Article: Waterboarding America

During his confirmation hearing for Attorney General,Michael Mukasey equivocated on the legality of waterboarding. Nonetheless, it's apparent that waterboarding is illegal torture. It's also clear why the Bush Administration defends the practice: for 6 years they've been waterboarding America. Waterboarding is a form of torture where the victim is slowly drowned. The prisoner is placed on their back on a board, completely immobilized with restraints, and tilted so their head is below their feet. The victim's mouth is forced open and water is poured in to simulate drowning - during the experience water enters their lungs. Then the victim is asked to answer specific questions. If they provide unsatisfactory answers, the drowning is repeated. During a discussion on the PBS News Hour, Michael Nance, a former instructor of Navy Seals who trained them to endure torture, observed: "War crimes trials have been carried out during World War II for people who actually conducted waterboarding. It is illegal by definition of the U.S. code and under the international statutes that we carry out military operations, as well." Moreover, the practice is explicitly prohibited in the U.S. Army interrogation manual. Nonetheless, Attorney General Mukasey refused to state unequivocally that waterboarding is illegal. Political observers believe the reason Mukasey was evasive on this subject was because he recognized that if he deemed the practice illegal, he would be saying that everyone who practiced waterboarding committed a crime, as well as those who authorized it: a chain of command that leads to President Bush. But, Americans already know the Bush Administration authorized waterboarding: we've all experienced it since 9/11. Our torture began on 9/11 when we witnessed the terrorist attacks replayed over and over on television replays. As a result, residents of Manhattan and many other citizens experienced the symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and millions of Americans suffered from anxiety. The United States was left depressed and helpless: immobilized by fear. The Bush Administration cultivated this anxiety. When they initiated their "war" on terror, they failed to give the average citizen a role in the endeavor other than to exhort them to "go shopping." The White House failed to call for common sacrifice, to encourage team behavior of the sort that FDR and Winston Churchill engendered in World War II. This approach might have worked if the duration of the war on terror had been brief or if key public leaders - President Bush and Vice President Cheney - had sustained a high level of public trust. But the war on terror has dragged on and confidence in the Administration has fallen to historic lows. Rather than alleviate our national anxiety, the Administration enhanced it by promoting a climate of fear. In a prescient article in the November 4, 2001, San Francisco Chronicle famed Stanford Psychology Professor Philip Zimbardo observed the Bush Administration was playing into the hands of the terrorists by inducing "high levels of public anxiety, confusion, mental exhaustion and sub-optimal information-processing." Zimbardo complained about the dysfunctional "Homeland Security Advisory System" that randomly warned Americans of heightened possibility of attacks but didn't provide them with concrete actions to take. The Psychology professor observed this system, coupled with random dire warnings by then Attorney General Ashcroft, caused Americans to: "lose their sense of personal security and trust; feel fearful, anxious and suspicious; experience disruption of usual lifestyle patterns; become hopeless about positive change; and feel helpless about participating in trying to effect solutions." After Americans were immobilized by the terrors of 9/11, augmented by a prolonged, manufactured climate of fear, the Bush Administration subjected them to repeated incidents of psychological drowning. The public was fed a steady diet of propaganda: first that the war on terror was succeeding in Afghanistan, then that its scope had enlarged to include the "Axis of Evil," and finally that Iraq had become an imminent danger to the United States. The justification for the invasion of Iraq was based on the patently false premises that the regime of Saddam Hussein was actively aiding terrorists and was developing weapons of mass destruction and delivery systems that would enable the WMDs to be used against the U.S. As the war dragged on, the Bush Administration repeatedly asserted it was "better to fight them there than here." Meanwhile, the White House used the threat of terrorist attacks to justify their draconian domestic policies: expansion of the role of the Presidency, curtailment of civil rights, tax cuts for the rich and powerful, emasculation of Federal agencies created to protect the public interest, and unfettered destruction of the environment - the looting of America. The Bush Administration created a culture of depression and helplessness, where many Americans became convinced the terrorists were out to get them and there was nothing they could do about it except go shopping or pray for the rapture. Bush Administration policies were designed to break the American spirit and disable democracy: to get us to agree to anything. So, it's no mystery why new Attorney General Mukasey equivocated about waterboarding. He's protecting his boss and an Administration that has systematically undermined the constitution by waterboarding America.