Dude... RIGHT ON!

[pecunium]

Patrick, at Making Light linked to Slacker Friday

He also did that with a highlighted part of the post. It deserves to be read, and so I am borrowing his edit.

I have now lived through three major episodes in my life where the political elite have told me quite plainly that neither I nor my fellow citizens are sufficiently mature to suffer the public prosecution of major crimes committed within my government. The first was when Gerry Ford told me I wasn’t strong enough to handle the sight of Richard Nixon in the dock. Dick Cheney looked at this episode and determined that the only thing Nixon did wrong was get caught. The second time was when the entire government went into spasm over the crimes of the Iran-Contra gang and I was told that I wasn’t strong enough to see Ronald Reagan impeached or his men packed off to Danbury. Dick Cheney looked at this and determined that the only thing Reagan and his men did wrong was get caught and, by then, Cheney had decided that even that wasn’t really so very wrong and everybody should shut up. Now, Barack Obama, who won election by telling the country and its people that they were great because of all they’d done for him, has told me that I am not strong enough to handle the prosecution of pale and vicious bureaucrats, many of them acting at the behest of Dick Cheney, who decided that the only thing he was doing wrong was nothing at all, who have broken the law, disgraced their oaths, and manifestly belong in a one-room suite at the Hague. Not to put too fine a point on it, but I’m sick and goddamn tired of being told that, as a citizen, I am too fragile to bear the horrible burden of watching public criminals pay for their crimes and that, as a political entity, my fellow citizens and I are delicate flowers encased in candy-glass who must be kept away from the sight of men in fine suits weeping as they are ripped from the arms of their families and sent off to penal institutions manifestly more kind than those in which they arranged to get their rocks off vicariously while driving other men mad.

Hey, Mr. President. Put these barbarians on trial and watch me. I’ll be the guy out in front of the courtroom with a lawn chair, some sandwiches, and a cooler of fine beer. I’ll be the guy who hires the brass band to serenade these criminal bastards on their way off to the big house. I’ll be the one who shows up at every one of their probation hearings with a copy of the Constitution, the way crime victims show up at the parole board when their attacker comes up for release. I’ll declare a national holiday—Victory Over Torture Day—and lead the parade right up whatever gated street it is that Cheney lives on these days. Trust me, Mr. President. I can take it.

As I said at ML, I am so there. I'll be in a chair next to him, asking him to pass the mustard and the bottle opener.

Comments

[calimac.livejournal.com]

I was willing to go along with this, even though I don't believe that "Gerry Ford told me I wasn’t strong enough to handle the sight of Richard Nixon in the dock" was the reason that Ford pardoned Nixon - until the second paragraph. That reminds me too much of the people who gathered at dawn to cheer the execution of Ted Bundy. Whether execution was the proper disposal of that man or not, cheering it on was not appropriate.

There's certainly an argument to be made for the prosecution of our official criminals, though the results of the trials of Milosevic and Saddam don't strike me as very salutary. But if we view the prospect with glee and relish instead of regret that it's necessary, then the critics are right: we're not strong enough to handle it.

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

I see your point, and I disagree.

I don't cheer an execution. I don't want to go to trials and see the various doers of wrong prosecuted. But the rule of law was, if not lost, in the past 12 years (because a lot of the argument against impeaching Bush was that we dare not establish a precedent. If the Dems went after Bush, everyone would know it was to get back for the Republicans going after Clinton).

The joy wouldn't be at the people who tortured people, and who sanctioned the tortures (and everything else) getting their just deserts, and the nation being shown that the legal compass; no one is above the law, was once again spinning freely.

[calimac.livejournal.com]

Very well, and I agree with that reasoning. But that's far from the impression given by lines like, "pass the mustard and the bottle opener." The person you are quoting is expressing gleeful joy at the prospect, and I do not wish to join in it.

Leaving aside the prosecution factor, I felt some satisfaction at Nixon's resignation, and I certainly judged it necessary and deserved. But no glee, no smugness, no celebration, just a sense of awe that such a thing became necessary.

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

I am not nice. I will cheer if I hear there are people being put in the dock for the things which have gone wrong.

We need to have this. I will be giddy. Not, per se because these people are going to suffer, but because we need to deal with it, and we need to say, "No, these are things we not only don't do, but don't allow to be done."

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

Well I guess you're just morally superior to some of us. This and your other comment just reeks of some sort of class elitism. (What social class you actually belong to I do not know, but you are certainly putting on airs in this discussion.)

[maps-or-guitars.livejournal.com]

After watching the Bush administration smugly and gleefully destroy my nation's reputation, economy, and moral compass, I would be laughing big Hillary Clinton belly laughs to see him and his cronies prosecuted fully. I would also be shedding tears of relief that the rule of law was not utterly destroyed. But I guess I'm just a wicked wicked man for feeling that way. I'll waste the energy feeling bad about myself the morning AFTER I've seen the Bush administration in pokey.

[lexica510.livejournal.com]

Gleeful joy? Yes, absolutely. If I see Cheney et al. prosecuted and convicted of the crimes they have committed and sentenced to a suitable term of imprisonment, I will be so full of gleeful joy it will be bubbling out my ears.

Having watched them willingly and knowingly do evil deeds for the past 8 years, and having heard critics of those actions be accused of treason and "hating America", if a jury of their peers convicts them I will be positively giddy.

It seems you think we should feel ashamed or morally inferior for hoping we get to shout "Hurray! The US justice system works the way it's supposed to! Hurray! My fellow citizens have weighed the evidence and convicted the wrongdoers! Hurray!"

