[Marxism] Ted Rall: The normalization of horror

["Raymond Chase" <r_chase@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

http://www.uexpress.com/tedrall/

January 11, 2004

The normalization of horror

American gulags become permanent

By Ted Rall

New York--A new documentary, "Hitler's Hit Parade," runs 76 minutes without
narration. Comprised entirely of archival footage, the film prompts its
reviewers to remark upon Hannah Arendt's famous observation about the
banality of evil. German troops subjugated Europe and shoved millions of
people into ovens; German civilians went to the movies, attended concerts,
and gossiped about their neighbors. People lived mundane, normal lives while
their government carried out unspeakable monstrosities.

Sound familiar?

As Congress prepared to rubberstamp the nomination of torture aficionado
Alberto Gonzales as the nation's chief prosecutor, the Washington Post broke
news that would have torn a saner nation apart. The Bush Administration, the
paper reported January 2, is no longer planning to keep hundreds of Muslim
prisoners currently rotting away in U.S. concentration camps at Guantánamo,
Abu Ghraib and Bagram merely "indefinitely." The Defense Department and CIA
are now planning "a more permanent approach for potentially lifetime
detentions" for these innocents.

We're locking them up forever. Without due process.

Before gangsters like Alberto Gonzales seduced us into abandoning our
values, a person was considered innocent before being proven guilty. Now
we're locking people away because "the government does not have enough
evidence to charge [them] in courts." And everyone, including Democrats, is
OK with this.

Untold thousands of people are being held without charges, tortured and
occasionally murdered in the system of gulags hastily strung together by the
CIA, FBI, INS and Pentagon. According to the government itself, only a few
dozen are former Al Qaeda officials. Most of these postmodern misérables
were farmers, truck drivers, grunt militiamen and political enemies sold
into bondage by Afghan warlords and similarly trustworthy souls for cash
bounties on a no questions asked basis. We know they have no ties to
terrorism, but they've already spent years getting beaten up. Releasing them
would serve as a tacit admission that we were wrong to describe them as--in
Dick Cheney's words--"the worst of the worst." They would sue our
government, and eventually win. Worst of all, they have unpleasant tales to
tell about systemic sodomy and countless other forms of horrific
taxpayer-funded abuse. We can never let them out.

Bush plans to divide U.S. concentration camp victims into two groups. One
set of "lifers" will end up in U.S.-run stalags like Gitmo's new Camp 6,
built to hold 200 "detainees who are unlikely to ever go through a military
tribunal for lack of evidence, according to defense officials." But not to
worry: Camp 6 would "allow socializing among inmates."

Others captured in the "war on terrorism" will be outsourced "to third
countries willing to hold them indefinitely and without proceedings" in
foreign-run gulags that pledge to make victims available for torture by
American interrogators. This practice, some claim, is "an effective method
of disrupting terrorist cells and persuading detainees to reveal
information."

"The threat of sending someone to one of these countries [where they are
likely to be tortured] is very important," said Rohan Gunaratna, author of
"Inside Al Qaeda: Global Network of Terror."

But the so-called "ticking time bomb" rationale for torture is patently
fallacious. We've heard the scenario repeatedly: wouldn't it be worth
torturing someone who knew the location of a nuclear bomb that was about to
destroy Manhattan? The short answer, to a moral person, is obviously no.
Moreover, its logic is ludicrous.

Suppose we had captured Osama bin Laden on 9/10 and immediately gone to work
on him with our Alberto Gonzales-approved psychotropic drugs and our Alberto
Gonzales-approved "waterboard" dunking technique. It wouldn't take long for
Osama's pals to notice that he'd failed to show up at the Terrorcave. They'd
assume that we had him and were torturing him. They'd assume that he'd tell
us everything he knew. So they'd delay 9/11 to 10/11 or 11/12 or 9/11/02. Or
go to Plan B. Or develop a Plan C. No one in an underground organization,
not even its top leader, is indispensable. Arrests are inconvenient, not
debilitating.

The information a person possesses at the moment of his capture ages like a
ripe cheese in hot sun. Even if what he told you at the beginning was true,
anything you'd get out of him days and weeks and months and years later
would be completely worthless.

Wait a minute.

Look at what we're talking about. Consider the breezy way we
Americans--Americans!--are debating the pros and cons of torture. Marvel at
our moral bankruptcy. The liberal argument against torture used to be that
it was wrong. Now it's that it doesn't work.

So.

Read any good books lately?




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