who has an op ed piece in today's Washington Post entitled Where This Buck Stops in which he argues
If you're going to punish people for condoning torture, you'd better include the American citizenry itself.
The basis of his argument is that elements of the torture were known, written about before the election 2004, and yet George Bush won a majority of the popular vote in that cycle:
Sixty-two million of us voted to reelect George W. Bush in 2004. That was more people than had ever voted for a presidential candidate up until then.
I will not go through his entire column. I will acknowledge that some of the information was available. Nevertheless I disagree with his framing and with his conclusion, his piece ending
Prosecuting a few former government officials for their role in putting our country into the torture business would not serve justice or historical memory. It would just let the real culprits off the hook.
Kinsley argues that the American people, collectively, bear responsibility for the gross and abusive actions of the previous administration. In one sense that is correct - We the People are sovereign, and therefore have some responsibility for actions done in our name. It is in large part why I have been insistent that we need to act against those who were most responsible for the gross actions, including the lies and deliberate manipulation of intelligence that got us into an illegal invasion of Iraq, itself a war crime.
But Kinsley basis his argument on the idea that the American people collectively knew that the Bush administration was torturing, and by reelecting the president acquiesced in those actions. Therefore we are the real and ultimate culprits responsible for torture. Sorry, but I don't buy it.
Kinsley notes the the first mention of "waterboarding" (that he could find) was in May 12, 2004, by the Associated press, itself referring to an earlier NY Times story. He goes on to write
Between April and November of that year, there were dozens of articles about torture in general and waterboarding in particular in major print media outlets, on the Web and on TV, many describing it in detail and some straightforwardly labeling it as torture. Millions of people saw these reports, knew that torture was going on and voted for Bush anyway. There is no way of knowing how many of those who voted against him were affected by the torture question. A good guess would be "not many." (Not me, for one, I'm sorry to say.) Bush's opponent, John Kerry, never mentioned waterboarding.
The mere fact that waterboarding was describe in stories as torture does not mean the American people undderstood it to be so. After all, any mention of waterboarding came in the midst of many more numerous stories about the abuses of Abu Ghraib, which consumed a great deal of ink and minutes during 2004, including reports in The New Yorker, on "60 Minutes,", and in many publications and news broadcasts. We had the Taguba report. We had acknowledgment that these were not the only such incidents, from people like General Mark Kimmett, spokesman for the military in Iraq. The American people were rightly horrified, expressing their disgust and having expressed for them by their elected public officials.
We were assured by many administration officials that the abuses were NOT policy. The Congress of the United States, where some Members and Senators had access to far more graphic evidence than was released to the American public did not insist on pursuing up the chain of command the issue of responsibility. Punishments were, over time, meted out, but only to lower ranking people. And somehow that seemed to satisfy the following: (1) most of our elected representatives; (2) most of the media. As Kinsley himself notes, John Kerry did NOT make it an issue during the 2004 election.
Thus to say that the American people reelected Bush despite knowing about torture is more than misleading. The press coverage of the campaign did not focus on the Bush policy including torture - because there was never an argument forcefully presented to the American people by either the so-called mainstream media, the Congress of the United States, nor Bush's election opponent that our government as a matter of policy was torturing.
I will agree with Kinsley that the subject was raised. I can well remember people here being quite assertive. When Alberto Gonzales was nominated for Attorney General, there was an effort, organized IIRC by Armando, for a mass blogging effort in opposition to his confirmation on the basis that he had justified torture. But Gonzales, even though his name had been floated, was not nominated for that position until November 10, AFTER the election, so even our concerted blogging effort to raise the issue came too late to have any impact upon the election.
I agree that in a Democracy ultimately the people are responsible. And perhaps some will argue that I do not fairly read Kinsley. I think I do. I think he willing to put too much direct blame upon the people collectively.
Yet those people were lied to by their administration. The press and the Congress failed in their oversight responsibilities. If neither chose to make this a fundamental issue, if Bush's opponent failed to make it a fundamental issue in the campaign, pray tell how can one argue that the American people chose to reelect Bush knowing he was authorizing torture?
What if in one of the debates someone like Jim Lehrer had posed such a question directly? What if John Kerry had argued FORCEFULLY that the policies of the Bush administration were in fundamental violation of our principles and our legal and moral commitments - that aggressive war was a war crime, that we were justifying activities for which we had executed others for torture and crimes against humanity - might the result of the election have been different? I cannot argue the hypothetical. One might argue that given a majority of the American people still is willing to accept some degree of torture the results would not have been different.
But the American people were NOT given that choice to make. They were denied the complete picture, as they had been denied a complete and accurate representation of intelligence in the rush to war.
