Bybee and O'Brien

In covering the Bush administration, many of us have invoked Orwell and Kafka. After reading the Bybee memo, Hilzoy makes the specific, obvious comparison.

(Cross-posted at Blue Herald)

Taking the Right Seriously

Dave Johnson has a good post over at Seeing the Forest called "Take The Right Seriously, Please":

We're all laughing at the right's nuttiness, especially the teabagging campaign. They say Obama isn't an American, that he is a communist, that in ten weeks he is responsible for the bush deficit, that he is planning to put everyone in concentration camps, that he is going to replace the dollar with a world currency, that he is gutting the military... And he has only been in office ten weeks.

In fact they're back to being as crazy and paranoid as they were when Clinton was President. Remember the accusations that Clinton and Hillary were murderers, that Hillary personally killed Vince Foster, that Clinton ran a drug-smuggling operation out of an airstrip, that he was looking through FBI files, that he fired the travel office to put a cousin in, that he "sold" plots in Arlington cemetery, that he held up runway traffic to get a $500 haircut, that he used cocaine in the White House, that he hung obscene ornaments on the White House Christmas tree and the other fabrications that came daily?

We laughed then, too, and how did that work out? They took over the Presidency, the House and the Senate. Then they started wars. They tortured people. They appointed corporate lobbyists to run every agency. They filled the courts with Federalist Society judges that rule for the corporations and religious right every time. They stole billions -- in one documented case actually having the Fed ship truckloads of pallets of hundred dollar bills directly to Iraq to be distributed to Bush cronies. They destroyed the economy of the world. And they worked hard to destroy the world itself -- the arctic is melting, the fisheries are depleted, the resources are plundered... And they get away with it -- who is being held accountable for any of that?

Go over and read the rest. I think the key is to confront this nuttiness, this selfishness, this cruelty, and - when it gets really advanced - this evil. One way to do that is indeed through ridicule. It can be very effective, and can be necessary for our own mental health. But it's dangerous to treat these people only as objects of ridicule, and it's dangerous to forget. Keith Olbermann recently made the same point many liberal bloggers have made over the years - it's dangerous to "move on" from major scandals, because the same people always come back. Demonstrating is good, but the big problem with the "tea parties" is that many of the participants were dupes buying the same old conservative shell game. Some conservatives in the base really are ignorant of how much their own leaders have been screwing them over. Others higher up are completely aware, and happy to keep the game going. (It often pays well.) I think mocking these people is healthy. But underneath that, we need to take the displaced rage and deliberate lies of these authoritarians, crooks and hustlers seriously.

(Cross-posted at Blue Herald)

The Favorite Poem Project

April is National Poetry Month. In past years I've promoted both it and the wonderful Favorite Poem Project, but as with Banned Books Week and the Big Read, it would be neat to get more bloggers involved. (Next year, I might even be more organized about it.) I'm not an official representative or anything - I just participated in the project several years ago, attended the related Summer Poetry Institute, and occasionally receive updates. It was an amazing experience I'd like to pass on. The official site has far more information, including resources for teachers and information on how to host a Favorite Poem Project event in your community. If you're interested, I'd encourage you to go to the official site, learn more and get involved. Meanwhile, I wanted to invite any and all bloggers to celebrate National Poetry Month, and the project provides a great model for that. This is all very informal, but if you decide to participate, just provide me the link to your post in an e-mail or in the comments below, and I'll compile them.

The Project

From the site:

The Favorite Poem Project is dedicated to celebrating, documenting and encouraging poetry’s role in Americans’ lives. Robert Pinsky, the 39th Poet Laureate of the United States, founded the Favorite Poem Project shortly after the Library of Congress appointed him to the post in 1997.

During the one-year open call for submissions, 18,000 Americans wrote to the project volunteering to share their favorite poems — Americans from ages 5 to 97, from every state, of diverse occupations, kinds of education and backgrounds. From those thousands of letters and emails, we've culled several enduring collections…

The Favorite Poem Project currently has three books in the series and a number of "mini-documentaries" on individual participants and the poems they selected. You can see the videos and read the accompanying poems at the project's site. There's also a YouTube channel now and a Facebook group.

