Pre-Inauguration hopes for post-Inauguration America
Watching The Countdown tonight, as always, and this is the most stirring comment since the one he made on Prop 8:
Yes. Exactly.
I' m all for post-partisanism and reaching across the aisle, but holy god, there has to be a line in the sand, a line beyond which America does not torture prisoners. If Bill Clinton had sanctioned this kind of evil--I'm not his hugest fan, but he mostly didn't screw up too horribly, especially in light of his successor--I'd have been calling for his head on platter.
Believe me when I say, I would like nothing more than to not see a US president convicted of war crimes. I do believe it'd break my heart--my country's heart--to see even this failure of a president and a human being be convicted of such a crime.
Not this crime, not my president, you know? Even though he's isn't mine and isn't truly president, election-stealing tendencies very much not aside.
But the only thing that'd be worse than a nation's broken heart--and those do heal, if slowly--would be letting this travesty slide, like he's Wynona Rider, and torture's just shoplifting. What's worse than a broken heart is broken honor, and breaking faith with the ideals this country was built on.
Our nation has been damaged enough without this final, realpolitik coup de grace.
I understand wanting to focus on the future, but Keith's right, hit the nail on the head. As have so many. We can't let the Bush version of history, the revisionist dreck go on record unchallenged, unrighted. I've had very few occasions in my lifetime to be proud of something great my country has done. Something honorable. Something shining. But on the heels of such a milestone election, I can only hope I'll be given another occasion. That Obama has the stones--though I seriously doubt he will; to be fair, I doubt Kennedy or FDR would've, though Lincoln might've and Teddy Roosevelt probably would've--to give his DOJ its head, and the DOJ in turn is as blind as the Justice they supposedly represent. That charges will be brought against the upper echelons of the outgoing administration. It can't be any other way, and America regains some of the honor she's lost. If some other country has to uphold our own laws for us when one of these criminals takes it in their head to go abroad, then . . . whatever rebuilding of our honor and reputation is beginning with this fledgling administration will also die there.
This is not a death history will judge us kindly for. Nor should it.
We're approaching a moment of truth--possibly one of the first for this new administration. Here's hoping that, in their headlong rush to smooth over the rough bits of America, they don't fuck it up and fuck us all over.
::raises a glass::
Click to viewYes. Exactly.
I' m all for post-partisanism and reaching across the aisle, but holy god, there has to be a line in the sand, a line beyond which America does not torture prisoners. If Bill Clinton had sanctioned this kind of evil--I'm not his hugest fan, but he mostly didn't screw up too horribly, especially in light of his successor--I'd have been calling for his head on platter.
Believe me when I say, I would like nothing more than to not see a US president convicted of war crimes. I do believe it'd break my heart--my country's heart--to see even this failure of a president and a human being be convicted of such a crime.
Not this crime, not my president, you know? Even though he's isn't mine and isn't truly president, election-stealing tendencies very much not aside.
But the only thing that'd be worse than a nation's broken heart--and those do heal, if slowly--would be letting this travesty slide, like he's Wynona Rider, and torture's just shoplifting. What's worse than a broken heart is broken honor, and breaking faith with the ideals this country was built on.
Our nation has been damaged enough without this final, realpolitik coup de grace.
I understand wanting to focus on the future, but Keith's right, hit the nail on the head. As have so many. We can't let the Bush version of history, the revisionist dreck go on record unchallenged, unrighted. I've had very few occasions in my lifetime to be proud of something great my country has done. Something honorable. Something shining. But on the heels of such a milestone election, I can only hope I'll be given another occasion. That Obama has the stones--though I seriously doubt he will; to be fair, I doubt Kennedy or FDR would've, though Lincoln might've and Teddy Roosevelt probably would've--to give his DOJ its head, and the DOJ in turn is as blind as the Justice they supposedly represent. That charges will be brought against the upper echelons of the outgoing administration. It can't be any other way, and America regains some of the honor she's lost. If some other country has to uphold our own laws for us when one of these criminals takes it in their head to go abroad, then . . . whatever rebuilding of our honor and reputation is beginning with this fledgling administration will also die there.
This is not a death history will judge us kindly for. Nor should it.
We're approaching a moment of truth--possibly one of the first for this new administration. Here's hoping that, in their headlong rush to smooth over the rough bits of America, they don't fuck it up and fuck us all over.
::raises a glass::