Ultimately of course we are all responsible. We have a responsibility as human beings for our actions, even if we act in circumstances where we have been assured what we are doing is legal and proper. That still does not free us from the consequences of those actions. In part it is why I argue that we cannot a priori state that those who carried out things like waterboarding should be exempt from any legal consequences. We may not be lawyers, able to parse legal distinctions, but we should be able to ascertain the difference between those things that should shock the conscience and those that might be more questionable.
There may be a collective responsibility, but it goes back far earlier than having been informed about waterboarding and similar abuses during 2004 in the midst of the broader news about Abu Ghraib and the heated presidential campaign. It is our systemic failure to instruct all Americans in civic and moral responsibility. Why do we not insist on ALL Americans understanding the Nuremberg principle that following orders is not a defense? Why are not all government officials instructed in the international principles of things such as Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions? I received instruction such things in 1965 in my Marine training. And as a teacher I have taken the time to ensure that my students were appropriately aware.
As I have also taken the time to ensure that my students were aware that we executed a Japanese general not because he ordered or authorized war crimes, but on the principle of command responsibility, that troops under his command committed such actions. His name was Tomoyuki Yamashita, and what amazed me is that I did not once in any of the stories about Abu Ghraib see any mention of this important precedent.
I agree that merely prosecuting a few lower level actors does not make up for what happened. I would also agree that merely prosecuting those at the very top also is insufficient. But that is not a reason not to pursue both actions.
I will agree that we bear ultimate responsibility, but not in the fashion Kinsley argues, because it is my firm belief that the American people were not given a choice to make on this topic - again, by Kinsley's own words,
Bush's opponent, John Kerry, never mentioned waterboarding.
We are again in the midst discussing how to fix our national educational system. We will hear about international test scores. We will be warned that we will not be able to economically compete. We will hear how badly we are doing in comparison in math and science. We will be told our economy is at risk.
What we are NOT hearing is that our educational system, from pre-K through graduate school, is failing us in a far more fundamental way. We are not being trained in moral responsibility. We look at the disaster of the American economy and somehow fail to make the connection that we can train people all we want in math, science and economics and in no way will it prevent the kinds of disasters that have occurred unless we actively focus on other things Responsibility beyond maximizing profits is one thing sadly lacking. We have judges and politicians who parse language of constitutions and statutes in order to benefit small groups, or to excuse inappropriate, illegal and immoral conduct. We have newspapers and broadcasters who have abandoned the idea of the press performing the task of making sure the populace is fully informed, being more concerned with ratings and profits and in some cases pushing an ideological perspective.
Perhaps the failure of the American people is that we did not rise up collectively a long time ago, that we allowed ourselves to be misled, brainwashed, pandered to - describe it any way you want.
Our we responsible? Of course we are. But not because we reelected George Bush over John Kerry knowing that Bush was a torturer. The American people were not given that choice, because John Kerry did not make that case. Nor did the Congress. Nor did most of the media.
Our nation and our society are in crisis. Economics are merely a symptom, important and crucial, but not the cause.
Morality is far beyond George Carlin's 7 dirty words. It should be far greater than proving we are 'tough on crime" by locking up low level users of banned substances, while allowing people and corporations to get obscenely rich pushing far more destructive substances like alcohol and tobacco. It is not that God was kicked out of the public schools because the Supreme Court rightly ruled that we should not be imposing prayer and religion upon school children of diverse background. And for those who consider themselves religious in a Christian sense, I wonder how they can tolerate - even advocate - for the inequities of our society in light of the words of Matthew 25 that whatsoever you do these the least of my brethren . . . or of James, asking how one could love God whom one cannot see while hating one's brother?
Yes, we are responsible, which is why we must act now, why we cannot simply go forward. Ultimately the government is our responsibility. We are responsible for one another.
But that is not what we have been teaching our people. It is not how our government has operated, and not just in the administration immediately past. It is not how our politicians and our journalists have operated.
The American people did fail in reelecting George Bush. But that failure was not on the basis of acquiescing in torture. That is not a fair representation, even of our failure, as great as it was.
And to my mind, to frame it that way does not solve the problem, which is far deeper than the fact that men - plural - who never should have been given the reins of power in 2001 were granted 4 more years.
"Teach your children well" sang CSNY back in the 1960s. We have not done so. We have not taught each other well. We have abdicated our responsibility to exercise sovereignty over the government our forefathers created.
Torture is wrong. It should never be justified. Nor should aggressive war nor glorification of wealth without responsibility.
They are all connected, even as we are all connected, with each other, with all of humanity, no matter how hateful the actions of others may be.
Frame it that way. Take FULL responsibility. That we must do.
Otherwise, what is the point?
And then, will my final word have any meaning?
Peace.