I have several poetry links in my sidebar near the bottom, but I'd particularly recommend Poetry Daily. It features a new poem and background on the poet each day. Slate also features a weekly poem and podcasts of the authors reading them (here's the latest one). Every few weeks, Robert Pinksy selects a poem and discusses it with readers.

The Favorite Poem Project suggests several guidelines, but has only one rule:

The Only Rule

The only rule for an event affiliated with the Favorite Poem Project is that poems recited are NOT poems the readers or their friends or relatives have written, but ones they have read, perhaps many times, and to which they feel a personal attachment. Poems, for example, from the great history of American poetry, perhaps by Walt Whitman or Emily Dickinson, Langston Hughes or Gwendolyn Brooks, Wallace Stevens or Robert Frost. A reader might also choose Robert Browning or William Shakespeare—or a poem written in another language, along with an English translation. At various readings, we've heard poems in Chinese, Portuguese, Spanish, Japanese, Russian, Yiddish, Vietnamese and other languages.

In the Favorite Poem Project books, each poem has a short blurb written by the person who submitted it about the poem's personal significance. At community events, people speak extemporaneously instead. Most blog posts will probably follow the written model, but the guidelines for the live, community events are useful for conveying the spirit of all this:

Important Suggestions

The readings Robert Pinsky has hosted have been unique and wonderful. Audiences really like this kind of evening, and the readers themselves are inspired by it. People always leave the events thinking, often audibly, about what poems they would choose. Having had successful readings we've learned a few things. Here they are:

● The readers should be personal, not general, in answering the question, "Why have I chosen this poem from among my favorites?" This is the big, important point to emphasize: not a term paper, but an account of the reader's experience.

● Tell everyone, emphatically, that they are limited to five minutes. That way, even the most long-winded readers won't go on too long. Five minutes is a long time, and should be enough for the poem and for explaining their connection to it. If a poem takes longer than five minutes to read, an excerpt will do.

● Absolutely nothing in writing should be allowed, except for the poem. There should be no reading of prose; participants who speak informally, from the heart, are far more effective. This prevents homework assignment or book report style digressions away from why readers are reading a particular poem. People who are lively and interesting as themselves can become dull and monotonous when reading from prepared text.

● Also, there are advantages to having the readers sit on a stage or in the front of the room in a crescent of chairs: the audience can watch their responses to each other and can also mark the progress of the reading.

I've found that even if you know someone pretty well, hearing his or her favorite poem and its personal significance may show you something quite new. It also starts conversations. Back during my brief teaching stint, I had a student who read part of "Howl" by Allen Ginsberg, which happened to be a favorite of one of the parents listening. They struck up an enthusiastic discussion afterwards.

Samples

From the mini-docs, here are three of my favorites, covering a wide range of tone. Long-time NewsHour viewers may have seen some of these. Feel free to skip around, or browse through the others here or here.

Poem
by Frank O'Hara

Lana Turner has collapsed!
I was trotting along and suddenly
it started raining and snowing
and you said it was hailing
but hailing hits you on the head
hard so it was really snowing and
raining and I was in such a hurry
to meet you but the traffic
was acting exactly like the sky
and suddenly I see a headline
LANA TURNER HAS COLLAPSED!
there is no snow in Hollywood
there is no rain in California
I have been to lots of parties
and acted perfectly disgraceful
but I never actually collapsed
oh Lana Turner we love you get up

The Sentence
by Anna Akhmatova

And the stone word fell
On my still-living breast.
Never mind, I was ready.
I will manage somehow.

Today I have so much to do:
I must kill memory once and for all,
I must turn my soul to stone,
I must learn to live again—

Unless . . . Summer's ardent rustling
Is like a festival outside my window.
For a long time I've foreseen this
Brilliant day, deserted house.

Translated from the Russian by Judith Hemschemeyer

I'm Nobody! Who are you? (288)

by Emily Dickinson

I'm Nobody! Who are you?
Are you—Nobody—Too?
Then there's a pair of us!
Don't tell! they'd advertise—you know!

How dreary—to be—Somebody!
How public—like a Frog—
To tell one's name—the livelong June—
To an admiring Bog!

