Rosa Brooks: Our Torturer-in-Chief
Until Bush took office, the U.S. had no problem defining what is cruel and inhuman.
Rosa Brooks
LA Times
WE DON'T torture detainees, President Bush has repeatedly insisted; we just make use of lawful "alternative procedures" of interrogation.
But if everything we've done is lawful, why is the White House suddenly so desperate to get a deal with Congress that would "clarify" Common Article 3 of the Geneva Convention and amend the War Crimes Act, which criminalizes violations of the article?
According to Bush, the problem is that Common Article 3, which prohibits "cruel," "humiliating" and "degrading treatment" and "outrages upon personal dignity," is vague. He claims it doesn't give "clear" guidance about what is permitted and what is prohibited during interrogations.
That's not what Bush is actually worried about, though. His real problem is precisely the opposite — Common Article 3 and the War Crimes Act aren't nearly vague enough. If called on to determine whether several of the administration's "alternative" techniques violate Common Article 3 — and thus the War Crimes Act — virtually any court in the land would agree that they do.
Our Constitution prohibits "cruel and unusual punishment." That's vague too, but our courts have always managed to define it. As the Supreme Court put it in the 2002 case Hope vs. Pelzer, the argument that a standard is vague and provides insufficient notice of what's prohibited just doesn't cut it sometimes. Some practices are just plain "antithetical to human dignity" and characterized by "obvious" and "inherent" cruelty.
True, one man's degradation may be another man's idea of a rousing good time. But unless the administration is claiming that U.S. detainees are grateful for the opportunity to wear dog collars and be dragged around on leashes, "degrading treatment" isn't a terribly vague concept in practice. And are there people — other than psychopaths — who honestly can't figure out whether repeatedly suffocating a prisoner while pouring water over his mouth and nose is cruel or inhuman?
If in doubt, take any of the "alternative" methods that Bush wants to use on U.S. detainees and imagine someone using those methods on your son or daughter. If the bad guys captured your son and tossed him, naked, into a cell kept at a temperature just slightly higher than an average refrigerator, then repeatedly doused him with ice water to induce hypothermia, would that be OK? What if they shackled him to a wall for days so he couldn't sit or lie down without hanging his whole body weight on his arms? What if they threatened to rape and kill his wife, or pretended they were burying him alive? What if they did all these things by turns? Would you have any problem deciding that these methods are cruel?
(The rest is here.)
Rosa Brooks
LA Times
WE DON'T torture detainees, President Bush has repeatedly insisted; we just make use of lawful "alternative procedures" of interrogation.
But if everything we've done is lawful, why is the White House suddenly so desperate to get a deal with Congress that would "clarify" Common Article 3 of the Geneva Convention and amend the War Crimes Act, which criminalizes violations of the article?
According to Bush, the problem is that Common Article 3, which prohibits "cruel," "humiliating" and "degrading treatment" and "outrages upon personal dignity," is vague. He claims it doesn't give "clear" guidance about what is permitted and what is prohibited during interrogations.
That's not what Bush is actually worried about, though. His real problem is precisely the opposite — Common Article 3 and the War Crimes Act aren't nearly vague enough. If called on to determine whether several of the administration's "alternative" techniques violate Common Article 3 — and thus the War Crimes Act — virtually any court in the land would agree that they do.
Our Constitution prohibits "cruel and unusual punishment." That's vague too, but our courts have always managed to define it. As the Supreme Court put it in the 2002 case Hope vs. Pelzer, the argument that a standard is vague and provides insufficient notice of what's prohibited just doesn't cut it sometimes. Some practices are just plain "antithetical to human dignity" and characterized by "obvious" and "inherent" cruelty.
True, one man's degradation may be another man's idea of a rousing good time. But unless the administration is claiming that U.S. detainees are grateful for the opportunity to wear dog collars and be dragged around on leashes, "degrading treatment" isn't a terribly vague concept in practice. And are there people — other than psychopaths — who honestly can't figure out whether repeatedly suffocating a prisoner while pouring water over his mouth and nose is cruel or inhuman?
If in doubt, take any of the "alternative" methods that Bush wants to use on U.S. detainees and imagine someone using those methods on your son or daughter. If the bad guys captured your son and tossed him, naked, into a cell kept at a temperature just slightly higher than an average refrigerator, then repeatedly doused him with ice water to induce hypothermia, would that be OK? What if they shackled him to a wall for days so he couldn't sit or lie down without hanging his whole body weight on his arms? What if they threatened to rape and kill his wife, or pretended they were burying him alive? What if they did all these things by turns? Would you have any problem deciding that these methods are cruel?
(The rest is here.)
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