The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #86955 Message #1621963
Posted By: GUEST,Whistle Stop
07-Dec-05 - 10:40 AM
Thread Name: BS: Condi Rice - not nice
Subject: RE: BS: Condi Rice - not nice
I don't think Secretary Rice's sex or race have anything to do with this. I judge her on her words and actions.
Is there more rumor and innuendo than fact in this discussion? Undoubtedly, but the Bush administration has it within their power to put the facts out there. That they have not done so suggests to many of us that the facts don't support their position.
I am an American citizen and military veteran who is appalled by this. The simple fact is that most people simply do not believe the Bush administration's denials that they torture people and/or send people elsewhere to be tortured. Given the administration's resistance to a law prohibiting torture (despit overwhelming support for the law in the Republican-dominated Senate), their creative interpretation of the meaning of the word "torture" (denials are easy when you get to define the terms used in the debate), their refusal to give straight answers on the question of secret prisons, their reluctance to allow unfettered international inspections of detention facilities at Guantanamo and elsewhere, their reliance on carefully-worded (and endlessly repeated) sound bites as a substitute for real discussion of the issues, and their history of misleading the world in support of their aims, they simply have no credibility left on questions of this sort.
Torture is a profound moral wrong, and that's the primary reason I am opposed to it. I also believe that it is strategically wrong. What the Bush team doesn't seem to realize is that, to the extent the US has legitimate aims in the world (and I believe that at least some of our aims are legitimate), we are engaged primarily in a war of ideas and ideals. And we undercut our own ideals, and our standing in the world, when we don't adhere to basic norms of civilized conduct and respect for universal human rights. Any small tactical gains that we might make based on information gathered through torture are outweighed -- dramatically -- by our reduced moral authority and damaged credibility as promoter of freedom and human rights for the peoples of the world. It amazes me that the Bush administration can't see that as clearly as the rest of the world does.