I have borrowed my title today from the last line of Bob Herbert's magnificent column on torture, entitled All Too Human. I will explore his column, and also that of Derrick Jackson, entitled Holding Muslims at arm's length. My remarks will also include reflections on FISA, and perhaps references to popular culture and other things as well. This will be a personal reaction, and as such, not thoroughly planned or organized. Consider it a bit of a cri de coeur, an appeal to what Lincoln called "the better angels of our nature." I invite you to read, and to respond as you deem appropriate.
And now?
Herbert's column beings by noting an odd juxtaposition on Thursday. David Addington and John Yoo were before the Congress, trying their best to avoid really testifying on aspects of torture, this on, as Herbert notes, the 21st anniversary of the United Nations Convention Against Torture. After introductory remarks about the two lawyers called to testify, Herbert writes
For most Americans, torture is something remote, abstract, reprehensible, but in the eyes of some, perhaps necessary — when the bomb is ticking, for example, or when interrogators are trying to get information from terrorists willing to kill Americans in huge numbers.
He then offers the contrast of the report from the Nobel Peace Laureate organization Physicians for Human Rights and the report it issued entitled "Broken Laws, Broken Lives." Herbert states bluntly that the report gives us such a "horrifying" face that we should know torture is a practice
that is so fundamentally evil that it cannot co-exist with the idea of a just and humane society.
The report profiles 11 detainees who were tortured while in U.S. custody and then released — their lives ruined — without ever having been charged with a crime or told why they were detained. All of the prisoners were men, and all were badly beaten. One was sodomized with a broomstick, the report said, and forced by his interrogators to howl like a dog while a soldier urinated on him.
He fainted, the report said, "after a soldier stepped on his genitals."
He goes on to describe how the organization medically documented what abusive practices, torture, had occurred.
Let me now turn to Jackson, whose column is critical of Obama and his campaign, and how they seem to want to keep the candidate and Islam at least at arm's length apart. He offers a number of examples, not just the recent embarrassing episode of the two women with head scarves being told they could not be on stage behind the candidate, an action for which Obama called them and apologized. Jackson chooses to confront the issue head on, in a fashion guaranteed to grab your attention. He begins:
I WISH Barack Obama were a Muslim. Better that than having supercilious staffers whisk women in Islamic head scarves out of photo-ops. Better that than telling Representative Keith Ellison of Minnesota, the nation's first Muslim congressman, not to come help Obama in Iowa and North Carolina.
Better that than wooing red states by wobbling before the modern equivalent of the Red Scare. In his year-and-a-half-long run for president, Obama has visited churches and synagogues, but no mosque. This has the musty feel of light-skinned African-Americans passing for white, paranoid over daylight visits from dark-skinned relatives.
Much of Jackson's column involves a conversation with Bilal Kaleem, executive director of the Boston chapter of the Muslim American Society. That worthy gentleman offers an interesting observation on Obama's dealing with the issue of Islam. When asked what he would say to Obama if given the chance, he responded
"It's a tough question, and it's sad that it's a tough question. . . . I would suggest that he might have to do the same thing [on Islam] that he did on race. He addressed it head-on in a landmark speech. He gave his speech in a mature way. If he could speak in the same way to that, it could be inspiring for our country and the world."
Jackson reviews for us the issues the Muslim community faces, reminds us of the weak words earlier in the campaign by Hillary Clinton, and the pointed observation by prominent Jewish American Michael Bloomberg about the smears about Islam being "wedge politics at its worst." Jackson points at data that seems to indicate that the American people are far more open to tolerance about Islam that the actions of the fear mongers would seem to imply, and quotes Keith Ellison as remarking
"A lot of us are waiting for him to say that there's nothing wrong with being a Muslim, by the way."
There's nothing wrong with being a Muslim That is such a simple statement, and it would be one that not only would help heal our fears, but would speak powerfully on behalf of this nation in many nations around the word, Muslim nations, in a band that stretches from south of the Saraha across the Middle East, the southern rim of the former USSR, through Pakistan and to Bangladesh, Malaya, and Indonesia. And to many nations with significant numbers of Muslims as well, whether in Germany with 3 million Turks, or India, whose 144 million Muslims is more than all nations other than Indonesia. One wonders if the people running Obama's campaign are reacting out of fear because of the Muslim connections in his family, because he has a Muslim name?
