Friday, October 12, 2007
Pacifica Commentary For October 10, 2007
Who Do We Call?
Would anyone have the 911 number to call? Criminality is rampant in the current administration of the United States.
The Chief Executive is lying through his teeth about no torture as we routinely practice horrendous forms of torture. It's true the Congress can and should impeach. But the Congress has passed away and is effectively not in session. The Supreme Court is on an early "long winter's nap".
Well then, do we contact the Attorney General to report such crimes? Should we call the FBI? The local police? The CIA?
Certainly many public officials have been arrested while in office; Governors, Mayors, members of Congress and state assemblies. There is no problem with such arrests.
But here we have the Chief Executive and his cronies clearly out of control. Are they to be exempt as they wantonly break national and international laws?
Millions of people are saying no, they are not exempt, as we observe thousands of daily vigils throughout the United States as well as dozens of major mass mobilizations.
But the criminality goes on as if there were some divine right of kings in our land. And now the justice and peace movement in the United States has taken a creative approach; leading Americans are asking our military to refuse orders to attack Iran.
This is an effort to create a kind of coalition that makes history.
Soldiers know the horrors of war, death, severed limbs, blindness and mental illness. They have seen the genocide in Iraq and they are not apt to romanticize about its repetition in Iran. A Pentagon consultant told Seymour Hersh, "There is a war about the war going on inside the building."
So while mindless thugs are doing everything possible to create an illegal war with Iran, elements within our military establishment are in opposition to another armed disaster.
We are not asking the Pentagon for a military coup in the United States. On the contrary, we are asking them to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. They do not need to show any loyalty to international crime.
Would anyone have the 911 number to call? Criminality is rampant in the current administration of the United States.
The Chief Executive is lying through his teeth about no torture as we routinely practice horrendous forms of torture. It's true the Congress can and should impeach. But the Congress has passed away and is effectively not in session. The Supreme Court is on an early "long winter's nap".
Well then, do we contact the Attorney General to report such crimes? Should we call the FBI? The local police? The CIA?
Certainly many public officials have been arrested while in office; Governors, Mayors, members of Congress and state assemblies. There is no problem with such arrests.
But here we have the Chief Executive and his cronies clearly out of control. Are they to be exempt as they wantonly break national and international laws?
Millions of people are saying no, they are not exempt, as we observe thousands of daily vigils throughout the United States as well as dozens of major mass mobilizations.
But the criminality goes on as if there were some divine right of kings in our land. And now the justice and peace movement in the United States has taken a creative approach; leading Americans are asking our military to refuse orders to attack Iran.
This is an effort to create a kind of coalition that makes history.
Soldiers know the horrors of war, death, severed limbs, blindness and mental illness. They have seen the genocide in Iraq and they are not apt to romanticize about its repetition in Iran. A Pentagon consultant told Seymour Hersh, "There is a war about the war going on inside the building."
So while mindless thugs are doing everything possible to create an illegal war with Iran, elements within our military establishment are in opposition to another armed disaster.
We are not asking the Pentagon for a military coup in the United States. On the contrary, we are asking them to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. They do not need to show any loyalty to international crime.
