SHOWDOWN ON THE POTOMAC
Submitted to the New York Times and The Nation
SHOWDOWN ON THE POTOMAC
Who is John McCain ?
…hanging in the balance: Victory for Torturers
Yesterday the NY Times’ Sanger and Schmitt report “Bush Says He’s Confident That He and McCain Will Reach Agreement on Interrogation Policy.” That is corpspeak for “assume the position, John boy.” (12.13.A 22) Today, wallah, “New Army Rules May Snarls Talks With McCain on Detainee Issue.” The army has ambushed the Senator, and the U.S. Senate, again. Changed the Army field manual to allow unspecified procedures, “pushing the limits of legal interrogation at the very moment when Mr. McCain (R. Arizona) is involved in intense three-way negotiations with the House and Bush administration to prohibit cruel treatment of prisoners.”
Taken together, and with what Bush did to him in South Carolina in the 2000 presidential campaign, these pose a serious question about what kind of man John McCain is. Piquant street metaphor would surely echo “This is a stick in McCain’s eye”, as a ‘defense official’ was quoted to have said (last line above the fold; nice touch, B.K.) – applied elsewhere to his anatomy -- if he takes it. Will he bend over for Bush again?
And another question needs raising, for him, the U.S. military, civilians, all. There was one facet of what went on at Abu Ghraib and at other places that go beyond printable descriptions of abuse, cued, however, by “inhuman and degrading.” It is the use of prisoner’s religious sexual practices and traditions against them, defiling them, or causing them to defile themselves in bodily acts, according to what they were taught was holy, as a mode of torture: reducing them to objects of revulsion and shame in their own eyes. This has been documented to have occurred. It is abominable in the same sense as defecation the Bible or the American flag, only worse, since inflected with permanent trauma on a living person, with the same intent. “Judenhaasen the towelheads” it came to be called at one point. Although on first thought this might be considered a valid instrument of intimidation – “breaking their will; sending a message to Allah- worshippers everywhere of what to expect” – it is not a soldier’s code. Abuse of those under one’s control is not honorable or manly. It is a perversion of humanity, recognized as such by civilized people.
If he yields, McCain’s acceptance of abuse will be for many in America. In the end, when he was given a historical opportunity to do something decisively correct, he crumpled. For the sake of what? The torture forces. The same type of torture carried out on Arab/Muslim males at Abu Ghraib is accepted by him, in principle. For America.
The Torture Now! warriors are out in force, that’s a fact. “Torture May Be Necessary: Former W. House Advisor” Robert Blackwill of Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government is quoted as averring. (NY Times 12.12 on-line Reuters). The Nation magazine’s display “The Torture Tree” illustrates some of the principals fed from Cheney’s treacle. Meanwhile, VICTORY! Sweet VICTORY! was in the air around the president, and the Washington Post launches Ben Connable, “a major in the Marine Corps” at us, saying “The Truth on the Ground” is looking good, for America, there. Iraqi soldiers are re-enlisting for third, fourth tours of duty, and would they be doing that if it were a quagmire?
VICTORY FOR THE TORTURERS? In this showdown on the Potomac, will the real Senator from Arizona please stand up?
Sid Thomas, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Philosophy, emeritus
SUNY-Binghamton
2327 Seneca Street
Binghamton, New York 13903
607 773 0071
sbthomas55@stny.rr.com
SHOWDOWN ON THE POTOMAC
Who is John McCain ?
…hanging in the balance: Victory for Torturers
Yesterday the NY Times’ Sanger and Schmitt report “Bush Says He’s Confident That He and McCain Will Reach Agreement on Interrogation Policy.” That is corpspeak for “assume the position, John boy.” (12.13.A 22) Today, wallah, “New Army Rules May Snarls Talks With McCain on Detainee Issue.” The army has ambushed the Senator, and the U.S. Senate, again. Changed the Army field manual to allow unspecified procedures, “pushing the limits of legal interrogation at the very moment when Mr. McCain (R. Arizona) is involved in intense three-way negotiations with the House and Bush administration to prohibit cruel treatment of prisoners.”
Taken together, and with what Bush did to him in South Carolina in the 2000 presidential campaign, these pose a serious question about what kind of man John McCain is. Piquant street metaphor would surely echo “This is a stick in McCain’s eye”, as a ‘defense official’ was quoted to have said (last line above the fold; nice touch, B.K.) – applied elsewhere to his anatomy -- if he takes it. Will he bend over for Bush again?
And another question needs raising, for him, the U.S. military, civilians, all. There was one facet of what went on at Abu Ghraib and at other places that go beyond printable descriptions of abuse, cued, however, by “inhuman and degrading.” It is the use of prisoner’s religious sexual practices and traditions against them, defiling them, or causing them to defile themselves in bodily acts, according to what they were taught was holy, as a mode of torture: reducing them to objects of revulsion and shame in their own eyes. This has been documented to have occurred. It is abominable in the same sense as defecation the Bible or the American flag, only worse, since inflected with permanent trauma on a living person, with the same intent. “Judenhaasen the towelheads” it came to be called at one point. Although on first thought this might be considered a valid instrument of intimidation – “breaking their will; sending a message to Allah- worshippers everywhere of what to expect” – it is not a soldier’s code. Abuse of those under one’s control is not honorable or manly. It is a perversion of humanity, recognized as such by civilized people.
If he yields, McCain’s acceptance of abuse will be for many in America. In the end, when he was given a historical opportunity to do something decisively correct, he crumpled. For the sake of what? The torture forces. The same type of torture carried out on Arab/Muslim males at Abu Ghraib is accepted by him, in principle. For America.
The Torture Now! warriors are out in force, that’s a fact. “Torture May Be Necessary: Former W. House Advisor” Robert Blackwill of Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government is quoted as averring. (NY Times 12.12 on-line Reuters). The Nation magazine’s display “The Torture Tree” illustrates some of the principals fed from Cheney’s treacle. Meanwhile, VICTORY! Sweet VICTORY! was in the air around the president, and the Washington Post launches Ben Connable, “a major in the Marine Corps” at us, saying “The Truth on the Ground” is looking good, for America, there. Iraqi soldiers are re-enlisting for third, fourth tours of duty, and would they be doing that if it were a quagmire?
VICTORY FOR THE TORTURERS? In this showdown on the Potomac, will the real Senator from Arizona please stand up?
Sid Thomas, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Philosophy, emeritus
SUNY-Binghamton
2327 Seneca Street
Binghamton, New York 13903
607 773 0071
sbthomas55@stny.rr.com
posted by Sid Thomas | 4:19 PM
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