It's not about them, it's about us

ABSOLUTELY NOT WORK SAFE.

The Rude Pundit cuts through the crap and tells us what the unwillingness of this nation to reject torture really means:

If you haven't yet read the New York Times article on just how deranged the Bush administration is about covering its ass over torture, do it and then come back here. The Rude Pundit will wait...

Yeah, yeah, it's long. Get the fuck back there and finish it. Jesus, short attention-spanned motherfuckers.

You done? Good. Let's get going here:

In essence, what that article by Scott Shane, David Johnston, and James Risen said is that conversations went on in the White House and the Justice Department in the United States that went something like this: Bush might say, "Hey, all that fucked-up shit we've been doing to prisoners, how much of it can we still do?"

To which some random bloodthirsty Yoo or Addington would say, "Oh, fuck, we can do whatever the fuck we want."

And some plaintive Comey or Goldsmith would say, "Umm, we kinda got treaties and shit, maybe a few laws that might say we should back off."

And some Cheney or, to a lesser extent, Gonzales would say, "Yeah, right, fuck you, Comey or Goldsmith. Yoo or Addington, kick out the enhanced interrogation jams and tell those CIA pussies who wanna know if shit's legal that we got their backs."
....

And some Cheney or, to an even lesser extent, Gonzales would go, "Call the CIA. Tell 'em naked, drownin', sleepless brown people is a-okay."

And Bush would say, "I'm glad we decided we're not war criminals. Now lemme go tell Umerka we done made 'em more securer."

And then in some brightly-lit metal cell at Bagram Air Base or Gitmo, ice cold water was thrown on a naked man from Iraq, with the water tosser feeling assured that what he was doing was good and right for God and country.

A few years back, a social worker friend gave the Rude Pundit a simple moral question that seems so obvious once it's said, but it hangs over the Rude Pundit constantly. He was looking for absolution for some betrayal of trust he wanted to commit. The friend said, "You have to ask yourself, 'At the end of the day, what kind of person do I want to be?'" The Rude Pundit decided he wasn't that kind of person. No, he ain't a saint, but he ain't outright cruel.

The Rude Pundit has not been one of the loud drum beaters for impeachment out here in Left Blogsylvania because of the practicality of achieving it. But he has to say that the longer these depraved motherfuckers get to go unpunished, the more obvious it is that the Congress and, indeed, the citizens of this fallen nation have decided what kind of people they are.

I don't think there is any way to force Bush and Cheney from power before the end of the term, so the focus has to be on two things:

1. Elect a president who has a freaking clue about foreign affairs and international law. That means Edwards, Kucinch and Gravel are out. Period. Not even VP material.
   
2. Elect as large a majority in Congress, particularly the Senate, as we can get to keep the Rethugs sidelined. The prospects are looking better by the day.

If we want any hope of help on extricating ourselves from Bush's war without having our military destroyed in the process, we have to show that we're serious about upholding the Geneva Conventions and destroying Cheney's imperial framework. Otherwise, we'll be left to our own increasingly isolated and powerless devices. Failure to do so, and we will get what we deserve.

Rejection of the Cheney doctrine is the first step to the refoundation of the republic.

Dear Religious Right: Give It Up

Courtesy of the Rude Pundit. NOT WORK SAFE:

How many more fuckin' times are we gonna go through this same pathetic charade with presumptive leaders for the religious right? For moral values supporters? How many more men, for indeed, can anyone name a powerful woman brought down in a sex scandal recently? How many hypocritical Ted Haggards and Newt Gingriches and Mark Foleys and David Vitters, all, all, all men that the religious right counted on to lead them to the promised land of political power, to keep those homosexuals down, to punish Bill Clinton, to make abstinence and anti-abortion policies the rule of the country? How many more men who make a show of deep faith who are just assholes who wanna get their rocks off?

When do we get to act like a nation of grown-ups where we can say, "You know, I don't give a fuck if my candidate likes to have his nutsack stomped by a cross-dressed male hooker in stiletto heels as long as he supports my issues"? And where those issues can be shit like war and education and health care and not bullshit like who's fucking who and for what reasons?

Amen. I am sick of the faux morals (and rampant moralism) of the religious right. Their leaders are some of the biggest perverts in the country, blathering on about their love of Jeezus while they are humping hookers and kids on the side. What's worse are the religious fellow travelers who tut-tut ordinary people's foibels, but won't hold their hypocritical fellows responsible for corrupting the very fabric of their faith.

America is so fucked up. We'll impeach a president over a consual blow job but don't have the balls to do it to one who has gutted rule of law and made us into a nation that condones torture. We are the opposite of a Christian nation.

Anglachel

Rude Pundit - Policy and Attitude

The Rude Pundit (WARNING - never work safe) has pointed out something from Seymour Hersh's New Yorker intreview with Gen. Taguba that hasn't been noted in other analyses I have read - the way in which the treatment of Taguba himself after release of his critical report exposes the way in which the attitudes of Rumsfeld et. al. created a perfect condition for a pro-torture policy:

And isn't that the whole key to what happened at that Hussein-era hellhole remade into an American-controlled hellhole? It wasn't enough to imprison the people there; they had to be made to regret ever having dared to think about opposing America. What Hersh's article tells us is not just that the decisions about the treatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib came from the highest levels of the Defense Department (and the Bush administration). It's that the very nature of the men who were creating the policy led naturally to the abuses. It's what they know. It's what they do. It's who they are. For if they can treat an American two-star general like a syphilitic camp follower, what chance did Iraqis have?

Yes, the torture that happened in the past - and even more that which continues to this day in the secret camps and undisclosed locations - was caused by bad apples. Rumsfeld, Cheney, Bush. They are three people who enjoy the prospect of harming and humiliating others.

These people are war criminals. Period. They were criminals from the day they entered office and they will continue to assault humanity even when they leave.

Anglachel