Glenn A Knight
In my study
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Conservatives Unsure About A Truth Commission
This cute little article by Jenifer Rubin assumes that the Bush administration would be vindicated by a detailed examination of what the payoff was from harsh interrogation. But I note that one of her examples is Jose Padilla, whose plot was disrupted as soon as he was arrested in Chicago, before he was subjected to years of unlawful imprisonment and harsh interrogation. Oh well, read it and see what you think.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
Wow! Our very own Truth Commission! Think how much better we'll feel after years of accusations and political wrangling! And after it's done with its hearings, about half of everyone will think what the Bush administration did was completely justified, and about half will think it wasn't. Wait a minute; isn't that the case now? Oh, well...
Seriously, the idea that a "truth commission" will purify our national soul and, of course, punish the sinister Bush administration officials who sullied our good name seems to be becoming an article of faith with the left. Ms Rubin's post shows that the idea is beginning to appeal to some on the right, too. I think both sides should carefully consider what they're hoping for, because they just might get it.
Rubin captures the right's position quite well:
> But most alluring for
> conservatives is the hope that
> the argument would finally be
> joined and the facts presented
> to the American people to
> establish what they have long
> argued: tough tactics (short of
> the common-sense understanding
> of “torture”) were used to save
> lives. The Bush administration,
> they hope, would finally get the
> credit it is due for keeping us
> safe for seven years after 9/11.
But what would happen if both sides "won" the argument? That is, as Rubin points out, nothing that was done to the detainees is torture in a commonsense way; and, indeed, a comfortable majority of Americans actually favor using real torture when it's necessary. However, it's questionable whether any mistreated detainee ever provided any useful information under duress, and the vast majority of terrorist plots that were breathlessly announced turned out to be the puffed up rantings of various nuts or the constructions of paid government informers.
I think John McCain is right: Show trials after leadership changes are a characteristic of banana republics and totalitarian states. We don't do that in the US-- and we shouldn't do it.
The only certainty is that after the truth commission concluded its work, no government agent would ever again risk doing anything that had the slightest chance of later coming back to bite him. And we might well like the result of such hesitation in a crisis a lot less than we like what was done to the mistreated detainees.
Well said, Lloyd, well said, indeed. As I noted in my review of Philip Shenon's book, the reason that the 9/11 Commission report was unanimous was that it avoided pointing too many fingers. You have, I suppose, a couple of choices in this sort of thing, but if you really want to hold people accountable and punish wrongdoing, you need to get together about two dozen good Americans, swear them to secrecy, and present them will all the evidence.
Wait, we already have that. It's called the grand jury system.
Post a Comment