A sad, sad day

Today is a sad day in our country. Normally I write my blog and sit on it for a month or so before I post it so that I have time to think over what I've written. Not so today. Our country has turned a corner that should have never been turned and undoing that misstep, I'm afraid, will take many years and many lives. Today, September 29, 2006 we have become a nation that approves of torturing human beings. Don't get me wrong. I'm not naive enough to believe that Americans have never tortured other people. I'm sure in times of war and in times of peace the military and other security agency personnel have tortured individuals. As a country, however, the United States was above that. Bad things happen and bad people do bad things but overall torture was not an approved technique of gaining information or of treating people. Veteran military and security agency personnel will tell you that you can gain very little, if any, useful information with the use of physical torture. Psychological interrogation methods work much better. Ask John McCain or others who have been POW's. Prisoners will say anything to make the pain stop but they won't necessarily tell the truth. McCain gave the names of the Packers when tortured instead of the names his torturers were looking for.

America used to be above the use of torture. We were the land of the free and the land of rights for all human beings everywhere. Prosecutors during the Nuremburg trials went out of their way to be sure that the Nazi's had fair trials. Why? Because we were not them...We were above that. Not today. We have become what we have hated most. We have become what we were meant to be fighting. Today Osama bin Laden won. I believe it was Thomas Jefferson who said, "there is nothing to fear but fear itself." Today our country gave into fear (again) and let it change our values and our beliefs. We let fear change our laws and threaten our constitution. We let fear win today and by doing so we let the terrorists change us to a nation without freedom, without justice and without civil rights.

Of course it is not the first time in America this has happened. Civil rights and justice were stomped upon during the McCarthy era and in the World War II internment camps. Our country ignored the rights of blacks for decades before recognizing them as human beings. It is not the first time the United States has overlooked civil rights and justice for all. I liked to believe, however, that we wouldn't go backwards. That we had learned from communism and from past mistakes that holding people without due process was wrong. We constantly ridicule China for taking prisoners without charging them, without giving them rights such as rights to a lawyer or the right to know why they are being held. Now we are the same. Today our congress decided that we can take people off the street and imprison them for an undefined period of time without charging them, without providing them a lawyer and without telling them why they have been imprisoned. Our country has agreed that anyone who is "arrested" by our country can be tortured and treated in any manner that our president feels is proper without any oversight by the congress or judiciary. The president does not have to provide evidence as to why this person is believed to be dangerous or have dangerous information. Anyone could be subjected to this torture without cause.

Recently a Canadian citizen was subjected to this torture at the hands of the United States. He was held and tortured and later discovered to be completely innocent of all charges and let go. This could be you or this could be me. I've written lots of negative things about Bush and this government. They could come to my house tomorrow, call me a terrorist and torture me relentlessly for as long as they deem appropriate. There would be no oversight, no lawyer, no one to protect me. My family would not have to be told. This is not a bill that should exist under our constitution or in a democracy. This does not uphold justice or rights or freedom.

For those who think that we can trust the president to choose only those really really bad terrorists to torture...Think again. This president has been approving torture for the past 5 years. Knowing that torture was illegal and against the Geneva convention, this president has approved torture and has created secret prisons in other countries to get around the laws. This president has also lied about those secret prisons until they were discovered and he had to tell the truth. This president has ignored the FISA court and has authorized illegal wiretapping and surveillance of phone and financial records without remorse or apology. This president believes in torture and nominated a Attorney General who is willing to re-write our laws and constitution to support the president's desire to torture people. Isn't this the exact trait that we so abhorred in Saddam Hussein that we felt it necessary to remove him from power? Sean Hannity loves to talk about the rape rooms and torture chambers of Saddam as our reason for taking over Iraq. How can we then do the exact same thing and not be equally abhorrent? The logic escapes me.

There are those in our culture who honestly believe that the end justifies the means. That is no surprise although very sad and frightening. Even if we did get useful intelligence from torture, which has not yet happened and may not ever happen, the end can not justify the means. Torture should never be an approved form of interrogation in our country. The most obvious reason is that we are better than that. We do not approve of it in China or Russia or pre-war Iraq therefore we should not approve of it here. Second, by condoning torture we put ourselves and our own troops in more danger than ever before. Once we ignore the Geneva convention our own citizens could be taken off the streets by foreign governments and tortured without cause and there is nothing our government could do about it. The foreign government could simply say that we are suspected terrorists and that would have to be the end of the conversation. Finally, by torturing alleged terror suspects we are creating more enemies and more terrorists around the world. Al Queda has already admitted that the US has done more to boost their enrollment than anything they could have done themselves. What we did to the prisoners of Abu Garab prison helped to encourage the people of Iraq to join the insurgency and fight against Americans. Other countries such as Iran, Venezuela and North Korea have been emboldened by our behavior because they finally have popular support in their own country to fight us. This stems from our treatment of people and our loss of the moral high ground. No longer can people say that the US is really just trying to help and we should then support them. People see us as an evil force because our policies are suddenly supporting evil deeds and evil techniques. The administration thinks that since Americans have not noticed then other people around the world will not notice. This is not the case.

