They write letters (emphasis mine).
Dear Mr. Longman:
Thank you for taking the time to contact me regarding the National Security Council Principals Committee’s discussion on interrogation techniques to be employed on enemy combatants suspected of involvement in terrorist plots. I appreciate hearing from all Pennsylvanians about this important issue.
I am appalled that senior Administration officials have been complicit in undermining American values against torture that are deeply rooted in our society. President Bush admitted that he knew that his top national security advisors, who comprise the Principals Committee, openly discussed and signed off on the use of “enhanced interrogation techniques,” including waterboarding.
I believe a commitment to the rule of law requires a firm statement that waterboarding is torture and thus illegal. The interrogation practices employed by U.S. government agencies and personnel should be consistent with the spirit and letter of international law. Engagement in torture stains our ideals and harms our national security interests, ultimately jeopardizing the safety of American troops deployed abroad.
Again, thank you for sharing your thoughts with me. Please do not hesitate to contact me in the future about this or any other matter of importance to you.
If you have access to the Internet, I encourage you to visit my web site, http://casey.senate.gov. I invite you to use this online office as a comprehensive resource to stay up-to-date on my work in Washington, request assistance from my office or share with me your thoughts on the issues that matter most to you and to Pennsylvania.
Sincerely,
Bob Casey
United States Senator
Is it just me? Am I just a stickler for the rules? Don’t most people that confess to conspiring to torture other human beings get something a little worse than a firm statement? Maybe I’m old fashioned.
I am old fashioned. They should be tried for war crimes. Forget the firm statements.
I don’t think Bob Casey understands that I have great difficulty reading that courteous response as anything less than an affront to my bedrock values.
A firm statement? No. Firm political or legal action is what basic decency and the rule of law require.
I got the exact sma eletter and will be making a call tomorrow.
202-224-6324
is that the homebrew typing?
nah, just sheer exhaustion.
and maybe a little brew…
A stickler? Nope- I don’t think so. You are simply incredulous. You have been brought up in a system that has preached “the rule of law! You have been taught that what makes this country the greatest country in the history of the world.
Nah- you aren’t a stickler. You are a witness. And what you are witnessing is the destruction of everything that you have been lead to believe.
You have been bombarded by a series of events that have debased just about every tenet upon which you and most citizens of this once great country have invested in.
And I also believe that you are infuriated by the apparent lack of willingness on the part those that promised to stop the insanity. And, when you thought that the 7 year nightmare was coming to an end, you have witnessed what might just be the greatest collapse of the party that should have walked into power.
I guess that there are alot of us that are trying to gather ourselves once again so that we can continue the good fight. So, I can tell you that this old fighter is running on fumes right now and it ain’t gonna be easy to step into the fray again. Pa was moment of illumination and what became extremely clear is that the good old citizenry seems to be harboring some pretty nasty ideas.
How do we educate them? How do we eliminate the insane hatred that seems to be driving them? I do know that if we don’t find answers, we are done.
Your post is once again terrific. Now, how about following it up with some answers!
boo, boo, boo, boo, boo:
Let us ALL take “firm positions” against sodomizing children in front of their parents for terror purposes.
Get with the program. We are ALL already against it. You must not be receiving the carbon copies. Send a note to the ministry of info. I’m sure they can put you on the mailing list. Then all will be right. Alright! even.
These people are all criminals. They require a judge, a jury, and a prosecutor. They broke the law. Period.
The abysmal contrast between the letter’s prissiness and the physical and moral depravity of its subject can only cause disgust. Torture has become the latest hot item among the salon, tea-drinking set, at least in Pennsylvania, evidently. Mr. Ratzinger, it seems, also avoided the subject.
My age estimate on the lowly LC staffer that typed up that letter to be about 24. I am sure the LA signed off on some of the wording but I highly doubt Casey ever even read it. The true reality of Capitol Hill.
This line cracked me up.
If you have access to the Internet,
It’s appalling that a U.S. Senator thinks a “firm statement” is an appropriate response to torture. Clearly, America has lost its way and become an outlaw state if its domestic opposition to torture is expressed in such gentle, and almost apologetic, terms. The truly sad thing is that this moral midget of a Senator can’t even muster the appropriate language in a letter to Booman, a constituent whose views the Senator purportedly shares, let alone an appropriately worded “statement” to the President and his fellow war criminals.
No Senator, you are “complicit in undermining American values against torture that are deeply rooted in our society. ” Bush and his cronies are actually guilty of torture and instituting a torture regime. You are guilty of complicity in undermining American values by doing nothing while your country tortured prisoners and violated other rules of war.
This letter disgusts me. I am also disgusted with the Democratic party for collectively taking the same position as Senator Casey. The Democratic party has failed this historic moral and political test.
it was you or I that was caught robbing a bank. Do you suppose that we would be warned with a “firm statement”? Of course not. This is a clear case of how there are two different sets of laws in this country- one for the rich & powerful, and one for us “less important” people.
But is obvious that the R &P will certainly not enforce the laws against one of their own- they don’t care about the law- so what can be don?
The shifting of the Overton Window on this issue over the last seven years has been truly remarkable. And when I talk to people I know about this issue, people who run the gamut from Right to Left, the fact that there is such apparent apathy in so many people to the concept of torture is just mind boggling. It seems that so many have become comfortable with simply treating torture as an abstract concept that they have subconsciously refused to accept that it is really happening and is being sanctioned, planned and encouraged by their country’s own government. The ability of the administration, along with the almost wholesale enabling by the media, to keep the facts out of our mainstream discourse will likely be proven by history to be one of most shameful acts that has taken place in our history.
If you haven’t done it, go read this diary at Kos, John Ashcroft Yelled at Me Tonight. It shows just exactly how one of the administration’s primary supporters and endorsers of torture reacted when bluntly confronted with a simple and very obvious question by a 21 year old college student during a Q&A session after a speech at the college. Every person in this administration should have to answer the very same question on nationwide television during prime time. No equivocation allowed.