Participating

In the future, the Favorite Poem Project may provide a more formal way for bloggers to participate (and I may suggest that). But one doesn't preclude the other, and Banned Books Week, the Big Read and the Blog Against Theocracy may provide a better model - more official, organized community events alongside more informal blogswarms. I'll be more organized next year, but once again, if you wind up participating this time around, just provide me the link to your post in an e-mail (batocchio9 AT yahoo DOT com) or in the comments below, and I'll compile them. Or support poetry and the arts in your own way. Thanks.

(Cross-posted at Blue Herald)

Eclectic Jukebox 4/16/09

Great Northern - "Low is a Height"

Rorschach Blots and Pirates

(Stare into the blot. Do you see – Bloody Courage?)
It's hard to keep up with the right-wing grumble du jour on the pirate incident. We've covered it at BH, Jill at Brilliant at Breakfast offers "Obama scores an early military victory -- and the wingnuts are going crazy" and Sadly, No also has a good post. Meanwhile, if you're not reading Roy Edroso, you really should. All followers of wingnuttia should at least read his weekly roundups for The Village Voice. From this week's installment:

To prove their superior Republican toughness, some rightbloggers offered their own fantasy-camp ideas of how to handle piracy. Jules Crittenden suggested a scorched water policy, destroying all boats on or off Somalia's coast. Later Crittenden admitted this would take innocent lives, and so proposed a more targeted Plan B which involved "decoy ships to ambush and kill pirates in the act," gibbets, and imaginative disposal of pirate bodies ("Drop from altitude into the middle of suspect villages and piracy bases"). Still later he suggested "a kind of biblical terminology. Fire and brimstone, wailing of women and children, that kind of thing."

Any readers who found his fantasies "a little too 18th century," and "consider all this violence abhorrent," Crittenden assumed would also believe that "the pirates are simply victims of dysfunctional society themselves." So if you don't see the utility of dropping pirate bodies on African villages -- which would make a totally awesome video game -- you are a caricature of a bleeding-heart liberal; you are, in the ancient warblogger usage, objectively pro-pirates! And so is Obama, whose pirate policy Crittenden said was all about "human rights lawyers and an excess of concern for the well-being of the larger pirate community." So what if it was effective? It wasn't badass like what Crittenden acted out in his bathtub.

I commented over at Jill's post that I think for wingnuts, the only purpose the news serves at this point is as Rorschach blots for diagnosing the flavor and extent of their insanity. And that was before I was laughing at the military brilliance and ferocious courage of dropping bloody pirate bodies from "altitude." Roy basically sums up the entire right-wing blogosphere:

Get the story straight, comrade: rightbloggers would rather display absurdly reflexive hatred of the President than give any impression that they would ever approve of something he did. We're not sure how that's supposed to work on voters who aren't already rightwing lunatics, but maybe it's not meant for them; maybe it's some sort of test of loyalty and message discipline. If so, it was indeed a great success. Now all they have to do convince normal people to pay attention to them.

To bring us full circle to Buck's post (the first link), Rush Limbaugh is attacking his fellow conservative hack Jonah Goldberg for daring... to compliment the President of the United States. Even a rare display of class must be punished, lest the children get the wrong idea or the dittoheads have a thought not fueled by constipated, misplaced rage. These people deserve to be mocked, but this long-standing hyper-partisanship and sheer insanity from the GOP has not been a good thing for America and won't be in the future. Still, if these rabid scallywags would at least stick to sinking their own party and not the entire country, we'd all be better off.

(Cross-posted at Blue Herald)

The End of David Brooks

No, not really – a more accurate title would be, '"The Limitations on David Brooks' Understanding of Ethics." He wrote an op-ed for 4/6/09 called "The End of Philosophy." It's not horrible, I guess, but it is rife with imprecision and inaccuracy. Hilzoy has a lovely dissection of it in "Philosophy: Not Dead Yet!"

I'd just add – although I'm overdue for re-reading Aristotle – Aristotle discussed the difference between doing good deeds with and without reflection and deliberation. Roughly speaking, Aristotle viewed true virtue as the good deliberately chosen, a set of good habits and a general path. Brooks puts moral thinking and snap moral judgments in opposition, but in actuality, the ancient Greeks discussed and debated both in great detail. Furthermore, the existence of snap moral judgments and our basis for making them (while interesting) does not mean that a more reflective form of moral thinking doesn't exist or is not valuable. It would be one thing if Brooks argued that we underestimate how many of our moral judgments are actually snap decisions and that we misjudge the source of our own sense of morality. I suppose if we're especially charitable that is what Brooks is saying. But he also misses something essential, because contrary to what he argues, not all "moral judgments are like that" – they are not all "rapid intuitive decisions." But read Hilzoy's post, because it uses a splendid analogy and her piece is far more elegant.

