Laurie Essig

Obama refuses to cleanse America of torture

President Obama will visit CIA headquarters today to talk to employees and once again express two contradictory thoughts: 1.Certain CIA employees engaged in acts of torture of prisoners that can only be described as Evil 2.There will be no prosecution of CIA employees who committed these crimes against humanity This is akin to using the vacuum cleaner to push dirt under the rug rather than suck it up and throw it out.  This clearly contradictory stance will be expressed after the Obama administration released memos detailing the sort of torture that occurred in the (not so) secret prisons of the Bush regime.  This torture included the now infamous "waterboarding"- a term that may not sound awful, like a new form of surfing- but in fact involves near drowning of the prisoner in order to supposedly gain information.  This method was used 266 times against 2 prisoners! One would think that if this form of torture were effective, 2 or 3 times would have been sufficient. But that hasn't stopped former CIA employees and Bushies from defending torture as a useful tool in the "war on terror."  And this is why there must be a Truth Commission that formally investigates how these crimes against humanity became standard operating procedure for the CIA. As cultural sociologist Jeffrey Alexander points out, if we do not publicly decide what is evil, then we can never know what is good.  When evil occurs, like the Holocaust, Watergate, or now the sanctioned torture of prisoners, we must respond with a public examination of it.  In this way, we ritually cleanse ourselves of the "dirt" that polluted us. Torture is surely dirt and if we as a society do not publicly express outrage and hold the leaders who sanctioned it accountable, then we can never rid ourselves of it.  It will remain merely swept under the rug, always ready to come back out and soil our society again. Fortunately for the future of our country, the Senate Intelligence Committee has begun an investigation of the C.I.A. interrogation program.  This Truth Commission, led by my own Senator, Patrick Leahy (VT), is an absolutely necessary part of the cleansing process that must take place to remove torture from official US policy.  Of course, torture will remain "unofficial" policy at the CIA, but at least it will be unofficial.  As unofficial policy, torture cannot be publicly  defended as a great way of getting information from prisoners. Waterboarding Used 266 Times on 2 Suspects - NYTimes.com.

Obama refuses to cleanse America of torture

President Obama will visit CIA headquarters today to talk to employees and once again express two contradictory thoughts: 1.Certain CIA employees engaged in acts of torture of prisoners that can only be described as Evil 2.There will be no prosecution of CIA employees who committed these crimes against humanity This is akin to using the vacuum cleaner to push dirt under the rug rather than suck it up and throw it out.  This clearly contradictory stance will be expressed after the Obama administration released memos detailing the sort of torture that occurred in the (not so) secret prisons of the Bush regime.  This torture included the now infamous "waterboarding"- a term that may not sound awful, like a new form of surfing- but in fact involves near drowning of the prisoner in order to supposedly gain information.  This method was used 266 times against 2 prisoners! One would think that if this form of torture were effective, 2 or 3 times would have been sufficient. But that hasn't stopped former CIA employees and Bushies from defending torture as a useful tool in the "war on terror."  And this is why there must be a Truth Commission that formally investigates how these crimes against humanity became standard operating procedure for the CIA. As cultural sociologist Jeffrey Alexander points out, if we do not publicly decide what is evil, then we can never know what is good.  When evil occurs, like the Holocaust, Watergate, or now the sanctioned torture of prisoners, we must respond with a public examination of it.  In this way, we ritually cleanse ourselves of the "dirt" that polluted us. Torture is surely dirt and if we as a society do not publicly express outrage and hold the leaders who sanctioned it accountable, then we can never rid ourselves of it.  It will remain merely swept under the rug, always ready to come back out and soil our society again. Fortunately for the future of our country, the Senate Intelligence Committee has begun an investigation of the C.I.A. interrogation program.  This Truth Commission, led by my own Senator, Patrick Leahy (VT), is an absolutely necessary part of the cleansing process that must take place to remove torture from official US policy.  Of course, torture will remain "unofficial" policy at the CIA, but at least it will be unofficial.  As unofficial policy, torture cannot be publicly  defended as a great way of getting information from prisoners. Waterboarding Used 266 Times on 2 Suspects - NYTimes.com.