Why torture horrifies us

On TheBackFence, one person who himself experienced waterboarding as part of his Marine Corps training to resist torture, insisted that it wasn't so bad and he didn't really regard it as torture. He also insisted that he is opposed to the use of real torture, but this isn't it.

Still, most people are feeling revulsion in reading about the techniques actually used in our name.

Jay Mulberry asks:

"Why do we feel horror at this one-on-one violence [torture], done with a purpose, when we overlook the hideous burning, dismemberment, destruction of families, famine etc. that is war?"

And Pete Zimmerman answers:

[Historically, as far back as the Bible,] "Violence was admired only when winner and loser were somewhat well-matched, when the winner could have lost catastrophically. It is tolerated when it is antiseptic (ie dropping bombs from 50,000 feet or launching an ICBM over 6,000 miles) and in our cause, but it's not admired. . . .

". . . we see the obvious analogy: the victim in torture has no chance to respond or fight back except by staying silent. Accordingly, what the interrogator does is an act of unmitigated evil, and probably sadism. We don't admire sadism for good reason. It offends our innate moral sense to kick a guy who's down or to shoot somebody in the back."

In another article, writer Christopher Hitchens volunteered to undergo waterboarding at the training camp of the type that the Marine experienced. His description of the procedure is chilling. With his permission and with signed waivers that it could result in his injury or death, he was then seized, handcuffed with his hands behind his back, a black hood placed over his head, and then strapped down to a gurney. He goes on to describe the panic that allowed him to last only a few seconds when water was poured over the cloth covering his nose and mouth.

But the obvious thing here is that they had provided him with a pre-arranged signal that he could halt the procedure at any moment. And he did. It is my assumption that was also true for the Marine training.

So we have a major difference: with Marines, it had a purpose: to teach them to resist, and it was done for their benefit; with Hitchens, it also had a purpose -- his own purpose, and he could stop it at any moment.

So neither of these really meets the criterion that the victim has no chance to fight back or to stop the process. It seems that the essence is the one-sided power of torture, where there is a perpetrator who has all the power and a victim with no power. And that does seem to us more horrible than the fighting, the bombing, etc.

It also helps explain the absolute horror we feel about gas chambers and -- for me -- about capital punishment, in general.

Ralph

Torture and responsibility

Obama has said that CIA interrogators will not be prosecuted for using Department of Justice approved techniques as revealed in the just-released memos. That reasoning seems to accept the idea you shouldn't be held responsible for doing what top government lawyers told you is legal and proper, even if later on that was proven to be illegal and morally wrong.

On most things I agree with Obama. And this is certainly a gray area. If it's clearly wrong, like sending innocent civilians to the gas chamber, they should certainly be prosecuted and held responsible as individuals for doing something that is clearly murder.

If it is something where two experts might disagree about what constitutes torture, as in the case of these memos, then I would agree with Obama's decision.

However, I do not agree that it should be dropped there. I think there should be a full investigation upward into how these decisions came to be made and who was responsible for the pressure on the DoJ to come up with these memos.

A note in today's NYTimes says:

"The first use of waterboarding and other rough treatment against a prisoner from Al Qaeda was ordered by senior Central Intelligence Agency officials despite the belief of interrogators that the prisoner had already told them all he knew."

In my opinion, this is exactly the tactic that Cheney and Rumsfeld used: continually insisting and badgering the CIA into coming up with what they wanted to find (WMD, for example), implying that they weren't doing their job or were incompetent until they produced what they wanted to hear. That's how we wound us with bad intelligence; they didn't allow intelligence analysts to use their judgment about reliability of data but insisted on having the raw data themselves. And then they could cherry pick what suited their agenda.

I'd like to see the emails or phone conversations (probably in the great heap of deleted ones) where CIA is saying the guy has told us all he can and Cheney is insisting that they rev up the torture until he "breaks" and tells them what he's holding back. What if the interrogators are right and he has nothing more to tell? Then they torture him, he makes up stuff to get them to stop, and then we go on wild goose chases, make claims that aren't true, and throw innocent people into Gitmo.

I think it is admirable that Obama wants to move forward and not get bogged down in the blame game, which will only increase the partisan divide. He thinks it will hamper getting his big agendas through Congress.

But I think it is vital that crimes done in our name be exposed and responsibility identified. I'm less interested in sending people to jail and more interested in getting the truth on record.

Let's have investigations where it looks like crimes were committed; and for the gray areas and for identifying those responsible up the chain of command -- all the way to the White House -- I think the Truth and Reconciliation type commission is the way to go.

Chris Dodd, who has proposed it, still has the best phrase about that: "We shouldn't turn the page until we have read the page."

