The lost honor of Gary Farber, and of all the rest of us Americans too:
Posted by DeLong at July 15, 2004 06:47 PM | TrackBack | | Other weblogs commenting on this postGary Farber: AGAIN, MANY ABU GHRAIB PRISONERS were not only not terrorists, they weren't even accused of being terrorists. I keep reading... rantings ... that variously claim that, after all, the Abu Ghraib prisoners were all murderers, killers, and terrorists, and obviously no one should care about them.... But, as reported many times, many were either just mistakenly arrested, or were, at worst, common criminals:
NEWSWEEK: ...military-intelligence officers... pressured the military-police guards there to "soften up" their charges between sessions. That, at least, is the defense of the six MPs.... So why did Cpl. Charles Graner Jr. order a young woman to pull her shirt up to her neck? She was an accused prostitute. MPs allegedly ordered Hussein Mohsen Matar to masturbate, and rode on his naked back as he crawled on all fours. He was an accused thief.... Not only did military police torture prisoners at Abu Ghraib, they often tortured the wrong prisoners. The case files of 26 abused detainees... obtained by NEWSWEEK... 13 of the victims were there for criminal offenses.... At least eight of the other 13 who were initially picked up as terrorists were later ordered released without any charges.
[...]It's difficult to escape the conclusion that the Abu Ghraib torturers were just having a good, if sadistic, time.... Prisoner Satar Jabar's photograph, showing him hooded and wired up, has become familiar to Iraqis, who derisively call it "the Statue of Liberty." Far from being a dangerous insurgent, however, Jabar, 24, was an accused car thief.... The U.S. military is reviewing the deaths of 32 Iraqis in detention, many of them at Abu Ghraib. One was Munadil al-Jumaily, a healthy 40-year-old who died Feb. 10 of a cerebral contusion and hemorrhage. But his family didn't learn about it until his 12-year-old son Mustafa saw al-Jumaily's body May 22 in an Iraqi newspaper—on ice, with MPs Sabrina Harman and Graner posing with thumbs-up gestures over the battered corpse.
We hope for better news from Iraq now, and we're getting at least some. But the facts of what happened must not be denied for the sake of morale and convenience, and the rot must be rooted out. Why? Because to do otherwise hurts the war effort, you bloody nitwit. Not to mention it's what's right. And if we can't do that, we've no bloody business there, or anywhere, at all. (I like to think we can, but only if people stop arguing we shouldn't do what's right.
For perspective, it might be worth keeping in mind that we are a society that has long since accepted buggery and other forms of sexual humiliation as appropriate penalties for ordinary criminals. Recall Bill Lockyer and his contemptible remarks about Ken Lay's prison roommate.
Posted by: Buce on July 15, 2004 08:25 PMBuce (Bruce?) is correct in noting that the US, particularly US states, have long been in the business of sentencing convinced criminals (sometimes no so convicted) to torture, rape, illness and death. However, in domestic prisons, it is usually the criminals themselves, not the jailors, who commit the torture and rape. Part of the problem in domestic prisons is that we, as a society, jail more of our citizens, for longer periods and for lesser crimes, that just about any other society ever, and then neglect to pay for adequate supervision. Maybe, in the end, we won't be so horrified by Abu G, either.
Posted by: kharris on July 16, 2004 06:40 AMExactly what would be the authority under which the US military goes arround arresting for prostitution?
The US military is undoubtedly the single biggest client of the prostitutes - money wise at any rate. During the building of the Whitehouse there was a bordello on the building site (where the helicopters land today).
"But the facts of what happened must not be denied for the sake of morale and convenience, and the rot must be rooted out. "
Speaking of rot, consider the fact that in the opinion of the author of "Bush on the Couch", Bush is himself a sadist, among other things. Somehow I think this has got something to do with what transpired at Abu Ghreib.
Posted by: Bob H on July 16, 2004 07:18 AMConsider also, that in the opinion of Rivka,a psychiatric practicioner of note, of Respectful of Otters, the author of "Bush On The Couch" is an unethical idiot.
http://respectfulofotters.blogspot.com/
Posted by: Gary Farber on July 16, 2004 08:02 AMW. Bush went from ultimate authority over one of the US's worst prison systems, to ultimate authority over a very bad prison in Iraq. I don't think it's an accident; W. Bush does not have very much empathy.
"But the facts of what happened must not be denied for the sake of morale and convenience, and the rot must be rooted out."
The basic fact of what happenned is rooted in the psychology of prison life; it takes very, very good discipline to prevent any system of imprisonment from going bad, very quickly (vide that psychology experiment at Stanford). At Abu Ghraib, of course, abuse was actively encouraged, and it escalated quickly to torture. Though the people directly involved are war criminals, in my view the commanders who encouraged it, and that seems to go all the way to W. Bush, are the greater criminals and I would like to see them tried in Geneva.
Posted by: Randolph Fritz on July 16, 2004 10:15 AM