And FISA. We see otherwise sensible Democrats also acting out of fear. They seem afraid that if they don't extend authority under FISA that they will be blamed should an attack happen within the United States, that they will be blamed for "blinding" the intelligence agencies and thus exposing the United States to risk. Never mind that the previous regime of FISA was already an abuse of our civil liberties, that the special court turned down only 5 out of tens of thousands of requests, that the FBI already could listen and seek authority afterwards, that there was no oversight to ensure that were an ex post facto request denied all information gained from the denied tap would be eradicated. The entire premise of FISA, and of the expansion of executive authority, is fear.
I promised you some popular culture. Let me offer a quote from a famous movie:
"Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You? You, Lieutenant Weinberg? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago and you curse the marines. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know: that Santiago's death, while tragic, probably saved lives. And my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives. You don't want the truth because, deep down in places you don't talk about at parties, you want me on that wall, you need me on that wall. We use words like honor, code, loyalty. We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that I provide and then questions the manner in which I provide it. I would rather you just said "thank you" and went on your way. Otherwise I suggest you pick up a weapon and stand at post. Either way, I don't give a damn what you think you are entitled to."
These words, spoken in the movie "A Few Good Men" by Jack Nicholson playing the part of Colonel Nathan Jessup, seem quite appropriate to all three of the issues I explore in this posting. Perhaps one might not immediate see the connection with holding Muslims at arm's length, but consider: that stems from the demagoguery of Islam which depends upon people's lack of knowledge and fear of the unknown. If the political tactic seems to work, it can serve to intimidate others from speaking up. It is part of the same mindset that in late 2001 saw Attorney General John Ashcroft say of critics of the proposed USA Patriot Act that they "only aid terrorists" and "give ammunition to America's enemies." (and for an extensive list of how widespread similar comments have been, read this 2004 piece by Dana Milbank).
Perhaps it is my age, but I think back to an earlier exchange in a movie, between Robert Redford as Joe Turner and Cliff Robertson as Higgins, the ranking CIA officer in New York, from the classic movie "Three Days of the Condor.":
Higgins: It's simple economics. Today it's oil, right? In ten or fifteen years, food. Plutonium. Maybe even sooner. Now, what do you think the people are gonna want us to do then?
Joe Turner: Ask them?
Higgins: Not now - then! Ask 'em when they're running out. Ask 'em when there's no heat in their homes and they're cold. Ask 'em when their engines stop. Ask 'em when people who have never known hunger start going hungry. You wanna know something? They won't want us to ask 'em. They'll just want us to get it for 'em!
Joe Turner: Boy, what is it with you people? You think not getting caught in a lie is the same thing as telling the truth?
Those who seek to manipulate us often seek to use fear: about another religion, about the ticking bomb scenario, about possible guilt should we be attacked again, and - yes - about running out of oil - or if we are paying attention, potable water. They want us quivering, or should we say, cowering. I would hope that the words of our putative nominee as they appear in Rolling Stone might serve as a reminder of what we need to remember, and act upon. Barack Obama said "I don't do cowering." If he does not, and we do not, then we will not allow fear of Islam to keep most Muslims at arm's length. We will not allow ticking bomb scenarios to justify torture in our name, a practice that are so fundamentally evil that it cannot co-exist with the idea of a just and humane society. We will not allow fear of future attacks, or the demagoguing of that possibility, to lead us to surrendering our 4th Amendment rights to privacy, or the Congress's obligation to provide oversight on ALL actions of the executive branch (for without oversight there are no checks and balances, there is only the path to tyranny).
The penultimate paragraph of Herbert's column reads as follows:
Congress and the public do not know nearly enough about the nation’s post-Sept. 11 interrogation practices. When something as foul as torture is on the table, there is a tendency to avert one’s eyes from the most painful truths.
That is what those with the mindset of the "fictional" Nathan Jessup want from us, that we avert our eyes, that we "trust" them to "keep us safe." It may be oil, as the "fictional" Higgins told Joe Turner, it may be water, it may protection from attacks in the United States. "Trust us" is the mantra. In all of these, at a basic, even atavistic level, there is a tendency to listen, because we want security, we are afraid of the unknown, and our fears can be used to manipulate us.
It is an understandable tendency. And as Herbert concludes, and as I titled this musing:
It’s a tendency we should resist. For the sake of our freedom and liberty. For the sake of the future of humanity. And if we have any sense of dignity and self-worth:
It’s a tendency we should resist.
Peace.