SIVACRACY.NET

Here is what I wrote:

It's Siva Vaidhyanathan here again. Tomorrow we will hear from Eric Bohlert. Then Eric Alterman will be back at the helm on Monday. Thanks to everyone out there who has been reading this week's stuff and engaging with us. It's really an honor and a blast to be able to hold forth from this site every once in a while. So thanks especially to Eric Alterman, Will Femia, and Paul McLeary (Go Sabres!) for making this happen.

The Unjustice Department

I was wondering something. Maybe somebody could help me out here. Yesterday a federal jury decided appropriately that this country shall not execute Zacarias Moussaoui, a wanna-be-mass murderer who also happens to be a mentally disturbed megalomaniac who dearly wished to become a martyr for his twisted cause.

No one disputes that Moussaoui should be held accountable for his actions in support of what became the air attacks of September 11, 2001. But it's clearly unjust to execute a person for deaths he did not cause (even if he had wished to) simply because he refused to incriminate himself to the FBI. Even those who were involved in planning the attacks have declared that Moussaoui was too unstable to consider a real part of the plan.

Moussaoui was such an incompetent terrorist that even the FBI could catch him. Think about it.

The jury had a difficult decision to make, in the face of wrenching emotional pleas by federal prosecutors and witnesses and the clear hunger we have to bring someone -- anyone -- to justice for these offenses.

What gets me -- what I don't understand -- is why millions of my fellow American citizens, led by the families of those who lost loved ones in the attacks, are not banging down the doors of the Justice Department to bring to justice those who really did mastermind the killings of 3,000 of my neighbors. Their memory still hangs heavy in the air of my city. And we wonder why our government seems all too willing to put on a show trial of a sad peripheral character instead of pursuing real justice and -- I admit it -- satisfying vengeance.

Somewhere in a secret prison sits Khalid Sheik Mohammad, the mastermind of the attacks. Our government could bring him to trial either here in the United States or in the Hague. It could use the trial to demonstrate not only the terrible hatred that drives Al Queda to murder so many innocents around the world. It could use a trial to reveal the depth and breadth of the ideological threat that we face in coming years. It could show how we can avoid such vulnerability in the future. A Khalid Sheik Mohammad conviction would be deeply meaningful and satisfying.

Best of all, it could demonstrate to the world that despite so much recent evidence to the contrary, the United States is a nation of laws and its governmental agents are not above either our laws or international laws. They whole world thinks we have given up on the concept of justice. We could use a decent trial to show otherwise.

The reason we have not done this may be very disturbing: in our haste to be brutal and stupid, we almost certainly tortured Mohammad, rendering him unconvictable in any decent court in any decent country. We have also held him and hundreds more for more than three years without counsel, without facing charges, without a chance to respond to accusations, and without even allowing their families to know that they are in custody.

So basically, we are unable to try the real killer, even though we know who he is and we have him in custody.

Why stop there? Why are not Americans demanding that this administration pursue and capture Osama bin Laden? Or Ayman al-Zawahiri? Why are we letting these guys continue to murder innocent people and inspire hatred against the entire world?

In recent years the Justice Department has created a small series of meaningless show trials. Those young men from Lackawanna, New York? They were dupes who let their religious fervor and a manipulative adult take them to Pakistan to fight against India. They never did fight against India or anyone else. Yet now they are serving prison terms in the United States because they saw no way out but to plea. And John Walker Lindh? Please. He's the biggest threat to my life and liberty? These folks a bad people who broke (unconsitutional) laws. But their trials seem to be counted among this administration's greatest victories.

Don't even get me started on poor Wen-Ho Lee or Richard Jewell. These problems with the Justice Department have grown deeper under this administration, but they certainly spring their roots in the last one. Is it any surprise that Louis Freeh served as FBI director in both?

The Justice Department (Clinton's and Bush's) has become very good at getting convictions (and occasional acquittals) out of people who have killed exactly no people in terrorist acts. But those who have killed? You have to go back to the Oklahoma City bombings or the arrest and conviction of Eric Rudolph to get anything close to a just conclusion in a terrorism case.