Ralph

Torture

Interesting discussion on TheBackFence about torture from a group of very bright and knowledgeable people across the political spectrum. Here are some excerpts:

From John Joyce:

My fellow Marines and I always used to comment that the rumors leaking out about the interrogation techniques didn't seem very horrifying to us at all. We would almost uniformly compare it to the SERE training that most of us had undergone . . . It turns out our comparisons were right on. According to this memo the interrogation techniques they were using at Gitmo were directly cloned from the approved SERE school techniques.
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In light of this memo I can't imagine that anyone can continue to call these methods torture. If you honestly believe that then you have to assume the position that the US government is systematically torturing thousands of its own troops every year.
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In closing, it's important for me to say that I am totally opposed to the US torturing anybody under any circumstances, even the ticking-timebomb scenarios, and during this whole ongoing controversy I've felt conflicted about the situation at times. After seeing this memo I feel a lot better about the situation and don't have any problems with the techniques that have been used.

From Carl Manaster:

That doesn't make it OK. SERE techniques were authorized as being in the interest of the Marines who go through it, to better prepare them for circumstances when we are facing a less ethical force than ourselves. . . . Subjecting Marines to [waterboarding] doesn't remove that label or that fact. Torture is unethical and illegal, and it doesn't work. It is unacceptable for us to do it to prisoners. . . . I'm sorry you were subjected to it; I think we are wrong to practice it even for the reasons SERE justifies it. But nothing justifies its use on prisoners, even guilty ones, and I will remind you that many . . . of our tortured prisoners at Gitmo, Abu Ghraib, and our other facilities were entirely innocent.

From an article in Washington Post:

Or listen to Army Col. Stuart Herrington, a military intelligence specialist who conducted interrogations in Vietnam, Panama and Iraq during Desert Storm, and who was sent by the Pentagon in 2003 -- long before Abu Ghraib -- to assess interrogations in Iraq. Aside from its immorality and its illegality, says Herrington, torture is simply "not a good way to get information." In his experience, nine out of 10 people can be persuaded to talk with no "stress methods" at all, let alone cruel and unusual ones. Asked whether that would be true of religiously motivated fanatics, he says that the "batting average" might be lower: "perhaps six out of ten." And if you beat up the remaining four? "They'll just tell you anything to get you to stop."

And from another Post article:

When CIA officials subjected their first high-value captive, Abu Zubaida, to waterboarding and other harsh interrogation methods, they were convinced that they had in their custody an al-Qaeda leader who knew details of operations yet to be unleashed. . . .

In the end, though, not a single significant plot was foiled as a result of Abu Zubaida's tortured confessions, according to former senior government officials who closely followed the interrogations. Nearly all of the leads attained through the harsh measures quickly evaporated, while most of the useful information from Abu Zubaida -- chiefly names of al-Qaeda members and associates -- was obtained before waterboarding was introduced, they said.

Torture is illegal, immoral, AND it doesn't work.

Ralph

Torture memos

It seems obvious from reading the torture memos that they were very carefully written as cya (cover you ass) documents for people who were very very worried that they were going too far and would be liable to prosecution.

If we ever get access to the emails ABOUT the memos, that will be the real treasure trove.

Ralph

What the memos reveal

I briefly skimmed over the torture memos, which are available online now. The description of torture techniques is chilling enough -- to realize that this was done in our name.

But, for me, it was doubly shocking and shameful to read that a physician and a psychologist were required to be present when the waterboarding took place. Not only that, but medical and psychological consultants advised about the procedures in the first place.

This is completely unethical for a physician or a psychologist to participate in torture. Both professional organizations have strict rules against it.

Ralph

A good call

Obama had been listening to the pros and cons from his Attorney General (pro) and intelligence people (con) about releasing the torture memos.

Today, he made his decision, and it is a good one. Here is what the president said:

"While I believe strongly in transparency and accountability, I also believe that in a dangerous world, the United States must sometimes carry out intelligence operations and protect information that is classified for purposes of national security. I have already fought for that principle in court and will do so again in the future. However, after consulting with the Attorney General, the Director of National Intelligence, and others, I believe that exceptional circumstances surround these memos and require their release."

And Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Christopher Dodd said this:

These legal memoranda demonstrate in alarming detail exactly what the Bush administration authorized for "high value detainees" in U.S. custody. The techniques are chilling... We cannot continue to look the other way; we need to understand how these policies were formed if we are to ensure that this can never happen again. This is why my proposal for a Commission of Inquiry is necessary.

