Dispatch from a Red State, which asked to remain anonymous

Biscuit's on a reduced posting schedule for a few days, as we are visiting my natal home to give the kid some quality time with my parents.

Unfortunately, I grew up in a red state. Fortunately, it's a warm red state, with fresh orange juice. (The state forgot to request that I obscure identifying features when it asked for anonymity.) Since Boston is buried in more snow than we've seen in a hundred years, it was a perfect weekend to leave town. Also, my father bribed us with tickets to some lunch with Russ Feingold, who for not-quite-clear reasons no doubt involving a potential presidential run, was making the rounds.

My hometown is, um, a lovely place full of thoughtful, intelligent, kind, and tolerant people. For example, just outside of town a group has generously invested in an educational billboard. Last time the biscuit family visited, we came down for the week before the election to get out the vote for the Kerry campaign. Biscuit baby spent many hours on the grimy floor of the campaign office playing with a Mr. Potato-head of unknown origin. We made it back to Boston just in time to go mill around outside of Faneuil Hall while Kerry conceded the election. (There may have been some angry chanting involved, and I lost a lens out of my sunglasses and didn't notice till we got home.) Like everyone sensible, we then descended into a pit of despair.

So we were a teeny bit reluctant to come back to what for us was the scene of democracy's last stand. But, sun, warmth, no snow. Feingold was very nice. I thanked him for voting against Gonzales and gave him crap for approving Condi Rice. The Senator seems to think there's some hope that this administration will dig its own grave in the next four years, causing Americans to finally see the light. It's adorable, this optimism. Me, I think Americans will be digging graves for their sons and daughters for a long time yet, and all the time preaching of Patriotism, and Freedom, and Prosperity, and Strength, and Resolution, and Liberty. And the more graves they dig, the worse things get, the more certain people will become that the cause for which they sacrifice is a great one, that we are living in historic times, and have an opportunity to end tyranny forever and ever and ever. Cause geez, if that story's not true, then what are we dying for?

Feingold said something -- I don't quite remember what his exact words, but he was talking about Condi Rice comparing the post-WWII period with today and saying how we too had to work to spread liberty so that future generations -- points to Biscuit baby, nursing at the table immediately in front of him -- would reap the fruits of their vision. I'm not sure what particular statement he was referring to, but the general sentiment to which he referred is clearly part of the current 'message' from the administration. And don't get me wrong, Feingold was certainly not approving the administration's vision. He was saying yeah, we do have to think about future generations, and this administration is not.

But actually, he reminded me that I've been meaning to discuss the new message, and just how dangerous it seems to me, not because it's utterly hypocritical for the administration to talk about spreading freedom (although it is), but because it is a prophetic, totalizing, and apocalyptic vision of the future. Here's Condi in her opening statement during her confirmation hearing (all the emphasis is mine):

And in these extraordinary times, it is the duty of all of us, legislators and diplomats and civil servants and citizens, to uphold and advance the values that are core to our identity and that have lifted millions around the world. One of history's clearest lessons is that America is safer and the world more secure than ever and wherever freedom prevails. It is neither an accident nor a coincidence that the greatest threats of the last century emerged from totalitarian movements. Fascism and communism differed in many ways but they shared an implacable hatred of freedom, a fanatical assurance that their way was the only way, and a supreme confidence that history was on their side. At certain moments, it seemed that history might have been on their side. During the first half of the 20th century, much of the democratic and economic progress of earlier decades looked to be swept away by the march of ruthless ideologies armed with terrible military and technological power. Even after the Allied victory in World War II, many feared that Europe and perhaps the world would be forced to permanently endure half enslaved and half free.

The cause of freedom suffered a series of major setbacks: communism imposed in Eastern Europe, Soviet power dominant in East Germany, the coup in Czechoslovakia, the victory of Chinese communists, the Soviet nuclear test five years ahead of schedule, to name just a few. In those early years, the prospect of a united, democratic Germany and a democratic Japan seemed farfetched. Yet America and our allies were blessed with visionary leaders who did not lose their way. They created the great NATO alliance to contain and eventually erode Soviet power. They helped to establish the United Nations and created an international legal framework for this and other institutions that have served the world well for more than 50 years. They provided billions in aid to rebuild Europe and much of Asia. They built an international economic system based on free trade and free markets to spread prosperity to every corner of the globe. And they confronted the ideology and propaganda of our enemies with a message of hope and with truth. And in the end, though the end was long in coming, their vision prevailed.The challenges we face today are no less daunting. America and the free world are once again engaged in a long-term struggle against an ideology of hatred and tyranny and terror and hopelessness. And we must confront these challenges with the same vision and the same courage and the same boldness that dominated our post-world war period. In these momentous times, America has great tasks and American diplomacy has great tasks First, we will unite the community of democracies in building an international system that is based on shared values and the rule of law. Second, we will strengthen the community of democracies to fight the threats to our common security and alleviate the hopelessness that feeds terror. And third, we will spread freedom and democracy throughout the globe. That is the mission that President Bush has set for America in the world and is the great mission of American diplomacy today.
[...]
[Re: Cold War]The road was not always smooth, but the basic unity of purpose and values was there and that unity was essential to our eventual success. No president and no secretary of state could have effectively protected American interests in such momentous times without the strong support of the Congress and from this committee. And the same is true today. Our task and our duty is to unite around a vision and policies that will spread freedom and prosperity around the globe. I've worked directly with many of you and in this time of great challenge and opportunity, America's co-equal branches of government must work together to advance freedom and prosperity. In the preface to his memoirs, published in 1969, Dean Acheson wrote of the post war period that, Those who acted in this drama did not know, nor do any of us yet know, the end, close quote. Senators, now we know. And many of us here were witness to that end. The end was a victory for freedom, the liberation of half of a continent, the passing of a despotic empire and vindication for the wise and brave decisions made at the creation. It is my greatest hope and my deepest conviction that the struggle we face today will someday end in a similar triumph of the human spirit. Working together, we can make it so.

I distrust all talk of ends. Stories end. Movies end. Individual lives end. But history does not end. We could do with less rhapsodizing on these momentous times, our great mission, the end of tyranny, and the need for unity of purpose and values. From the mouths of reasonable people, these words would seem to me merely misguided hot air. But this administration is not 'reasonable people'. They are revolutionaries in the name of freedom! They will spread their freedom and democracy throughout the world, once and for all, even if they have to kill us all to do it.

"It's not censorship if we do it ourselves!" says PBS Prez

Via TPM, here's a Globe article on the Spellings-Lesbian-PBS thing. :

Last week, PBS agreed with WGBH that it was appropriate to air. On Friday, a PBS spokeswoman said that the PBS president, Pat Mitchell, had viewed the episode and was satisfied with its contents, especially in light of the fact that WGBH pushed back the air date of the episode from Feb. 2 to March 23 to allow member stations time to review the contents.

Over the weekend, Mitchell had second thoughts, said Wayne Godwin, chief operating officer of PBS. Her concern, he said, was that ''the debate surrounding this might cause parents to be concerned about PBS as a safe harbor. There is a concern that this particular material at this age group might not be appropriate.'

Godwin said that Mitchell reached her decision before she received a letter from Spellings. Godwin said he does not agree with those who say the government is censoring public television. ''There's always a tendency to dash to that conclusion,' he said.

In fact, Godwin said, PBS needs to evaluate itself to determine how such an episode reached an ''advanced stage of acceptance without us having more thoughtful involvement.'

One result of this incident may be the creation of a panel that would evaluate whether children's programming is suitable for broadcast, he said.

So we are actually expected to believe that the president of PBS changed her mind her ownself over the weekend, before she got the letter from Spellings. But in any case, PBS will set up a special panel right now to ensure that nothing that might get them in trouble with Spellings will ever show up on the network again.

Self-Esteem Suffers From Low Self-Esteem After New Studies Tell It It's Worthless

Via Crooked Timber

Kevin Drum relays the bad news that high self-esteem is basically good for nothing in terms of tangible outcomes. These findings sound much like the literature on optimism and pessimism, which finds that optimists overvalue their abilities and blame others for their mistakes. People with sunny dispositions are a real menace to society.

This tidbit of news is a perfect opportunity for me to get on one of my parenting soapboxes (a parent's best defense against being endlessly preached to about how best to raise one's child: preaching louder). It's not related to the usual biscuit diet of torture, torture, and more torture, but nicely dovetails with the "pessimism" aspect of the blog.

