I chose to ask whether a crime was committed by members of the Bush administration in authorising the interrogation techniques in question. It seemed a central question to ask of the world's most powerful democracy.
Obama refuses to prosecute Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and co-conspirators for war crimes during Bush's tenure, but he is willing to go after the lawyers who supposedly advised the regime on ways to tweak their operations and the law, to make torture legal.This, despite the fact that the atrocities perpetrated by the Bush regime in Guantanamo and elsewhere are in violation of the Geneva Convention.
Bush and Rumsfeld contended that prisoners were treated properly as prisoners of war, as per the Geneva convention rules, but most involved in the operations knew that these were bald-faced lies.
Prison guards who perpetrated the torture - underlings - face censure for their evil deeds, as they should. But if those deeds were sanctioned or encouraged, as Licence to Torture asserts, then surely Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld, architects of the torture policies, are ultimately culpable.
It's true that no soldier can expect mercy for "following orders" when he knows that those orders are illegal or just plain wrong - as Nuremberg exemplified. But if a soldier is found guilty for following orders, then those that gave the orders, or made it possible to do so, should be far more severely dealt with.
The Bush / Cheney "exigent circumstances" argument cannot justify their torture policies and nor can their amendments to US law to accommodate their new definitions of torture be allowed to exonerate them, where they defy the Geneva Convention rules. If America and Britain are permitted to get away with torture, they cannot cry foul in future conflicts when their own soldiers suffer the same fate as the Guantanamo detainees.
Should Bush, Rumsfeld and Cheney be indicted, can Blair conceivably escape the same fate?
It would be most peculiar were the EU to appoint a potential war criminal as its first 'permanent' President. What message would that send to the rest of the world?
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"Should Bush, Rumsfeld and Cheney be indicted, can Blair conceivably escape the same fate?"
17 July 2009 at 05:29The question should surely be: can Pelosi and the other Democrats escape the same fate?
That's why Obama is talking about going after lawyers (and I think talking is all that'll happen, to please his idiot base) and not those who nodded through the paperwork.
Apart from the possibilty of him being accused of war crimes no-one asked me if I wanted Blair to be UKs preferred candidate as Appointocrat President of the EU.
17 July 2009 at 06:11Fad they done so I would have said Daniel Hannan, the Elected MEP.
Julia, I guess if they locked up all the [top] lawyers, there'd be nobody left to prosecute Pelosi et al!
17 July 2009 at 06:31I'd be willing to bet that Pelosi is up to her eyballs in it. She does the crony back-scratch.
banned, isn't Hannan too honest for that den of *******s?
If they are innocent, what do they have to fear from scrutiny?
17 July 2009 at 06:56Isn't that what they tell us when it comes to databases, cameras, and undercover civil detectives?
Why are people getting all upset over Cheney’s illegal death squads, illegal torture techniques, illegal NSA spying program, lets face it, nothing will happen to him, they might investigate, the justification will be 9/11, 9/11, 9/11 or you are only giving ammunition to our enemies and in the end nothing will happen, he is part of the ruling class. The chickens are coming home to roost from the operatives that stole the election for Bush/Cheney 2000 in Florida and 2004 in Ohio. I love listening to Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, and Glenn Beck, these chicken hawks on the War on Terror have become chicken little’s that the sky is falling when it comes to the economy, too funny.
17 July 2009 at 19:00Post a Comment