I wasn't planning on posting anything tonight, but 2-star general Anthony Taguba has just directly accused George W. Bush, and others in Bush's Administration, of war crimes.
George W. Bush's response, apparently, is to deny that he directly and personally authorized torture. Rather than taking personal responsibility for his actions George W. Bush has attempted to blame American troops in the field (who themselves have been systematically abused by the Bush administration) for premeditated war crimes that were almost certainly directly authorized by Mr. Bush himself.
Foul, Mr. President.
You sent American soldiers off, on false premises, to fight and suffer in a needless and horrible war, now you blame them for edicts that have flowed from your own presidential, executive signature ?
Foul, Mr. President. Take responsibility. You yourself have reveled in your role as "the decider". Do you now claim that claim was a hoax or an empty boast ?
[below: George W. Bush accuses US troops of acts Mr. Bush himself authorized]
Last year, in the fall, my friend George E. Lowe told me, over breakfast, that he was sure George W. Bush had personally authorized torture. George Lowe tells me he's written executive action memos for members of the National Security Council, so he's familiar with the process. George W. Bush's torture policies came out of the NSC, and Bush is head of the National Security Council and signs off in all decisions of such magnitude...
Thus, Bush had to have personally authorized torture. It's that simple. Or else there was a coup, by some of Bush's cabinet members presumably, that's not been noticed so far, but that have been a very quiet coup indeed...
Otherwise, Bush signed off on torture.
When I first met him, for breakfast in last 2007 George Lowe encouraged me to raise the torture issue, per his informed perspective, and I finally did so - initially in a Sunday April 2, 2008 post, Countdown: Bush Authorized War Crimes Says Law Prof that was not so popular but was followed by a quartet of back-to-back recommended posts, on torture & the Bush Administration : Signed By Bush, ALLOWING TORTURE, Memo Shows Bush NOT 'Insulated', ABC: BUSH Says He APPROVED TORTURE. What About SEXUAL Torture?, [UPDATED] How You Can Fight, Help Expose US Gov. Torture Programs and "You could almost see them getting turned on by new torture ideas."
My little bit was part of a great, collective effort so masterfully and bitingly expressed in Meteor Blades' Tuesday Daily Kos post, Clear Evidence of War Crimes: Stern Letters to Come? which cited Daily Kos member Jonathan Hutson's airing of the terrible personal consequences [see this Physicians For Human Rights report] of George W. Bush's authorization of torture - that Mr. Bush is now trying to heap on the backs and moral consciences of US troops...
That just a wee bit of the enormous body of work that's been done, in the Blogosphere, on the torture issue. I don't want to slight anyone - so much incredible work has been done on this, by so many. The upshot of all that dedicated work is this:
I'm sorry Mr. Bush, but an old saying goes, The Fish Rots From The Head
You can't blame US troops. They did not make your administration's torture policies. You did. Either you personally authorized torture or else there was an amazingly quiet palace coup.
***
Here's a two-part audio interview on this issue, that George W. Bush had to have authorized the torture policies that happened under his administration, which I did with George E. Lowe last April 2008 - based in Lowe's 3+ decade in US government, at high levels of naval Intelligence and also in a US presidential administration. I title the two part interview "The Fish Rots From The Head". Start with the 2nd video:
( alternate YouTube links to videos -
http://www.youtube.com/...
http://www.youtube.com/... )
George E. Lowe worked, in the Pentagon with John McCain's father and this 3:26 video with audio clips of Lowe starts with Lowe's declaration that John McCain's father, Admiral Sidney McCain, 'would have rolled over in the grave' at his son's dalliance with the American Christian right.