Max and I have noticed that other upper-middle-class parents (besides enrolling their babies in lots and lots of classes to teach them things like "movement") are always telling their kids "good job!" This is because the parenting experts have told them that they should praise their kids a lot so they'll have high self-esteem. This has driven us crazy ever since we read John Holt on how to turn your children into "praise junkies". Holt basically says that kids, like adults, know perfectly well when they've accomplished something worth praising, because they feel pride about it their ownselves. People are always telling their kids "good job!" (and telling OUR kid "good job") about stuff that is really no big deal. I've had people tell biscuit baby "good standing!", "good sitting!", "good eating!", etc. Of course, when your kid does something he's been working on for a long time, it's appropriate to share his excitement with him. But it doesn't make any sense to praise a kid for something he's not especially impressed about himself. It either causes your kid to lose touch with his own pride in his accomplishments, or else to react with cynicism and contempt when adults praise him. (Did the A's I got in school mean anything to me? Of course not -- I knew they hadn't taken any effort to get, so what did I care about Honor Rolls? )

Refraining from indiscriminate praise is not the same as withholding love. I'm pretty sure our kid knows we love him more than life itself, whether or not he's currently doing anything impressive. But I think most adults find that praise from others is ultimately hollow -- I don't know why we think that kids should experience it some other way. No one can fill the hole at the center of our being -- like humans have always, we must just live with it.

I want my kid to get good at living with that hollow place, because I don't believe anything I do as a mom can make it go away. I want him to not be so afraid of the hollow place, to not spend his whole life in a mad rush to fill it up with accomplishments and awards and things and people. I want him to know the hollow place won't make him crazy (something I am still trying to learn!), that love is possible despite the hollow place. We do not have to say "alas!" that we are hollow men. We can simply lean together, and live.

"this kind of subject matter"

TAPPED has a tidbit on one of the first acts of our new Education Secretary, Margaret Spellings, which was pressuring PBS to pull a show that incidentally included two lesbian couples.

I fear for our country.

Highlights from the Rice Hearings, Part #1

I've been reading the transcripts, just for fun, and also to see what else was said besides the widely-reported Rice-Boxer catfight. Here's what I've found so far:

1) Most hysterical statement about Saddam Hussein ever: "We knew that he was an implacable enemy of the United States, who did cavort with terrorists."

2) Rice on 'living in a fear society': "If a person cannot walk into the middle of the town square and express his or her views without fear of arrest, imprisonment and physical harm, then that person is living in a fear society. And we cannot rest until every person living in a fear society has finally won their freedom."

I would direct her attention to this report from The Hill, regarding a Senate staffer who was arrested for holding up a "No War" sign at the Bush Inauguration:

Ackerman, who said he plans to plead not guilty to the charge that he was “disorderly, loud and boisterous,” said that he thought his sign was within size restrictions and that he saw a government placard posting limits on the allowable size of signs at a security checkpoint.

But a Capitol Police spokesman, Sgt. Michael Lauer, said the Inaugural Committee clearly prohibits signs and banners. “You’re not allowed to protest on Capitol grounds unless you have permission to do so,” he said.

3) Senator Allen, after praising Reagan for calling the Soviet Union an evil empire, which paved the way for " hundreds of millions of people tasting that sweet nectar of liberty" in Central Europe, refers to the Voice of America and asks Rice what we can be broadcasting now to the Arab world to make sure they understand "our motivation or just the concepts of freedom, so that the people of Iraq and others in the Arab world have a fair and balanced view of the United States and our purposes and the concepts of individual liberty?"

You can't make this shit up.

4) Most Impressive Failure to Answer a Question:

VOINOVICH: But I am very concerned about what's going on in Serbia- Montenegro today. I'm very concerned about what's happening in Kosovo. Because I really believe that, unless things are stabilized in Serbia-Montenegro and we stabilize things in Kosovo, that we could very well have another crisis on your hands this year, particularly because we're discussing the final status of Kosovo, what's going to be happening there. I'd like to say that Mark Grossman has done a good job. I'd like to know, where is that on your priority list? And are you familiar with it? And what do you -- you know, we've got our NATO forces over there.

RICE: And so I think we have to have a new, renewed effort on that piece of it, getting our message out. We also have to have a new, renewed effort on getting our people back and forth. Because people, when they come to the United States and see who we are and can get past some of the filter of perhaps some of the sides of America that are not well-liked or respected, I think do come away with a different view of us. And so I will have a strong emphasis on getting our message out, on getting the truth to people, on diminishing the -- on doing something to mitigate against the propaganda that's out there against us, but also on going to our long-time partners and friends, and saying, We have a common purpose here, a great cause ahead of us. And the trans-Atlantic alliance, you know, sometimes it's a little bit like whatever it was that Mark Twain said about Wagner's music. I think he said it's better than it sounds. Well, in fact, our trans-Atlantic alliances are really better than people give us credit for. We're cooperating in a lot of places. We're working hard together in a lot of places. We've had a lot of successes. But we can do more in this period of tremendous opportunity to unify the great democracies, the great alliances for a push to spread freedom and liberty. I think it's an agenda that is inspiring. And I think we've done a lot already, but there is much more that we can do.

VOINOVICH: Thank you.

5) Best attempt to ask a question involving global warming without actually saying, you know, global warming:

MURKOWSKI: And there's a lot of focus right now on what's going on up north because of the climate change. We're wondering whether or not this is a permanent event or whether it's just part of a natural cycle. But we do know that it's a reality. We do know that it will have an impact on our lands, particularly up north. And what we're seeing is there's a potential for increased circumpolar maritime commercial activity, which is going to impact our northernmost boundaries, as well as substantial new scientific exploration in the Arctic region.

6) Statements in Rice opening remarks most likely to increase world cynicism:

It is neither an accident nor a coincidence that the greatest threats of the last century emerged from totalitarian movements. Fascism and communism differed in many ways but they shared an implacable hatred of freedom, a fanatical assurance that their way was the only way, and a supreme confidence that history was on their side.

Every nation that benefits from living on the right side of freedom has an obligation to share freedom's blessings.

We are joining with developing nations to fight corruption, instill the rule of law and create a culture of transparency.

We will insist that leaders who are elected democratically have an obligation to govern democratically.

We -- and I know you, Mr. Chairman; and I want to thank you for your role in this -- were heartened by the refusal of the people of Ukraine to accept a flawed election and heartened by their insistence that their democratic demands would be met.

Yeah, I know I'm supposed to get over it, and bothering to post excerpts when Condi's been confirmed is, as our dear friend John McCain might say, evidence that I'm a sore loser. What can I say? I'm not just a freedom-hater. I'm a sore-losing, baby-killing, gay-sex-loving, Christian-hating, commie-pinko-feminazi liberal supporting-the-terrorists freedom-hater.

Who says women can't have it all these days?

Salon on the "press conference"

Commenting on one reporter's "question", Salon asks::

Why not make it easier on everybody and just go with, 'Mr. President, do you believe that by criticizing your war policies Senators Kennedy and Boxer are in fact standing with the terrorists against democracy?'

A Few of My Favorite Senators

8 Senate Dems who voted No on Gonzales
Kennedy
Leahy
Biden
Feinstein
Schumer
Durbin
Edwards
Feingold

13 Senate Democrats who voted no on Rice
Akaka
Bayh
Boxer
Byrd
Dayton
Durbin
Harkin
Jeffords
Kennedy
Kerry
Lautenberg
Levin
Reed

Kennedy and Durbin get a special shout-out for voting no on BOTH!

Dissembler-in-Chief

I am watching GWB on the Cisco IPTV Viewer over which the undisclosed financial institution where I work streams MSNBC. I am agog. Why do reporters treat this pathological shitsmearer with deference? His false jocularity which is really open hostility; his complete evasion of questions with catch phrases like "I am going to speak directly to the American people on this one"; his endless hammering on his totemistic keywords "freedom" and "democracy."

I didn't notice him correcting reporters for using the term "private account", though see TPM for some creepy, creepy Orwellian language-shifting.

I'd love to see a White House press conference empty of any reporters. That way he could "speak directly to the American people," without the corrupting influence of insufficiently respectful (yet still utterly cowed) journalists.

God Bless Ted Kennedy

His office says he plans to vote against both Rice and Gonzales. Here's the statement.

Also, call these senators this morning, rumor has it that the judiciary committee is going to vote on Mr. Torture today. Call them even if they're not yours, they're keeping tallies of everyone who calls, not just constituents:

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA), committee chair 202-224-4254
Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT), minority leader 202-224-4242
Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) 202-224-5323

DailyKos Blogger Petition on Gonzales

There finally seems to be some momentum in the 'um, as human beings, we oppose the Gonzales nomination' department. DailyKos has a petition, and he can count Biscuit in: "With this nomination, we have arrived at a crossroads as a nation. Now is the time for all citizens of conscience to stand up and take responsibility for what the world saw, and, truly, much that we have not seen, at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere."

To Senators thinking of confirming the guy, I say: "This will go down on your permanent record!" And it won't be pretty.

What's worse than sanctioning torture? Lying about getting the Guv'ner off of jury duty

...notes TPM: "In our up-is-down political world, authoring memos which for the first time put the United States government on record sanctioning torture probably can't get you nixed for Attorney General. But fibbing about your role in covering up one of the president's DUIs just might. Newsweek's Isikoff is on the case."

Because we need more drug convictions in this country, damnit!

