Hitchens: A Moral Chernobyl - Prepare for the worst of Abu Ghraib

[Barrett808]

This is the first Hitchens piece I've been able to agree with for a long, long time.

A Moral Chernobyl
Prepare for the worst of Abu Ghraib.
By Christopher Hitchens
Posted Monday, June 14, 2004, at 1:46 PM PT

In a recent public debate, so I was told, an American officer referred to the Abu Ghraib scandal as a "moral Chernobyl." You might think that this was overstating matters, even if in one important sense—because Chernobyl was morally an accident, albeit in some ways a "systemic" one—it is actually understating them.

But get ready. It is going to get much worse. The graphic videos and photographs that have so far been shown only to Congress are, I have been persuaded by someone who has seen them, not likely to remain secret for very long. And, if you wonder why formerly gung-ho rightist congressmen like James Inhofe ("I'm outraged more by the outrage") have gone so quiet, it is because they have seen the stuff and you have not. There will probably be a slight difficulty about showing these scenes in prime time, but they will emerge, never fear. We may have to start using blunt words like murder and rape to describe what we see. And one linguistic reform is in any case already much overdue. The silly word "abuse" will have to be dropped. No law or treaty forbids "abuse," but many conventions and statutes, including our own and the ones we have urged other nations to sign, do punish torture—which is what we are talking about here at a bare minimum.

So far, the press has focused on the questions "who knew" and "how far up did it go?" I'm equally interested in the question of how far down it has gone and how widespread it is. As Seymour Hersh has pointed out, the original imperative for harsh measures came from a Defense Department, and by extension a White House, that was under intense pressure to get results in the battle against al-Qaida and felt itself hampered by nervous lawyers. Almost the whole of public opinion is complicit in this, as is shown by the fury over the administration's failure to pre-empt the Sept. 11 assault: a pre-emption that would almost certainly have involved some corner-cutting in the interrogation room.

(more)

http://slate.msn.com/id/2102373/

[bluestateguy]

1. I'll never trust that fucker again

Left wing Clinton haters are still Clinton haters.

[merh]

13. He is blaming us? He is trying to cover his & GW's a**.

"Almost the whole of public opinion is complicit in this,
as is shown by the fury over the administration's failure to
pre-empt the Sept. 11 assault: a pre-emption that would almost
certainly have involved some corner-cutting in the
interrogation room."

I never asked that we go to war for 9/11, as a matter of fact,
I never believed GWs lies regarding the link between 9/11 and
Iraq.

This guy is a creep, slime, lower than low, 

[myopic4141]

14. I got a different take on the complicity angle.

In many ways, Hitchens is correct in this nation's public opinion complicity. A majority of the population allowed Shrubby great leeway in his decisions while those questioning were shunted aside after 11Sep01. Having said that, I do disagree with his analysis that corner-cutting was needed to prevent the 11Sep01 catastrophe. Here too, I blame Shrubby; but, not from a strict LIHOP standpoint. Many policies were instigated by Shrubby that bottlenecked information from reaching those that could have prevented a skyjacking (stopping the skyjacking would have also stopped using the aircraft as missile whether or not foreknowledge of skyjacked aircraft usage was present). The policies I am referring to are those which stopped investigations of various Saudi's within our borders by the FBI when Shrubby first arrived in office. My contention is that Shrubby knew of the skyjackings; but, being a tunnel vision thinker, did not realize the full impact of aircraft usage. The Administration needed something to jump start the war and a simple skyjacking would have been enough to fit the bill. It was just that the end result was more than anyone bargained for.
Returning to the original complicity issue. There was a group arguing against the validity of the reasons for invading Iraq; but, they were muted as well by the majority. Shrubby's "end justifies the means" attitude became acceptable following the very lightly challenged policy of preemptive war. Few were listening and those of any influence who argued against the policy found themselves removed from positions of power. Equally absent was any backbone within the Democrat Party leadership who quelled outspoken voices as well. We are where we are because the public opinion stood mute on the subject until it was too late.

[lancdem]

2. Didn't Hitchens diss Seymour Hersh

just a few weeks ago? BTW, this must be hard for him to swallow since he loves Bush. Hehe

[struggle4progress]

3. Indeed he did. Here:

http://slate.msn.com/id/2100717/

His theory was that Hersh was wrong: the rot couldn't possibly go all the way to the top. He's still eager not to blame the White House too directly:

"As Seymour Hersh has pointed out, the original imperative for harsh measures came from a Defense Department, and by extension a White House, that was under intense pressure to get results in the battle against al-Qaida and felt itself hampered by nervous lawyers."

But he's having a hard time of it. :evilgrin:

[Hoping4Change]

4. If public opinion played a role Bush would srewed by the pig.

What bullshit that "almost the whole of public opinion is complicit in this." How dare Hitchen's try to lay blame elsewhere. If anyone other than the a**wipes in the administration are to blame it is he.

His moral bankrupcy supporting this adminsistration is beyond bloody contempt.

Talk about closing the barn door after the horses have left.

[Th1onein]

5. He's blaming US, the American people, now, instead of Bush

That's such bullshit.

[mistertrickster]

6. As usual Hitchens is full of shit, but this article is important because

it shows how desperate the right wing is to preempt the firestorm of criticism when the really sick pictures come out.

Whoa, those photos must really be bad.

And the same internet that brought you Pamela Lee's and Paris Hilton's sex videos are going to be the conduit that the big corporate media couldn't stop.

