You're right Ken, & so is Naomi Klein in her article when she says:
Other cultures deal with a legacy of torture by declaring "Never
again!" Why do so many Americans insist on dealing with the current
torture crisis by crying "Never Before"? I suspect it has to do with a
sincere desire to convey the seriousness of this Administration's
crimes. And the Bush Administration's open embrace of torture is indeed
unprecedented--but let's be clear about what is unprecedented about it:
not the torture but the openness. Past administrations tactfully kept
their "black ops" secret; the crimes were sanctioned but they were
practiced in the shadows, officially denied and condemned. The Bush
Administration has broken this deal: Post-9/11, it demanded the right
to torture without shame, legitimized by new definitions and new laws.
Despite all the talk of outsourced torture, the Bush Administration's
real innovation has been its in-sourcing, with prisoners being abused
by US citizens in US-run prisons and transported to third countries in
US planes. It is this departure from clandestine etiquette, more than
the actual crimes, that has so much of the military and intelligence
community up in arms: By daring to torture unapologetically and out in
the open, Bush has robbed everyone of plausible deniability.
I suspect many of us are so against the Bush gang we have forgotten
this history, or repressed it. Not that it helps, except to remove them
from our own sense of their 'exceptionalism.'
Doug
On 20-Dec-05, at 11:39 AM, Kenneth Wolman wrote:
> Unfortunately the US-SOA connection is old news to anyone who's been
> an active (leftist only!) Catholic or Quaker. People have done time
> in Federal prison for protests at the SOA encampment. Nuns, priests,
> laity both secular and part of faith groups. You think the SOA or
> whatever it's called now is not scared of the exposure? Triple barb
> wiring to keep out those dangerous protestors does not testify to
> confidence in what they are about
>
> They taught torture to the Salvadorian death squads who killed Oscar
> Romero and later (November 1989) shot down the Jesuits of Jose Simeon
> Canas University. Because the eight priests were shot in the back of
> the head, the murder was termed a "Sophiacide," the murder of wisdom
> or knowledge.
>
> At the time we may (MAY) have not dirtied out hands ourselves, just
> instructed others and directed their efforts. Now it seems we're up
> to our elbows.
>
> The latest from one of the several anti-SOA groups:
>
> http://www.soaw.org/new/
>
> I'm still not sure what this has to do with male hysterics, but it's
> interesting anyway.
>
> Ken
>
>
Douglas Barbour
11655 - 72 Avenue NW
Edmonton Ab T6G 0B9
(780) 436 3320
the precision of openness
is not a vagueness
it is an accumulation
cumulous
bpNichol
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