For years I have lived in this state of Illinois and have seen Sen. Durbin's name in the newspaper, on television, and even on my ballot with a freshly marked X next to his name.
HOWEVER...his statement of 6/14/05 stunned me.
Here's an excerpt from his comments from the US Senate floor from 6/14/05: FULL TEXT
On one occasion, the air conditioning had been turned down so far and the temperature was so cold in the room, that the barefooted detainee was shaking with cold. ..... On another occasion, the [air conditioner] had been turned off, making the temperature in the unventilated room well over 100 degrees. The detainee was almost unconscious on the floor, with a pile of hair next to him. He had apparently been literally pulling his hair out throughout the night. On another occasion, not only was the temperature unbearably hot, but extremely loud rap music was being played in the room, and had been since the day before, with the detainee chained hand and foot in the fetal position on the tile floor.
If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime--Pol Pot or others--that had no concern for human beings. Sadly, that is not the case. This was the action of Americans in the treatment of their prisoners.
First of all, I do not condone torture. Coercion of terrorists is necessary to extract information to help keep our country safe. Torturing them, however is not acceptable (and so far, I am not seeing convincing evidence of this...?mistreatment...I don't know. Working for those who murder 3000 people isn't exactly being nice or cordial either.)
The purpose of this post is to ask the simple question: How in the world can Senator Richard J. Durbin compare this purported mistreatment of terrorists at Club Gitmo with the murderous, evil regime of the Third Reich? Or Pol Pot? Or Stalin? To put things in perspective: NO ONE has been killed by US servicemen at Gitmo. NO ONE has been starved to death. NO ONE has been shot simply because they disagreed with the commandant. NO ONE was lined up in front of a large ditch and machine-gunned down and buried simply because they were of an undesirable race. NO ONE has been purged because they were not of the same political party or persuasion. NO ONE has had their homes plundered, their women raped (we're talking about the US here, not the UN remember) or their children being kept for medical experiments. Prisoners there get three meals a day, have access to their religious texts and are allowed to pray five times a day as they feel led. They get exercise and a room all to themselves.
As a student of history, I can tell you there is NO comparison between the treatment of terrorists at Gitmo and the treatment of prisoners by the Third Reich, Pol Pot, or Stalin. NONE WHATSOEVER. Are they "mistreated?" That's a matter of opinion. Is solitary confinement mistreatment? Is the room being too cold or too hot mistreatment? Is listening to music mistreatment? I guess it would depend on the circumstances, but to say that it is akin to torture, and to the extreme that was given out by Hitler et al above is off-the-wall ridiculous.
Durbin did make a point about making sure the image of the US in their treatment of prisoners needs to be higher. I would agree. Unfortunately, with the few abuses that were documented at Abu Ghraib and now the media's spin on what's going on at Club Gitmo, American servicemen are being portrayed as Nazi's; we aren't seeing balanced reports or the whole story. What we ARE seeing is Al-Jazeera repeating Durbin's comments to the radical islamic extremists in the Middle East. Can someone say, "aid and comfort to the enemy?" No, not quite, but it sure doesn't help now does it?
Mr. Durbin will find that this will come back to haunt him in 2008. Will it cost him his seat in the Senate? Some say yes; but TDD will say no, and he may end up being right. It will be an uphill battle, that I can guarantee you!
Until next time...
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8 comments:
I was going to post something about this also, but you have done a superb piece which I'll link to from Solid Logic.
Durbin has alienated many of his conservative and middle of the road supporters with his "Party of NO" version of national politics.
Does he not remember the unity and support he expressed right after September 11?
Does he forget why the bad guys are there?
Does he even care that some of them could very well have information that could be useful in preventing more AMERICAN lives from being taken?
The supposed mistreatment pales to the threat that these vicious people (and their supporters in Congress) are to America. Sen. Durbin should retake some of his history lessons.
Follow up...
Durbin has "clarified his statement"...
He was comparing the interviewing tactics used by our servicemen to the those used by Nazi's. Well, that would be okay, if it were true.
Nazi's put a gun to your head if they wanted information. They would shoot the interviewee's fellow prisoners, cut off fingers or other appendages, or just beat the prisoner senseless until he talked. Pol Pot didn't care what you had to say, he just killed you. Same with Stalin; there was no information he wanted from those he was going to purge. He just killed 20,000,000 people any way he could.
By first refusing to apologize, and now totally screwing up his "clarification" he has, in effect, given up his Senate seat for 2008, provided the Republicans in Illinois can come up with someone better than Mike Ditka to run against him.
Lookout, TDD has "got Durbin's back." Sounds like military terminology...
Don't get too militaristic TDD or you get called a Nazi in this country.
Durbin's statement almost seems surreal, as if we were hearing Howard Dean being channelled through him. I would agree that Durbin's political life may have suffered a major blow, but to count him out this early would be presumptuous. Your prediction of TDD's thoughts was right on the money, however, I would have to say he is probably right. The question now is how far down will Durbin dig himself? If he goes much lower than this, TDD may then have to realistically re-think his position.
Durbin's words were a fair and limited comparison, which anyone not wishing to find something to bash Democrats with would admit to. I'm proud he is my senior Senator. I'm a veteran, and the stories out of Gitmo and A. G. make me sick. These people, though most of them are scum, should be treated according to the Geneva Convention. We shouldn't be using some legal fiction to dodge our responsibility.
If the Nazi's and US Servicemen are a "fair and limited comparison" then the Jews must have been given Torahs, three meals a day, their own air-conditioned room, not made to work in ANY camp, and none were killed by their captors...the Holocaust never happened.
Yeah, makes a whole lot of sense.
The interrogation techniques employed by the Nazi's and those employed by our servicemen are TOTALLY different, as I posted earlier. To say they are a fair comparison is totally idiotic.
You called it right about the apology, but do you consider it adequate or even complete? He's sorry for hurting your feelings, not about whatever politically partisan demon that he was being influenced by when he orginally wrote the comments, made the comments in the U.S. Senate, then standing by them.
This was a good, carefully crafted political apology, which actually is the subject of another post to come.
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