It's an astonishingly beautiful early fall morning in Seattle. But the cloud of knowing that our Congress is on the verge of crossing a moral divide to become complicit in the routine use of torture and
gulag as official policy tools of the state, leaves me cold this morning. I just got off of the phone with our junior Senator, Maria Cantwell.
In retrospect, I'm not sure why I even bothered to call. Cantwell is the epitome of a Democratic Party in Washington state that is constantly triangulating, never leading. Washington used to be a healthy bipartisan political environment, one where I was proud to be an independent voter focusing on individuals instead of party affiliation. That time is long gone here, steadily poisoned over the last twenty years or so by a cynical and increasingly corrupt Republican agenda. Cantwell squeaked by wingnut Republican Slade Gorton in 2000, and as near as I can tell, has never made a vote since that was based on anything more or less than maximizing political position.
But surely, I thought, torture is above political consideration. Surely she can take a chance, just this once, and do the right thing. Maybe she won't have the nerve to lead a fight to kill this reprehensible "compromise", but at least she'll have the integrity to make the only possible moral choice when it's time to vote.
The staff phone in DC went unanswered twice, ringing and ringing each time, before a harried staffer put me on hold. When I finally got to someone, I asked what Cantwell's position was on the compromise torture legislation. Her staffer unapologetically told me that the Senator had not yet made a decision about the issue, and would not discuss it until she had.
Translation: Cantwell's decision will be based on the political calculus of the situation, and not on the evil inherent in violating international law and fundamental human morality by sanctioning state torture.
Translation: My junior Senator has no moral center whatsoever.
As has become drearily standard practice for Cantwell's minions, the staffer became edgy when I asked her what Cantwell's thinking was on this issue, what mitigating factor might lead her to support it. "She hasn't analyzed the exact wording of the legslation yet." When I asked what exact wording there was to consider about a bill that sanctions torture, the staffer snippily informed me that my comment had been noted, and would be relayed to the Senator.
And so, it comes down to this. Evil is being done in our name. McCain insisted on a compromise that gives Bush what he really wanted all along - a free hand to unilaterally reinterpret international law, the US Constitution, and fundamental human ethics, but didn't require Congress to flat out say what they were doing. It is the worst kind of compromise imaginable, a nothing posing as something in the service of state-sponsored terrorism.
Our representatives in Congress know full well that they are surrendering control to the executive on terms that would have made Mussolini very pleased (Bush is no Hitler, but he is like Mussolini - except with lots more weapons). Furthermore, they are surrendering on the one issue that destroys any pretense of US exceptionalism in its commitment to human rights, the one issue that should transcend politics - the fundamental human right not to be disappeared and tortured as a matter of state policy.
But my Senator needs to study the issue further. It no longer matters how she ultimately votes. She will not be a part of the fight to end this atrocity. If she votes against it, it will be because, on balance, it gains her more votes than she loses in the upcoming election. It will not be because, in her heart, she knows evil when she sees it.