According to today's New York Times, in 2005 the Justice Department issued a secret order basically giving the CIA and any other organizations under Bush's purview authority to beat the hell out of prisoners in any way they might see fit. This, while the White House publicly condemned the use of torture.
The Times story provides chilling evidence of just how spineless Alberto Gonzales was in standing up for basic notions of justice, and what a fanatical and extreme bunch of bastards the Bushinistas really are. The "war on terror" gave these sociopaths the green light to do anything they wanted, and no one had the guts to say no.
Why? Democrats and some Republicans have claimed to be shocked--shocked!--by the bloodthirsty actions of gun-crazed thugs operating under the authority of Blackwater USA, actions that have gained attention as the voices of protest from within Iraq have grown louder.
Yet I've known about Blackwater and the other private security firms the US government hired to transport energy company execs (the press likes to refer to these guys as "diplomats") to and from the oil fields, and the kill-crazy attitudes of these mercenaries, for, gosh, years now. Let me repeat that: I've known about it, and I don't have access to documents and licensing agreements and whatever else our elected representatives have. Yet somehow they didn't know about all this?
Of course they knew. Not until the Iraqi government formally protested, threatening to kick Blackwater out, did our government profess the slightest concern for all those dead brown-skinned people. Not until we were officially shamed in the court of world opinion did we care. This is the hollow, pathetic excuse for democracy we want to spread around the world, and we're surprised when the world rejects it.