SCOTUSBlog:

The Supreme Court, in a 6-2 decision Monday, ruled that police do not violate the Fourth Amendment when they use a drug-detecting dog to locate illegal drugs in the trunk of a car during a legal traffic stop. In an opinion written by Justice John Paul Stevens, the Court declared: 'A dog sniff conducted during a concededly lawful traffic stop that reveals no information other than the location of a substance that no individual has any right to possess does not violate the Fourth Amendment.'

The Court majority stressed that it was ruling only narrowly, in a situation where a dog was used only to check out the exterior of a car stopped for speeding. Thus, the Court appeared to leave open the question of conducting a dog-sniff investigation outside of a home, if that were capable of detecting legal activity going on inside the residence. A number of cases are pending at the Court challenging the use of dogs to sniff the exterior of homes.

Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and David H. Souter dissented, but each indicated they were not saying police could not use dog-sniffs to detect explosives or biological weapons, perhaps used by a terrorist. The case was Illinois v. Caballes (03-923).

God Bless Ruthie and David. May they live, and serve, a long, long time.

The "Democrat" party.

It's official -- it is now the "Democrat" party -- since the WH has its official spokespeople calling it that, as shown in this WaPo story today: "'As we move forward with our efforts to talk about the problem and the need for reform, administration officials are talking about what leaders of the Democrat Party have said about the problem,' White House spokeswoman Claire Buchan said."

They probably like it cause it sounds like "Bureaucrat". And it's insulting, but in a way that no one can quite articulate. And if asked, they can always claim it's all just a slip of the tongue. As though, if Nancy Pelosi started calling them the "Republic" party in official statements, it wouldn't be questioned.

UPDATE:
Kos has a discussion of this here.

Actually, not just a slip of the tongue. Here are two written press release examples of Republican groups using the term:

Texas GOP Press Release, June 2004

New Hampshire Republican State Committee Press Release, April 2004

Everyone else who uses it seems to be an insane right-wing fanatical freak.

I wonder if I can get Bill Safire to do a words column and research the history of this use of the term for me. Ooh, and today was the last day I have to read his annoying op-eds in the Times.

God grants Bush second term, says He hates liberals

Prayer starts Bush's second term -- The Washington Times: "President Bush began his second term in office yesterday by praying for guidance at a church service in which the Rev. Billy Graham credited God for the president's re-election.
    'We believe that in Your providence, You've granted a second term of office to our president, George W. Bush, and our vice president, Richard Cheney,' the evangelist, 86, said in an opening prayer at the National Cathedral in Washington.
    'Their next four years are hidden from us, but they are not hidden from You,' said the preacher, who persuaded Mr. Bush to turn to God and away from the bottle at age 40."

Front Page News: Look America, Torture Works!!!

Boston.com / News / World / Europe / Guantanamo tip tied to arrests of 22 in Germany: "Information obtained through the interrogation of a Guantanamo Bay detainee led to a spectacular series of counterterrorism raids in Germany this month, in which more than 700 police swept through mosques, homes, and businesses in six cities and arrested 22 suspected militant extremists, according to a senior Defense Department official."

If I say I'm cynical about this revelation, which comes immediately before the Alberto Gonzales vote, was disseminated by an anonymous DoD official, and is reporting news that is two weeks old (so as not to be overshadowed by the Coronation parties), does that make me a terrorist sympathizer? Of course it does. I hate freedom, don't I?

Today's snowstorm

The snow.

Also, I appear to be blithely participating in an extraordinarily convenient information-gathering apparatus (Google's, who owns Blogger, Picasa, Gmail, and Hello) that can be coopted by our increasingly authoritarian state at some time in the future. They can search all of our political rants, and some of our photo library too! Whee!

Oh look, the military has deployed special ops domestically! What fun!

Sayeth The Times: Commandos Get Duty on U.S. Soil

Orlando Patterson on freedom

The Speech Misheard Round the World

In the 20th century two versions of freedom emerged in America. The modern liberal version emphasizes civil liberties, political participation and social justice. It is the version formally extolled by the federal government, debated by philosophers and taught in schools; it still informs the American judicial system. And it is the version most treasured by foreigners who struggle for freedom in their own countries.

But most ordinary Americans view freedom in quite different terms. In their minds, freedom has been radically privatized. Its most striking feature is what is left out: politics, civic participation and the celebration of traditional rights, for instance. Freedom is largely a personal matter having to do with relations with others and success in the world.

Freedom, in this conception, means doing what one wants and getting one's way. It is measured in terms of one's independence and autonomy, on the one hand, and one's influence and power, on the other. It is experienced most powerfully in mobility - both socioeconomic and geographic.

It's a good op-ed, read the whole thing.

Kids these days

From an article in WAPO about inauguration attendees: "'I liked being part of history, and the passage of power,' said Moidel, who said he considers himself a conservative Democrat. 'But the long lines and being protested against. . . . There was one lady who yelled at me, 'Are you prepared to die?' I guess she thinks Bush is an aggressive leader who will get us into war.'"

heh?

Too bad this article appeared on page A25

washingtonpost.com: Bush's Words On Liberty Don't Mesh With Policies: "President Bush's soaring rhetoric yesterday that the United States will promote the growth of democratic movements and institutions worldwide is at odds with the administration's increasingly close relations with repressive governments in every corner of the world.

Some of the administration's allies in the war against terrorism -- including Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Uzbekistan -- are ranked by the State Department as among the worst human rights abusers. The president has proudly proclaimed his friendship with Russian President Vladimir Putin while remaining largely silent about Putin's dismantling of democratic institutions in the past four years. The administration, eager to enlist China as an ally in the effort to restrain North Korea's nuclear ambitions, has played down human rights concerns there, as well."

Via some blogger I forget: "terrorist" word creep watch

ESPN.com - Team seeks millions to stay in Sunshine State: "The Marlins, though, may have a bigger hurdle on the other side of the Capitol, where Senate President Tom Lee appeared less receptive.

'I thought that we already appropriated money to help them move to Vegas,' he said. 'I was very disappointed that they publicly announced the negotiations and discussions with Las Vegas, and I don't negotiate with terrorists.'"

Wouldn't it be more appropriate to say "I don't negotiate with capitalists"?

Orcinus on God-Talk in the Coronation Address

here: "Some of my regular commenters have expressed doubt that religiosity like this (or that voiced by Clarence Thomas or right-wing theocrats) represents anything new or troubling. I think they're being taken in by the window dressing and not listening to what's really being said."

Jonathan Schell on Torture and Why the Alberto Gonzales vote matters

What Is Wrong with Torture:

Torture is not wrong because someone else thinks it is wrong or because others, in retaliation for torture by Americans, may torture Americans. It is the torture that is wrong. Torture is wrong because it inflicts unspeakable pain upon the body of a fellow human being who is entirely at our mercy. The tortured person is bound and helpless. The torturer stands over him with his instruments. There is no question of 'unilateral disarmament,' because the victim bears no arms, lacking even the use of the two arms he was born with. The inequality is total. To abuse or kill a person in such a circumstance is as radical a denial of common humanity as is possible. It is repugnant to learn that one's country's military forces are engaging in torture. It is worse to learn that the torture is widespread. It is worse still to learn that the torture was rationalized and sanctioned in long memorandums written by people at the highest level of the government. But worst of all would be ratification of this record by a vote to confirm one of its chief authors to the highest legal office in the executive branch of the government.

Torture destroys the soul of the torturer even as it destroys the body of his victim. The boundary between humane treatment of prisoners and torture is perhaps the clearest boundary in existence between civilization and barbarism. Whether the elected representatives of the people of the United States are now ready to cross that line is the deepest question before the Senate as it votes on the nomination of Alberto Gonzales.

Add some meow mix, and stir..

The coronation speech: "We will persistently clarify the choice before every ruler and every nation -- the moral choice between oppression, which is always wrong, and freedom, which is eternally right. America will not pretend that jailed dissidents prefer their chains, or that women welcome humiliation and servitude or that any human being aspires to live at the mercy of bullies.

We will encourage reform in other governments by making clear that success in our relations will require the decent treatment of their own people. America's belief in human dignity will guide our policies. Yet, rights must be more than the grudging concessions of dictators; they are secured by free dissent and the participation of the governed. In the long run, there is no justice without freedom, and there can be no human rights without human liberty."

Let us play this speech our president has given to all our captives, all over the world. We will play the speech for them, and it will break them.They shall know that Americans do not see their humiliation or despair, that the man responsible for their mistreatment believes in human dignity, human rights, and human liberty. "All who live in tyranny and hopelessness can know the United States will not ignore your oppression or excuse your oppressors." That man calls out to them, and says that "freedom is the permanent hope of mankind, the hunger in dark places, the longing of the soul." Let us play this speech to those who hunger in our dark places. Then they will understand that they are not human anymore, that there is no hope for them. If they were human, then they could have freedom, dignity, and liberty. They are in the custody of the country that wants that for all humans -- that wants to spread freedom. Ergo, they are not human.

That he can say those words, knowing what he knows about what has been done by this country, by his administration, in the name of freedom -- that he can say those words, and mean them, and believe in his great mission...

