[I started to excerpt this, but I couldn't decide what to omit:]
New York Times
July 6, 2008
The Truth Commission
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
When a distinguished
American military commander accuses the United States of committing war
crimes in its handling of detainees, you know that we need a new way
forward.
“There is no longer any doubt as to whether the current
administration has committed war crimes,” Antonio Taguba, the retired
major general who investigated abuses in Iraq, declares in a powerful
new report on American torture from Physicians for Human Rights. “The
only question that remains to be answered is whether those who ordered
the use of torture will be held to account.”
The first step of accountability isn’t prosecutions. Rather, we need
a national Truth Commission to lead a process of soul searching and
national cleansing.
That was what South Africa did after apartheid, with its Truth and
Reconciliation Commission, and it is what the United States did with
the Kerner Commission on race and the 1980s commission that examined
the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.
Today, we need a similar Truth Commission, with subpoena power, to investigate the abuses in the aftermath of 9/11.
We already know that the United States government has kept Nelson
Mandela on a terrorism watch list and that the U.S. military taught
interrogation techniques borrowed verbatim from records of Chinese
methods used to break American prisoners in the Korean War — even
though we knew that these torture techniques produced false confessions.
It’s a national disgrace that more than 100 inmates have died in
American custody in Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantánamo. After two Afghan
inmates were beaten to death by American soldiers, the American
military investigator found that one of the men’s legs had been
“pulpified.”
Moreover, many of the people we tortured were innocent: the
administration was as incompetent as it was immoral. The McClatchy
newspaper group has just published a devastating series on torture and
other abuses, and it quotes Thomas White, the former Army secretary, as
saying that it was clear from the moment Guantánamo opened that
one-third of the inmates didn’t belong there.
McClatchy says that one inmate, Mohammed Akhtiar, was known as
pro-American to everybody but the American soldiers who battered him.
Some of his militant fellow inmates spit on him, beat him and called
him “infidel,” all because of his anti-Taliban record.
These abuses happened partly because, for several years after 9/11,
many of our national institutions didn’t do their jobs. The Democratic
Party rolled over rather than serving as loyal opposition. We in the
press were often lap dogs rather than watchdogs, and we let the public
down.
Yet there were heroes, including civil liberties groups and lawyers
for detainees. Some judges bucked the mood, and a few conservatives
inside the administration spoke out forcefully. The Times’s Eric
Lichtblau writes in his terrific new book, “Bush’s Law,” that the
Immigration and Naturalization Service commissioner, James Ziglar,
pushed back against plans for door-to-door sweeps of Arab-American
neighborhoods.
The book recounts that in one meeting, Mr. Ziglar bluntly declared,
“We do have this thing called the Constitution,” adding that such
sweeps would be illegal and “I’m not going to be part of it.”
Among those I admire most are the military lawyers who risked their
careers, defied the Pentagon and antagonized their drinking buddies —
all for the sake of Muslim terror suspects in circumstances where the
evidence was often ambiguous. At a time when we as a nation took the
expedient path, these military officers took the honorable one, and
they deserve medals for their courage.
The Truth Commission investigating these issues ideally would be a
non-partisan group heavily weighted with respected military and
security officials, including generals, admirals and top intelligence
figures. Such backgrounds would give their findings credibility across
the political spectrum — and I don’t think they would pull punches. The
military and intelligence officials I know are as appalled by our
abuses as any other group, in part because they realize that if our
people waterboard, then our people will also be waterboarded.
Both Barack Obama and John McCain should commit to impaneling a
Truth Commission early in the next administration. This commission
would issue a report to help us absorb the lessons of our failings, the
better to avoid them during the next crisis.
As for what to do with Guantánamo itself, the best suggestion comes
from an obscure medical journal, PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases. It
suggests that the prison camp would be an ideal research facility for
tropical diseases that afflict so many of the world’s people. An
excellent suggestion: the U.S. should close the prison and turn it into
a research base to fight the diseases of global poverty, and maybe then
we could eventually say the word “Guantánamo” without pangs of shame.