Hilzoy also remarks:

(Parenthetical note: what is it with these conservatives and their desire to kill off the humanities? Fukuyama and the End of History, now Brooks ... can the Death of Inner Asian and Altaic Studies be far behind?)

Considering conservative antipathy toward the arts and toward science, it's not surprising.

(Cross-posted at Blue Herald)

Bring Your Own God (or None)

(Thanks to Darkblack for the cool graphic and to Blue Gal for organizing this yet again. My past Blog Against Theocracy posts can be viewed here. Check out the Blog Against Theocracy site for other participants.)

Blog Against Theocracy has been going long enough that there are some things I'd like to take for granted, but it's wise to reiterate some core concepts. Freedom of Religion in the First Amendment, and the separation of church and state, protect religious people as well as non-religious people. Religion is not a problem, and can be a strength, but authoritarians (religious or otherwise) and theocrats are. America was expressly not founded as a theocracy. Religious people have every right to participate in civic, secular society, but not being a theocracy means being religious does not legally confer extra status (how this actually plays out in individual communities is another matter). Whether they realize it or not, theocrats are not pursuing rights, which they already possess. They are pursuing power, specifically the power to dictate to other people how to live their lives. While Blog Against Theocracy involves many atheists, it's heartening that many people of faith participate, and fight against theocracy for the "right to worship – or not."

I've said this in earlier posts, but there's an expression I've really liked ever since I heard it from a religion professor: There are many paths up the mountain. Personally, I tend to look to the arts for my eternal truths, not sacred texts, but that's me. Religion is not the source of morality, but it may be one person's route to morality and their way of expressing it. As long as that's done in a non-proselytizing manner, fine. There's a big difference between quoting from scripture to express a general principle ("whatever you did for the least of my brothers, you did for me," "blessed are the peacemakers") and quoting to claim authority over others and/or condemn them ("homosexuality is an abomination!" "So is shellfish!"). Still, in general I'd say respect for atheists is the most important gauge for how healthy church-state separation is. Your mileage will vary on this depending on what communities you live and work in. I have some quietly religious friends and family who have had some annoying experiences, and I'm sympathetic to that. However, on the national political stage, generally it's considered safe to trash atheists and pander to religious folk. (More principled politicians and public figures don't do this, of course, but it's still quite common.)

This year, I thought I'd go for the hippie love song fest, since there's a nice tradition of working for social justice among atheists and religious folk alike. Here's two renditions of Arlo Guthrie performing "Amazing Grace," with his signature move of telling-a-story-in-the-middle. In this first clip, from a 1984 performance, Arlo explains some of the background to the song:



This story isn't entirely accurate, since Newton's full, public opposition to the slave trade came later, most notably in support of William Wilberforce's movement to abolish it. Arlo sings one verse that was written by Lee Hays:

Shall I be wafted to the skies
On flowery beds of ease
While others strive to win the prize
And sail on bloody seas

In the second clip, from 1993, Arlo takes an even long break and tells a few relevant stories:



Bring your own god. Outnumber them. It's easier to make a difference in lousy times. All funny and memorable.

Bill Moyers did a special on "Amazing Grace" that runs on PBS every so often. And the 2007 film Amazing Grace ain't bad and is well cast (Ioan Gruffudd, Albert Finney, Romula Garai and Michael Gambon, among others). Wilberforce's commitment to social justice is driven in part by his religious convictions, although some of his cohorts have different motivations. Seeing and hearing about the realities of the slave trade – especially handling the shackles and smelling the rankness of the ships – also has a strong impact on Wilberforce and those he tries to move. The film's particularly good at depicting the dangers for activists of burnout, and what friendship and community can do to alleviate those. The slave trade was very profitable, and that was the chief objection in Britain's parliament to ending it. The film also shows a very clever side maneuver for achieving abolition.