This is an incomprehensible post. I apologize. I have a headache. Some people are not people, but vermin. Everyone else gets freedom, but the vermin get waterboarding and permanent detention.

And those of us who get freedom? We get the word, sure. Words are easy. As long as we think we are free, then we're free. Right? And if in 20 years we come to see what we've done, what was done in our names, then will we say "but we were not free! it is not our faults"?

Andrew Sullivan prints some letters from his readers. "Hate to sound flip, but relax" says one. "What was being done ... is not torture by any conventional definition... At worst, we 'waterboard'. At best, they behead. I'm sorry, but these are new times with a truly evil enemy..." says one reader.

Bully on Andrew for not relaxing. Please, god, let us never relax about this.

Who let Robert Bork into WaPo?

I'm going to have nightmares tonight. This is Bork and some other guy I don't know complaining about evil activist courts and how they should keep their noses out of the war on terrorism. Here's the whole damn vile thing:

A War the Courts Shouldn't Manage (washingtonpost.com)

As speculation mounts about President Bush's nominees to the federal judiciary, and particularly to the Supreme Court, one factor that should be of paramount importance is too often overlooked. Curbing or reversing the Supreme Court's usurpation of so many domestic issues is crucial. But perhaps even more important is avoiding judicial micromanagement of America's war against radical Islamic terrorists. Already there are disturbing signs of judicial overreaching that is constitutionally illegitimate and, in practical terms, potentially debilitating.


The vast majority of war opponents and attorneys for captured terrorists are pressing for a full-fledged criminal law model never before applied to enemy combatants. Realizing that Congress and the president will not adopt their position, these litigants are resorting to the federal courts. Real abuses that inevitably occur in war, as well as in peacetime prisons, are being punished by our military, but that does not assuage critics who have an agenda other than justice. They allege that the abuses stem from the administration's legal analysis and that the analysis is contrary to the Constitution and to international norms. That is wrong on both counts.

A pair of confusing Supreme Court decisions handed down June 28 plowed the ground for astounding lower-court activism. Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, involving a petition for habeas corpus on behalf of a U.S. citizen held by the military as an enemy combatant fighting in Afghanistan, was a qualified victory for the government. The court approved the use of military tribunals but held that Yaser Esam Hamdi must have an opportunity to contest his status as an enemy combatant. It left unclear how that opportunity could be exercised, and it is difficult to see how it could be without calling witnesses from the combat zone, a procedure that would divert American soldiers from waging war.

Rasul v. Bush, on the other hand, was a disaster for the war effort. Aliens held at Guantanamo Bay, not a part of the United States or within the jurisdiction of any federal court, were held to have a right to a habeas petition. The result would seem to be that captured alien combatants held by the U.S. military anywhere in the world can henceforth litigate their status in federal courts.

Some lower federal courts have not resisted the temptation to insert themselves further into the conduct of the war. In doing so, they have interfered with the war effort while fostering the false impression that the executive branch is trampling on constitutional liberties. The district court's decision in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld (2004) is a prime example. The judge applied the Geneva Conventions in contradiction of the legal framework laid down in Hamdi, misread the conventions and severely encroached upon the president's war powers. In Omar Abu Ali v. Ashcroft (2004), another district court outdid the Supreme Court by finding that it had, at least potentially, authority to determine the legality of a foreign government's detention of an accused dual-nationality terrorist because of an allegation that the United States had prompted the detention.

Nearly 70 years ago, the court held in a famous decision (Curtiss-Wright Export Corp. v. United States) that the executive branch's extensive prerogatives in foreign affairs are grounded in its unique expertise, information and unitary nature. Courts have neither the constitutional authority nor the expertise and information to override the president's determinations on issues such as whether we are in armed conflict or what kind of anti-terrorist cooperation we should engage in with foreign governments. For obvious reasons, the executive cannot share all the relevant information with judges. Nor has the judiciary the necessary unitary nature, unless every case is decided by the Supreme Court.

Thus, in addition to fighting legal battles in court, the administration would be well-advised to make a far stronger public case for its detention policies, which are designed not only to prevent enemy combatants from returning to fight against us but also to obtain intelligence that might save the lives of American soldiers and civilians as well as shorten the war. Although current detention and interrogation procedures can surely be improved, and additional safeguards against abuses should be adopted, these ought to be matters for the political branches. Freezing policies through constitutional rulings should be a last resort. The executive and Congress, as circumstances change and experience accumulates, can debate and resolve in a flexible manner the policy imperatives of individual liberty and America's reputation overseas, on one hand, vs. the demands of collective safety. But in doing so they must avoid trampling on the president's constitutional prerogatives. Congress should not lay down detailed prescriptions on what interrogation techniques are appropriate. And it should resist the temptation to grandstand; passing exhortations against torture is not the way to proceed.

Sensitivity to these matters and the crucial but limited role of the judiciary should be taken into account in the choice of nominees to the courts and in the confirmation process. Too much is riding on the outcome of this war -- ultimately, perhaps, the survival of Western societies -- to choose judges who are unaware of the complexities of what is at stake.

Alleged abuse

At present, Amy is allegedly abusing herself by reading George W. Bush's coronation speech. She will post a followup after the point at which the alleged abuse may or may not reach its logical conclusion, which is to say, after the alleged "event" does or does not transpire within a specified timeframe of temporal intervals.

Department of Misleading Headlines, WaPo Torture Edition

NYTimes headline on Gonzales claims that he says ‘torture by U.S. Personnel Illegal’

Attorney general nominee Alberto R. Gonzales, responding to questions about his role in setting controversial detention policies, told members of the Senate Judiciary Committee that any form of torture by U.S. personnel is illegal, according to new documents released yesterday.

But Gonzales, the White House counsel who is expected to be confirmed by the Senate in coming weeks, declined to identify the techniques allowed under U.S. interrogation policies, citing restrictions on classified information. He also reiterated his view that a president could theoretically decide that a U.S. law -- such as the prohibition against torture -- is unconstitutional, though he dismissed the question as irrelevant under President Bush.

"The president has consistently stated that the United States will not use torture in any circumstances, so it is simply implausible that I would ever be called upon to address whether the president's constitutional authority as commander-in-chief would permit him to, in effect, nullify the torture statute for national security reasons," Gonzales wrote in one response. He added later: "I would approach such a question with a great deal of care."

Torture is illegal.
The president has said there will be no torture.
Although if he felt like it, he _could_ order torture.
We won't tell you how we _are_ interrogating people.
But whatever we're doing, it's not torture.
Cuz we said so.

The Biscuit family is going to New Zealand for the month of March, to see if maybe we might like living there instead.

Pentagon On Seymour Hersh

DoD News: Statement from Pentagon Spokesman Lawrence DiRita on Latest Seymour Hersh Article

The Pentagon's statements on Hersh stuff are hilarious reading. The lengths they must go to claim that he is factually wrong without actually providing any facts are impressive.

My favorite paragraph: "Arrangements Mr. Hersh alleges between Under Secretary Douglas Feith and Israel, government or non-government, do not exist.  Here, Mr. Hersh is building on links created by the soft bigotry of some conspiracy theorists.  This reflects poorly on Mr. Hersh and the New Yorker."

The "soft bigotry of some conspiracy theorists"?

Ask Not for What Laptop the Bell Tolls...

Brad Delong has some excellent advice for us all: "Remember: a machine has no mind: you cannot sense beforehand when it is about to betray you."

More Safire Insanity...

The New York Times > Opinion > Op-Ed Columnist: The Depressed Press:

On mainstream media's feeling that President Bush doesn't give a hoot about what we say or write: That's his loss more than ours. He may deliver an uplifting second Inaugural Address, but still does not appear thoughtful or adept at answering questions.

The reason: Bush holds quarterly, rather than the traditional monthly, news conferences. This lack of regular rehearsal costs him familiarity with issues, and costs his administration the discipline of deadlines for suggested answers. As the debates showed, Bush gets better with practice. He is not as good as he thinks he is when winging it.

Um, can we just look at what Safire is saying here? Bush's "lack of regular rehearsal costs him familiarity with issues". Actually, Mr. Safire, we expect the president to be familiar with issues whether or not he discusses them with the press. What you are saying here is that more frequent press conferences might force the president to actually know what he is talking about. This would be good because then he could give better press conferences. He just needs practice, the poor man....

Bob Herbert today

The New York Times > Opinion > Op-Ed Columnist: Out of the Darkness:

From my perspective, this is a dark moment in American history. The Treasury has been raided and the loot is being turned over by the trainload to those who are already the richest citizens in the land. We've launched a hideous war for no good reason in Iraq. And we're about to elevate to the highest law enforcement position in the land a man who helped choreograph the American effort to evade the international prohibitions against torture.

Never since his assassination in 1968 have I felt the absence of Martin Luther King more acutely. Where are today's voices of moral outrage? Where is the leadership willing to stand up and say: Enough! We've sullied ourselves enough.

