By pushing Congress and the American people to “provide the military and intelligence (CIA) with the (torture) tools they need” President Bush is displaying his megalomania, arrogance, and/or hubris before the world.
Since when is it possible to rewrite or modify an international treaty without the inclusion and approval of the other signatory nations? As the New York Times writes in an article called “Stampeding Congress” Bush thinks he can do just that and do it over the objections of his own military and legal advisors.
The Geneva Convention is a treaty that’s been revised several times and each time the revisions were agreed upon by the same countries that initially passed it in the forties. But George W. Bush is pushing for revisions that need only be approved by the U.S. Congress and the hell with the rest of the “civilized” world.
And this is being attempted by the person who, in 2000, was promoted as a facilitator, a mediator good at bringing opposing sides together, a moderator and intermediary who could diplomatically resolve the give and take until everyone signs agreements for the common good. After 9/11 he morphed into something just the opposite.
Today, Bush tells us that “diplomacy is too slow” and we need to be able to act quickly to beat the fanatics out to kill us. If we aren’t faster on the draw than they are, we’re going to be killed.
Besides that, the evildoers don’t play by the rules. They don’t wear uniforms and dog tags so we can recognize and identify them. They stab us in the back when we least expect it instead of facing us at the border, at the OK corral, or out in the street in front of the saloon because they know they can’t stand up to our superior firepower. They’re sneaky cowards that hide in dark corners, caves, and behind women’s skirts.
This is not to be confused with our own revolutionary heroes who ambushed the British when the redcoats were marching or standing and kneeling in neat orderly lines or George Washington when he crossed the Delaware in the dead of night to wipe out the enemy sleeping in their bunks on Christmas morning at Trenton or even the French underground that hassled the German invaders for so many years. This is different, a new age. New rules apply.
Our President has sworn to do everything in his power to protect us, and that includes taking the battle to them, invading nations that even look like they might be supporting or housing the enemy, and torturing suspects to learn about their plans to attack us again somewhere, somehow.
It doesn’t matter that our borders, ports, and shorelines are still wide open after nineteen of these “terrorists” entered our country, lived here more than two years while renting homes and apartments, opening bank accounts, getting driver’s licenses and credit cards, learned to fly but not land large planes, and then brought us the horrors of 9/11 with our own technology and box cutters. After five years have passed, we’re finally getting around to that problem because the American people realized many of our major ports were managed by a British company that was about to sell them to an Arab firm and millions of illegal aliens took to the streets to protest possible new immigration rules after living under a form of permissiveness prevalent for decades.
It doesn’t matter that the rest of the “civilized” world objects to our retaining hundreds of “suspected” terrorists in Guantanamo (Gitmo), a naval base set up in Cuba to protect the Windward Passage from pirates ages ago, or that we are now confessing to having sent many others to secret prisons in places where they could be tortured to get the information we need. According to Bush, these are some of the “tools” our information services need.
It doesn’t matter that our own Supreme Court handed down a ruling rejecting the military tribunals Bush established by executive order. It also said that President Bush has “overstepped his authority” by allowing and encouraging the torture of prisoners in direct violation of the Constitution and the Geneva Conventions as well as taking prisoners to secret prisons in other countries where, also in violation of the convention, they are denied contact with the Red Cross.
Nor does it matter that the U.S. Army just published its own Field Manual that fully endorses the Geneva Convention in opposition to Bush’s push to rewrite article number three of that treaty. At least the Pentagon realizes that the Bush policy opens our own troops to the same vicious treatment.
And it doesn’t matter that members of his own party are divided on this issue and three of the leading republican senators plus Colin Powell have come out strongly against it. Unfortunately, most democrats seem to be cowering in fear and willing to give Bush his way.
Nothing will stop Bush from his “stay the course” idea that he can revise the Geneva Convention, particularly if he can get the endorsement of Congress. He would like to get the entire country behind his idea to redefine torture and may be doing so simply to protect himself from prosecution for war crimes. Bush even wants to rewrite the War Crimes Act which makes it a crime to violate the Geneva Conventions.
He has even cast this in terms of “improving” prohibitions against torture, claiming that the third section is too vague and undefined. Without proposing the list, Bush would like to specify exactly which of the thousands of torture methods are prohibited. That way, there will always be some not on the list that can be utilized. Imagine what he would do if he had line-item veto power.
The truth is that it is not possible to alter an international treaty without the inclusion and approval of the other signatory nations. We do not make the laws for other soverign nations, at least not yet.
Bush can, however, do other things. For one, he can simply violate provisions as he has here and in the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. Or he can try to get Congress and the Supreme Court to endorse his proposal for what seems to amount to a belated "signing statement" exempting himself and the CIA from the terms of the treaty. That's what this latest "push" seems to be.
Let’s be honest with ourselves. Until recently, have you ever heard of “signing statements?” Isn’t it surprising to find that
When do we recognize one of our presidents as a dictator?