What we have become

We have become what we despise - or what we have longed claimed to despise. I want to share with you an article by Robert Parry entitled "Bush's "Dirty War" Amnesty Law" that reveals something about what we have become. Here's part of what it says:

The United States is following the lead of "dirty war" nations, such as Argentina and Chile, in enacting what amounts to an amnesty law protecting U.S. government operatives, apparently up to and including President George W. Bush, who have committed or are responsible for human rights crimes.

While the focus of the current congressional debate has been on Bush's demands to redefine torture and to reinterpret the Geneva Conventions, the compromise legislation also would block prosecutions for violations already committed during the five-year-old "war on terror."

The compromise legislation bars criminal or civil legal action over past violations of Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions, according to press reports. Common Article 3 outlaws "violence to life and person," such as death and mutilation as well as cruel treatment and "outrages upon personal dignity."

The legislation now before Congress also would prohibit detainees from citing the Geneva Conventions as a legal basis for challenging their imprisonment or for seeking civil damages for their mistreatment. [Washington Post, Sept. 22, 2006]

Since U.S. courts generally limit plaintiff status to people who have suffered definable harm, these provisions amount to a broad amnesty law for Bush and other administration officials who have engaged in human rights violations since the 9/11 attacks.
...
The emerging U.S. amnesty law would be unusual in that it wouldn't explicitly acknowledge that offenses had been committed, nor is the word "amnesty" used. Nor have there been public hearings in Congress to determine what the Bush administration might have done that requires amnesty.

Nevertheless, the legislation, which seems to be gaining bipartisan support, would create broad areas of legal protections for Bush and other human rights violators for past crimes. By also barring victims from seeking enforcement of the Geneva Conventions in U.S. courts, the bill would give the Bush administration wide latitude for future acts of abuse.

It's really insidious, isn't it? I told you yesterday that the "debate" on torture was all about keeping Bush out of jail. But it's also a way of giving him free rein to go on torturing with impunity.