The Iranian President was on 360 with Anderson Cooper last week. Cooper cut clips of the interview with the Iranian President and clips of Bush's speech in the UN. It was chilling. Bush came across as a bully. He came across as a man who felt he could do whatever he wanted without justification and without cause. Bush came across as someone without boundaries and who could tell others what to do without limit. The Iranian President talked about wanting peace. He sounded like a man being unfairly picked on by the school yard bully and repeatedly talked about wanting to sit down with Bush and talk about the problem in a peaceful and congenial manner. Now, as an American and as someone who is not completely naive I tend to not believe the Iranian president when he says he does not want nuclear weapons. Whether the Iranian President was sincere or lying it does not really matter. He came across as the underdog. He came across as the victim. The Iranian president came across as the bigger man, the man who wants peace but is being denied peace. To anyone watching, the effect was chilling. The United States is digging itself into a hole where we will lose support of our allies and we will be the "bad guys" of the world. That is not a place we have ever been in our 200 year history and it will not be a good place to be once it happens.

Of all the people in this country I would guess that the lawyers would be the most appalled by today's vote. The lawyers are the ones who know the law, the constitution and the way that our justice system works. The lawyers know that the justice system is meaningless without the basic freedoms afforded our citizens and any human being who is tried under the parameters of our legal system. The entire judicial system is based on the basic idea of justice. Justice includes fairness. Each person has the opportunity to see the evidence against him in order to create a proper defense. Each person has the right to an attorney or someone who knows how the law works and what the evidence means. Every person has the right to a quick trial meaning that people can not be held indefinitely without charges. People must be charged with some type of crime and told what that crime is so that they know how to defend themselves. Everyone has the right to proper treatment. It is a proven fact, in research and in real events, people will incriminate themselves when tortured even if they are completely innocent. People will say anything to make torture stop even if it means saying that they did something they did not really do. That is why it is illegal in our country to torture a confession out of someone. It is not admissible because people lie in order to stop the pain. I have not been to law school but I'm guessing they cover this the first year. These laws were created in our country because they work. They make justice possible. That is why they are used throughout the world to this day. They were used in the Nuremburg trials, and they are being used in Saddam's trial. They are used because they are the moral way, they are the democratic way and they allow for justice. Congress forgot that today but Americans should never forget. Americans should not go on with their lives and allow this miscarriage of justice to go unrecognized. Americans need to speak up and say that torture is not the right way and torture is not the American way.

2-2-07
New information about the Canadian who was deported to Syria to be tortured can be found at:
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/02/01/america/NA-GEN-US-Canada-Arar.php

Peace above all else

It is about being right and not about doing right. This is the only way I can explain the views of the 33% or so Americans who continue to think the President is doing what is best for America. I have talked to a number of these individuals, many of whom are my friends and family. They continue to support the President regardless of what new illegal, dishonest or downright sneaky actions he commits. The press, who has finally woken up from their post 9/11 fear of printing anything negative about the administration, has been revealing disturbing facts about the way this administration has been operating for the past 5 years. Millions of Americans have been shocked, appalled and sickened by the abuses of power and the attack on our constitution. Others, however, are secure in their convictions that they voted correctly regardless of the facts. Really, who needs facts when you have great self-esteem?

These Americans sometimes site patriotism as their reason for supporting the President regardless of his actions. Following a leader regardless of his actions, however, has nothing to do with patriotism. Loyalist would be a better description. Loyalists remain loyal to their ruler regardless of his actions even if those actions violate the premise of their own country. The term was popular in the US during the revolutionary war and was used to describe people loyal to the king. Patriots, on the other hand, are looking out for what is best for the country. Patriots defend the constitution of the United States regardless of who is the current President and regardless of political affiliation. That is why every soldier presently serving our country is a patriot. Although many do not believe in what this President stands for, they do believe in America and our constitution and they defend it each day by putting their lives at risk.

