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Posted by: anna missed | Apr 24 2009 8:13 utc | 3

pfaff

Yet there is a limit. The latest case of the human moral vacuum created and encouraged during the Bush years is so outrageous, perverse, sadistic and nihilistic that it demands attention, for all that it tells us about the rest that has happened. I speak of the ordered, authorized, and conscientiously supervised water-boarding of two prisoners 266 times.
The men who authorized, ordered, and performed such acts should be hanged. It is as simple as that.

yikes. i believe i just posted that w/a retraction.

Posted by: annie | Apr 24 2009 9:31 utc | 5

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
Several of the links proposed above by b indicate that there is a
significant fraction of the U.S. electorate that views a serious
public examination of the torture policies of the Bush administration
as a moral necessity. A question of such importance requires that
determination of responsibility, guilt, and innocence
be made with both full respect to due legal process and
full public access to the proceedings and all relevant documentation.
It is clear that the U.S. Congress has neither the desire nor the
moral standing necessary to undertake that serious public examination.
Indeed, the silent complicity of some of its most influential members
undoubtedly facilitated the crimes authorized by the highest echelons
of the Bush administration, and perpetrated by all-too-zealous subordinates
under a squalid cover of bi-partisan unity.
It is, therefore, with only faint hope of seeing an expiatory process set in motion, that one might begin to seek a forum adequate to the task. Suggestions for appointment of a Special Prosecutor, or convocation of a commission akin to South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission are certainly in order. The former is somewhat tainted by the activities of Ken Starr (and, to a degree, the less than exemplary performance of Patrick Fitzgerald); the latter risks degenerating into nothing more than an official whitewash brigade, as in the case of the 9-11 commission, or many other of its anodyne predecessors. Another possibility would be a series of public hearings by a Senate committee, along the lines of the celebrated Ervin committe of the Watergate era. But such an arrangement would almost certainly lead, at best, to a bipartisan effort to “set the record straight”, and at worst (and more likely) a tawdry spectacle of partisan acrimony and a defense of criminal behavior by the Republican minority. The Washington elite seems too intimately involved with the history of these crimes to conduct a credible investigation. One might hope that the Justice Department itself would allow its career professionals to act responsibly in unraveling this knot of responsibility and complicity, and to bring indictments against the “major actors”, but present indications hardly inspire confidence in such an outcome. Here too the web of bi-partisan capital complicity seems too pervasive to permit honest investigators sufficient latitude in preparing their briefs and bringing the facts to public scrutiny.
Nevertheless, the investigation and “exorcism” of government approved torture is of such importance that it must not be consigned to the oblivion of scholarly studies and fringe group protests. It may well be that the issue can only be confronted at a national level, something quite distinct from “at the level of the U.S. government executive and legislative branches”.
Perhaps a truly national commission could be constituted by reverting to the primal federalism of the U.S. constitution, and placing the nomination of members in the hands of the “several states”.
A commission of 50 eminient jurists (not politicians) could bring the professionalism and gravitas necessary to confront the painful questions, and would, by its very composition, foster a truly national debate and examination of conscience. Such jurists could be nominated, for example, by the state legislatures or state bar associations, and nomination would be a noteworth addition to the curriculum honoris of any jurist. Enabling legislation at the national and state levels
would, one hopes, not be an insurmountable obstacle, once the goals of such a forum had been accepted. The exact powers, duration, staffing and budget of such a commission would be specified in that enabling legislation.
An institutional novelty along these lines would indeed by a way to “look at the future rather than the past”, and would also represent a welcome example of “change we can believe in”.

Posted by: Hannah K. O’Luthon | Apr 24 2009 10:21 utc | 7

Baghdad Bombs Kill 60 Iraqi, Iranian Shiite Pilgrims
Same scheme as yesterdays double bombing.

Posted by: b | Apr 24 2009 14:53 utc | 9

annie-I think that was the point… your lungs don’t have to fill with water for your automatic response system to signal your brain that you’re drowning. Most drowning victims don’t have very much water in their lungs… doesn’t take but a teaspoon to drown a person who panics and just stops breathing… sometime leading to cardiac arrest, sometimes just shutting down the person’s breathing which then triggers the heart to stop.
I’ve played in the water for much of my life and I’ve had two near drowning experiences; both caused by a pair of kids my age who thought they were being funny… both times my mom drug me back to shore (need to remember those mother’s day flowers!) and both times I didn’t have any water in my lungs to speak of.
So while you might think Hichen’s video was more for show than for experience, I suggest you try it and see how long you last… not trying to be snarky, but from your comments I take it you you don’t think it was “trying it.”
Some people stick to the bunny slopes of torture, while some (like myself) wouldn’t even want to submit to a couple of hooded guys tying me to a board while awful music plays in the background, let alone pouring water in my mouth…
You’d think they’d have picked a piece of music more inspiring, like maybe Mozart’s Requiem. These terror types are losing their touch.

Posted by: DavidS | Apr 24 2009 16:33 utc | 11

And the Gitmo torture story for twelve-year-olds …which also makes it perfect for ME!