Now that it looks like the Spanish chief prosecutor is not going to bring a case against the bush six (Gonzales, Feith, Addington, et al) who were involved, releasing these memos is even more essential. It might even lead to some sort of investigation here in the U.S.

Ralph

Good sense

Elizabeth Warren, the economics professor that Obama appointed to oversee the TARP bailout, impressed John Stewart -- and me.

She's got the whole deregulation thing mapped out and made a very strong and clear case in explaining the dire consequences we have suffered from it, beginning with the S&L crisis.

"We start[ed] pulling the threads out of the regulatory fabric and what's the first thing we get: we get S+L crisis," Warren said. "Seven hundred financial institutions fail. Ten years later what do we get? Long Term Capital Management, where we learn that when something collapses in one place in the world it collapses everywhere else. Early 2000s we get Enron, which tells us the books are dirty. And what is our repeated response? We just keep pulling the threads out of the regulatory fabric. So we have two choices, we are going to make a big decision, probably over about the next six months. And the big decision we are going to make is going to go one way or another. We are going decide, basically, hey we don't need regulation. 'You know, it is fine. Boom and bust, boom and bust, boom and bust, and good luck with your 401k.' Or alternatively we are going to say, you know, we are going to out with some smart regulation that is going to adapt to the fact that we have new products and what we are going to have going forward is we are going to have some stability and real prosperity for ordinary folks."

She also threw out a line worthy of the show she was on:

"Capitalism without bankruptcy is like Christianity without hell."

That speaks to one of my concerns: the idea that some financial institutions got "too big to fail." And once you take away those consequences, you have given them a license to take risks, to cheat, and to obfuscate.

It's so refreshing to have smart people in charge who actually know what they're doing and are committed to fixing the problems instead of using the office to destroy the function of the office they hold.

Ralph

Disgust, undisguised

Well, yes, my favorite sport is ridiculing the conservative right-wing of the GOP and all their accolytes and promoters, including those clowns in Congress, plus Rush and Newt and the preachers.

But today, my disgust overflows. It's no longer fun because, in order to ridicule, I have to watch or read about what they're doing and saying. And just a few moments of clips from their "Tea Bag Parties" was enought to make me ill with disgust.

It is sheer idiocy and political posturing. Folks from the tea party rallies were ranting nonsense. Talking about Obama being a fascist and wanting to control their lives and take their money for taxes. Dollars to donuts, every one of them will be getting a tax cut. Because anyone making less than $200,000 will pay less tax. And they didn't look like rich folks.

And there was the governor of Texas at his state tea party, saying that Texas might even consider seceding from the Union. Well, he said, they're not there yet because Texas' economy is doing just fine, thank you very much; but it's something they might have to consider later.

And there was a FoxNews reporter whipping up the crowd's furor about taxation. The "fair and balanced news source" had spent the past week whipping up the anti-tax furor and touting the tea bag parties, as though it was their job to get out the crowd.

Surely, surely they've gone too far and it will backfire. And surely no one will ever again take Fox seriously that they are non-partisan.

Ralph

New perspective on banks

I was surprised just now to read a column by Arianna Huffington on HuffingtonPost that puts the banking crisis in perspective. Quoting Edward Yingling, CEO of the American Bankers Association, Wall Street banking and Main Street Banking are very different and should not be confused.

All the troubles with toxic assets, and all the rest of the doom and gloom we've been hearing, have to do with the gluttons, risk-takers, and irresponsible high-flyers of Wall Street investment banking.

According to Yingling, "of the over 8,000 banks in this country, very few ever made a single subprime loan, and they did not engage in the highly leveraged activities that brought down Wall Street firms." And, for the most part, they're doing just fine, continuing to lend money to small businesses and to collect payments on the mortgages they hold.

This is even more true for credit unions. Huffington writes:

Another bright spot on the banking front is credit unions. They're lending, their balance sheets are solid, and their capital levels are at near record highs.

Unlike the big banks, credit unions are not owned by shareholders, who are looking for maximum quarterly profits, but by members, who are looking for stability and service. Since their goal is not to maximize short-term profit, credit unions by and large steered clear of risky subprime loans. As a result, their balance sheets could pass the Geithner stress test just fine.

Eighty-five million Americans belong to credit unions. And, according to the Credit Union National Association, as of mid-2008, delinquencies on its members' mortgage loans were only 0.7 percent. Around 70 percent of credit union loans are held by the credit unions themselves, as opposed to being sold off on secondary markets.

This all just makes me even madder. The older system really does work, where banks or credit unions make prudent loans and continue to hold the mortgages themselves in a one-to-one relationship between lender and borrower. No kicking the risk up higher and more abstractly into credit default swaps and then making money off insurance that they will fail.

