AN OPPORTUNITY FOR WATERBOARDING

It gets harder and harder to think that this Congress is ever going to take any definitive action about all the inappropriate actions taken by BushCo, but there is some activity going on in the Congress that gives me hope.

The House Judiciary Committee has, for some time now, been wrestling with dick Cheney over whether or not his staff should or could be required to testify in a hearing on the process of authorizing torture – oh, excuse me – that’s “harsh interrogation methods” for use on prisoners of war – oops again – terrorists in captivity.

dick Cheney, of course, has been solid all along – as befits a good conservative - in his position that his office is not answerable for anything. It has taken months towheedle, whittle and wear away the resistance, but it appears now that the committee has at last decided to issue a subpoena for the appearances of David Addington http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iakd9i9QHJn3MgPadkhBZT4X2-HAD90G6M2O0 before the House Judiciary Committee. John Yoo has agreed to appear without being forced to do so by subpoena.

It’s hard telling what, if anything, of value will come of all this, though. Addington, Cheney’s chief of staff and former legal counsel, is famous among his peers, though not the general public because he tends to duck publicity, for being the driving force behind the idea that a president during war time is not bound by the limitations of the constitution. By virtue of that alone, he is a treasured member of dick C’s staff, and also it is not likely that he considers the Congressional subpoena to be binding on him in any way. According to Colon (Sp. Intended) Powell, Addington “doesn’t care about the constitution”. http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/07/03/060703fa_fact1 Any government official who disdains the constitution: (1) shouldn’t be a government official in any capacity, and (2) can’t be expected to hold Congress in high esteem or (3) isn’t likely to think that any oath they require him to take would bind him to tell the truth.

Yoo, on the other hand, is so steeped in his belief that this righteous nation of ours can do no wrong that he can lie through his teeth in the full certainty that he’s telling the truth. His rationalizations for American misconduct are too unbelievable in their very essence for anyone with any respect for anyone else to fall for. He will provide very little in the way of concrete revelations of fact and a great deal of rationalizations for whatever actions were taken. One hopeful point, though, is that he does like to talk, so maybe he’ll wind up talking a little too much.

All in all, this is going to be a process worth watching, though one from which I expect very little in the way of concrete results. We’ll be lucky if we get more out of it than a perjury charge months later, but if I’m surprised by some unexpected revelations damaging to BushCo I sure won’t be disappointed.

Hmmm, maybe the committee ought to confine the boys to a 3x6 cell for a few years and then waterboard them. That way they could get them to confess to anything just as though they were prisoners of war – oops, I keep forgetting – it’s as if they were terrorists.



Be the change you wish to see in the world. -- M. K. Gandhi

Individually we have little voice. Collectively we cannot be ignored.
But in silence we surrender our power. Yours in Peace -- BR

The reason for going was to keep the crude flowing and raise a false flag abroad. – from a poem by Jack Evans titled 3500 Souls - http://www.myspace.com/paralegal_eagle