The Indefensible Department

Meanwhile, its becoming clear that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, in addition to being incompetent, arrogant, and stupid, is also a criminal himself. As law professor Marty Lederman explains, Rumsfeld clearly broke the law when he ordered U.S. military personnel to torture captives:

... the Army filed criminal charges against Lt. Col Steven L. Jordan, a military intelligence officer who was second-in-command of interrogation operations at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. Charge III of the Army's Charge Sheet accuses Jordan of "cruelty and maltreatment," based on the allegation that he subjected Iraqi detainees subject to his orders "to forced nudity and intimidation by military working dogs."

This is a charge under Article 93 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ), 10 U.S.C. 893, which provides that "[a]ny person subject to this chapter who is guilty of cruelty toward, or oppression or maltreatment of, any person subject to his orders shall be punished as a court-martial may direct."

The Army's charges against Jordan reflect the view, undoubtedly correct, that the use of forced nudity or intimidation with dogs against detainees subject to military control constitutes cruelty and maltreatment that Article 93 makes criminal. It doesn't matter whether they are or are not "torture," as such; nor does it matter whether the armed forces should be permitted to use such interrogation techniques: As things currently stand, they are unlawful, as even the Army now acknowledges.

But then how can we account for the actions of the Secretary of Defense and his close aides?

On November 27, 2002, Pentagon General Counsel William Haynes, following discussions with Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz, General Myers, and Doug Feith, informed the Secretary of Defense that forced nudity and the use of the fear of dogs to induce stress were lawful techniques, and he recommended that they be approved for use at Guantanamo. (The lists of techniques to which Haynes was referring can be found in this memorandum.) On December 2, 2002, Secretary Rumsfeld approved those techniques for use at Guantanamo -- and subsequently those techniques were used on detainee Mohammed al-Qahtani.

In other words, the Secretary of Defense authorized criminal conduct. ...

Good thing opera star Enrico Palazzo was not an immigrant!

Isn't it hilarious that some people actually take offense at the idea that new Americans should take so much pride in this country that they are wiling to translate the National Anthem into the language of their origin? I can't think of a greater complement to the inclusiveness and promise of America.

In that spirit, I want to offer Altercation readers the following (via Balkinization), the Star-Spangled Banner in Yiddish:

O'zog, kenstu sehn, wen bagin licht dervacht, Vos mir hoben bagrist in farnachtigen glihen? Die shtreifen un shtern, durch shreklicher nacht, Oif festung zich hoiben galant un zich tsein? Yeder blitz fun rocket, yeder knal fun kanon, Hot bawizen durch nacht: az mir halten die Fohn! O, zog, tzi der "Star Spangled Banner" flatert in roim, Ueber land fun die freie, fun brave die heim!

The Library of Congress displays this sheet music from 1919: "La bandera de las estrellas." That's 1919 -- 12 years before The Star-Spangled Banner became the National Anthem of the United States. In other words, it's been in Spanish longer than it's been the anthem. So get over it. Ya basta. Claro?

Want more? Ok. Here, (via BoingBoing) you can find the Anthem in both Morse Code and binary code. Maybe this will start a movement to expel all telegraph operators and computer geeks from our shores!

BTW, according to Kevin Phillips, W sang the anthem in Spanish during the 2000 campaign. Of course, that was back when he pretended to be running for president of the entire country, not just the bitter white part.

Poor Philly

I often feel sorry for Philadelphia. It's a great city and has many cool things. But its sports franchises and their core fans are just embarrassing. Check out this photo of Flyers fans attacking a poor lone Devils fan. Fortunately, thanks to the great and good Buffalo Sabres, we don't have to worry about the Flyers any more.

Still, count yourself lucky if you live in Philadelphia because Rosanne Cash is scheduled to give a live reading and performance on Thursday, May 11 at the World Cafe Live, 3025 Walnut Street. She is helping to celebrate the move of the legendary poetry journal, Painted Bride Quarterly, to its new home at Drexel University. For information and to register to attend, please click here.

Ok. Later. Peace.