Given the atrocities that were
committed at Abu Ghraib and the latest speculation about what goes on inside the CIA's
secret prisons, it would seem that in order to present a positive image of the US at home and abroad, a clear ethical stance on human rights would be a top priority for the United States.
Not so, says Cheney. In fact, it would appear that Cheney is calling all the shots and feels he answers to no one.
One only needs to read the latest WaPo story, Cheney Fights for Detainee Policy, to understand Cheney's stance on torture and the lengths he's willing to go to have his way.
Over the past year, Vice President Cheney has waged an intense and largely unpublicized campaign to stop Congress, the Pentagon and the State Department from imposing more restrictive rules on the handling of terrorist suspects, according to defense, state, intelligence and congressional officials.
It doesn't stop with select segments of our government.
Last winter, when Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.), vice chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, began pushing to have the full committee briefed on the CIA's interrogation practices, Cheney called him to the White House to urge that he drop the matter, said three U.S. officials.
He's even butting heads with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, interrupting her foreign summits to have remote meetings to ensure she's not being left out of the loop.
In recent months, Cheney has been the force against adding safeguards to the Defense Department's rules on treatment of military prisoners, putting him at odds with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and acting Deputy Secretary of Defense Gordon R. England. On a trip to Canada last month, Rice interrupted a packed itinerary to hold a secure video-teleconference with Cheney on detainee policy to make sure no decisions were made without her input.
The latest revelation now on torture-gate is how Cheney wants to exempt CIA officials from interrogation technique reforms that Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) has recently introduced as a congressional ban on torture and other inhuman treatment of prisoners in U.S. custody that has overwhelming support with a
90-9 vote last month in the Senate
The exemption would cover the CIA's covert "black sites" in several Eastern European democracies and other countries where key al Qaeda captives are being kept.
Not surprisingly...
Cheney spokesman Steve Schmidt declined to comment on the vice president's interventions or to elaborate on his positions. "The vice president's views are certainly reflected in the administration's policy," he said.
So Cheney's views are being reflected in the policy of the administration? One only has to read to the next paragraph of the article to see that's not the case, or at least, it's not the case for more and more officials.
Increasingly, however, Cheney's positions are being opposed by other administration officials, including Cabinet members, political appointees and Republican lawmakers who once stood firmly behind the administration on all matters concerning terrorism.
As isolation from the rest of the administration continues to grow, Cheney's POV on the relevance for the exemptions is presented.
Cheney's camp says the United States does not torture captives, but believes the president needs nearly unfettered power to deal with terrorists to protect Americans. To preserve the president's flexibility, any measure that might impose constraints should be resisted. That is why the administration has recoiled from embracing the language of treaties such as the U.N. Convention Against Torture, which Cheney's aides find vague and open-ended.
Unfettered power. That's an very interesting phrase to hear coming from Cheney's camp. Ironic because when the phrase "unfettered power" is placed next to a world leader with as much angst, bitterness, and stubborness as George Bush, it brings forth thoughts of the word fascist, which is used far too often and incorrectly as a means to describe liberals.
Also ironic is the the joining of the phrase "unfettered power" with the phrase "protect Americans." How does creating exemptions to prisoner treatment, which for all intents and purposes is torture, protect Americans? Is it that tidbit of information an officer might receive that could prevent a plot from forming or taking place?
Or, as is the case, is it the information gleamed from an unreliable source, such as Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, that can allow the President to wage war on a country that faced no threat to us so that we can "fight them over there instead of fight them over here?"
We've seen what this war has produced. Over 2,000 dead American soldiers, thousands of dead Iraqi's, and countless injuries on both sides that largely go unreported. There is raging anti-American (or anti-Bush, however you want to call it) sentiment as seen most recently in Mar del Plata, Argentina.. Every day, it seems, another US soldier is being killed in some raid, somewhere...in Iraq. And still, there is no end in sight.
And for what? So Dick Cheney and friends can play patriots-on-parade by supporting legislation that will allow "enhanced interrogation techniques" by the CIA, all in the name of freedom, democracy, and protection?
I don't feel protected. I don't feel right. As evil and ruthless and despicable as the enemies are that we're fighting, I cannot bring myself to be on par with them. I cannot condone the actions of what is supposed to be the greatest country of the world. America stands for democracy. America stands for freedom.
America does NOT stand for torture, undue punishment, "secret prisons," "unfettered power" for a President, or unjust wars of choice, pushed forward by known faulty intelligence.
I agree with Sen. Dick Durbin when he said, "[cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of prisoners] is not what America is all about. Those aren't the values that we're fighting for."
You're right, Sen. Durbin. But it is what Dick Cheney and company are all about.