Beltway pundits love their shallow bipartisanship, but the real thing only makes sense when people share a goal. The same goes for activism in general. Some religious people – including a percentage of conservatives - will work on anti-poverty campaigns, eliminating world hunger, climate change and civil/human rights issues. There are other ideals – upholding reproductive freedom, defending the separation of church and state, fighting against theocracy – which can't be compromised and where there may not be common cause. Legitimate differences are fine, but it can be foolish to ignore them. Meanwhile, in my experience, the people who make the biggest public show of their virtue, piety, patriotism and the like are biggest phonies. Real moral authority isn't claimed, it's earned or it's evident. And someone who cares about social justice, who reveres the First Amendment and opposes theocracy, is (as Arlo says) a friend of mine. So at the next rally, bring your own god – or none at all. The revolution will not be televised, but it may be sung.

Fixed a typo.

(Cross-posted at Blue Herald)

Eclectic Jukebox 4/9/09

Emiliana Torrini - "Me and Armini" and "Jungle Drum"

She recently recorded a live session at KCRW here in L.A.

Economy Watch 4/8/09

Barney Frank chatted over at Crooks and Liars today, mostly about the bailout and financial matters. His responses are pretty interesting. He answered some of the issues in my (lengthy) comment/question elsewhere in the thread:

Congressman Frank, thanks for being here. I don't know if you've read Simon Johnson's piece for The Atlantic yet, but it articulated many concerns I and others have. Economic recovery might not be possible if all the current Wall Street oligarchs remain in power and the system is one of private profit and public risk. Non-bailout companies are a different matter, but for the insolvent banks, why go more the successful Swedish route of temporary nationalization, receivership, breaking them up, and so on? Even when measures are implemented to protect the taxpayer, it seems there's always an exemption and no real check on bailout CEOs trying to exploit the situation, most recently with the toxic assets plan and accounting changes. I don't envy Geithner, but it seems he and Larry Summers are far too wedded to protecting specific people and institutions versus the financial system, the economy as a whole, and average citizens. Wealth and power could wind up being even more concentrated with the same people who created this mess in the first place and have shown repeatedly that they cannot be trusted to do the right thing on their own – and all without a recovery. It seems both unpatriotic and like a hostage situation. I'd feel better if Paul Krugman, Robert Reich and Simon Johnson were being heeded much more.

What safeguards are there for the average citizen? Where, if at all, are the oligarchs being confronted and not getting their way, all for the sake of a more effective recovery? Thanks.

DDay explains how JP Morgan Chase is greedier than the actual J.P. Morgan. You'll be shocked to learn that even bailout recipients are still actively working to screw over average citizens, even if it will hurt economic recovery.

In "Hoping to Build on History's Greatest Rip-off By Making It Even Greater," Jonathan Schwarz links an op-ed by Dean Baker, who writes:

In effect, the cutters are proposing that the government default on the bonds held by the Social Security trust fund: U.S. government bonds that were purchased with money raised through the designated Social Security tax.

It is truly incredible, and unbelievably galling, that anyone in a position of responsibility would suggest defaulting on the government bonds held by the Social Security trust fund at the precise moment that the government is honoring trillions of dollars of bonds issued by private banks.

While the government has no legal or moral obligations to pay off the banks' debts to wealthy investors (who presumably understood the risks they were taking), the Social Security bonds carry the full faith and credit of the U.S. government.

It is understandable that people are angry. We have a government and an elite that never stop looking for ways to take money from ordinary workers and redistribute it upward to the richest people in the country.

I'm reminded of the mafia raiding union pension funds – it's an almost identical dynamic. It is not enough for these people to be rich. It is not even enough for them to be bailed out from their losses, or to become even richer. They are actively working to screw over average citizens. Americans don't like to believe we have a class system, let alone class warfare, but a few things are clear. One, we're witnessing class warfare by and for the rich. Two – these people are evil. They do not give a damn about who gets hurt, or if the country gets hurt, if they benefit, despite already enjoying great privilege. Their actions, taken collectively, form the greatest impediment to economic recovery. The "shock doctrine" can be pushed in different directions, and they want to exploit a crisis they themselves created Picture a drowning man, rescued at great personal risk, who then clubs his rescuer and throws him into an undertow. Three, these people will never, ever stop voluntarily, which is why safeguards and oversight are essential, not to mention solid social systems they can't destroy easily, and public awareness of their dirty tricks. Prosecuting and jailing a few of these bastards would help, too.