I'm convinced, without being able to prove it, that those voices will emerge. There was a time when no one had heard of Dr. King. Or Oscar Arias Sanchez. Or Martin O'Brien, who founded the foremost human rights organization in Northern Ireland, and who tells us: 'The worst thing is apathy - to sit idly by in the face of injustice and to do nothing about it.'

Happy MLK Day

AlterNet: MLK Jr. In His Own Words:

My favorite: "Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. Hate destroys a man's sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as beautiful, and to confuse the true with the false and the false with the true."

Post opposes Gonzales

The Vote on Mr. Gonzales (washingtonpost.com):

A number of senators clearly believe, as we do, that Mr. Gonzales bears partial responsibility for decisions that have led to shocking, systematic and ongoing violations of human rights by the United States. Most apparently intend to vote for him anyway. At a time when nominees for the Cabinet can be disqualified because of their failure to pay taxes on a nanny's salary, this reluctance to hold Mr. Gonzales accountable is shameful. He does not deserve to be confirmed as attorney general.

[...]

According to the logic of the attorney general nominee, federal authorities could deprive American citizens of sleep, isolate them in cold cells while bombarding them with unpleasant noises and interrogate them 20 hours a day while the prisoners were naked and hooded, all without violating the Constitution. Senators who vote to ratify Mr. Gonzales's nomination will bear the responsibility of ratifying such views as legitimate.

Because of MY phone call... (did you make yours yet?!)

On Gonzales, Kennedy Breaks With Colleagues (washingtonpost.com): "Democratic senators have been lambasting President Bush's nominee for attorney general, White House Counsel Alberto R. Gonzales, for his role in developing aggressive administration policies for the detention and interrogation of suspected terrorists. But most have said they would vote to confirm him anyway. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) broke with his colleagues yesterday and said on television that he is 'leaning against' supporting Gonzales at the moment."

Mark Fiore's newest

Truth Enhancement 1/12/05

How can this be appropriate?

Inaugural05.com :Presidential Inauguration - Donor Information: "The Washington Post Washington DC $100,000"

"accountability moment" and "we don't want to be editorializing"

Quotes to add to the little red book, from a WaPo interview with Our Great Leader:

The Post: In Iraq, there's been a steady stream of surprises. We weren't welcomed as liberators, as Vice President Cheney had talked about. We haven't found the weapons of mass destruction as predicted. The postwar process hasn't gone as well as some had hoped. Why hasn't anyone been held accountable, either through firings or demotions, for what some people see as mistakes or misjudgments?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, we had an accountability moment, and that's called the 2004 election. And the American people listened to different assessments made about what was taking place in Iraq, and they looked at the two candidates, and chose me, for which I'm grateful.

[...]

The Post: Will you talk to Senate Democrats about your privatization plan?

THE PRESIDENT: You mean, the personal savings accounts?

The Post: Yes, exactly. Scott has been --

THE PRESIDENT: We don't want to be editorializing, at least in the questions.

The Post: You used partial privatization yourself last year, sir.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes?

The Post: Yes, three times in one sentence. We had to figure this out, because we're in an argument with the RNC [Republican National Committee] about how we should actually word this. [Post staff writer] Mike Allen, the industrious Mike Allen, found it.

THE PRESIDENT: Allen did what now?

The Post: You used partial privatization.

THE PRESIDENT: I did, personally?

The Post: Right.

THE PRESIDENT: When?

The Post: To describe it.

THE PRESIDENT: When, when was it?

The Post: Mike said it was right around the election.

THE PRESIDENT: Seriously?

The Post: It was right around the election. We'll send it over.

THE PRESIDENT: I'm surprised. Maybe I did. It's amazing what happens when you're tired. Anyway, your question was? I'm sorry for interrupting.

Yum, propaganda. It's what's for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

The New York Times > Washington > Social Security Agency Is Enlisted to Push Its Own Revision:

Over the objections of many of its own employees, the Social Security Administration is gearing up for a major effort to publicize the financial problems of Social Security and to convince the public that private accounts are needed as part of any solution.

The agency's plans are set forth in internal documents, including a 'tactical plan' for communications and marketing of the idea that Social Security faces dire financial problems requiring immediate action.

Social Security officials say the agency is carrying out its mission to educate the public, including more than 47 million beneficiaries, and to support President Bush's agenda.

The invisible injuries of war...

Marine vs. Marine in Interstate 64 shooting

Denial not just a river in egypt...

FT.com / Home UK - Powell gives bleak assessment of Iraq security problems: "According to Chas Freeman, former US ambassador to Saudi Arabia and head of the independent Middle East Policy Council, Mr Bush recently asked Mr Powell for his view on the progress of the war. 'We're losing,' Mr Powell was quoted as saying. Mr Freeman said Mr Bush then asked the secretary of state to leave."

The Permanent Propaganda Machine

From WaPo:

President Bush plans to reactivate his reelection campaign's network of donors and activists to build pressure on lawmakers to allow workers to invest part of their Social Security taxes in the stock market, according to Republican strategists.

White House allies are launching a market-research project to figure out how to sell the plan in the most comprehensible and appealing way, and Republican marketing and public-relations gurus are building teams of consultants to promote it, the strategists said.

The campaign will use Bush's campaign-honed techniques of mass repetition, never deviating from the script and using the politics of fear to build support -- contending that a Social Security financial crisis is imminent when even Republican figures show it is decades away.

[...]

With resistance hardening among congressional Republicans, the White House is escalating efforts to get Social Security restructured this year. There will be campaign-style events to win support and precision targeting of districts where lawmakers could face reelection difficulties. As Republicans signaled earlier, they have begun hard-hitting television ads to discredit opponents and prop up the Bush plan.

The same architects of Bush's political victories will be masterminding the new campaign, led by political strategists Karl Rove at the White House and Ken Mehlman at the Republican National Committee.

Bush set the tone for campaign-style lobbying earlier this week with a speech promoting his plan. Yesterday, during an appearance at Catholic University, Vice President Cheney sought to counter opponents' arguments about the risks of the plan, saying that limiting investment options should keep the accounts safe, while harnessing the power of the stock market should provide a far higher rate of return than Social Security reserves now receive.

"Young workers who elect personal accounts can expect to receive a far higher rate of return on their money than the current system could ever afford to pay them," Cheney told an audience of college students and administrators.

This morning, White House budget director Joshua B. Bolten will begin courting business on the issue with a speech at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. And that is all before Bush takes the oath of office for a second term on Thursday and delivers his State of the Union address on Feb. 2.

Mehlman, who was the Bush-Cheney campaign manager and is the RNC's incoming chairman, said the campaign apparatus -- from a national database of 7.5 million e-mail activists, 1.6 million volunteers and hundreds of thousands of neighborhood precinct captains -- will be used to build congressional support for Bush's plans, starting with Social Security.

"There are a lot of tools we used in the '04 campaign, from regional media to research to rapid response to having surrogates on television," he said. "That whole effort will be focused on the legislative agenda."

[...]

In addition to their own efforts, White House and RNC officials are working closely with the same outside groups that helped Bush win reelection in 2004, especially Progress for America, a political organization with close ties to Rove. RNC officials have privately told top congressional aides they will work with Progress for America and others to provide political cover through television ads supporting the Bush position and condemning those who oppose it. To coincide with Bush's new drive, Progress for America is running a television ad on Fox and CNN that compares Bush to Franklin Roosevelt, the father of Social Security.

The group also phoned or e-mailed Republicans, culled from its list of more than 1 million supporters, to enlist their help in selling the Bush plan, either by donating money or talking up the plan to neighbors. Brian McCabe, a spokesman for the group, said it is applying the lessons it learned electing a president to selling a public policy.

One lesson was "realizing the importance of getting information in front of a lot of people," he said. "When it comes to Social Security, for instance, few know even the basic facts."

Once the debate intensifies, Progress for America and other pro-Bush groups such as the National Association of Manufacturers plan to target individual congressional members with the precision of an election campaign.

"We have through CNN and Fox painted with broad brushes," McCabe said. "Over time, we will take our messages inside states and communicate with individual members."

Via Salon, fabulous doublespeak from Scott McClellan

Press Gaggle with Scott McClellan:

Q There's a report out that Iraq could become an important breeding ground for terrorism. Is the President concerned about that?

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, I think the report talks a lot more -- about a lot more than that. We welcome the report. I think the report confirms that our strategy of staying on the offensive and spreading freedom to win the war on terrorism is the right approach. We are in a struggle of epic proportions and the stakes are high, and the President believes it's important to continue to advance freedom in a dangerous region of the world because it will make the world a more peaceful place, and make America more secure. And so I think that's the -- this report is a speculative report about things that could happen in the world, but we welcome the report and --

Q To what extent is he concerned that Iraq has become, or is becoming a breeding ground for terrorism --

MR. McCLELLAN: I think we talked about this before -- the terrorists recognize how high the stakes are. We're fighting them abroad so that we don't have to fight them here at home. And the way to win the war on terrorism is to stay on the offensive and work with the international community to bring to justice those who seek to do us harm, and to work together to advance freedom, particularly in the broader Middle East region. And that's how we ultimately defeat the ideology of hatred that terrorists espouse.