You may not share that feeling of happiness. Fine. But don't go claiming that those of us who do feel happy about the prospect are one step away from cheering on a lynching.

Prosecuting the Guilty

[oxjock.livejournal.com]

I certainly believe that Cheney et al. deserve their proper days [if not weeks, months, or years] in court, just as the rest of us have to suffer when we have been accused of some wrongful act. Unlike in France, it is not in the good ol' USA enough to shout j'acuse [possible misspelling; I did not take3 French] loudly enough; it must be proven.

So says the Constitution [and Bill of Rights]; so say we all.

With that said, I will certainly be glued to C-SPAN, where it should be broadcast commercial-free [who would buy an ad during something like this? Rope manufacturers? Guillotine salesmen? Legal courses?]

Then, I watched the broadcast of the Watergate Committee hearings [every single minute of them, sometimes more than once] ... and I was glad I was unemployed at the time because I got an extremely good understanding of Constitutional Law through those hearings. I considered -- and decided against -- a career in law. That would never have worked; though I love researching something thoroughly and arguing one side against the other -- and can do it [plausibly and with conviction] from both sides simultaneously -- I am terrified of public speaking. As a research assistant, yes; a lawyer having to appear in court, never. It being an easy living, yes; boring after a while, definitely; a job, most certainly, and one I could do well; a career, no, never. I know myself too well, alas.

As to knowing that I love to argue the law, a friend and I -- we are both "typically Libra" -- both like to argue with passion and feeling on either side -- any side -- of an issue. After arguing abortion rights for a hour one time, we said [almost simultaneously, I believe] "I'm tired of this. Could we switch sides? And we did, the the utter confusion of his current spouse and my former lover ... as we continued for another hour, just as passionately on the other side of the debate.

They finally called it a draw and we called the evening a great success.

But both of use were asked later [we checked] as to our true feelings. They hadn't changed. From arguing the other side, each got a better appreciation of the passion and "flavor" of the opposition and the strengths and weaknesses of each argument. Yes, each has strengths ... and weaknesses.

c&ped from somewhere online

[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

Marge, I would appreciate it if you didn't tell anyone about my busy hands. Not so much for myself, but I am so respected, it would damage the town to hear it.
—Artie Ziff, The Way We Was

[pgdudda.livejournal.com]

Y'know, my take on it is that it would cause more damage to this country and its people if we did not prosecute. Failing to prosecute gives future leaders carte blanche to repeat the actions undertaken by BushCo. It undermines the very system of government which the USA is supposedly based upon, limits the freedoms of its residents, and paves the road to a police state. (I do not say that lightly -- I recall quite keenly the history of my country-of-birth; and I recall that the USA is the most heavily-incarcerated country in the "industrialized world". Neither of these data points encourage me.)

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

With respect, I don't wanna see these guys get an Orange County trial ("If the hood doesn't fit, you must acquit!") in an American court; after all, it was their ability to cozy up to senior legal types that they exploited to get into this situation in the first place.

I wanna see these guys in the Hague. I wanna see the tradition of international law courts carried forward and shown expressly to apply to the nation that did the most to get them started... to see that idealism come back and push out the cynicism that took its place. I wanna see it made expressly clear that it's not victor's justice.

-- Steve also wants to see the "one-world state" fearin' types blow multiple aneurysms when it happens. He is but mortal clay...

[hamadryad11.livejournal.com]

Hi! I'm familiar with your posts on Making Light. You've said a lot of interesting things on the topic of torture vs. interrogation. I was actually wondering if you could recommend any (readily available) written materials on effective interrogation? Non-fiction would be great, but if you have come across any fiction that depicts effective interrogation, it would be very interesting to read as well.

[hamadryad11.livejournal.com]

Oh, I posted this before scrolling down and seeing your post. Good stuff! But if you can recommend any additional reading materials on this topic, it would be appreciated.

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

The Interrogator: Hans Scharrf

He was the Luftwaffe interrogator for Pilots of the 8th Air Force in WW2. His job was to get some information from them, at time of capture. Until he got something, he didn't move them on to the LuftStalag. It's interesting to see what the people he dealth with thought of him.

He did play some games with food, sleep cycles and temperature. Mostly what he did was to jiggle timing. Make lunch closer to dinner, and then breakfast further from dinner. Cooling the cells some, which would make sleep a little less restful.

But that's as close as he came to torture, and none of it was overt.

The Interrogators

The title of this one is an homage to the first one. I know Mackey. I like him a lot (the name is a nom de plume, but the community is small, and there are details in there which make it plain, to me, who he is).

There is a lot unsaid in the book, and I don't know that it is obvious to the non-professional reader, but the account is interesting, and the questions he asks near the end are questions an working interrgator has to ponder.

After that, it's pretty thin on the ground.

[hamadryad11.livejournal.com]

Thank you! My local library doesn't have either book, so I won't be able to start reading until I have a chance to buy them, but the suggestions you've given me have already led to some other interesting reading material. I've Googled Hans Scharff, and he sounds like a fascinating person. There will probably be a lot of stuff in the books I won't completely understand, but I have no doubt that it will be interesting anyway.

[sinboy.livejournal.com]

From the "this just get worse" department, McClatchy Reports (http://www.mcclatchydc.com/227/story/66622.html) details that the torture wasn't just for tactical information, it was to get them to confess to a link (real or not apparently) between Iraq and Al-qaeda.

We should have seen that coming.