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Rewriting the Rules

by TChris

If George "the brat" Bush has to play by the rules, he doesn't want to play at all. On Friday, the president announced that his administration would stop interrogating terrorism suspects if interrogators must follow the Geneva Conventions, prompting this editorial response from the NY Times:

To some degree, he is following a script for the elections: terrify Americans into voting Republican. But behind that seems to be a deeply seated conviction that under his leadership, America is right and does not need the discipline of rules. He does not seem to understand that the rules are what makes this nation as good as it can be.

The president's threats failed to impress the three Republican senators (McCain, Graham, and Warner) who argue that tortured confessions and trials based on secret evidence do not serve American interests. Perhaps someone in the White House noticed that the weekend headlines were about Republicans fighting Republicans, not the kind of reading that encourages GOP prospects in the upcoming elections. Suddenly the White House is making noise about a possible compromise.

One anonymous White House official told the Times that nobody in the administration anticipated "the avalanche of opinion that would be assembled on the other side of what seemed like a pretty abstruse legal issue." The inability of the administration to conceive of the Geneva Conventions' protection against torture as anything but an "abstruse legal issue" explains the administration's strategy. A frightened public wouldn't object to a little tinkering with the Geneva Conventions, they predicted, giving the public little credit for understanding that the same Conventions protect Americans. If we break the rules, we can expect other countries to follow our lead.

Americans also understand that we can't defend ourselves by trading our values for the illusion of safety.

The debate over these bills is not about America's security against terrorism. It is, rather, a referendum on Americans' willingness to remain what they have been through a Revolution, a second British invasion, a Civil War, two world wars and assorted police actions: a people who choose not to validate the atrocities of their enemies by stooping to their enemies' level.

McCain answers his critics in similar terms.

The Times reports no details of any new administration proposal, and McCain said that no compromise has yet been discussed. It would be better for the Senate to do nothing than to act in haste. The president has authorized indefinite detentions without trials, torture and abuse of detainees, rendition and secret prisons, and the warrantless interception of communications within our borders. A president who has recognized no limits on his powers now claims an urgent need for legislation to ratify his conduct. He had hoped to argue that Democrats who opposed him were soft on terror, but the Republican Gang of Three have blunted that attack. The rest of the GOP should join them to protect the government from the president's thirst for executive power.

It is, of course, easier for Republican senators to take a principled stand this year, when Bush is as popular as chicken pox. It's amusing to read Senator Graham's observation that "[t]here are three branches of government, not one." That's been true for the last six years, although it seems to have escaped the notice of the Republican Party. Where have you been, Senator?

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  • Re: Rewriting the Rules (none / 0) (#5)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Sep 18, 2006 at 12:19:08 AM EST
    On Friday, the president announced that his administration would stop interrogating terrorism suspects if interrogators must follow the Geneva Conventions
    He's going to stop asking Cheney questions now? How will he know what he's supposed to think he thinks? ===edger

    Re: Rewriting the Rules (none / 0) (#1)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Sep 18, 2006 at 01:19:10 AM EST
    This dimwit has some deep emotional disturbances (as does the people he has in his administration). They are bullies and thugs. They seem to thrive on cruelty. Alot I feel has to do with all of thier Manly - so called - insecurities and immaturity. I really think the photo circulating around with dimwit pouting is the perfect one to show the real dimwit

    Re: Rewriting the Rules (none / 0) (#2)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Sep 18, 2006 at 01:19:10 AM EST
    Sorry guys... Huckleberry, Senator 'Slimeball' McCain and Warner the Wonder Dog don't strike ME as much of anything other than a bunch of Bush enablers. This makes fer nice 'Kabuki' but puuuuuuuuuuuhleeese stop with the 'Republican Rebels' bullsheet. The last time folks like this were really Rebels they wore butternut. And they fought to make the world safe for... Slavery. Nothin's changed. Get yer head out; this is the BushWacker playin' you and the Duoh! Dems fer fools.

    Re: Rewriting the Rules (none / 0) (#3)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Sep 18, 2006 at 01:19:10 AM EST
    So basically, if Bush can't torture people, he's going to punish us all by not defending the country at all. Thanks buddy.

    Re: Rewriting the Rules (none / 0) (#4)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Sep 18, 2006 at 01:19:10 AM EST
    Would that be the same Lindsay "Goober' Graham(R-Cracker)that sneaked the "we don't need no stinkin Habeas Corpus" law through some months ago? (h/t)Sen. Ron Wyden(D-AIPAC)

    Re: Rewriting the Rules (none / 0) (#7)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Sep 18, 2006 at 07:36:10 AM EST
    Isn't it clear that bush is frantic to avoid being tried as a war criminal?

    Re: Rewriting the Rules (none / 0) (#6)
    by cpinva on Mon Sep 18, 2006 at 08:58:36 AM EST
    this would be the same approach he's used to warrantless wire/phone tapping: make my illegal actions ex post facto legal, or else! i still can't believe anyone still defends impeaching clinton, over lying about a bj in the oval office.

    Re: Rewriting the Rules (none / 0) (#8)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Sep 18, 2006 at 09:58:38 AM EST
    I'm impressed by McCain, Warner and now Colin. They're standing up to their president, the leader of their political party, because even they've recognized he's crossed a line....I have voted for and likely will vote for Warner again, as he tends to make the right decision in serious matters such as these...and I will strongly consider voting for a McCain-Powell ticket come 2008...but I am a tree-hugging liberal....at least I THINK I am... It's preposterous that interrogation can't go on if we say we won't allow techniques to violate the Geneva Convention, that's tantamount to admitting that weve been ignoring it thus far, and given the presidents position, we'd ignore it in the future if we can... It's not as bad as videotaping a beheading, but WHAT IS HE THINKING?!? That just gives those who stand against us more ammunition in their recruiting campaigns, knowing that we approve of and use toture will do nothing but ensure our folks are tortured in return...and anyone who REALLY knows torture (See John McCain), knows it doesn't work!! I'm not saying that if we catch someone who has planted a nuke, and won't tell us where it is, and we KNOW it's out there, that we shouldn't torture him...in that specific type of circumstance, yank his pubic hairs one by one till he talks, waterboard him, WHATEVER...do what you have to do....but how often do we get THAT type of situation? Never in the real world...

    Re: Rewriting the Rules (none / 0) (#9)
    by aw on Mon Sep 18, 2006 at 11:55:11 AM EST
    Please don't call Bush a "brat". That's what I call my young lovers.