies from blocking content they don’t like. Up to now the internet has been open, allowing innovations like blogging to emerge on the same playing field as the commercial web sites and compete for readers without needing to pay money for the privilege. With the help of Republicans and certain misguided Democrats, corporate America is about to change all that if we don’t stop them.
This isn’t some arcane technological issue. It affects all of us who surf the internet. It means that the network providers will be able to make deals with certain companies to degrade or cut off your access to its competitors to give you an incentive to use their service. The providers complain that companies like Google or Yahoo are making big bucks and they should get a piece of the action. But the only thing they have to offer these companies is access — and the only way they can assure them that they will get their money’s worth is by assuring them that they can deliver customers. Right now, everybody competes openly for readers and customers. If this bill passes, that will change. Internet providers will be in the business of delivering customers to certain web sites and they will likely use all the technical capability they have to do it.
Watch this very short video for a simple explanation of how this will work. Read Matt’s post on this subject. And contact your representative.
As Matt says:
Can we win this fight? Yes, we can. Congress isn’t that set on giving away the internet. They just don’t understand the issues involved and don’t think anyone’s paying attention.
I have been remiss in not publicizing this issue until now. This may very well affect what I do. If a telco or cable company decides they don’t like this blog, for political or any other reasons, they could theoretically slow it down or block it so that their customers cannot see it. In this environment that is a very scary thing.
Keep in mind that when the Bush administration decided they wanted to shred the constitution and conduct warrantless wiretaps, they went to the telephone companies and the telephone companies said not a word about it.
Consider that the former owners of my own cable company and internet provider, Adelphia, were right wing religious zealots (and crooks) who refused to show certain content on their cable line-up. And consider that there are only a handful of high speed internet services even in a metropolis like Los Angeles.
If you think that this country would be better off politically with another corporate cartel deciding what information you can have access to, then don’t bother calling your congressman. But if the internet has become an important source of news and information that you believe is important to a functioning democracy, get on the horn.
Here is a map showing where members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee stand on this subject. As it turns out my own congressman, a member, has not yet committed. He is going to hear from me today. Perhaps those of you who live here in Southern California (or not) would like to call or fax one of his offices and let him know where you stand.
Bush = Lincoln? Sure, And Ashlee Simpson = Yo-Yo Ma
by tristero
A week or so ago, Iran was the new Cuban Missile crisis. This week, Bush is the new Lincoln. Riiiiight.
For those who think this is a debatable comparison that deserves serious, thoughtful, and nuanced discussion, Bennet Kelley and Mahablog have saved the rest of us a lot of time.
Let’s see – Churchill, Kennedy, Lincoln – who’s next? Napoleon? Nope, he’s French for starters. Gandhi? Ehhh, it would just irritate Pakistan. Me, I’m leaning towards this guy or this one. Or maybe, given the way his poll numbers are going, Bush will go down in history as someone akin to this.
I wrote yesterday about the re-emergence of the shrieking harpies as the Republicans go down to defeat. I was speaking specifically of the wingnut gasbags, but Robert Parry points out that it is more than rhetoric. They are agitating to criminalize dissent. He cites this column by Tony Blankley:
The upcoming, unprecedented generals’ “revolt” described by Mr. Holbrooke, if it is not against the law, certainly comes dangerously close to violating three articles of the Uniform Code of Military Justice:
Article 94 — Mutiny and sedition Text (a) “Any person subject to this chapter who (1) with intent to usurp or override lawful military authority, refuse, in concert with any other person, to obey orders or otherwise do his duty or creates any violence or disturbance is guilty of mutiny; (2) with intent to cause the overthrow or destruction of lawful civil authority, creates, in concert with any other person, revolt, violence, or other disturbance against that authority is guilty of sedition; (3) fails to do his utmost to prevent and suppress a mutiny or sedition being committed in his presence, or fails to take all reasonable means to inform his superior commissioned officer or commanding officer of a mutiny or sedition which he knows or has reason to believe is taking place, is guilty of a failure to suppress or report a mutiny or sedition.”
Certainly, generals and admirals are traditionally given more leeway to publicly assess war policies than is given to those in lower ranks. But with that broader, though limited, discretion comes the responsibility not to be seen to in any way contradict the absolute rule of civilians over the military in our constitutional republic.
The president has his authority granted to him by the people in the election of 2004. Where exactly do the generals in “revolt” think their authority comes from?
