Opinion:
On Torture and Enemies Domestic: Why do
Politicians support torture?
by Diane V. McLoughlin; 05/02/08
The toughest wall to hoist yourself over is the possibility
that 9/11 was blowback. You have to be willing to roll the
problem over in your mind and contemplate the
possibilities. That takes guts. Intestinal fortitude it was
called in another era.
Many gung-ho guys are big-hearted and don't like people
getting hurt. If their leaders tell them that people - theirs or
somebody else's somewhere else - are in trouble, they
want to step up and fight for right.
Problem is, how do you know you are being told the
truth?
The best answer to any question I have ever read in my
life went like this. In a weekly news item, a few local
religious leaders representing their respective faiths
would be given a question, and each would be given the
space of a few paragraphs to attempt to answer from their
particular faith perspective.
One week, the question was this:
What does your religion tell you about how to deal with
your enemies?
The Rabbi responded with an answer about
proportionality.
A Christian something about turning the other cheek.
I mean no offense but I cannot remember what the Muslim
cleric had to say, because the next guy's answer hit me
like a two-by-four. I believe he was Hindu. His answer:
If I am not hurting anybody; if I am respecting other
people's rights; If I am not usurping anybody's property:
"what need have I of enemies?"
It is time we began to meditate on this question.
The oath of the military is clear, to protect the country's
Constitution from enemies both foreign and domestic.
The worst of them, it would seem to me, are those that
would threaten the fabric of democracy from within -
like Hitler in Germany.
It happens. We know it happens. But how does it
happen? Through harnessing the natural good feeling for
God and country and twisting it into something else; a
harness to put the people to the yoke serving power
interests.
Through lies.
If democracy, if any free society is to survive, it must reject
idol or hero worship. Democracy demands critical
enquiry. Meaning? You have to cut through the bullshit.
This is not an easy thing to do, to question the people at
the top; people who are supposed to be the embodiment
of the highest ideals in your heart.
Most of us are wised up enough to know that, clearly, that
is not always what you get. Sometimes, what you get
instead is a set of very talented liars, liars who were
strongly motivated to get control of the reins of power; liars
who use people 'just like pawns in chess'.
(From, 'War Pigs'; Black Sabbath; remake by Cake.
Hear it on my widget, here.)
In any crime, one of the questions top of mind for
investigators is motive. This is a clue.
It seems to me that the current U.S. Administration
advocating the use of torture, is a clue. A bread crumb.
Any American in a position of leadership who stands in
front of the people and tells them that torture is what we do
is a freak.
The obscenity of it, the madness of it, is that torture
doesn't even freakin' work. Torture will not get you reliable
information. If you are being tortured, you will say anything
to make it stop.
What does torture succeed in doing? Torture succeeds in
making enemies. Torture is a form of terrorism.
Bad politicians support torture. They support torture
because bad politicians make enemies. That makes
bad politicians afraid.
A bad politician who lies and keeps the truth from the
people, who uses people as instruments of death, who
hurts other people elsewhere, is a very dangerous thing.
Finally, a bad politician is a threat to national security.
That is why the military swears an oath to protect the
nation's ideals, enshrined in the Constitution, against
enemies within at home.
home
|
|
