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commentary by
Michael L. Bromley |
Bromleyisms
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... of Politics
Nothing new there, just a well made, much forgotten point through all the media and political rampage over the "Gonzales Memo" and his confirmation hearings, now concluding. Gonzales will be nominated, just as was Ashcroft before him, and after an even more bitter confirmation fight. You remember the Ashcroft hearings?* I listened to it all on C-SPAN, which is why I did not listen to the Gonzales mess. There was no war, no terror, and no torture scandal back in early 2001, just a former Senator and an even split in the Senate taken to by Democrats squealing to avenge the 2000 election and leveling it all upon their old colleague, a man who had accepted without complaint, with grace, indeed, a bogus result of his own election, won by an illegitimate contender, the widow of his opponent who was illegally installed on the ticket and affirmed there by a judge (an event repeated in the Robert "The Torch" Torricelli episode of 2002 in NJ). Ashcroft was beat up for supposed insensitivity to civil rights, for supposed racism, for being... uh, religious. (Since then, my father and I took to calling him "The Reverend Ashcroft"). God bless, Mr. Ashcroft, and Godspeed to some deserved peace of mind for your job done right, and conducted with firmness and decorum despite the rage, the fear, and the nonsense of the partisans and the fools who hounded you these past four years. And good luck to you, Mr. Gonzales. They threw it all at you, including what they didn't have, just as they did with Mr. Ashcroft. It is not the narrow question of was Ashcroft a racist, or did Gonzales sanction torture that drives such things. These accusations would mean little -- wouldn't happen -- without the larger, insipid context of supposed racism on the right or the war in Iraq. Ashcroft was no racist, and his critics knew it. They went after him by association, merely, that his beliefs and his politics were somehow racist. (The most specific accusation was a case Ashcroft prosecuted as A.G. of Missouri that gave no such proof.) Bogus, top to bottom, but insipid for the general slander of Ashcroft the archetype of rightwing evil.** Same thing here with Gonzales and torture. The memo, the man, and the policies are not the target: it is what Gonzales is supposed to represent that is being attacked here, not the man and not his record. Thus launched to things larger, things beyond definition -- what does Gonzales really represent? what does this Torture Memo really mean? -- these become illegitimate questions for a confirmation hearing. And, as MacDonald demonstrates, more harm comes of exaggeration of the supposed torture than of any torture itself. I beg you to read Ms. MacDonald's article, and you will see that it does matter. These aren't just words. The accusations so exceed the reality, and we're not just talking one man's reputation, as vile as it is what they said of Ashcroft back in '01. Here's a summary of the MacDonald article: ■ U.S. forces were entirely unprepared for the new type of prisoner in the dedicated terrorist, one who has no loyalties to family or self, no fear of death, and total contempt for the world and for consequence. Old strategies of interrogation did not work. Afghan war detainees quickly learned to defeat U.S. methods, since they understood and held in contempt the American self-limits. ■ "Stress" techniques were discussed and successfully applied (see Mark Bowden's 2003 article in Atlantic Monthly, The Dark Art of Interrogation, which described some successes of the technique), but, true to the American way, their legality became an issue immediately, especially vis-a-vis the Geneva Accords, which MacDonald points out -- and Gonzales affirmed as White House counsel -- are inconsistent with the situation, since notions of reciprocal treatment of prisoners between these combatants -- the U.S. and terrorists -- are at face absurd. ■ MacDonald flatly states that the Gonzales memo and Abu Ghraid are unrelated. The Defense Secretary and the White House were approached for legal clarity regarding interrogation of the "20th hijacker," a man who was denied entry at Orlando on August 4, 2001, with Mohamed Atta awaiting on the other side of Customs, and a high-level Al Queda recruiter who was captured in Pakastan. Outside of Gitmo, the Army was not party to these discussions. What went on in Iraq was not a matter of policy, but a breakdown in it. Writes MacDonald:
■ According to MacDonald, as a result of the overblown outrage over Abu Ghraid (thank you Dan Rather), interrogation policy was changed, even though it had no bearing upon Abu Ghraib:
Thus hysteria, thus self-loathing, and thus its politics does harm, does hurt to our own. Thus my outrage at the abuse of the political process in the Gonzales hearings and the hyperventilation over Abu Ghraid (thank you Dan Rather). We are weaker as result:
As for what went on at Guantanomo, let us hope our people have learned what they needed to learn from the prisoners. There will be no repeat of Abu Ghraid. It won't happen, and it didn't take a national scandal to keep it that way. Far more important is the War on Terror, and if we are equipping our side with the tools needed to win. The best I can find of hope in all this is, according to MacDonald, what the CIA is doing, that is what they're doing that we don't know about. She writes parenthetically,
and, again parenthetically,
Can we, please, keep this one away from Dan Rather and the DNC? [See also this article: How Should We Coerce Life-Saving Information from Terrorists?, a review of the articles mentioned above.] * For a refresher on the disgusting treatment of Ashcroft at his January, 2001 confirmation hearings, see:
** Here's a slice of vitriol out there that the Rev. Ashcroft has had to endure, from some leftist website, PoliticalStrategy.org:
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