Pushing Whales

The President and Secretary of Defense insist that the guards’ torturing prisoners at Abu Ghraib does not reflect American values. What conceit!

As a people, we go down to the beach and push whales back to the ocean. We torture cats.

It is not the culture, so much as it is the place. A prison creates the environment for violence. Especially in a time of war. It is always necessary to hate those whom we must kill.

Our government, once again, woefully under prepared for this war. Or, the Administration lies when it claims it knew nothing of the orders that led to this torture. Which result will be more mortifying?

In July 2003, Amnesty International issued a Memorandum on Concerns Relating to Law and Order in Iraq. The Memorandum included allegations of torture and ill-treatment of Iraqi detainees by US and Coalition forces. The allegations included beatings, electric shocks, sleep deprivation, hooding, and prolonged forced standing and kneeling.

Furthermore, Major General Antonio Taguba found "systemic and illegal abuse of detainees" in the Abu Ghraib facility (Baghdad Central Confinement Facility, BCCF) between August 2003 and February 2004, and concluded that soldiers had "committed egregious acts and grave breaches of international law at Abu Ghraib/BCCF and Camp Bucca, Iraq".

Our culture has imprisoned 174,179 people in 2004 in Federal facilities alone. 70,088, or 40.3%, of these people are African Americans. (Federal Bureau of Prisons QUICK FACTS website.)

Since 1990, the United States has executed 19 people for crimes committed as juveniles, despite the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The ICCPR prohibits execution of minors. Only the United States and Somalia refuse to ratify the ICCPR.

Deputy Rumsfield apologized. He also accepted responsibility. This implies accountability. Will he face any consequence? Not likely.

Time for a regime change at home.