In listening to Keith Olbermann’s on-air commentary concerning water-boarding and the patriotic acts of Daniel Levin who went on his own fact-finding mission to look into this practice of torture, Olbermann stated, “Because, remember if you can’t get it, or you won’t with the time between tonight and the next presidential election likely to be the longest year of our lives, you are leaving this country, and all of us, to the water-boards — symbolic and otherwise — of George W. Bush.” I would go him one better.
Ever since Bush came into office, he has taken us all down the road to hell and back again. It is as if he has water-boarded Lady Liberty herself and for the most part the American people have bought into this nightmare.
In viewing that commentary by Olbermann one notices a rag stuffed down the throat of a person depicting this torturous technique. As I gazed upon it, I could not help but think that rag symbolized the United States Constitution. It was only a “god damn piece of paper” according to Pres. Bush.
When the first Patriot Act was approved by congress in all of its cowardice, it was as if all of them crumpled the Constitution up and stuffed it down all of our throats and poured water down it. Some screamed as it was being done, but screaming under the water, our condemnation was muffled. No one, not even the media wanted to hear of our concerns.
If that wasn’t enough, congress approved the Iraq Resolution. That resolution only gave this president permission to take his case before the United Nations Security Council and what did then Secretary of State Colin Powell do? He used false information to prove Bush’s case. Ultimately the Security Council saw through this façade and did not give this administration permission to invade Iraq. Oh, that did not stop Bush but he turned this resolution into the war powers act in a unilateral move and invaded Iraq.
The American people failed to realize that only the congress can declare war and not this imperial president. People’s eyes glaze over when one points out that little known fact. But, in all honesty it is not a little by any means especially when it has caused so much death and destruction.
Those of us who protested were all shoved under the water to drown out our condemnation and as it turns out, we were right. All who protested were in fact water-boarded into silence and still today any acts or protest can and will be stopped.
As Ari Fleisher (Bush’s first Press Secretary) stated “Watch what you say” to the media dissention in this country was shoved under the water. Any one that dared to question this administration was literally shoved under the water.
In seeing soldier after soldier die in that far off land in Iraq, they drowned in their own blood instead of water. The same can be said of the one million Iraqis who have died as well. All of their deaths were of sheer torture and this congress lacks the fortitude to stop it. Many have asked; when will the killings stop? But, to no avail as we demand answers, we are shoved under the water again as congress walks away with their tale between their legs.
With the passage and signing into law the Military Commissions Act of 2006 take note of this passage that it “would both recognize the President’s inherent authority under the Constitution and authorize the President to interpret the meaning and application of the Geneva Conventions” Again, he is the decider who gets to interpret as we scream from under the water.
If that wasn’t enough, it would, “prohibit an alien enemy unlawful combatant from invoking the Geneva Conventions as a source of rights during his trial by a military commission.”
Speaking of the Geneva Conventions, I found this passage noteworthy, “I think Robert Jackson, who’s the architect of Nuremberg, would turn over in his grave if he knew what was going on at Guantanamo,” Nuremberg prosecutor Henry King Jr. told Reuters in a telephone interview.” He went onto say, “It violates the Nuremberg principles, what they’re doing, as well as the spirit of the Geneva Conventions of 1949.”
Let me add that those who prosecuted those monsters stared down pure evil and yet they adhered to the Geneva Conventions. Have we water-boarded ourselves in failing to remember that? Have we submersed our heads under water by not demanding this administration and congress live up to the Geneva Conventions?
Now with Iran in Bush’s sights and many in congress as well as our presidential candidates on both sides saying “All options are on the table” we again scream out from underneath the water. All of us feel as if we are being held down by this defective government as we scream into that rag which is our United States Constitution.
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