Sometimes I see something of interest on a topic of interest to MOJ readers. One such topic: Obama's faith-based initiative proposal. And when I do, I sometimes call the attention of MOJ readers to what I see. Yesterday I linked to what David Skeel had to say about Obama's proposal (here). Today I linked to what Cathy Kaveny had to say (here). If I thought that *I* had something of interest to say, I would say it. But sometimes my highest, best service is not to say anything myself--because I have nothing of particular interest to say--but just to call the attention of MOJ readers to what someone else has to say. Now, Tom Berg, by contrast, does have something--indeed, many things--of interest to say about Obama's proposal, but because he has said them here, at MOJ, there was no need for me to link to what Tom has said. I notice, by the way, that Tom has posted a comment at dotCommonweal in response to Cathy's post. [UPDATE: Rick too has posted a comment at dotCommonweal.]
Michael P. suggested that we read Cathy Kaveny's post, at Commonweal, on the recent speech by Sen. Obama on the faith-based initiative. It seems to me that, at the end of the day, and despite the "Look! He's reaching out to evangelicals!" press coverage, all that Sen. Obama has proposed is a roll-back of the more religious-organization-friendly changes that Pres. Bush made to the Clinton Administration's program.
Cathy wrote:
Senator Obama is sensitive to the facts that taxpayer money has to be dedicated to building up the political common good–the good of what St. Augustine would call the Earthly City–rather than to increasing membership of the Heavenly City (which is ultimately a matter for God’s grace) . Building up the political common good is a project in which people of good will can cooperate, no matter what their faith. So the organizational arms of faith-based groups which receive public funds won’t be allowed to discriminate, either in the provision of services or in hiring people to provide those services. Furthermore, they won’t be allowed to use the provision of services as an occasion to proselytize.
I am surprised that my colleague Cathy regards this restriction as justifiable, let alone praise-worthy. What, exactly, is inconsistent with "building up the political common good" about permitting faith-based groups to actually be faith-based groups? What is it about "building up the political common good" that should require faith-based groups to give up the right to hire-for-mission in order to enjoy public support for the public goods they provide? Michael?
Walking down the catwalk in front of the great and the good in New York is
a far cry from using your hands to clean up human excrement for a living.
But this week a group of such women - known in India as scavengers - have
been doing just that. They have been attending a United Nations conference here
and doing some modelling at the same time.
In all, 36 scavengers from India have been invited by the UN to attend a
conference to mark the UN's International Year of Sanitation.
The women were brought up from early childhood for the demeaning work.
Scavengers are invariably from the lower-caste, "untouchable" (Dalit)
community. They carry the human excrement in pots on their heads. They can also
be found clearing rubbish from the streets and open drains outside homes.
'Humilitation'
Usha Chomar is one of these women. Walking along the corridors of the UN
headquarters, she was ecstatic by the respect and honour showered on her by
dignitaries and the movers and shakers of the world.
Thirty-year-old Chomar gave up scavenging in 2003. She says she finally feels
like a human being. "I have always done the work of scavenging and have faced
humiliation all my life.
"So I had never imagined that I would ever have been honoured like this. I am
very happy at last to be treated like a normal person."
The women got the opportunity to hit the catwalk during a fashion show called
Mission Sanitation where they appeared alongside top models from India and other
countries. Some of the designer clothes worn by the models were embroidered by
the women .
The ceremony was especially poignant for Usha Chomar, because she was
unofficially crowned as princess of sanitation workers.
Among the various organisations taking part in the activities was the India
non-governmental organisation, Sulabh International, which was invited by the UN
to work with other groups around the world in the struggle to provide better
sanitation.
"This is the dream coming true of Indian independence hero Gandhiji (Mahatma
Gandhi)," said Bindeshwar Pathak, the head of Sulabh International.
"In India scavengers have been looked down upon for centuries. But those who
have abandoned that work are... being treated with respect which they deserve. I
am over the moon with happiness."
Huge task
Usha Chomar said that she hoped that other disadvantaged women could derive
inspiration from her story. "I tell all scavenging women that it is not
impossible for them to change their lives and command just as much respect as
any other human being."
Official statistics in India say that there are still around 340,000
scavengers working in villages and small towns.
