Evil that Men Do

I haven't been posting about the big torture bill before the senate. I am hard-pressed to come up with anything constructive to say. I see (via Glenn Greenwald) it has passed - 65-34 even. That's 12 democrats voting for it. The earlier vote on Arlen Specter's amendment to strike section 6 (which suspends habeas corpus) was closer - I'm not sure what logic led those who voted for the amendment to end up voting for the bill. Greenwald runs through some of the more agregious offenders: Specter claiming the bill sent us back 900 years, then voting for it anyway - that sort of thing.

It's a thoroughly depressing situation. There's lots of grumbling about the democrats, who, while most voted against it, have not exactly acted like they were all that exercised, really. Are they worried about being called soft on terror? What the fuck is that? How can you not have an answer to that? How can you be so pathetic you don't slap that shit down on contact? What does this have to do with fighting terrorism? What the hell is the point of fighting terrorism if you aren't willing to stand up for what your country is supposed to be about? No secret courts - every man can face his accuser and knows the chareges against him - basic stuff. And as for the torture parts of the bill (eliminating appeals to the Geneva convention, say) - why don't democrats insist on calling this what it is? Call this the Permission to our Enemies to Torture American Soldiers act of 2006. Because if the laws don't apply to us, they don't apply to them either.

Anyway: this does simplify things in one respect: any politician who voted for this has, or should have, forever lost any right to appeal to morality, ethics, the scriptures, the western tradition, decency, common sense, the law, or, indeed, any justification for anything except naked self-interest. (Not that self-interest or cynical utilitarianism justifies this - torture doesn't work and will cause the country more harm than it could ever save; stripping civil rights always comes around the bite the people who do the stripping - if you pass laws assuming that you will always be the ones enforcing them, you are in for a nasty surprise in a year or so.) They start quoting scripture, you can say, with 100% assurance that they are only pretending to morality for their own narrow partisan gain. They are hypocrites. This will no longer be a matter of opinion, it will have been demonstrated. Hell, you can use it on your friends - religious nut A starts bloviating about stem cell research or pharmacist rights to deny emergency contraception or how gay marriage is against god's word, you can ask them: what do you think of the Military Commissions Act of 2006? for or against? if they say for - you can, in all good conscious, tell them they can fuck themselves. If they are your friends, I suppose, you can phrase it more politely ("whatever dude") - but you don't have to consider their opinions worth a thing.

I don't know. The fact that the democrats are allowing the republicans to pretend supporting this shit somehow makes them tougher on defense - mind-boggling. The cfact that either party (let alone both) think supporting this bullshit will get them more votes than fighting it - mind-boggling. The fact that none of them seems willing to stake their campaign on convincing the public that this has to be repealed at all costs - not so mind boggling, but boy, I would like to see some of that.