Q But has the war -- did the war create a vacuum that has made it more conducive for terrorists to use Iraq as a base?

MR. McCLELLAN: The President talked about that during the campaign. I mean, that's just a misunderstanding of the war on terrorism.

Q -- the President to talk about this, as a central front of the war on terrorism, when essentially, what the report is suggesting is that it is a central front created by and essentially helping terrorism.

MR. McCLELLAN: Did the report say that?

Q -- insinuating that it's a place where it's a breeding ground for --

MR. McCLELLAN: I think the report, like I said, confirms that we have the right strategy for winning the war on terrorism, which is to stay on the offensive and go after the terrorists, and to work to spread freedom and hope to regions of the world that have only known tyranny and oppression. And the war on terrorism is won by staying on the offensive and spreading freedom.

We are staying on the offensive to defeat the terrorists, and to suggest otherwise is just a misunderstanding. We are fighting them abroad so that we don't have to fight them at home. The terrorists recognize how high the stakes are. The elections coming up in Iraq are a significant achievement for the Iraqi people, and it's another step forward on the path to democracy in Iraq. And when we achieve peace and democracy in Iraq, it will be a significant blow to the ambitions of the terrorists and their ideology of hatred and oppression that they espouse.

Q Does the President --

MR. McCLELLAN: That's the stakes that are involved. This is a struggle of ideologies. It is an epic struggle, and the stakes are high.

Q Does the President disagree with the report's conclusion that the war and the uncertainty on the ground has created a breeding ground for terrorism?

MR. McCLELLAN: I think we just answered this question. We just went through it, so I would go back to what I just said, and those are, I think, the points to make.

Q I mean, the reason that we keep asking the question again is that it's just confusing to me how you can say it confirms your strategy is the right approach when there is terrorism in Iraq now, a terrorist breeding ground in Iraq now and growing there, and wasn't there before. So how does that confirm your approach?

MR. McCLELLAN: That's assuming that terrorists would just be sitting around doing nothing if we weren't staying on the offensive in the war on terrorism. I mean, by going on the offensive we've been able to liberate two countries, the people of two countries -- in Afghanistan and Iraq. And now we must continue to do everything we can to support efforts to build democratic futures for the people of the region. And that's exactly what we'll continue to do.

But I disagree with the characterization of the report, because I think the report confirms that we have the right strategy to win the war on terrorism, because of what I said a minute ago. So I would disagree with that. And this is -- the report looks at much more than just that. It's a speculative report that looks at a number of areas in the world, and we welcome the report. It's important to look at what the report has to say. And I don't think we've had time to look at the whole report, and I would encourage each of you to look at the whole report, as well, and maybe -- because I think some of the characterization is off the mark.

More protest ideas:

black-thursday.com

Black out your website on Jan 20th

BushBlackOut - 24 Hours Of Silent Protest

Not One Damn Dime!

Not One Damn Dime!

Don't spend money on January 20th.

Michael Isikoff on death squads

MSNBC - ‘The Salvador Option’: "[O]ne Pentagon proposal would send Special Forces teams to advise, support and possibly train Iraqi squads, most likely hand-picked Kurdish Peshmerga fighters and Shiite militiamen, to target Sunni insurgents and their sympathizers, even across the border into Syria, according to military insiders familiar with the discussions. It remains unclear, however, whether this would be a policy of assassination or so-called 'snatch' operations, in which the targets are sent to secret facilities for interrogation. The current thinking is that while U.S. Special Forces would lead operations in, say, Syria, activities inside Iraq itself would be carried out by Iraqi paramilitaries, officials tell NEWSWEEK."

I'd say it was farce, but torture can never be anything but tragedy...

digby on idiot metrics in the WOT:

Like the mediocre, hack bureaucrats they are, they [Rumsfeld et al] decided that they would guage success or failure --- certainly they would report to the White House success or failure --- based upon the sheer numbers of raids, arrests, interrogations, reports, confessions and breakdowns achieved, regardless of whether any of it resulted in good intel or enhanced security anywhere.

This was the only metric they could conceive of and in order to get those numbers up they had to detain large numbers of innocent people and torture them for false information to fill the endless reports of success on the ground in Afghanistan, Gitmo and Iraq. They could hoist up a huge pile of paper in a meeting with their president and say, 'look at how much intelligence we're getting. We're really getting somewhere.'

What amazes me is that people still behave as though all the torture that resulted from this focus on the numbers was unanticipated by those at the top. It may well have been, but anyone who has ever read even the tiniest bit of history knows that the arrest and torture and sometimes death of innocents has always been the result of such a numbers game.

Marie Cocco on Democratic Senators' Cowardice re: Gonzales

Democrats' Fury, and Values, Go AWOL:

No senator has come forward to oppose Gonzales. Senate Republicans coalesce around their commander-in-chief. Senate Democrats coalesce around a strategy of convenient fecklessness.

The Democrats are, of course, opposed to torture. They have, they say, 'serious questions' or 'grave concerns' or 'deep reservations' about Gonzales' record on the subject. And they are, most all of them, planning to vote for him anyway.

Just like most of them voted to give the president authority to invade Iraq, even though they had serious questions and grave concerns and deep reservations about that, too. The Iraq war vote, more than anything, is what ignited the Dean insurgency. There was this sense - a correct one - that Democrats in Washington would not stand up to stop George W. Bush even when they sensed the president was driving us over a precipice.

Now these senators are poised to take the following position: They are against torture but they are for the man who set the stage for torture.

[...]

Enabling the Bush administration's habit of escaping accountability for even the grossest failure isn't smart politics. It's cowardice. If Democrats are to compete on the political turf of values, they'd better find some they stand for.

Fucking the future

Arianna Huffington: America's Finite Future?: "It's important to point out, however, that it's not just the White House and the End-Timers. Acting as if we have a finite future has infected our entire culture. Just look at personal savings, which have fallen to next to nothing, with Americans socking away a meager two-tenths of 1 percent of their disposable incomes. Meanwhile, the average U.S. household carries about $14,000 of credit-card debt; one in four consumers spends more than he or she can afford; and, as a result, every 15 seconds, someone somewhere in America is going bankrupt. Which, I guess, in Bush World is how an angel gets his wings. 

All this represents a seismic shift in our cultural outlook. Since our founding, the American ethos has been forward-looking, geared to a bountiful future, with each generation of parents working as hard as they can to ensure a better life for their children. Those days are clearly gone.

And it has put our entire civilization at grave risk – a point echoed with great clarity by Jared Diamond, whose new book, Collapse,' looks at the reasons why so many great civilizations of the past have failed.

Although Diamond offers a range of reasons why these societies collapsed, one message comes through loud and clear: We've got to stop living like there is no tomorrow – or 'f – - the future' will become a self-fulfilling prophecy."

Also, the future's not even a good lay.

Torture memo links; Jay Leno

Conatus: Memo links includes this choice comment from Jay Leno: "According to the New York Times, last year White House lawyers concluded that President Bush could legally order interrogators to torture and even kill people in the interest of national security - so if that’s legal, what the hell are we charging Saddam Hussein with?"

More on torture...

Andrew Sullivan's excellent review of two new books about the torture will appear in the NYT Sunday book review. As is now usual, it is already online. Sully often annoys the hell out of me, but his continued focus on and abhorrence of the torture has been really wonderful. Read the whole review, but some choice quotes below:

And the damage done was intensified by President Bush's refusal to discipline those who helped make this happen. A president who truly recognized the moral and strategic calamity of this failure would have fired everyone responsible. But the vice president's response to criticism of the defense secretary in the wake of Abu Ghraib was to say, ''Get off his back.'' In fact, those with real responsibility for the disaster were rewarded. Rumsfeld was kept on for the second term, while the man who warned against ignoring the Geneva Conventions, Colin Powell, was seemingly nudged out. The man who wrote a legal opinion maximizing the kind of brutal treatment that the United States could legally defend, Jay S. Bybee, was subsequently rewarded with a nomination to a federal Court of Appeals. General Sanchez and Gen. John P. Abizaid remain in their posts. Alberto R. Gonzales, who wrote memos that validated the decision to grant Geneva status to inmates solely at the president's discretion, is now nominated to the highest law enforcement job in the country: attorney general. The man who paved the way for the torture of prisoners is to be entrusted with safeguarding the civil rights of Americans. It is astonishing he has been nominated, and even more astonishing that he will almost certainly be confirmed.

But in a democracy, the responsibility is also wider. Did those of us who fought so passionately for a ruthless war against terrorists give an unwitting green light to these abuses? Were we naïve in believing that characterizing complex conflicts from Afghanistan to Iraq as a single simple war against ''evil'' might not filter down and lead to decisions that could dehumanize the enemy and lead to abuse? Did our conviction of our own rightness in this struggle make it hard for us to acknowledge when that good cause had become endangered? I fear the answer to each of these questions is yes.

