0549

A Personal Message from The OO

This is not a regular Objective Observer column. Our regular column tries, as the name implies, to be objective, to see different sides, and to point out ridiculous behavior in the United States, in Anguilla, or in the world, without paying the slightest attention to the prevalent and stupid use of labels such as “Liberal” or “Conservative”, which have long become meaningless. Readers often flog our Staff for being Lib or Con, but they are simply complaining when their pet balloons are pricked. This week is different, and the OO speaks from the heart, and a sore heart.

Watching the Senate hearing on the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse was painful and deeply emotional. The OO has always believed that the United States, whatever its many flaws and the frequent failings and selfishness of its politicians, yet was a country that stood for something in the world. The U.S. was the bright city on the hill, the beacon of Liberties, the country where the ideals were always shining, despite the criminalities of Nixon, the slimy behavior of Clinton, or even the fascist attacks of Joe McCarthy on the ideals themselves. So, for over 10 years the OO has served (uncompensated) as the United States Consular Warden for Anguilla, and served proudly, too.

The behavior of this Bush Administration has been most troubling. The Administration attacks on the – admittedly rickety – structure of the world order have been, yes, un-American, and they have been continuous. The United Nations so scorned isn't very effective, but it is all we have at the moment, and it carries promise of a better ordered world. So did the treaties scorned over and over by the present Administration, such as control of global warning (falsely attacking the uniform scientific evidence), or joining an International Criminal Court (also falsely attacked), or polluting the seas and skies, or ... the list continues.

Yet, we have all seen many struggles of ideas in the U.S. and in the world, and these debates, when they are open, do not threaten the foundations of America. We can honestly disagree, and those who believe otherwise are not necessarily evil, though they may be wrong.

Then came the Iraq war. Here, the excuses pushed by the Bush Administration have all proved to be, flatly, false. To be charitable, perhaps the claims that there were Weapons of Mass Destruction, even nuclear weapons, were believed by those who made them. Not so the claims that Saddam and al Qaeda were linked – those were plainly false claims, and known to be so. Not so the claim that Iraq was buying uranium, which was known to be false. Finally, Iraq was invaded when the daily evidence was coming from the UN inspectors – directed by the U.S. – that there were no WMDs.

At the President's last news conference he was asked what mistakes he had made, and to the astonishment of those present and humanity at large, he said he couldn't remember one. My friends, that is the most damning statement a man could make. But still, that is only one politician, and America has survived worse. Being wrong and even destructively wrong is not a crime.

With no WMDs found, and no threat to the U.S. evident, the Administration excuse for invading Iraq, spending the lives of thousands of Americans, and maiming and killing tens of thousands of Iraqis, has shifted to “Bringing democracy to Iraq”. As the OO column has said, countries get the governments their citizens deserve. From the behavior of the Iraqi crazies and their multiple militias, they don't deserve much. But, worse, because none of this was anticipated, because there were no plans to control the civic order, because insufficient troops were sent, the entire American occupation is a terrible botch.

Then, we have just seen those pictures of American soldiers, our much-praised boys and girls, abasing and abusing prisoners who may or may not have been guilty of anything at all. You cannot tell anyone who knows how bureaucracies work that this was just seven guards fooling around. It is a disgrace, and a profound one. The invasion of Iraq meant to the Moslem world that the U.S. was on a crusade against them, however bad Saddam was. Now, they will not forgive us for generations.

The worst Administration false claim – daily repeated – is that the Iraq war is “fighting terror”. It is not. Saddam was not threatening terror strikes against the U.S. The religious Osama bin Laden hated the Iraq regime and often said so. But now, with the invasion and the awful prison pictures, the terrorists have a recruiting weapon that means we are at much higher risk for years, generations, on end.

This is not all. Consider now the response to the pictures, and the more awful revelation this week of the carefully printed rules for what is claimed to be permissible torture. The response of such as Senator James Inhofe was shameful indeed: he shouted about “The humanitarian hand-wringers” who were appalled. Not so the impressive John McCain, who sturdily explained why the Geneva rules were both right and provide safety for U.S. prisoners. The Inhofe and similar screams are as disgusting to the OO as the prisoner abuse itself. The Inhofes attack the very image and ideal of America. If we don't care about inhumanity, what the Hell are we doing in Iraq at all? And why are we better?

Then, last, there was the detailed revelation that prisoners at Guantanamo are not treated as under the Geneva Convention at all and the truly chilling and frightful printed Defense Department rules for torturing prisoners, with special details of what tortures had to be approved at higher levels. This, this, is ultimately perverse, and the last straw for the OO.

There are calls for the resignation for the voluble Rumsfeld, who at the least has totally botched the occupation. The OO goes far beyond. We all must do everything possible to restore the image and indeed the behavior of the United States. We must return to supporting a better world order. This cannot be done under the Bush Administration. We are tarnished, and we are not now seen as, nor are we, a force for good.

I leave you with only three words: ABB. Dedicate yourself to it. I shall, for the honor of America and the future of my children and their children.

Thank you, Faithful Readers, for listening to this somewhat emotional personal message.

Respectfully,

The OO

(Columns will resume with Pick20 [OO #549])

| Printer-friendly page | Send this article to a friend |

Home