Our constitution specifically names three separate but equal branches of government that are to act as a type of fail safe. Anyone who has seen Saturday morning cartoons know that no one branch is to hold all of the power. That is why the executive branch can veto a bill but the legislative branch can vote to override the veto. President Bush has illegally signed hundreds of bills by simply crossing out parts he does not like or adding statements saying that he does not have to follow the laws if he chooses not to. By doing this, he avoids the veto process in which congress would/could vote down the changes he has made to the bill. Most frightening is that he did this with last year’s so called “torture bill” on which he wrote that the president could order torture of enemies if he deems fit even though the bill expressly forbids it. This is undermining our constitution and is a way for the executive branch to hold power without oversight by the legislative or judicial branches of government. This is the largest danger that faces the United States today.

Another way this president has snubbed the constitution is by ignoring the FISA court. President Bush admits that he has ordered wire-tapping and searches of phone and financial records of millions of citizens without gaining a warrant. The FISA court was created in order to make it easy for federal agents to gain necessary warrants in a secretive manner. The court has rarely denied requests for warrants and actually grants warrants up to 72 hours AFTER the search or wire-tapping. If our administration or any security agency really needed to conduct wire-tapping or other searches on suspected terrorists they could have easily gained a warrant either before or after the search was conducted. This is the legal way to conduct such searches in the United States. By deliberately not getting these warrants, the government has conducted illegal searches. Of course, the court then could throw out any evidence discovered during these searches. So why would the government not get a warrant if it is easy and if they cannot use the evidence without one. Why has President Bush continued to stand behind his decision to conduct searches without a warrant and why has he refused to turn over lists of people whom were involved in these searches and wiretaps? There is only one logical answer to these questions. The government does not intend to prosecute these people and the FISA court would not grant a warrant if asked because the people were not enemies of the state. The only logical reason why Bush would not attempt to get a warrant would be that these people are not terrorists at all but just people who disagree with him and have somehow crossed his radar by either protesting against him or running in an election against a republican candidate. Bush refuses to give out these names and refuses to adjourn an oversight committee because he will be caught. Bush continues to refuse to comply with federal law and gain warrants for searches and wiretapping.

Other presidents have been careful to maintain the equality of power among the branches because they know how important this balance is in a democracy. President Nixon nominated a liberal judge for Supreme Court while Jimmy Carter nominated a conservative. These presidents and others before them both understood the importance of our constitution and our democracy and put the wellbeing of both before the wishes of their party. It is not against the law to do otherwise but it certainly undermines the constitution each time Bush attempts to throw off the balance of power and attempts to gain more power for the executive branch. I would hope that even die-hard republicans could see the danger in the precedent given that someday a democrat will again hold the office of president. I wonder if they will be so willing to defend Bush’s actions if a democratic president uses this precedent to get around the laws and the constitution the way Bush has done for the past 5 years.

Finally, there is very clear and overwhelming evidence that Bush lied to congress and the American people in order to gain support for invading Iraq. The republican congress has been able to put off a formal investigation for more than 3 years now because they hold a majority but they did promise, 3 years ago, to investigate the information that led to the invasion of Iraq. They agreed to do this investigation in two parts. The first part was completed relatively quickly because it was the investigation of the intelligence agencies that provided the faulty pre-war intelligence. Even after the investigation was completed, the subcommittees in congress were able to hold off the release of much of the information until now. The investigation found that much of the intelligence gathered was actually correct however; the president only sited the incorrect and misleading intelligence in speeches to the American public and in documents to congress. The CIA and FBI both gave correct intelligence about Iraq’s nuclear capabilities and Saddam’s ties to Al Qaeda but both were ignored. Bush chose to believe information that supported his decision for war although it was less reliable, more obscure, was disputed openly by our own intelligence agencies, and was in the end, false.

The second part of the promised investigation is to be whether the president and administration knowingly used false information about Iraq in order to gain support for an illegal war. This investigation has not yet formally begun because congress has been able to stall. Why wouldn’t any congressperson in the United States want to know if he or she was lied to by the president of the United States and tricked into giving the president the power to go to war with out just cause? I simply do not understand how a congressperson can put loyalty to their president or their party over a loyalty to their country and their constitution. When Nixon participated in illegal activities and lied about it, his own party insisted that something be done. Americans love to talk about democracy and how we are so wonderful but other countries in the world see our hypocrisy and wonder why we feel we have any right to preach to the rest of them. Other countries see very clearly that the president of the United States does not follow the rules he is trying to force them to implement and therefore we, as a country, have become a joke in the Middle East, in Europe and in the rest of the world. The president of Russia sees this irony but 33% of Americans in this country have not caught on yet.