[..]

I'm not saying that those who unwittingly made this torture possible are as guilty as those who inflicted it. I am saying that when the results are this horrifying, it's worth a thorough reassessment of rhetoric and war methods. Perhaps the saddest evidence of our communal denial in this respect was the election campaign. The fact that American soldiers were guilty of torturing inmates to death barely came up. It went unmentioned in every one of the three presidential debates. John F. Kerry, the ''heroic'' protester of Vietnam, ducked the issue out of what? Fear? Ignorance? Or a belief that the American public ultimately did not care, that the consequences of seeming to criticize the conduct of troops would be more of an electoral liability than holding a president accountable for enabling the torture of innocents? I fear it was the last of these. Worse, I fear he may have been right.

Presented without comment...

by the AP: "Bush administration comments on WMDs (pre and post war).

Iraqi Victim Says U.S. Torture Worse Than Saddam

from Common Dreams, reported originally in Reuters:

A former inmate at Iraq Abu Ghraib prison forced by U.S. guards to masturbate in public and piled onto a pyramid of naked men said Tuesday even Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein did not do such things.

The inmate testified at the court martial of reservist soldier Charles Graner, accused ringleader of guards who engaged in the abuse, which prompted outrage when pictures of the sexual humiliation were published around the world.

"I couldn't believe in the beginning that this could happen, but I wished I could kill myself because no one was there to stop it," Hussein Mutar, who was sent to Abu Ghraib accused of car theft, said in videotaped testimony.

And also: "At the trial military prosecutors have presented evidence not seen before in public from Abu Ghraib, including a video of forced group masturbation and a picture of a woman prisoner ordered to show her breasts."

This is my country, land that I looo-oove! [ insert further patriotic off-key singing ]

Matt Yglesias on why dems should not claim to be open to compromise

TAPPED: "Right now, strictly speaking, the White House doesn't need any Democratic support to pass a bill and doesn't expect to give much up in order to get it. That means there's no basis for a genuine compromise. The only way to get a compromise is to convince the Republicans that a failure to achieve one is going to bring the rest of their agenda crashing down around them. That calls for demonstrating an eagerness not for compromising with the GOP but for using Social Security as a political bludgeon with which to destroy the Republican Party. "

Cornel West on hope v. optimism

AlterNet: Prisoners of Hope:

The country is in deep trouble. We've forgotten that a rich life consists fundamentally of serving others, trying to leave the world a little better than you found it. This is true at the personal level. But there's also a political version, which has to do with what you see when you get up in the morning and look in the mirror and ask yourself whether you are simply wasting your time on the planet or spending it in an enriching manner. We need a moral prophetic minority of all colors who muster the courage to question the powers that be, the courage to be impatient with evil and patient with people, and the courage to fight for social justice. In many instances we will be stepping out on nothing, hoping to land on something. That's the history of black folks in the past and present, and of those of us who value history and struggle. Our courage rests on a deep democratic vision of a better world that lures us and a blood-drenched hope that sustains us.

This hope is not the same as optimism. Optimism adopts the role of the spectator who surveys the evidence in order to infer that things are going to get better. Yet we know that the evidence does not look good. The dominant tendencies of our day are unregulated global capitalism, racial balkanization, social breakdown, and individual depression. Hope enacts the stance of the participant who actively struggles against the evidence in order to change the deadly tides of wealth inequality, group xenophobia, and personal despair. Only a new wave of vision, courage, and hope can keep us sane – and preserve the decency and dignity requisite to revitalize our organizational energy for the work to be done. To live is to wrestle with despair yet never to allow despair to have the last word.

Biscuit's mom complains about hypocritical Christians

on Democratic Underground today: The Religious Wrong

Yes, Biscuit is very proud of her mommy.

Best..Correction...Ever

From Andrew Sullivan

Correction: The newly minted word "santorum" - meaning "the frothy mixture of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the byproduct of anal sex" - didn't win the word of the year according to the American Dialect Society; it won the most outrageous word of the year. My apologies.

Department of Software Development, excuses edition

'Minor' Software Glitch Is Cited in Missile Failure (washingtonpost.com): "The test failure last month of the Bush administration's new missile defense system resulted from a 'very minor' computer software glitch that can be easily corrected and will have no effect on the system's ability to defend the United States against attack, the general in charge of the Pentagon program said yesterday."

All software glitches are minor, right up until something explodes.

continued death throes of the mainstream media. CBS edition

Hollow Accountability (washingtonpost.com): "Later, '60 Minutes' killed a report about whether the Bush administration had relied on false documents in making the case that Iraq tried to buy uranium from Niger. A CBS spokesman said it would have been 'inappropriate to air the report so close to the presidential election' -- a statement just plain stunning in its implications. First of all, it was late September -- a full month before the election -- and, second, isn't affecting elections what can happen when journalists do their jobs? I mean, are we supposed to withhold the truth because, in addition to making you free, it might make you change your vote? This was a dark day for CBS and for all journalism."

Don't be fooled: White House STILL thinks torture is A-OK

The New York Times > Washington > White House Fought New Curbs on Interrogations, Officials Say:

At the urging of the White House, Congressional leaders scrapped a legislative measure last month that would have imposed new restrictions on the use of extreme interrogation measures by American intelligence officers, Congressional officials say.

The defeat of the proposal affects one of the most obscure arenas of the war on terrorism, involving the Central Intelligence Agency's secret detention and interrogation of top terror leaders like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, and about three dozen other senior members of Al Qaeda and its offshoots.

The Senate had approved the new restrictions, by a 96-to-2 vote, as part of the intelligence reform legislation. They would have explicitly extended to intelligence officers a prohibition against torture or inhumane treatment, and would have required the C.I.A. as well as the Pentagon to report to Congress about the methods they were using.

But in intense closed-door negotiations, Congressional officials said, four senior members from the House and Senate deleted the restrictions from the final bill after the White House expressed opposition.

Call your senators

to tell them not to confirm Alberto Gonzales as AG

For MA residents:

Kennedy

315 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
202/224-4543

2400 JFK Building
Boston, MA 02203
617/565-3170

Kerry
http://kerry.senate.gov/

Washington D.C.
304 Russell Bldg.
Third Floor
Washington D.C. 20510
(202) 224-2742 – Phone
(202) 224-8525 – Fax
Click here to email Senator Kerry

Boston
One Bowdoin Square
Tenth Floor
Boston, MA 02114
(617) 565-8519 – Phone
(617) 248-3870 – Fax

For those of you not living in the Commonwealth, see http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

Democracy at work...

Military to play big role in Inaugural security

Tom Ridge, the homeland security secretary, said Tuesday that even in the absence of any specific security threat to next week's presidential inauguration, civilian and military forces had been ordered to an extraordinarily high state of alert.

"You can well imagine that the security for this occasion will be unprecedented," Mr. Ridge said at a news conference. "Protective measures will be seen. There will be quite a few that are not seen. Our goal is that any attempt on the part of anyone or any group to disrupt the inaugural will be repelled by multiple layers of security."

In his first detailed outline of inauguration security planning, Mr. Ridge said that more than 6,000 civilian and military personnel trained in crisis response, crowd control and dignitary security would be in place, with thousands more available to respond if necessary.

At the heart of the plan are tightly controlled security zones that will restrict pedestrian and vehicle access to the streets around the Capitol, where Mr. Bush will be sworn in, and over the route of the traditional parade along Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House.

Before the inauguration events, security teams will sweep through hotels and office buildings along the parade route, in some cases barring office workers from sitting near windows overlooking the procession.

[...]

The military will play a more visible role in this inauguration, with 2,500 troops involved in security, said Maj. Gen. Galen B. Jackman, commander of the Joint Task Force-Armed Forces Inaugural Committee, which coordinates military operations for the inauguration.

"We believe we are ready to deter any type of attack," General Jackman said before Mr. Ridge's news conference.

The general wore camouflage gear as he spoke with reporters in front a group of battle-dressed soldiers who carried automatic weapons.

The security plan for the inauguration is based on a system of overlapping zones. Vehicular traffic will be restricted from an outer zone about six blocks from inauguration sites. Pedestrians will be screened at 22 checkpoints set up around an inner zone perimeter about two blocks from event locations. An even more restrictive area in the vicinity of the swearing-in and the parade bleachers will be closed to anyone without a ticket or an invitation.

In a break with past inauguration parades, protest groups are being assigned specific areas for their demonstrations in a way that protest organizers say will enable law enforcement agencies to exert tighter control over them.

Bill Safire thinks our "personal, political, and national character" are "stronger and better than ever"

The New York Times > Opinion > Op-Ed Columnist: Character Is Destiny:

Call me a chauvinist unilateralist, but I believe America's human and economic sacrifices for the advance of freedom abroad show our personal, political and national character to be stronger and better than ever. This moral advance will be more widely appreciated as an Islamic version of democracy takes root. (What's triumphalism without a triumph?)

