The banana republic

It's us, as in the United States of America--but not quite. Never in my life have I been in so much awe of Jefferson, Paine, and Madison. To think that their pragmatic and brilliantly simple approach to government and self rule could not only still be applicable well over 200 years later is amazing enough. To think that it could still keep us relatively sane and coherent with this presidential administration in place is beyond remarkable. That's the good news.

Here's the bad news: It's worse than you think. This is a must read. It is an article about General Taguba--a career officer charged with investigating the Abu Ghraib scandal--and his experience in fulfilling his duty. It seems rather long at first, but at the end I wanted to know more. Writing now, I demand to know more and I trust that is will come out with time.

The highlights for me:

Wolfowitz asked. Someone else asked, “Is it abuse or torture?” At that point, Taguba recalled, “I described a naked detainee lying on the wet floor, handcuffed, with an interrogator shoving things up his rectum, and said, ‘That’s not abuse. That’s torture.’ There was quiet.”

Having male detainees pose nude while female guards pointed at their genitals; having female detainees exposing themselves to the guards; having detainees perform indecent acts with each other; and guards physically assaulting detainees by beating and dragging them with choker chains.

I learned from Taguba that the first wave of materials included descriptions of the sexual humiliation of a father with his son, who were both detainees. Several of these images, including one of an Iraqi woman detainee baring her breasts, have since surfaced; others have not. (Taguba’s report noted that photographs and videos were being held by the C.I.D. because of ongoing criminal investigations and their “extremely sensitive nature.”) Taguba said that he saw “a video of a male American soldier in uniform sodomizing a female detainee.”

A few weeks after his report became public, Taguba, who was still in Kuwait, was in the back seat of a Mercedes sedan with Abizaid. Abizaid’s driver and his interpreter, who also served as a bodyguard, were in front. Abizaid turned to Taguba and issued a quiet warning: “You and your report will be investigated.” “I wasn’t angry about what he said but disappointed that he would say that to me,” Taguba said. “I’d been in the Army thirty-two years by then, and it was the first time that I thought I was in the Mafia.”

A recently retired C.I.A. officer, who served more than fifteen years in the clandestine service, told me that the task-force teams “had full authority to whack—to go in and conduct ‘executive action,’ ” the phrase for political assassination. “It was surrealistic what these guys were doing,” the retired operative added. “They were running around the world without clearing their operations with the ambassador or the chief of station.”

Know this. Regardless of political affiliation (I'm an Independent), with this President and his staff, along with a complicit majority Congress and an invertebrate opposition party, the United States is an officially barbaric and rogue world power. I emphasize "officially" because the decision making has come from the top. For the first time in my life, at age 36, with seven generations deep in this country, I'm ashamed of being an American.