Alberto Gonzales
I'm such a good girl, I've educated myself! I read Erik Saar's Inside the Wire (good book, by the way), and then actually read the appendix with the famous memorandum for Bush in which Gonzales supposedly called the Geneva Gonventions "quaint." In actually reading the thing, I found that the "quaint" sentence was probably one of the least desturbing in the document. All he wrote was that the new kind of war on terror, "renders quaint some of [the Geneva] provisions requiring that captured enemy be afforded such things as comissary privileges, scrip (i.ie., advances of monthly pay), athletic uniforms, and scientific instruments." So he's essentially saying that he doesn't really like this part of the Conventions and figures it needn't apply to terrorists. But, of all the things he could (and does say), in my mind, this isn't the world's biggest problem. Yes, he should be telling the president that stupid as he may find the rules, they need to be followed, but really. He didn't write something along the lines of, "just ignore the Geneva Conventions, they whole thing is quaint anyway!" (although this seems to be what some want to tell us. Really, we aren't stupid. You could tell us the facts. And, as often is true, the full story is actually worse than the innacurate summary anyway.
You may or may not have heard this, but one of the bullet points on the positives of determiniting that GPW (the Geneva Convention III on the Treatment of Prisoners of War) is that doing so, "Substantially reduces the threat of domestic criminal prosecution under the War Crimes Act (18 U.S.C. 2441)." He then points out that a "war crime" as defined includes "outrages against personal dignity." Now, unless he thought there might be such outrageous, why would Mr. Gonzales care so much? I, for one, do not like the idea of our government being involved in any outrages against personal dignity (although we all know there have been plenty). But really, with language like this, the administration looks pretty stupid going around pretending there was no higher connection to the torture scandals. The same goes for, "inhuman treatment." His reason that this is a concern is that these phrases are vague and it's not clear what falls under those headings. But if you're honestly going to try to treat the prisoners humanely, it wouln'dt be an issue.
Gonzales goes on to argue that terrorists are not going to follow Geneva whether or not we do, so the arguement that if we do not grant protections to the terrorists, they won't grant them to us doesn't apply. Personlaly, I would hope that this country would like to take the high road and not stoop down to the low of terrorists. Is this the arguement now? They don't treat us well, so we won't treat them well. I sure hope not. It would be (and is, I suppose) a sad day for America when we determine policy not because of our values as a nation, but because of the values of those we are fighting.
Finally the former White House counsel mentions that the U.S. will still honor its committment to treat detainees humanely. He seems to feel that this should be enough to make other countrie sshut up. But there is a reason we have laws. History has shown that people need to be held accountable. Anyone can say they are treating prisoners well. The U.S. can, Sweden can, Al Qaeda can, whoever. And that doesn't mean a thing (especially when inspectors have such a hard time getting access to detention facilities and they don't report to the public). Now, if you agree to a law, which you will be breaking if people are not treated properly, that's a whole different level of committment. Given the administrations track record with the accuracy of what comes out of their mouths, just saying something doens't make it so.
You may or may not have heard this, but one of the bullet points on the positives of determiniting that GPW (the Geneva Convention III on the Treatment of Prisoners of War) is that doing so, "Substantially reduces the threat of domestic criminal prosecution under the War Crimes Act (18 U.S.C. 2441)." He then points out that a "war crime" as defined includes "outrages against personal dignity." Now, unless he thought there might be such outrageous, why would Mr. Gonzales care so much? I, for one, do not like the idea of our government being involved in any outrages against personal dignity (although we all know there have been plenty). But really, with language like this, the administration looks pretty stupid going around pretending there was no higher connection to the torture scandals. The same goes for, "inhuman treatment." His reason that this is a concern is that these phrases are vague and it's not clear what falls under those headings. But if you're honestly going to try to treat the prisoners humanely, it wouln'dt be an issue.
Gonzales goes on to argue that terrorists are not going to follow Geneva whether or not we do, so the arguement that if we do not grant protections to the terrorists, they won't grant them to us doesn't apply. Personlaly, I would hope that this country would like to take the high road and not stoop down to the low of terrorists. Is this the arguement now? They don't treat us well, so we won't treat them well. I sure hope not. It would be (and is, I suppose) a sad day for America when we determine policy not because of our values as a nation, but because of the values of those we are fighting.
Finally the former White House counsel mentions that the U.S. will still honor its committment to treat detainees humanely. He seems to feel that this should be enough to make other countrie sshut up. But there is a reason we have laws. History has shown that people need to be held accountable. Anyone can say they are treating prisoners well. The U.S. can, Sweden can, Al Qaeda can, whoever. And that doesn't mean a thing (especially when inspectors have such a hard time getting access to detention facilities and they don't report to the public). Now, if you agree to a law, which you will be breaking if people are not treated properly, that's a whole different level of committment. Given the administrations track record with the accuracy of what comes out of their mouths, just saying something doens't make it so.