Posted by: DavidS | Apr 24 2009 17:02 utc | 13

xymphora is always over the top. Yet, does it concern anyone that Kellerman either had expressed a need for guards at his home or had even hired a guard? (various reports)
Odd bits floating in the internet:
** There are anomalies in the reporting, which could, of course, just be the result of reporters jumping too fast. Earliest local radio reports and NYT said Kellerman was found hanged, while the later reports mention only a gun, a wound, and uncertainty about cause of death.
** Kellerman had worked at Freddie Mac 16 yrs, in the capital markets division. So he would certainly know many details related to the Freddie Mac collapse.
** Some observers have connected Paulson’s decision to put Freddie & Fannie in “conservatorship” to Paulson meetings with representatives from China, Russia, other major foreign creditors. Surely the corporate financial sector was equally interested. In any case, Freddie Mac management was not informed or included in the emergency planning for conservatorship. It was effectively a hostile takeover.
** Then there are Katherine Anne Fitts’ accounts of the fraud she discovered at HUD at the end of the last housing bubble. First she had to clean up the accounting. She asserts that this revealed clear fraudulent activity by the government for the purpose of funding black budgets in the Texas/Arkansas region.
Could this be relevant at Freddie Mac today? The popular recent rogue solution for pursuing illegal or unauthorizable policies has been to privatize it.
Or does something about working inside government housing finance institutions just tend to drive individuals to paranoia? Fitts seeing deliberate fraud, financing dark policies, and Kellerman imagining that he and his family were in danger?
NYT reports:

Mr. Kellermann, 41, began working nonstop, sometimes returning home only to change clothes, colleagues say. He was losing weight and telling friends that it seemed impossible to appease everyone — regulators, lawmakers, investors and other executives — given their competing demands. Someone was always angry with him, he told one friend. And no matter how many hours everyone worked, it seemed as if the economy and homeowners were still slipping farther into the abyss.
… Last month the company’s chief executive, David M. Moffett, resigned in part, he said, because federal regulators were using Freddie Mac to carry out economic policy at the expense of nursing the publicly held company back to financial health. The company has not had a president since 2007.
… Mr. Kellermann was also working in a poisonous political atmosphere. In addition to taking criticism over the bonuses, he was recently involved in tense conversations with the company’s federal regulator over its routine financial disclosures, according to people close to those discussions who also spoke on condition of anonymity. Freddie Mac executives wanted to emphasize to investors that they believed the company was being run to benefit the government, rather than shareholders.
… The company disclosed in March that there was a continuing federal investigation of its accounting, disclosure and corporate governance practices…

Is this enough to push someone to suicide? The father of a 5 yr old daughter?
I don’t know.
But most certainly there are very nasty tracks through those Freddie Mac books, if you are in a position to follow them.

Posted by: small coke | Apr 24 2009 18:04 utc | 15

“China revealed on Friday that it built up its gold reserves by three quarters since 2003, making it the world’s fifth largest holder of bullion.”
…

In my mind, there is no doubt that China is looking to topple he U.S. dollar as the world’s reserve currency. And this will happen over time. The Europeans want it – they are a rival in currency terms. The Asians want it – they want to stick it to an arrogant country which caused great hardship to Asia through the IMF in the Asian Crisis. And the oil exporters like Saudi Arabia, Iran and Venezuela all want it too. It will happen. The question is when and what will replace the dollar.

Is this an official declaration of economic war, taking it above ground? The author at naked capital compares the situation to France’s acquisiton of sterling reserves after WWI.
Maybe b will explain some of the implications, inc. for policy.

Posted by: small coke | Apr 24 2009 18:34 utc | 17

thanks small coke, good stuff. but what’s this about black budgets in the texas/arkansas area? i saw that and initially thought NAFTA superhighway, and then i chuckled to myself, because surely in a few years texas will no longer be a part of our crumbling empire.
all kinds of intrigue bubbling up to the surface.

Posted by: Lizard | Apr 24 2009 19:32 utc | 19

lizard #19

surely in a few years texas will no longer be a part of our crumbling empire.

not so much crumbling as chewed, the long awaited repast. Builds an appetite. Imagine their saliva.
Jones, Sheen, Oprahmatic
dragon in grail
#14 breal, thanks, will watch the Cohen thing tonight, “everybody knows” is playing behind me now.
And we know more than that, but it’s all too scary. (The Cartwrights wouldn’t send bovines to market, would they? Hoss must be a vegetarian and Little Joe couldn’t be a werewolf, i.e. a dismemberor of peasant children. (redolent of Emperor, hmm. power has possibilities, says Little Joe, Adam must go, but it must be his own idea.) The top matters, we cattle mutter.
(now he’s on “Suzanne.” (“Cohen Live”, several dates/venues). (I’m a 1 finger typist, neurosis.)

Posted by: plushtown | Apr 24 2009 21:23 utc | 21

Nature mag 2 reviews: Final warning from a sceptical prophet
(I don’t agree on general warming, by the way, but as said/linked before think heating is local from below, including from the estimated 3 million volcanic cones over 100 m high under the ocean. So currents make local seem global, and climates cascade, as will land ice, again local becoming global.)

Posted by: plushtown | Apr 24 2009 22:29 utc | 23

small coke- California, used to be the ninth largest economy in the world. They already have boarder checkpoints in place (ie fruit check points) and could give the middle finger to the feds for their share of the taxes which would only benefit the state’s economy.

Posted by: DavidS | Apr 25 2009 0:02 utc | 25

fucking type pad ate my link. let’s try that again

Posted by: Lizard | Apr 25 2009 1:31 utc | 27

That question applies to post-secession Montana.

Posted by: rjj | Apr 25 2009 5:09 utc | 29