Injecting religion into this equation has only made the situation more bizarre. Recently someone told me that I am not a good Christian because I believe the president is lying. Last Memorial Day I sat through a sermon about why it is okay to put the flag behind the cross. The premise was good. He started by saying that the cross comes first but we are all Americans after we are Christians. The problem came with the delivery in which he explained why we all must support America’s war and America’s government because we are good Christians. That part was a bit confusing to me if not downright heresy. When were Christians called by God to support American political figures or political agendas? I can see being deemed unchristian if I questioned God’s truthfulness or motives. I can even see how some would think me unchristian by questioning the king, if we had one, since many believed kings have divine rights to the throne. When did God start supporting our president or our country above all others? I think it is odd that Americans have begun to believe such absurdity although the religious right has spent billions of dollars to force this connection. The truly frightening thing, however, is that the religious right, and those who follow them, does not recognize the heretical act in claiming God is on their side.

The Christian right has made a political agenda of supporting one party regardless of their actions in order to advance their political agenda to ban gay marriage and outlaw abortion. Although they may have true religious beliefs about these two issues, they have misrepresented Christianity in order to advance this agenda. They have overlooked or even supported many actions by the administration that are questionable if not outright antichristian. The religious right has increased racism, bigotry and hatred in this country at a rate that is beyond compare in any other era. They have increased separatism and have been feeding on and encouraging the divided political atmosphere of our nation. This has not only made it impossible for Congress to work together to help anyone in our country, it has fed an anger toward homosexuals, liberals, democrats, feminists, muslims, immigrants etc that has resulted in violence against these groups. This effort to divide the people of our country and to ignore the political left may have helped their two main causes but it has left a majority of our nation without representation. It also has turned ordinary people, even Christians, away from the church and our religion. The plight of the poor has been virtually unheard for the past 5 years, as the rich have gotten billions of dollars worth of tax breaks. They have overlooked or even supported unjust war, torture, the death penalty, decreased gun control, and program cuts for our poorest citizens in order to advance their narrow agenda.

I have another good friend that will claim that the above paragraph is judgmental and therefore antichristian. He would tell me that by claiming they are not following God I am being judgmental and therefore doing the same as them. I do not think that is the case. We are called, as Christians, to spread the good news and to point out those who are misrepresenting our faith. In the book of Revelations John writes to the first church, “I know that you cannot tolerate wicked men, that you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them false.” This is his complement to them before he then criticizes them for forgetting their first love. God. By putting America and our president on a pedestal, have we too forgotten our first love? Again, in the letter to Smyrna John states there is “slander by those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan.” John recognizes the people of Smyrna for choosing to suffer rather than to follow those who claim to follow God but who are not. John spoke of the same ideas in his letter to Philadelphia. Are we forgetting to look for false apostles and are we overlooking their false statements because we are afraid to judge other Christians?

Jesus was especially concerned about the religious people of His time who were misrepresenting the Father and who were hypocritical. I believe the people of the religious right are the Pharisees of our time. They have twisted the message of the Bible so completely that it is unrecognizable to me as a Christian woman. Jesus spoke of love, forgiveness, giving all that you have for the poor and the least of these. Jesus spoke about humility and faith that God will judge and that we do not need to judge. The only warning he gave was to avoid the religious leaders who pointed out the sins of others without the proper humility. Jesus had great contempt for these religious leaders and stated that their sin is greater than any sins they were preaching about. I believe that supporting the hedonistic, violent and dishonest tendencies of this administration in order to gain political power to persecute people is the greatest sin. Even if they believe the people they are persecuting are acting in a sexually immoral, it does not excuse their own actions. The end does not justify the means, so to speak.

As Americans, we have freedom of religion so we tend to think that everyone has the right to think and say whatever they want to think and say. As Americans we do have this right. The religious right has a right to distort Jesus’ message in our country without consequence from the government. They can believe that Jesus is pro war, pro torture, anti gay, pro gun, etc. and legally they have a right to believe that and preach that. The ACLU would be inflamed if we tried to deny them that right. As Christians, however, we are not supposed to just sit back and ignore false statements by other Christians. We are not supposed to overlook their hypocrisy and ignore their distortion of our faith. We are caught up in the right of Americans to think whatever they want to think and we forget that we are Christians first and then Americans. The cross should be in front of the flag, not the opposite. Christians have an obligation to God to point out when other Christians are distorting His teachings. Historically Christians have upheld the premise of peace, equality, and love and we should continue to do that even in the face of the more “popular” Christians preaching the opposite. We should worship only the Father and the Son and recognize that the country and the president are not to be worshipped but admired. Only then can Christianity be omnipresent and the country a true democracy.