There's a little good news on that front. Barney Frank outlined several accountability measures in the chat today, and DDay also posts on a Congressional Oversight Panel report. Elizabeth Warren, who's been consistently sharp on all this mess, summarized their findings:

The report looks back at how these types of financial crises have been traditionally handled over time. Warren offers three choices to policymakers: liquidation (essentially what we did in S&L crisis), receivership (the Swedish option), and subsidization (what we're doing to keep zombie banks alive, like in Japan). As you can see above, Warren handles each of these options expertly, and finds four crucial actions needed to successfully resolve banking crises:

• Transparency. Swift action to ensure the integrity of bank accounting, particularly with respect to the ability of regulators and investors to ascertain the value of bank assets and hence assess bank solvency

• Assertiveness. Willingness to take aggressive action to address failing financial institutions by (1) taking early aggressive action to improve capital ratios of banks that can be rescued, and (2) shutting down those banks that are irreparably insolvent.

• Accountability. Willingness to hold management accountable by replacing – and, in cases of criminal conduct, prosecuting – failed managers.

• Clarity. Transparency in the government response with forthright measurement and reporting of all forms of assistance being provided and clearly explained criteria for the use of public sector funds.

Warren concludes that the TARP bailouts failed to provide transparency, accountability or clarity. The Geithner Treasury Department plans, including PPIP and increased transparency, still fall short. "Bottom line: Treasury's efforts to date could be enough, but we will continue to press Treasury about these four tests." Essentially, Warren gives a mixed review, and she thinks that the Treasury efforts are based on the idea that the problems are temporary and not systemic…

The current power dynamics stink. The more Warren, Krugman, Reich and Baker are heeded, the better.

(Cross-posted at Blue Herald)

Torture Watch 4/8/09

What precisely was done, by whom, to whom? Who ordered it? Who knew? And what will be done about it?

We previously covered Mark Danner and his important article in the New York Review of Books on the Red Cross Report on Torture. He has a new piece, "The Red Cross Torture Report: What It Means," and the site allows readers to read or download a PDF on the original report.

Dan Froomkin has a good roundup of reactions in "How Many Others Were Tortured?" (An earlier post, "Bush's Torture Rationale Debunked," is good wrap-up of issues Froomkin has written on before, and we've covered here.) The Washington Post commented on the report in "Report Calls CIA Detainee Treatment 'Inhuman'" and The New York Times did in "Report Outlines Medical Workers’ Role in Torture."

In The Daily Beast, Scott Horton asks, "Are Republicans Blackmailing Obama?" Given that they made similar comments before Eric Holder's confirmation, my bet is yes. The dynamic reminds me of the U.S. Attorney scandal, in that public officials were improperly pressing the Attorneys' offices for information about then-current cases. In this instance, apparently Republicans are going several steps further morally, even if they're probably in the clear legally – demanding that the Justice Department under Obama make a specific decision on cases they've yet to investigate fully. Horton's piece is a good start, but this affair would benefit from more whistleblowing on Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) and other Republicans. There's little doubt that Cornyn knows the Bush administration committed war crimes, and he's doing everything in his power to ensure the truth doesn't get out and they never face justice.

The problem isn't just the Republicans, however. John Sifton writes for The Daily Beast today, "Is Leon Panetta Covering Up Torture?" Glenn Greenwald has written several posts on Obama administration efforts to stall or cover up the truth, including their assertions of unaccountable power, similar or in some cases even exceeding claims made by the Bush administration. See "There are no excuses for ongoing concealment of torture memos," "New and worse secrecy and immunity claims from the Obama DOJ" and "Obama, the ICRC Report and ongoing suppression" (QuestionGirl covered some of this earlier). Today, Greenwald posted two segments from Countdown on these issues, featuring the reliable Jonathan Turley:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Scott Horton continues to cover human rights issues diligently at his blog, No Comment. "In Brennan, Cheney has a Friend" builds on the issue of Cheney "stay-behinds" and those with similar interests covered earlier by Seymour Hersh. There's also “Investigate and Punish the Perpetrators,” "Torture Doctors," "Lock ‘Em Up,""Obama’s National Security State," "Presidential Accountability" and "Left Behind."

