As we rail at the Bush Administration, and the warped souls that decided inflicting physical and psychological pain on other human beings was an acceptable way to deal with their fear and anger; as we turn over the rocks in the Senate and Justice Department, lash out at the leaders in the Congress, and demand that, "someone should pay"; as we congratulate ourselves for our early outrage and our warnings that something was rotten in Denmark, let us not forget the men who were the victims.
Justice can take on the soothing balm of allowing us to believe that the problem is solved. That we can move on. That a world gone mad has been restored to balance.
But the maimed bodies and minds, the corpses, the victims, are not assuaged by justice.
The justice is for us. The righteous. Justice is a way to make ourselves feel better. Justice allows for the punishment of those who broke the laws of state and humanity. But justice does not repair the trauma of the victims.
Truth commissions uncover evils, but do not raise the dead. No child left without a parent is better for justice. No crippled body is made whole by justice. No mind, driven to the edge of extinction is repaired by our justice.
As we watch the unfolding of the law, and the political system that claims to be based on that law, seeking to claim justice for the torture of human beings, let us never, for one moment, think that legal and political stances will undo the harm to those tortured.
Great evil can not be swept under the rug of history by seeking only justice. We must find a way to restore the balance of the universe for those who were victimized.