SLIP SLIDING AWAY

SLIP, SLIDING AWAY by Barbara Carr

It's like watching a "B" movie with bad actors. The hero (our
beloved country) is hanging over the cliff, grasped by the fragile
grip of her citizens. With enough of them to help, it would be
possible to pull the hero back onto firm ground. But the bad guys
have weapons of mass deception, and they fool too many of those who
would help if they knew the truth, and our hero slips further and
further out of reach into the abyss.

One of their bad actors went to the United Nations environmental
treaty talks in Montreal. The conference wrapped up this past
weekend with the calamitous walkout of the American representative,
who left last minute midnight-oil discussions aimed at finding some
common ground that could move the process of reducing "greenhouse gas
emissions" forward. The United States and China, the two worst
oreductions. Former U.S. President, Bill Clinton spoke to the
thousands of delegates, noting the "precautionary approach" the Bush
administration had taken to fighting terrorism, saying, "There is no
more important place in the world to apply the principle of
precaution than the area of climate change........We know what's
happening to the climate, we have a highly predictable set of
consequences if we continue to pour greenhouse gases into the
atmosphere, and we know we have an alternative that will lead us to greater prosperity."

With the close of this environmental conference, the focus shifted to
the International Peace Conference which began on Dec. 10 in London,
a gathering of people from the US, UK and IRAQ who want
PEACE.......not WAR. This gathering follows closely on the high
heels (and high horse) of Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice's trip
around the continent trying to reassure those who are anxious and
concerned (all) that the president was telling the truth when he said
"The U.S. does not torture." Rice applied the usual tactic of
repetition + repetition = truth. The wary and weary world did not
fall for her hollow and false assertions, which made matters worse
instead of better. British playwright Harold Pinter had some words
for her and the president in his lecture upon receiving the Nobel
Prize for literature, raining shame down on all the lies, distortions
and deceptions that our country and the world have endured since our
fateful contested elections of 2000 and 2004. He reminds us that the
U.S. now occupies 702 military installations throughout the world in
132 countries, and has 8,000 active and operational nuclear warheads,
2,000 of which are on hair trigger alert, ready to be launched with
15 minutes warning. Maybe those are different from the NUCULAR
weapons George talks about, and he doesn't know he already has gobs?
Maybe George and Condi didn't see the photographs taken of the
TORTURE at Abu Garib prison. Maybe they are hiding the rest of the
photographs the American courts ordered released to the public. We
all know they're too horrible to see - precisely why they must be
seen. The ACLU has a lawsuit pending to hold Rumsfeld and other high
officials accountable for torture documented in 77,000 pages of
records they have obtained through the Freedom of Information Act.

In trying to accuse Europe of complicity with the U.S. on the
rendition of hundreds of suspected terrorists to "black sites" and
spread the guilt, Rice caused a firestorm of fury among those she
sought to mollify. The Italians, who have issued indictments of 22
current and former CIA operatives for the rendition of an Egyptian
suspect, say emphatically that they are not involved. The UK also
scrambled to deny involvement and clarify their policies. In a lead
opinion, Lord Bingham of Britain's highest court, the Law Lords,
ruled that evidence obtained through torture, no matter by whom, is
not admissible in British courts. This ruling overturns the existing
tacit acceptance that torture can be condoned under certain
circumstances, and renews adherence to the UN 1994 Convention Against
Torture.

In a rebuke of the fuzzy definitions employed by the Bush administration,
Lord Bingham states that "prohibition against torture
has become one of the most fundamental standards of the international
community.....an absolute value from which no one must deviate."
Germany is intensely investigating the U.S. regarding our rendition
activities, and claims it has records of 400 U.S. rendition flights
over European airspace. Most shameful was Rice's attempt to mend
fences with Germany's Chancellor Merkel, who applauded Rice's
admission to her of the U.S. "mistake" in the rendition of German
citizen, Khaled el-Masri, to the CIA jail "the Salt pit" in
Afghanistan. el-Masri was tortured there for 5 months in a case of
"mistaken identity." After their meeting, Rice denied she had
admitted the mistake. The European Council declared that any member
nation harboring a CIA prison would be put under sanctions by the
European community.

In America, the press broke the story of the Al Queda operative, Ibn
al-Shaykh al-Libi, who was tortured into providing the
mis-information of a 9/11 Al Queda and Saddam Hussein connection, and
says he gave the information he thought they wanted to hear so they
would stop the torture. The president used his mis-information to
make the case for war, even though it was discredited at the time by
the CIA. Claiming that our invasion of Iraq is a necessary part of
the War on Terror, our military has spent $277 BILLION on the War on
Iraq to make the world a safer place because of the danger of Saddam
Hussein to the U.S.. According to Representative John Murtha, who
knows, the military will ask for an additional $100 Billion for
operations in Iraq next year. U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales
says the Geneva Convention is "quaint." Dick Cheney insists that the
CIA needs an exemption from John McCain's proposed anti-torture
legislation. McCain says that there is no information obtained by
torture worth the shame it would cause the United States. Over last
weekend he and others tried and tried to broker a solution to this
impasse with the White House, so far to no avail.

We are obviously witnessing a colossal clash of values, both within
and without our borders. As citizens of this noble nation, we are
left with a terrible quandary. Shamed by our leaders, who control
all three branches of our government and repeat lies in order to
create truth out of falsehoods, our power is limited. We have only
our voices. Harold Pinter has some words for us to consider: " I
believe that despite the enormous odds which exist, unflinching,
unswerving, fierce intellectual determination, as citizens, to define
the real truth of our lives and our societies is a crucial obligation
which devolves upon us all. It is in fact mandatory. If such a
determination is not embodied in our political vision we have no hope
of restoring what is so nearly lost to us - the dignity of man." Men
and women, mere citizens all, are gathered in the pursuit of peace in
London. Iraqis who want their country healed will be there.
Americans and Brits who long for peace and the return of their brave
soldiers will be there. The future will be there.

Barbara Carr


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