Somebody Will Exact Revenge
“Mark my words,” Mr. Rohde said. “Whether it is impeachment in the United States, an international court (or) a war crimes tribunal, for the shameful conduct they have participated in, for the murder of prisoners in United States custody, for the torture of those prisoners, this government will be held accountable. We far too often ignore the details and accept the easy excuses of George Bush and his lawyers for what they have done — and for torturing the definition of torture. For the President to come out and say the United States does not torture, oh, yeah? Guantanamo detainees being tied to a leash and led around like dogs, forced to wear women’s undergarments, stripped naked, held in isolation for months on end, subjected to 48 and 54 consecutive days of 18- to 20-hour interrogations, subjected to sleep deprivation (soldiers) seeing who could make more detainees urinate or defecate on themselves, being chained hand and foot to the floor for 18 to 24 hours without food or water, subjected to temperatures below freezing and well over 100 degrees, being gagged with duct tape that covered much of their heads, being kept for months on end in isolation in their cell, which was always flooded with ice, and of investigators breaking the vertebrae of a Guantanamo detainee who was later exonerated by stomping on his back, dropping him on the floor and repeatedly forcing his neck backward, leaving him in a wheelchair, sensory deprivation, and other forms of cruel and inhuman punishment.
On Your Behalf?
“Ladies and gentlemen,” Mr. Rohde continued, “that is what has been done in our name. That is why the world hates us as the President weirdly tries to wrap himself in that expression. That is why this President has violated the Constitution and international law. If, after this coming election, the majority of the House eventually votes articles of impeachment — for it takes a majority of the House and two-thirds of the Senate — if that happens, we will begin the process in this country of restoring for ourselves, and for our place in the world, some of our lost dignity.”
An Injunction for Vigilance
Rewinding the clock of American history by more than 200 years, Mr. Rohde warned his listeners against Washington governments that have instinctively overreached at critical junctures, especially in wartime, to the detriment of its citizens. He bracketed the charged violations against the Bush Administration with the worst in U.S. history. “It seems to me,” he said, “this is another of those dark periods in American history that we have periodically lived through.” Citing the current perceived polarization of Muslims and the recent harsh criticism of The New York Times and the Washington Post, Mr. Rohde said that “punishment of outsiders and restrictions on a free press are an ugly coupling” that has appeared throughout the last two centuries. In a deadly date with destiny, Mr. Rohde said, the Bush White House has blended “arrogance and hypocrisy” in a backfiring posture that has turned most of the world and perhaps a majority of American citizens against Washington. Right Recipe for Wartime The Alien and Sedition Act of 1798 passed (wrongly, he implied) by the John Adams government, is “a sinister document.” In wartime, he said, Presidents have tended to contract civil liberties when the opposite is called for. “We need greater, not lesser, protection in time of war,” he said. During the Civil War, “tens of thousands of Confederate supporters” were jailed, held incommunicado, “without lawyers, without charges, without trials.” He lashed out against President Roosevelt’s jailing of 120,000 Japanese Americans at the height of World War II, “no charges, no lawyers, no trials, no crimes. When a government moves against marginalized peoples,” Mr. Rohde ominously concluded, “if left unchecked, it will move against its own citizens.” DEM CLUB NOTES — At the Aug. 9 meeting of the Democratic Club, a three-person panel will debate illegal immigration issues…New graduate Molly Wyatt, bound for U.C. San Diego, was introduced as winner of the Trudy Cherness Scholarship, named for a founding member of the club 55 years ago. Ms. Cherness’ son Darryl, immediate past president, made the presentation. Ms. Wyatt envisions a career as a political advisor, a position from which she believes policies can be promoted more effectively than from an elective office…First Vice President Greg Valtierra will lead a team of club members conducting voter registration drives the next two weekends at the Fox Hills Mall. Mr. Valtierra and his friends will hold signups from 12 to 4 both Saturdays and from 12 to 4 both Sundays…Longtime club member Herb Rosenberg was absent following recent back surgery…Stephanie Miller of AirAmerica radio, heard on AM 1150 (weekdays 6-9 a.m.), will receive the club’s first Social Conscious Spotlight Award on Saturday afternoon, Oct. 14, at the Jazz Bakery. Ms. Miller’s father was a Vice Presidential candidate in 1964…The club’s website is ccdemclub.org…