Up on my blogbox about torture, America's shame: the worst thing about Bush that won't go away

It's pretty self-evident that the blame for US soldiers torturing Iraqis lies with Rumsfeld and ultimately Bush, although the only people who've gone to jail for it are peons like Lynndie Englund.

And it's pretty obvious that this puts Rumsfeld and Bush in a vile category all of their own: bureaucrats of an Eichmann-ilk who sacrifice small fry like Lynndie Englund for actions whose ultimate responsibility is theirs and theirs alone. I don't know whether to call them cowards or sadists. Maybe I should pull my punches: they're only scumbags.

The reason I'm driven to use words like cowards, sadists and scumbags about our esteemed leaders, is this: I saw the PBS Frontline program about US torture at Gitmo and Abu Ghraib this week. They make it clear that "coercive interrogation" started with Bush and Rumsfeld, and went down the line to our troops via Generals Miller and Sanchez. General Miller was sent to Abu Ghraib with explicit instructions to "Gitmoize" the interrogations there. Sanchez kept demanding more "actionable" intelligence from the people at Abu Ghraib.

"The gloves are coming off" was the instruction to interrogators.

As one congressman said, the torture question is not about who the terrorists are, but about who we are.

Are we prepared to lose our own humanity and become barbarians in the fight against barbarians? Are we comfortable about handing our humanity over to the likes of Rumsfeld and Bush to sanction torture in our name?

And the moral argument is not the only argument against torture. In the beginning the military was dead-set against it. JAG, Colin Powell and others argued that we endanger our own troops when we torture people, because we open our guys to being tortured if they're caught by our enemies. If we don't play by the Geneva Conventions, why should they?

It's instructive that torture started with civilians like Rumsfeld who have no empathy for what soldiers may suffer in war situations. It took a civilian to put our army in disrepute.

And what about the despicable practice of "rendition" -- picking up suspects anywhere in the world and dropping them off in a country where we know they'll be tortured? It's happened to an innocent Canadian and an Italian. This seems to me the height of cowardice -- getting others to do our dirty work. It reminds me of Herod washing his hands after giving Jesus to the Jews for crucifixion.

The worst thing about torture is not what it does to others, but what it makes of us -- about who we are -- about what we're doing to our own young men and women. Encouraged by their leaders in a "wink wink" policy, our young soldiers are now beating up Iraqis in their homes, breaking their fingers in the back of Humvees, and kicking the shit out of them in prisons. Marjorie Cohn writes in Truthout:

Last month, an Army captain and two sergeants from the 82nd Airborne Division contacted Senator John McCain and Human Rights Watch with allegations that members of the unit routinely beat, tortured and abused detainees in 2003 and early 2004. Capt. Ian Fishback, a Westpoint graduate, said he was frustrated that his reports to superiors went unheeded. They reported seeing soldiers break prisoners' legs, and strike blows to the heads, chests, and stomachs of prisoners - on a daily basis. They described witnessing soldiers pour chemical substances on prisoners' skin and into their eyes. They said the mistreatment at a base near Fallujah was "just like" what happened at Abu Ghraib. Capt. Fishback ... believes the abuses he witnessed in Iraq and Afghanistan were caused in part by Bush's 2002 decision not to apply the Geneva Conventions protections to detainees captured in Afghanistan.

This is how torture strikes us: we are brutalizing our own young men and women.

What are we to make of our leaders who turn young Americans into torturers? Don't they think they are responsible for the morals of the young soldiers in their charge? Don't they bear any responsibility to the parents of those youngsters? Should this be part of our army recruitment effort: join the army because you'll get a chance to torture people?

I had one question after watching the PBS program: our politicians tried to impeach Bill Clinton for having his dick sucked in the Oval Office -- so why does Rumsfeld and General Miller get a free pass to have people tortured? Isn't their offense far worse?

Bush has threatened to veto the McCain-sponsored Senate bill that tries to put a stop to torture, voted for by 90 Senators to 9 -- the first veto he will ever use in his Presidency. Where does Bush come off trying to defend torture?

I believe this is the worst aspect of Bush and his policies (and let's face it, he has a lot to answer for). An American president who countenances torture: I'd rather have ten Clintons having their dicks sucked every morning in the White House than one Bush threatening to veto a bill against torture.

It's truly disgusting, and an indictment of how far into a moral morass our nation has been led by Bush & Co. This practice is happening in our name, in YOUR name as an American, and nobody up high is being held accountable. It has taken our nation from a position of moral authority to a pariah in the world's eyes.

May the souls of those responsible for this stain on our name rot in hell. And may the media who don't pursue them for it, rot in hell, too. How did our country come to this shame? Why have we sunk so low? Would that I never lived to see this day. But I have, and so have you.