How can we, as a country, purport to be the beacon of democracy when our leaders willfully ignored the lawless actions at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo that defied the Geneva conventions and our own military regulations?
The general who headed the military's own internal investigation now states that the torture and mistreatment of prisoners was not the act of a few renegades, but was tacitly supported by the top levels of this administration, who even now continue to hide behind a farcical shield of "plausible deniability".
May their lawless actions be subjected to the full light of day, and may they be held acountable and prosecuted to the full extent of our judicial system.
"Here . . . comes . . . that famous General Taguba—of the Taguba report!" Rumsfeld declared, in a mocking voice. The meeting was attended by Paul Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld's deputy; Stephen Cambone, the Under-Secretary of Defense for Intelligence; General Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (J.C.S.); and General Peter Schoomaker, the Army chief of staff, along with Craddock and other officials. Taguba, describing the moment nearly three years later, said, sadly, "I thought they wanted to know. I assumed they wanted to know. I was ignorant of the setting."
In the meeting, the officials professed ignorance about Abu Ghraib. "Could you tell us what happened?" Wolfowitz asked. Someone else asked, "Is it abuse or torture?" At that point, Taguba recalled, "I described a naked detainee lying on the wet floor, handcuffed, with an interrogator shoving things up his rectum, and said, 'That's not abuse. That's torture.' There was quiet."
Is this what our country now stands for?
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