All this didn't have to happen.

Obama's major address on the economy yesterday struck me as first rate. His explanation for how it all happened is easy to understand, his reasoning behind the current measures to handle the crisis seems sensible, and his vision for what needs to be done in the future is sweeping and necessary.

Read it carefully and you will see that his plan calls, not just for restoring regulation, but for a reinvention of the financial system. If only he can sell it to Congress.

Ralp;h

Teensy, weensy baby steps

Obama is taking postive, but so far very very small steps, toward changing our policy toward Cuba.

He is easing restrictions to allow Cuban-American exiles to travel and send money to Cuba, and he is also allowing U.S. telecommunications firms to seek business in Cuba. For the time being, however, the trade embargo and travel restrictions for ordinary citizens will remain in place.

OK. Right direction. But far from enough.

It turns out that further changes will require an act of Congress to undo laws put in place long ago. So politics will be involved, led by the anti-Castro, Cuban exiles who have kept the embargo and travel restrictions in place since 1962. That is 47 years.

What has it accomplished? Isn't it time to change?

Ralph

Ike warned us

As he was leaving office, President Eisenhower warned about the power of the "military-industrial complex" in driving our national agenda. That warning is often quoted, rarely heeded.

Never heeded less than right now.

In Obama's budget proposal, the F-22 fighter plane will be phased out. Originally designed to fight the Soviets in the cold war, newer models have been adapted for more air-to-ground missions. However, although we have 183 of them, DoD Secretary Gates points out that they have not been used (because they are not useful) in either of the two wars we have been fighting for the past 7 and 8 years.

Makes sense, doesn't it, to phase out building any more? The budget calls for just 4 more, although I fail to see why we need 4 more of something we don't use and have a stockpile of 183 anyway. Politics must be involved.

Yes, indeed. Enter our own Senator Saxby Chambless, who has vowed to fight for the F-22. In language aimed at arousing voters, he's using two key words: Iran and jobs.

Saxby is rattling the spectre of Iran as a nuclear power and the potential loss of jobs from Marietta's Lockhead-Martin that builds the F-22 -- both hot button, key issues right now.

Surely 183 F-22s is enough to protect us against Iran, especially given that we have a much newer, more useful fighter jet to take its place.

But the military-industrial complex is a powerful force. Ike warned us.

Ralph

Fallout from Iowa

When solidly midwestern Iowa's top court ruled that same-sex couples cannot be denied marriage, people correctly took it as an indicator that it was not just a bi-coastal, liberal thing.

So, yes, I think it can be taken as much wider support and increasing momentum for gay marriage. Of course, opponents are trying to use this to rouse the troops (and money) again, and they will mount a constitutional amendment campaign.

But, unlike California, it will have to pass in two different legislative sessions before it can be put to the voters. That means two more years, at least, during which time many gay and lesbian couples will marry; and Iowans will see that the sky doesn't fall, that heterosexual marriage has not been affected, and so what's the big deal?

But there's another aspect to the effect of gay marriage coming to the heartland: jealousy and shame. There are murmurings from ordinary people -- as well as politicians -- in New York and California:

Iowa ??? How can we let Iowa lead the way out of the closet? That is the role of liberal New York and California, where trends are supposed to start.

So maybe it will spur them on. In New York, the governor and both senators support it. In California, the governor supports it. I'm not sure about Senators Feinstein and Boxer; they're probably close, if not already on board; and certainly they would not work against it.

Ralph

Spain will do it for us

The same Spanish court that indicted Chilean dictator Pinochet will announce on Tuesday that it will open criminal investigations of Alberto Gonzales, Douglas Feith, John Bybee, John Yoo, William Haynes, and David Addington for sanctioning torture at Guantanamo.

These are the lawyers from george bush's Departments of Justice and Defense who wrote the memos and provided the cover for allowing torture -- in clear violation of the Geneva Conventions and our own laws.

This has come up in connection with a case before this court involving terrorism charges against five Spaniards who were held at Guantanamo. A group of human rights lawyers filed the original complaint and asked the court to investigate. It was referred to their prosecutors who, after reviewing the charges, have now decided to proceed with investigations.

Two questions: Why have we not done this ourselves? and Why are not rumsfeld, cheney, and bush themselves included? Perhaps the answer is that these are all lawyers, and they are responsible for the legal opinions that allowed others to pretend they were operating within the law.

I don't think Obama is likely to order extradition, if it comes to that. So it will be a trial in absentia -- but still a very important development. That is, assuming that their investigation leads to indictments.

It will keep the issue alive and in the news, and it will mean that these men cannot travel outside the U.S. without the risk of being arrested and brought to trial.

