Bush Hijacked Our 9/11 Unity and Flew It Into Iraq

Don't you just love election year bumber stickers?

For the past month the weather in Auckland has fluctuated between pretty good and really great. Spring was starting to feel like the beginning of summer. Not that I had much chance to enjoy it while I was working 10-12 hour days, 7 days on my paper. Even this weekend, I came in to finish marking tests. Now that’s done and I’m ready for a day off, the Equinox Effect has arrived - torrential rain, thunder and lightning (a rarity here), even a tornado. Sheesh.

Since the weather outside’s been frightful, I’ve just been hanging around surfing the 'net and catching up on the news. Wow. Between the National Intelligence Estimate (the war in Iraq is not making America safer – really?), Woodward’s latest book (State of Denial), not to mention the Brits might be pulling out of Iraq, and Mark Foley - the Republican from Florida who resigned last week over his X-rated e-mails to underage male pages - the Bushies are having a rough week. And so close to the election.

Speaking of which, an interesting thing I read about the terrorist detention bill - the one the House and Senate both passed last week, right before they recessed for election campaigning - the one that eliminates habeas corpus, and leaves the definition of “enemy combatant” wide open to administration interpretation - provides top administration officials (in addition to everyone in the CIA and the military) with retroactive immunity from prosecution for war crimes. Neat. Good timing, too, since it would have been harder to get this into law if the Dems win enough seats to gain some control over the situation. In which case they may also want to start some investigations.

Jane Smiley (who wrote one of my all-time favorite books, A Thousand Acres) sees this as the pivotal moment when tyranny comes into the open:

the simultaneous granting of immunity to administration criminals for breaking both US and international laws concerning the detention of suspected "terrorists" and the removal of the right of habeas corpus for, essentially, anyone the administration deems unacceptable, citizen or non-citizen. Let me make that perfectly clear. Bush and his friends cannot be punished for crimes they have committed, while others can be thrown in jail without even knowing what crimes they are accused of. As Molly Ivins details her her op-ed piece today, it is even worse than it looks, because after the Bushies appeared to compromise with McCain and his allies, they changed the terms of the compromise to make the bill MORE DANGEROUS rather than less. If you aren't crying about this, my fellow Americans, you should be. I am.

Yeah, but she cried when Reagan was elected, too.

Come to think of it though, so did I.

Ah, but no matter - the ACLU will always be there to stand up to the government and champion civil rights. Or maybe not. Turns out the ACLU is in turmoil, riven by internal contradictions that threaten its continued existence, at least as the institution it once was.

Which may explain why that haven't done much to help people like Maher Arar, the Canadian citizen the U.S. kidnapped and sent to Syria to be tortured. And, as if we needed more reminding of how important it is to have someone stand up for civil rights - particularly when 'war time security' justifies every kind of rampant bigotry, Iva Toguri died last week. A loyal American who became infamous as 'Tokyo Rose' - for things she never said and never did - after she was framed by the Justice Dept. Thank God that couldn't happen today.

Hyperbole aside, things are looking a tad grim. This election is serious. But so was the last one. Isn’t anyone paying attention? To paraphrase something I saw on the wonderful Huffington Post:

I’m heading for the Americans-Must-Be-Morons Camp. It’s on the lake, right next to Camp Jesus.

Last Saturday, the 30th of September, marked two years since we moved here. Not as eventful as the year before, but it’s nice to have finished my degree and secured a full-time job. Because the way things are going in the 'Land of the Free', I'm not sure it's safe to go back.

Cheers,
Sandie