[Miss Authoritiva]

7. I already can answer your questions, Mr. Hitchens.

"I'm equally interested in the question of how far down it has gone and how widespread it is."

It blasted through the human members of the military and went as far down as the military guard dogs. One cannot go any farther down than that.

And it extended from one end of the U.S. military's gulag archipelago to the other.

[Barrett808]

11. Total corruption, from top to bottom. Absolutely. n/t

[peacetalksforall]

8. I'd like the statistics -

How many prisons.
How many prisoners in each.
How many men, women, children.
How many 'abused'.
How many photographed.
How many murdered.
How many released.
How many tried.
How much information did we get.
How many doctors took care of them.
How many years to repair our sickness.
How many of us despise the planners, authorizers, and implementers.
How many low lever, medium level, high level carried this out.
How much money did the contract employees make - including their CEO's.
How do they cover up their Warsaw Convention compliance claims?

I don't need to see the pictures. Give me the statistics.

[lapfog_1]

9. What difference does that make?

How many prisons? What if it were only one?
How many prisoners each? Again, what if it was only one?
How many men, women, children. What if it was only one man, one woman
one child?
How many photographed? What if it was only one?
How many murdered? What if it was only one?
How many released? What if none, or all (not dead)?
How many tried? What if it was all or none?
How much information did we get? What if it was everything? or nothing?

Torture was done in our names, by our government. We can't let
even one instance go by. So what if we don't get information from
the prisoners... it matters not that we save the lives of
our soldiers, if in doing so, we lose our souls.

[peacetalksforall]

10. I don't disagree with you.

But, if we don't know the breadth of abuse there will always be people who will say that it was only a few who did it and who had it done to them and where. We won't know the extent of planning, orders, implication, and permission.

The images won't mesh with our opinion of ourselves and we'll try to put it out of our minds even if the rest of the world doesn't.

I want to know the extent that we lost our souls. And the length we have to go to get our Senators and Congresspeople to know that they are not doing their jobs. They are allowing or participating in the reign of the Pentagon and the White House with the corporations. They need to know that privitization is not governing and does not mesh with the constitution and bill of rights and our former leadership role in prisoner rights agreements and demands and participation in tribunals, tax-payer paid.

[enki23]

15. it would be much less important, were it only one

much, much less important. to pretend otherwise would be willfully ignorant.

[KoKo]

12. The rest of these photos must be so depraved that even Hitchen's depravity

is cowered by them. He is "butt covering" big time here. He thinks big stuff is coming down and he's clueing his audience in and letting himself off the hook.

Where was he when we were out every weekend holding signs up against this Invasion? Where were they all, when those of us knew that this group who stole an election and brought down a popular President would stop at NOTHING to get their way.

We knew they were depraved, their policies were depraved and everything they do is depraved. But, did Hitch and the rest even devote a sentence in their columns that SOME PEOPLE including some in House and Byrd and other in the Senate stood on the floor of Congress arguing their guts out to stop this War? Where was he then?

I don't even want to know what his "pig" reference is, but I'm thinking there's going to be "beastiality" in these photos. And it's revulsive to all of us who tried so hard to stop this.

We have become the depraved and Saddam will fade into the background because the Occupier has taken the place of Oppressor.

Ugh...How can writers like Hitchens be taken seriously by anyone. Are people so deaf and blind that they couldn't seem what we saw with all their experience, degrees and insider influence and chummyness. Beltway Wasington is indeed an incestous group think place. Those folks need to get a life out here in America. They are too full of themselves to be writing for the public. :grr:

[funnymanpants]

16. Hitchens a scoundrel

"Many, many people must have fantasized about getting Osama Bin Laden into some version of an orange jumpsuit and then shackling him for a while to the wrong end of a large pig. ... so we face something like a collective responsibility, if not exactly a collective guilt."

No, we are not. Those who advocated the war, like you, Hitchens, are.

If you want to play cowboy and cheer people on to invade countries under lies, don't you think you should accept a little responsibility, Hitch, you nasty piece of insulting douche bag full of sophistry?

Do you not have a decent bone in your whole body?

[Disturbed]

17. A Born Again Right Wing Fascist.

That's similar to a born again Christian in the usual way that these people become zealots and over bearing. Hitchens slid over into the dark side and now is trying to worm his way back out.

The Videos that will come out will disgust most people that aren't hardened to seeing perversion. This will be difficult to contain for BushCo because along with the visual evidence will be doucments proving BushCo compliance with torture. So far 289 cases of detainees dying whole in custody. This will move way beyond "abuse" into depravity and War Crimes.

I believe that certain people in the DOD and CIA are intent on bringing BushCo down hard.

[newyawker99]

18. Hi funnymanpants!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[funnymanpants]

19. Thanks

My girlfriend who lurks on these boards told me I would get a welcome. Well, here it is, and thanks!

[TiredTexan]

20. Welcome aboard................

Good perception on Hitchens, too.

[teryang]

21. The rude drunk awakens from his stupor

...and catches a glimpse of reality that doesn't fit in with his clash of civilizations bullshit. He cites Hersh? What a hypocrite.

[Classical_Liberal]

22. I don't feel complicit in this Hitch!

I was against the Iraq invasion from the beginning since Al Qaeda wasn't there. If the public is complicit it is because they trusted you and the rest of the punditocracy to tell the fucking truth.