Thankful
ayse:
Let Us Be Thankful—By Scott Horton (Harper’s Magazine)
Consider this nugget from the tyrannical soul of the Bush regime exposed by Roger Cohen in a Thanksgiving op-ed published yesterday:
A U.S. official met one of the dozens of Afghans now released from Guantánamo and was so appalled by this document that he forwarded me a copy. Dated Oct. 7, 2006, it reads as follows:
“An Administrative Review Board has reviewed the information about you that was talked about at the meeting on 02 December 2005 and the deciding official in the United States has made a decision about what will happen to you. You will be sent to the country of Afghanistan. Your departure will occur as soon as possible.”
That’s it, the one and only record on paper of protracted U.S. incarceration: three sentences for four years of a young Afghan’s life, written in language Orwell would have recognized. We have “the deciding official,” not an officer, general or judge. We have “the information about you,” not allegations, or accusations, let alone charges. We have “a decision about what will happen to you,” not a judgment, ruling or verdict.
This is the lexicon of totalitarianism. It is acutely embarrassing to the United States. This is the face the Bush regime has shown the world over the last eight years. It is an ugly face of tyranny, a face which mouths the words “freedom,” “liberty,” and “democracy” but whose actions reveal no belief in these values.
I am thankful for all those who rose to defend the nation’s values and traditions throughout the Reign of Witches, their number ever swelling as the conclusion approached. And I am thankful for a young lawyer from Illinois who prepares now to assume the mantle of leadership and promises to restore our nation’s good name in the world and to lead us out of the fetid, corrupt swamp in which we have been mired for eight years.
