The Sound of Silence

Five and half weeks of silence on HOTS wasn’t planned. It just happened. One week was spent on the Monterey peninsula in a company leadership meeting; one week was spent preparing for a trip to China that covered nine days; and one week was spent recovering from that trip and the Chinese cold I brought home with me.

One other thing contributed to this the second lengthy period of silence this fall – the Military Commissions Act of 2006 (MCA). The last time I blogged down on this page was during the initial debate on the subject of torture and the U.S. adherence to the Geneva Conventions. The two sides in that debate reached a so-called compromise that allowed the president to go forward with the MCA. When it was passed by Congress I wanted to write about it – but I didn’t know where to start. I was even more concerned that I didn’t know where to stop.

That piece of legislation left me wondering about the moral foundation in America right now. I’m pragmatic enough to realize that the “compromise” was reached because neither party wanted to carry this debate any closer to the November 7 election. Voters could have rebelled against either party in response to the issues presented by that legislation. So they struck a deal and each side declared a moral victory. In fact, only one side won and the extent of morality in that victory is questionable. The president knew that he could count on the fact that the Dims and the moderate rebels in his party did not want to appear to be soft on “enemy combatants” just before the election. So he made a few relatively minor concessions and the law went through.

As a result America has handed the executive branch unparalleled authority to hold “illegal” enemy combatants for any length of time without trial. The people who can get caught up in this web cannot be counted or defined because the definition of such combatants is so broad that it defies clear boundaries. U.S. citizens can be detained under its umbrella.

The right to seek a writ of habeas corpus has been suspended for the people whom the president deems to be residents in this no-man’s land. If and when these people are brought to trial the government is allowed to use coerced evidence and, except for a few designated “grave” violations of the Geneva Conventions, the president is authorized to decide what does and does not constitute torture for purposes of coercing that evidence.

It’s an amazing time in America; it’s disheartening and disillusioning to me. Throughout its history America has been a leading voice in the world in protecting human rights especially from violations at the hands of powerful or over zealous executive leaders in countries that lack the constitutional protections that we enjoy everyday. Now, I’m not so sure about where our voice is leading us or anyone else.

The attacks on 9/11 were horrific acts and anyone involved in planning, supporting or executing those acts of terror, or any others like them, should be brought to justice and held accountable without question. We should be relentless in the pursuit of anyone inside or outside the U.S. who intends to bring terror to our citizens. Relentless pursuit will require us to cast a broad net and to haul in a large number of people who will fall all along the criminal spectrum, from the clearly guilty to those who are detained for direct involvement or other good cause, to those only suspected of some indirect connection to some act or plan, to those who have been detained for inadequate reason – or for no good reason at all. That’s what a broadly cast net produces – the catch of the day and a bunch of “throw backs”. Every fisherman knows that some fish you keep and fry, others you catch and release. No fisherman catches a fish, puts it on the stringer, and then leaves it at the lakeshore

I’m not sure what we fear so inordinately. Everyday in America we extend our Constitutional rights and due process to all manner of depraved criminals – mass murderers; serial killers; murderers who behead and dismember their victims; organized crime bosses who order the deaths of those who oppose them and the executioners who carry out those orders; ultra-violent rapists; vicious pedophiles; arsonists who kill people in their sleep; heartless drug dealers who bring death and misery to thousands of people year after year; abductors who torture their victims, including children, in unspeakable ways.

Every year in America we have thousands of our citizens who are killed or victimized by the heinous acts of depraved people. Yet we extend Constitutional rights and due process to each and every one of the perpetrators – because this is the United States of America and we are governed by the Constitution of the United States of America, the Bill of Rights, and by the rule of law in all governmental action.

That is who we are! That is what every member of the executive, legislative and judicial branch of government is sworn to defend. That is what every man and woman in uniform fights to defend. That is what makes us free – the very freedom for which the president claims the terrorists hate us. That is what sets us apart from Iran, Syria, North Korea, Cuba and Saddam’s Iraq.

I suspect the courts will reign in the MCA, as they should, but the fact that we have passed it and that it now exists as part of the “law of the land” makes our land less than it was before we surrendered to fear. As Benjamin Franklin said, “People who are willing to give up freedom for the sake of short-term security deserve neither freedom nor security.” I choose freedom, which is what Americans have been choosing since Franklin made this statement.

There, now, that subject is out of me. I could have said less, and certainly could have said more. But, it’s time to move on. Silence does not come naturally to me.