Over the weekend it was interesting to see the messages from the Obama Administration about the prosecution of the people involved in the torture of enemy combatants, as the Bush people called them.
That includes from the top, for me, Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, Rice, Tenet, down to and including the agents and soldiers who actually carried out the orders of the top people. Because, if they involved children, and to water board someone 183 times in a month, and another 82 times in a month, that goes beyond what their so called guidelines were, into either irresponsibility or just plain sadism.
We have already tried and convicted some members of the military, for the abuses at Abu Ghraib, which I wrote about here. If they could be tried and convicted for the crimes of torture, for which they say they were carrying out orders, why should the others not be?
The case at Abu Ghraib and of these non com's who were punished by giving them sentences in prison is typical, they were punished but the officers were let go with a slap on the hand. As I pointed out, the most that happened was they were busted one grade in rank, or a letter of reprimand was put in the file. One was even fined $8,000.
So much for equal justice.
Rahm Emanuel was on This Week with George Stephanopoulos and stated he didn't think there would be any prosecutions. Then you have David Axelrod on Face The Nation saying if there is clear indication of laws being broken there could be prosecution.
See, mixed messages.
My own Sen. Claire McCaskill, on Fox News Sunday, with Chris Wallace, says she is ready to start hearings into possibly impeaching Jay Bybee, Judge on the 9th Circuit in CA. Possibly??? Another mixed message to me.. there should be no possibly, this should be a definite. He wrote one of the damn memos. He should be impeached and gone from the bench.. Matter of fact someone should tell him to step down until they get it done.
That's just my thoughts for now. I will have more later. Let me know what you think.
1 comment:
I've become so disconnected from the political sphere that I don't even know what to say. It seems like a simple response - prosecute the crime, dammit!
I'm glad you're paying attention, Annette, because right now I'm like all those other oblivious Americans. I'm kind of embarrassed by it, but haven't done anything to change it yet.
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