Ralph

Curmudgeons

"Curmudgeon -- a crusty, ill-tempered, and usually old man." (Merriam-Webster).

Oddly, the late afternoon HuffingtonPost news page juxtaposed two of our highest placed public curmudgeons: Dick Cheney and Clarence Thomas.

The article about Cheney was a poll that asked people if they agreed with Cheney's statement: "actions Barack Obama has taken as president have increased the chances of a terrorist attack against the U.S."

Only 26% agreed, while 72% disagreed.

Of course, that won't carry any weight with our curmudgeon-in-chief. Once while he was VP, a reporter asked him about the fact that some huge number (like maybe 80%) said the country was headed in the wrong direction. He replied, "So what?" In the context, it seemed pretty clear that he meant that he didn't give a good g-damn what the people thought.

The second article was about Clarence Thomas speaking at a dinner sponsored by the Bill of Rights Institute. It seemed an odd occasion for him to declare his uneasiness with the whole concept of rights. He thinks there is too much emphasis on rights and not enough on responsibilities.

This is from an African-American man who probably has benefited from affirmative action as much as anyone in history, who denounces the very concept of affirmative action and would reverse those decisions if he could.

Bah, humbug to them both.

Ralph

Military insanity

A small factoid was buried within a New York Times article today on Richard Holbrooke, special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, and the restoration of diplomacy under President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Decrying the imbalance that put the Pentagon and the military, rather than diplomats, in charge of these troubled areas during the bush era, the article made the startling point that we have more musicians playing in military bands than diplomats working around the globe.

Add to this the fact that, under Don't Ask, Don't Tell, we have 55 fewer Arabic language experts working to translate intelligence data -- simply because they are gay -- in an area already critically undersupplied with translators.

Things are out of whack. Obama is determined to change both of these insane situations.

Ralph

Newt's very bad day on TV

Newt Gingrich, perhaps (but probably not) stinging a bit from the open letter from his half-sister chastising him for his anti-gay stance, was on This Week With George Stephanopolis. He did not have a good morning.

Several of his rants were shot down, one quite decisively and dismissively by George Will. Others were simply ignored or challenged by other guests or by George himself. The air seemed a bit chilly there for a while. And Newt got that "I'm not wowing them," dejected look on his face.

The one rant that perhaps might have had some lasting impact was his decrying Obama's passive stance on the American sea captain being held hostage by the Somali pirates. Newt portrayed it as a sign of weakness that Obama had refused to discuss it when asked by a reporter. He assumed that silence meant he was ignoring the plight and the problem.

Now comes news that the captain has been safely rescued, that three of the four pirates were killed and the fourth is in custody. Details not in yet, but it was definitely a U.S. Navy operation, perhaps Navy Seals or some other special U.S. forces that pulled off the rescue.

See, Newt. A real leader doesn't bloviate to the press like you do. He just gets the job done; and sometimes that's better done while keeping your mouth shut.

I think Newt just drove another nail in the coffin of his presidential hopes. And Obama looks more like a president and a commander-in-chief than ever.

Ralph

Warren skips opportunity to explain his flip

On 4-8-09 I posted comments about Rick Warren's conflicting statements about whether he endorsed, was an activist for, or otherwise supported California's Prop8.

Today he was scheduled to have been interviewed by George Stephanopolis on This Week, but he canceled just moments before the scheduled interview, citing exhaustion.

I suppose it is exhausting for a religious figure of his following to have to explain on national TV how he stretched the truth, if not outright lied. But I think he could have done a credible job of explaining the difference between (1) his own personal view and advice that he gave on his church's web site and at the same time (2) the fact that he was not part of the activist campaign to push Prop8, as the Mormons and Catholics and other evangelicals were -- to their dishonor, in my view, given the lies and disinformation they spread all over California like manure.

As I did when Obama picked him to give the inaugural prayer, I give Warren some slack for being less offensive than most megachurch, evangelical pastors. I don't think he was really lying, just emphasizing different aspects of the truth in order not to offend one group or the other in dealing with a controversial issue.

And, as I said about Obama's inclusiveness in choosing an evangelical to give the invocation, what if this influenced him to rethink his position and to become a little more moderate on the issue? Warren is a supporter of civil rights for gays and other issues of social justice and equality; what if he actually did change his mind on marriage?

I suspect that behind the "exhaustion" may be some ambivalence in his own private thoughts. Perhaps the Iowa and Vermont decisions this week made it just too hot an issue for someone like him to have to discuss on national TV right now. If he were sure of his opinion, he would probably welcome the forum to explain it.

Stay tuned.

Ralph