It is that growing strength of national character - more than our individual genius or political leadership or military power - that ensures the future success of America and brightens the light of liberty's torch.

What universe is he living in?! We're thinking of death squads to supplement our already-impressive assortment of morallly indefensible behavior (extraordinary rendition, detention without trial, torture, etc.) and our national character is "stronger and better than ever"? This is patently fascist speech. I fear for our country...

The Eichmann defense...

Here's another blogger's comment on the involvement of doctors in torture:

The banality of evil indeed. The U.S. medical personnel interviewed by Bloche and Marks compartmentalize and then subordinate their individual conscience, professional ethics, and international laws to dictates of military service, and in their compartmentalization and subordination echoes the final plea of Adolf Eichmann:

I cannot recognize the verdict of guilty. . . . It was my misfortune to become entangled in these atrocities. But these misdeeds did not happen according to my wishes. It was not my wish to slay people. . . . Once again I would stress that I am guilty of having been obedient, having subordinated myself to my official duties and the obligations of war service and my oath of allegiance and my oath of office, and in addition, once the war started, there was also martial law. . . . I did not persecute Jews with avidity and passion. That is what the government did. . . . At that time obedience was demanded, just as in the future it will also be demanded of the subordinate. (emphasis added, "Eichmann's Final Plea")

That future that Eichmann predicted is here now -- or rather it has been with us always, invisible only to those who thought: "It Can't Happen Here."

Why write our doctors about torture?

One of my correspondents asked me what the point was of writing to our doctors about torture. He asked what influence he had over his doctor, and what influence his doctor had over the Bush Administration's policies. He said he thought the most effective action is continued exposure of the torture, and that saying you're against torture is "too easy." All good points. Here is my response:

Of course, the torturers need to be exposed. But where do you think the pressure comes to expose them? What drives individuals who have access to torture memos, to photographs, who have witnessed and participated in torture, to leak those memos, stories, photos to the press? It is their sense that what has happened is wrong, and that THEY CAN AND SHOULD DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. We do not know who we know who might know someone who does have access, who can make a difference. I may not know a doctor who has served in Iraq and has important information that he/she might be convinced to reveal, but my doctor might. Or others of my doctors' patients might. Or his colleagues might.

In a sense, what I'm urging is exactly like the common advice for job-hunters: Put the word out to everyone that you won't stand for this, they shouldn't stand for it, and they expect their friends, family, neighbors, doctors, bankers, and furniture-makers also not to stand for it.

As it stands today, there are lots of people who don't know what is going on. They don't even know who Alberto Gonzales is, much less why he's important. They have no idea what Biscuit teams are, or why they should oppose them. They saw Abu Ghraib, they accepted the administration's line that this was an isolated incident, and they'd rather not think about torture anyway. No one they know is expecting them to do anything about it, because hey, what influence do they have on the Bush Administration anyway. If they do think about it, they feel helpless, like there's nothing they can do, so they say "well, I don't have any influence." And they think about something else, because hey, torture is just no fun to think about .

In addition, there are a lot of people out there who would say that torture is wrong, except that in this case those bastards killed innocent Americans, they behead people, they are scum, and we have to get information out of them, and what's happening isn't really torture anyway, and it's not worse than they deserve, and it's guilty people, and so on. These people may not be able to be convinced that torture is wrong in any circumstances, but they can be convinced they are in the minority, if enough of those who think torture is wrong speak up. But if we don't speak up because we assume that everyone else thinks torture is always wrong, then those people won't know they're in the minority.

If we each personally took responsibility for influencing all the people we do have influence over, then the wave of personal responsibility will spread, and very quickly reach the people who have more direct responsibility. As for whether you have any actual influence over your doctor, I don't know. But I suspect the simple shock of receiving a letter from a patient about a non-medical issue will cause your doctor to give the letter a real reading, out of curiosity if nothing else. Having read the letter, your doctor a) knows what is happening if he/she did not before b) knows that one of his/her patients thought this was so outside the pale that he contacted his doctor about it, breaking a very strong taboo against bringing 'politics' into a 'business' or 'patient-doctor' relationship, and turning the traditional patient-doctor authority upside down by asserting a moral authority over your doctor. Both of these circumstances increase the likelihood that your doctor will also act by making it clear to everyone he/she knows that something very wrong is happening. Perhaps not by very much, but by a little bit.

I've just finished reading a book based on extensive post-war interviews with rank-and-file members of the Nazi party, They Thought They Were Free. I wrote a blog entry about what I learned from it, at http://www.kafka.com/politics/2005/01/new-years-resolutions.php I hope you'll read it, I think it's very relevant here. And then I hope you'll say, well, maybe I don't have any influence over my doctor, but maybe I do. If it's so easy (too easy, you say) to say you're against torture, then why not say it?

More stuff you'd rather not think about

AlterNet: A Dispatch From Bizarro World:

'The internal evidence – the awful details of the abuse itself and the clear logical narrative they take on when set against what we know of the interrogation methods of the American military and intelligence agencies – is quite enough to show that what happened at Abu Ghraib, whatever it was, did not depend on the sadistic ingenuity of a few bad apples. This is what we know. The real question, now, as so often, is not that we know but what are we prepared to do,' Danner writes.

Apparently, we are prepared to sit by and watch the confirmation of Bush's attorney general nominee Alberto Gonzales, a key player in the Bush administration's attempt to re-write the Geneva Conventions.

Biscuit Recipes

The LA Times has an op-ed by the guys who wrote the NEJM article on doctors and torture...

Critical to understanding the medical role is the change in interrogation doctrine introduced by Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller and his team, first at Guantanamo, then at Abu Ghraib. A classified memo, prepared by Miller in late 2003, made the case for "fusion" of all prison functions to support the "interrogation mission."

Miller argued that "Behavioral psychologists and psychiatrists" were needed to "develop … integrated interrogation strategies and assess … interrogation intelligence production." To this end, he called for creation of "Behavioral Science Consultation Teams," known as "Biscuits," made up of psychologists and psychiatrists.

Desperate for some edge against a worsening insurgency in Iraq in November 2003, U.S. commanders implemented Miller's design at Abu Ghraib. In one example that came to our attention, Maj. Scott Uithol, a psychiatrist, arrived in Iraq expecting to serve with a combat stress-control unit. He was deployed instead to Abu Ghraib's newly formed Biscuit.

Uithol declined to talk to us, but other sources, including Abu Ghraib's chief of military intelligence, Col. Thomas Pappas, shed light on what at least some Biscuit members did. In testimony taken last February for an internal report but made public in October, Pappas described how physicians helped devise and execute interrogation strategies. Military intelligence teams, he said, prepared individualized "interrogation plans" for detainees, including a "sleep plan" and "medical standards." A physician and a psychiatrist monitored what went on.

[...]

How did military physicians who advised or served with Biscuits justify this role to themselves? Some may have conflated Geneva protections with the ban on torture. So long as interrogation strategies didn't rise to the level of torture, they could see their conduct as lawful. Other physicians feared prosecution for disobeying orders more than they worried about the consequences of following illegal orders.

Some military doctors advanced another rationalization: Whatever their obligations under the international human rights law and the laws of war, medical ethics do not apply when they devote their skills to intelligence-gathering and other war-fighting functions. In such cases, these physicians say, they are combatants, not physicians, because they apply their knowledge to achieve military ends. A medical degree, Tornberg told us, isn't a "sacramental vow." When a doctor participates in interrogation, "he's not functioning as a physician," and the Hippocratic ideal of fidelity to patients is beside the point.

Time to get a new lawyer department

CNN.com - Opening statements start first Abu Ghraib court-martial - Jan 10, 2005: "FORT HOOD, Texas (Reuters) -- A lawyer for Spc. Charles Graner Jr., accused ringleader in the Iraq prisoner abuse scandal, defended piling naked prisoners in pyramids Monday as valid prisoner control and compared it to shows by cheerleaders.

'Don't cheerleaders all over America form pyramids six to eight times a year. Is that torture?' Guy Womack, Graner's attorney, said in opening statements to the 10-member military jury at the reservist's court-martial."

How personal? And could we get some pictures?

From Cursor: Bill Clinton said to be a friend of George W., with the two reportedly having "grown surprisingly warm and personal over the last six months."

News Corp. News

The New York Times > Business > Media & Advertising > Murdoch Will Buy Rest of Fox Shares in $7 Billion Deal

And now we'll never know...

Undiplomatic Immunity - Did Al Gonzales say the president can authorize torture? By Chris Suellentrop: "Finally, Harold Hongju Koh, a Yale professor of international law (and dean of the Yale Law School), solves the riddle—about the 'commander-in-chief override' not the mysterious nanny—by proposing a simple question for Gonzales. He tells the Judiciary Committee, 'A simple question you could have asked today was, 'Is the anti-torture statute constitutional?' If Gonzales answers yes, then he does not believe the president can override the statute. Mystery solved. Only one problem with this professorial inquiry: By the time Koh testified, Gonzales was already gone."