It is a time of freedom and fear, of Gaia and of borders, of many paths and the widening of a universal toll road, emptying country and swelling cities, of the public bought into privacy and the privacy of the public sold into invisible data banks and knowing algorithms. It is the time of the warrior's peace and the miser's charity, when the planting of a seed is an act of conscientious objection.

These are the times when maps fade and direction is lost. Forwards is backwards now, so we glance sideways at the strange lands through which we are all passing, knowing for certain only that our destination has disappeared. We are unready to meet these times, but we proceed nonetheless, adapting as we wander, reshaping the Earth with every tread.

Behind us we have left the old times, the standard times, the high times. Welcome to the irregular times.


 
As the hours pass, it appears more and more that the responsibility for the American military torture scandal goes right to the top. Among the latest revelations: The Bush Administration engaged in a cover-up of the torture. Under direct control from the Bush White House, the Pentagon refused to inform Congress that it had discovered the practice of torture by American soldiers in Iraq, even after an official Pentagon report confirming the torture was completed.

In fact, Donald Rumsfeld "briefed" members of Congress on the situation in Iraq last Wednesday, just hours before the stories of Americans torturing their prisoners were revealed. During that "briefing", Rumsfeld told Congress nothing about the torture, even though Rumsfeld himself knew full well about it. The Bush Administration only informed Congress and the public about the torture after CBS 60 Minutes broke the story.

This cover-up of torture by the Bush Administration is illegal because the congressional authorization of military action in Iraq required the White House to keep Congress fully informed of military operations there. On this point alone, the law has been broken, and on this point alone it may be possible to impeach George W. Bush.

The question that remains in my mind is this: How long was George W. Bush planning to keep the use of torture secret from Congress and the American people? Did Bush have any plans to ever let us know about it?

Senator John McCain is right when he says that the use of torture by Americans in Iraq calls for an open, public investigation. But the investigation must not be of the American military alone. Congress must also initiate an independent, public investigation of the Bush White House, in order to discover who knew about the torture, when they knew about it, and whether there were any plans to make the legally required disclosure to Congress. It's time for George W. Bush to appear before a panel of investigators, and this time, he must not make an appearance all by himself, without Dick Cheney by his side.

Posted by J. Clifford Cook at 5:15 PM. # (permalink)  




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