Silent Complicity

The more we learn about Omar Khadr, the more it becomes apparent just how badly Canada has messed this one up. Now this morning we learn that our government knew that Khadr was being mistreated but that Stephen Harper isn't going to do anything about it. I guess he wants to look "tough" in front of his Washington pals. Or something. This is the man that came to power on the slogan "stand up for Canada" and yet once again he'll sit on his hands when real courage is required. Even Australia and the UK, often considered the two most steadfast US partners in the war on terror, have brought their citizens home from Guantanamo. Now it's our turn. Bring Khadr home. If the evidence warrants it, give him a fair trial in the Canadian justice system. No torture, no kangaroo courts, no legal limbo, no bullshit.

The Disappeared

I think we are in denial. I know I am in denial, because I'm not saying enough about this. We are fucking disappearing people in Afghanistan! What the hell? Were we satisfied that we nicely asked the government to look into it? Maybe, I don't know. We are losing everything that we built, our reputation as peacekeepers, as respecters of human rights. We are betraying it in Afghanistan for the sake of convenience and we are allowing such a thing to happen because those who support such policies will denounce us as unpatriotic if we do not.

What happens in a few years when Afghans come to us looking for their family members. Can't happen here you say? I'm not so sure. We are monsters if we let this continue with our knowledge. If we have to be complicit with a murderous, torturing regime we ought not to be in Afghanistan. If the Afghans want us, they can damn well get their shit together with regard to prisoner treatment.

Black, Rumsfeld, and the "Ostrich" Defence

On the way into work this morning I heard on the radio that the judge in Conrad Black's trial has said that Conrad cannot use the Ostrich defence in his trial (i.e.: his lawyers can't plead that he had his head in the sand about this whole thing if he was deliberately ignorant).

Meanwhile it appears that Rumsfeld is attempting the very same thing when it comes to the issue of torture at Abu Ghraib. It now appears that he deliberately made a show of not looking at photographs of what had happened. Andrew Sullivan writes:

"The most plausible inference is obviously that he covered his tracks and feigned ignorance and did not look at the photographs to create a record of complete deniability. The incompetence comes from ordering torture at Abu Ghraib and not realizing that evidence of it would spread and disseminate through new media that Rumsfeld probably wasn't that familiar with."

One wonders whether Rumsfeld will get away with this defence for what amounts to a war crime when Black has been denied this defence in a white collar crime trial.

What is Torture?

I have to give credit to Andrew Sullivan for sticking to this issue relentlessly. Anti-torture conservatives are important allies on what has to be one of the most vital moral issues facing the West right now. It makes it harder to deflect criticism on the grounds that this is just the whinging of the usual bleeding hearts - even if I think us bleeding hearts are 100% right on this one.

Anyway, today Sullivan quotes Greg Dejerejian on the need to have tough questions posed to both the sitting president and all the candidates about this matter. When is it torture? When is it enhanced interrogation? What is the difference between those two.

I'll save everyone some time and give you the working definition of the torturephiles: When we do it, it's enhanced interrogation; when they do it, it's torture.

A Good Friday Thought

I'd like to think that we've progressed in significant ways over the past couple millenia. Slavery is mercifully constrained, women are no longer considered property. Nonetheless, I can't help thinking that, as Christians comemorate the subjection of an innocent man to a show trial, torture, and execution in the middle east by an occupying army, so very little has changed.

Not a great day for Jesus

First there was the wealthy pastor and his impoverished flock, now this pithy observation from Andrew Sullivan:

"The religious right base actually seems to believe in torture. Along with making lots and lots of money, and losing weight, torture is now apparently a one of Jesus' core teachings."

There is no limit to how human avarice and cruelty can contort any philosophy - be it religious or secular - to satisfy the basest of desires.