President Barack Obama's speech today has to be taken in the context of how so many members of his own party behave. Day after day, they offer examples of why progressives need to excise a couple of words from the previous electoral mission statement so that, from here on out, the "more and better Democrats" slogan sticks solely with those final two words.
Obama's own stirring words today struck many of the right points. His vigorous pushback against the rancid right-wing theme that ending torture makes Americans less safe was welcome indeed. On the contrary, it has been the willingness to torture and to defend the use of torture that has made Americans less safe. And all the lies and hyperventilations of the chief stringpuller of the previous administration will never upend that reality.
Obama said:
I know some have argued that brutal methods like water-boarding were necessary to keep us safe. I could not disagree more. As Commander-in-Chief, I see the intelligence, I bear responsibility for keeping this country safe, and I reject the assertion that these are the most effective means of interrogation. What’s more, they undermine the rule of law. They alienate us in the world. They serve as a recruitment tool for terrorists, and increase the will of our enemies to fight us, while decreasing the will of others to work with America. They risk the lives of our troops by making it less likely that others will surrender to them in battle, and more likely that Americans will be mistreated if they are captured. In short, they did not advance our war and counter-terrorism efforts – they undermined them, and that is why I ended them once and for all.
Every word of it true, and a proper smackdown not only of those like Dick Cheney who - the accumulating evidence makes clear - ordered torture in violation of law and human decency, but also the likes of Charles Krauthammer who have made the philosophical argument that the only time the U.S. should engage in torture is when some official feels like it.
But, for elected leaders, pundits and citizens who still don't get it, the utilitarian argument against torture - that it serves as a recruitment tool for America's enemies, irks our allies and risks the lives of American captives in the future - always ought to be supplemented with a plain and clear message. Something along the lines of:
America doesn't torture anymore because torture is wrong, whoever does it, for whatever reason.
"Anymore" is an important addition because it is more accurate than "America doesn't torture." History informs us that officially condoned and implemented torture by the U.S. did not begin with the Cheney-Bush administration. The only difference between torture during their term of office and in previous eras is their brazen attempt at justification and their efforts to bend the law to cover their behinds.
Not enough praise can be attached to Obama's reiterated message that this will not be the course America takes in the future.
But taking the best course in the future is in part dependent on dealing effectively, firmly, with the past. If LarsThorwald is right in his assessment, and torture-related prosecutions do finally emerge from the Department of Justice, that might go far toward dealing with digby's concerns:
Unfortunately, the last administration lied so constantly and so blatantly in the name of national security that the new president has to make a much stronger case and demonstrate his commitments much more visibly before anyone will believe America has changed its policy. Just saying you believe in the constitution and that America should live up to its values isn't really good enough. After all, Bush used to say the same thing.
For the quick-on-the-trigger crowd, digby is in no way saying that Obama=Bush, merely that Bush - whose name should never be delinked from Cheney's - did such damage to the nation, to the office of the Presidency, to America's reputation among friends and enemies alike, and to the American psyche overall that even Obama's oratorical skills are sorely tested in making clear to the world that things are going to be different from now on.
The promises of such a turnaround are in no way helped by a number of actions and plans team Obama has undertaken. As ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero said today:
"We welcome President Obama's stated commitment to the Constitution, the rule of law and the unequivocal rejection of torture. But unlike the president, we believe that continuing with the failed military commissions and creating a new system of indefinite detention without charge is inconsistent with the values that he expressed so eloquently at the National Archives today."
Indeed. As digby points out, Guantánamo is more than a symbol. It's representative of a whole system which says it's appropriate to permit indeterminate detention without trials and/or trials that allow inadmissible evidence to be used to convict special categories of special people. So far, we have yet to hear either the President or more than a few others in the Democratic Party challenge that system at its core. On the contrary.
Which brings up the most disturbing aspects of Obama's speech, one that mcjoan has perfectly deconstructed:
The election was not an end to the debate. We are not re-fighting any debate because the debate is ongoing, however much we would like to move on. The very fact that President Obama had to schedule this speech today to pre-empt Dick Cheney is proof of that. Anger is not the primary fuel for those of us who want to see accountability for what the previous administration did in our names. The fuel is a commitment to justice.
And then there was Obama's linking of one practically non-existent group to the quite extensive "anything goes" group that comprises elected leaders (and former leaders, including the former Vice President), the right-wing punditry of the megamedia and plenty of prominent bloggers.
Certainly, if one trolls around enough, there can be found a few people who "would almost never put national security over transparency," just as Obama says. But how very few they are. And, with all due respect to the President, how ludicrous to make it seem that these few represent the majority of people who seek justice. That means justice for the remaining prisoners in Guantánamo (and elsewhere) and also for the likes of Dick Cheney who ordered and implemented torture.
It reflects no lack of concern about national security to believe that there should be no special categories of special people who can be judged under different rules than everyone else. The rule of law must be like torture: No excuses. No exceptions.