Republicans truly seem to have the idea that when a president wins an election he becomes dictator (or a “decider” as some might call it) Keep in mind Blankley is talking here about officers who resign or retire and then speak out about the policy. He claims that if they did this en masse, by design, they would be guilty of mutiny and sedition and a whole bunch of other things. He’s desperately reaching for a legal way to stop these people from objecting to Bush’s policies, even after they are out o0f the military.
Meanwhile, Bill Bennett says that journalists should be in jail for reporting that the government is tapping the phones of would-be terrorists without a warrant. Parry rightly reminds everyone of what Alberto Gonzales himself said about that:
At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Feb. 6, 2006, Sen. Joe Biden, D-Delaware, asked Gonzales, “How has this revelation damaged the program” since the administration’s attack on the disclosure “seems to presuppose that these very sophisticated al-Qaeda folks didn’t think we were intercepting their phone calls?”
Gonzales responded, “I think, based on my experience, it is true – you would assume that the enemy is presuming that we are engaged in some kind of surveillance. But if they’re not reminded about it all the time in the newspapers and in stories, they sometimes forget” – a response that drew laughter from the citizens in the hearing room.
I know that the wingnuts don’t want to admit that the illegal wiretapping story is not about national security but rather about a heretofore unknown executive authority to flush the fourth Amendment down the toilet whenever it chooses, but that’s the issue.
The revelation of the secret prisons that is causing the harpies to foam at the mouth this week-end is equally ridiculous:
As for the secret prisons, the fallout appears to be largely political, causing embarrassment for countries that collaborated in what appears to be a clear violation of international law by granting space for “black sites” where torture allegedly was practiced.
The most likely consequence is that the Bush administration will find it harder in the future to set up secret prisons outside the scrutiny of the International Red Cross, the United Nations and human rights organizations.
Certain allies who were bullied or cajoled into accepting our torture facilities were exposed. I would not be surprised to find out that they were relieved not to have to host our sickening little gulag. It’s certainly hard to imagine they were entirely thrilled to have been drawn into our quixotic adventure in spreadin’ freedom through torture by serving as our illegal prison hosts.
Parry concludes:
… what appears most keenly at stake in the escalating political rhetoric is the Bush administration’s determination to stop its political fall by branding its critics – even U.S. generals and CIA officers – as unpatriotic and then silencing them with threats of imprisonment.
Bush is trying to mark the boundaries of permissible political debate. He also wants total control of classified information so he can leak the information that helps him – as he did in summer 2003 to shore up his claims about Iraq’s WMD – while keeping a lid on secrets that might make him look bad.
The firing of CIA officer Mary McCarthy and the threats of criminal charges against various dissenters are just the latest skirmishes in the political war over who will decide what Americans get to see and hear.
The other signal to Bush’s critics, however, is this: If they ever thought he and his administration would accept accountability for their alleged abuses of power without a nasty fight, those critics are very mistaken.
This is why the Democrats need to be very tough and make it clear that they are serious about holding this administration accountable for what they’ve done. If they are not out front, visibly willing to get these generals’ and these whistleblowers’ backs, they are sending a signal that these folks are on their own while the harpies are circling. Democrats need to step up here.
In this very interesting article in the American prospect, Ruy Texeira and John Helpin offer this thesis: “Progressives need to fight for what they believe in — and put the common good at the center of a new progressive vision — as an essential strategy for political growth and majority building.” I don’t know about you, but I believe in the Bill of Rights. (I actually think it may be the single best thing the United States ever did.)
I know it’s unfashionable to talk about rights at this political moment and that we are supposed to pull together and submerge our individual needs for the common good. But I’ve got to say that I think without a robust defense of the Bill of Rights, there is no common good. They are what allow the minority to participate in the common good. They are what allow the people to be heard and the truth to be spoken so that we can even know what the common good is. They are what restrains government from using its awesome power to repress its citizens instead of using it to promote the common good. In my mind, if Democrats don’t stand for the Bill of Rights then they stand for nothing. It’s the foundation upon which everything else we do is built.
So, as we go into this election season and we see the shrieking harpies like Bill Bennett and Tony Blankley agitating for the government to repress dissent, I hope the party keeps in mind that while braying about national defense, Republicans are increasingly “standing” for a police state. If we don’t defend the constitution then who the hell will?
Can someone explain to me why it’s assumed that Mary McCarthy leaked information for partisan reasons (because she gave money to the Kerry campaign) while her boss Porter Goss, who was a Republican congressman until a year and a half ago, is not assumed to have fired her for partisan reasons?
Remember, when Goss was head of the house intelligence committee, he had this to say about the alleged leak of covert operative Valerie Plame’s name to Robert Novak:
“Somebody sends me a blue dress and some DNA, I’ll have an investigation”