Nell makes an important point at A Lovely Promise and A Tiny Revolution about how torture is not about "intelligence gathering":

But torture does something else altogether, and is designed to do so: it extracts false confessions. These confessions, along with the agony of the torture itself, serve the goals of limitless, lawless "war": to humiliate and break opponents, to divide them from supporters, to terrify those not actively in opposition into staying inactive, and, most importantly, to justify the operations of the dirty war within which torture takes place: commando raids, assassinations, spying, kidnaping, secret and/or indefinite (and unreviewable) detention, and further torture.

The mistaken assumption that those in the previous administration who set the torture policy were motivated solely by an urgent need for information has several other bad effects…

Check it out. There's at least one comment in the ATR thread that's well worth reading.

You may have caught Colin Powell on the Rachel Maddow show. Dan Froomkin and Scott Horton comment, but I'd especially check out DDay's post on Colin Powell and the My Lai massacre (it was new to me). (Digby has a followup.)

In a despicable move, the "Privilege Review Team" at the Justice Department has threatened British lawyer Clive Stafford Smith and a colleague with possible six month jail sentences for writing a letter to President Obama detailing the abuses inflicted on their client, Binyam Mohamed. This one gets uglier the more one learns. Amy Goodman and Glenn Greenwald both spoke with Smith, but the audio is poor in both cases (Greenwald will be providing a transcript).

Then there's "Seton Hall Law Students Reveal That Generals Knew Guantanamo Detainees Were Tortured," which comes via Digby, who comments. Let's add in "The Bush Six" by Jane Mayer, "Release the Torture Memos" by Hilzoy, and from Hullabaloo, "That Mighty Liberal Blog Power Made Manifest" by DDay and "Blackmail" by Digby.

Jason Linkins noticed back in late March that the "Washington Post Finally Describes Waterboarding As Torture (When Someone Else Does It)."

When dealing with movement conservatives, the ignorance-to-evil ratio often becomes a question, even if it's a bit moot. In "From The Pro-Torture Cocoon," anti-torture conservative Andrew Sullivan looks at the torture apologia of happy wingnut John Hindraker. (For added irony, read the whole Hindraker post to see him call Obama ignorant.)

Meanwhile, I'm really looking forward to getting a hold of a copy of Christopher Durang's dark comedy, Why Torture Is Wrong, and the People Who Love Them. I've directed a couple of Durang's plays, and NYT reviewer Ben Brantley gushes over the premiere production: "But Mr. Durang, bless his heart, believes that no other art form can offer the communal catharsis — and consolation — that theater does, a point he makes quite directly (between bouts of violence) in "Torture."" While we push for truth and justice, the arts come to the rescue once again.

Finally and perhaps most importantly, Suzanne Ito of the ACLU has a post at Crooks and Liars about the Office of Legal Counsel torture memos and links an ACLU petition for Attorney General Eric Holder to assign an independent prosecutor.

It's shameful that most of what we know comes from ACLU efforts and a handful of reporters, activists and lawyers. Most Beltway pundits are trying to prevent the truth coming out, and certainly want to prevent prosecution. While Obama is much brighter and more competent than Bush, he's currently skewing far too closely to the Bush method of doing things, from coddling arrogant, corrupt and incompetent oligarchs on Wall Street, to borrowing too much of Bush's foreign policy, to invoking state secrets and claiming the government is not reviewable or accountable, to hiding and protecting horrible abuses of the past. The political realities are tough for effecting lasting, positive change in many areas, given the entrenched, powerful interests opposing that on Wall Street, on health care, on defense spending, and in the intelligence community. But there's no excuse for hiding the misdeeds of the Bush administration or repeating them. Civil rights don't defend themselves, and justice won't magically happen. There are members of the Obama administration who want to do the right thing, but public pressure is essential. The Obama administration needs to be pressed to investigate, disclose and prosecute where appropriate the human rights abuses that form one of the most shameful chapters in our recent history.

(Cross-posted at Blue Herald)