The UN aims to reduce by half the number of people without basic sanitation
by 2015.
But in India alone they face a huge task.
It's estimated that around 700 million Indians do not have access to safe and
hygienic toilets.
Experts say that scavenging in India is most prevalent in the states of Uttar
Pradesh, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat.
They warn that because they work in such nasty conditions, many suffer from
acute health problems. They say that the stench that goes with the job forces
many scavengers to hold their breath for long periods of time, which in turn
causes respiratory problems.
The Indian government banned manual scavenging in 1993, but the law is not
widely implemented.
My good friend, Fr. Bruce Nieli, CSP, has an excellent July 4th reflection at Busted Halo:
In a cultural climate such as the United States —where the sense of polarization along social, economic, political and religious lines seems to be the default posture— maintaining unity amidst great diversity has become a profound challenge. As this division grows it can become increasingly difficult to hold onto one's identity while being open to the values, beliefs, and cultures of others.
How can I be a free person while living in community? This question is a practical application of the age-old philosophical problem of maintaining unity amidst diversity. How can I retain my uniqueness while belonging to others is a question faced by every family, every neighborhood, every village, and every nation, but it is by no means a new challenge.
As we celebrate our nation’s independence it is important to remember how this same issue was faced by our forefathers who, during the Continental Congress of 1776, appointed Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and John Adams to create a seal and motto for the newly declared United States of America. The thirteen colonies, with a highly diverse population, were to be one nation, one free people. The motto Franklin, Jefferson and Adams arrived at was e pluribus unum, the Latin phrase meaning "out of many, one" which can still be found today on the reverse side of the one dollar bill, within the Great Seal of the United States, on the ribbon carried by the bald eagle.
The opening of the “Pauline Year” on June 29, 2008 by Pope Benedict— celebrating the 2000 years since St. Paul’s birth—also reminds us that this same concept of unity out of diversity was taken up by Saint Paul 1700 years earlier. His model of the Church as the Body of Christ is ingenious: "For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one Body, whether Jews or Greeks, slaves or free, and have all been made to drink of the one Spirit." (1 Corinthians 12: 13)
More recently, those seemingly diverse strains of thought—America’s and the Catholic Church's—found their convergence in the thinking of the "Yankee Paul," Father Isaac Thomas Hecker (1819-1888) the founder of the Paulist Fathers. Hecker’s insight— radical for his day—was that Catholicism and the American experience weren’t mutually exclusive, in fact they complemented each other quite well. …
Isaac Hecker, whose cause for sainthood was recently opened, had grappled with this e pluribus unum issue as a twenty-something New Yorker fresh out of the utopian Transcendentalist communes of Brook Farm and Fruitlands. … Hecker, in his idealism, would see in his newly embraced Catholicism a spirituality of e pluribus unum when, on July 14, 1844, he wrote in his diary: "The Catholic Church has preserved unity without encroachment on individual liberty, and has preserved individual liberty without the loss of perfect unity."
I just realized we let July 2 pass without mention the 100th anniversary of the birth of Thurgood Marshall. However 4th of July is a pretty good day to reflect on a couple of his thoughts.
"A child born to a Black mother in a state like Mississippi...has exactly the same rights as a white baby born to the wealthiest person in the United States. It's not true, but I challenge anyone to say it is not a goal worth working for."
"None of us got where we are solely by pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps. We got here becuase somebody - a parent, a teacher, an Ivy League crony or a few nuns - bent down and helped up pick up our boots."
"In recognizing the humanity of our fellow beings, we pay ourselves the highest tribute."
Still in response to Rick's post on the assisted suicide story in Germany, it made me think of how many opportunities there are to reach out to people who are alone in our cities, not only to take care of their material needs, but also to help them feel that they are a part of a community in which they are both loved and needed.I had a tiny experience recently that reinforced this for me. Some time ago a friend of mine and I noticed that one the elderly ladies who attends daily mass had holes in her shoes.We asked if she needed a new pair, and after we had collected a bit of money, my friend went with her to the shoe store to pick out what she needed.Some time later she brought us a beautiful “thank you” card, and then we began to sit next to each other in the very large church where usually folks tend to keep quite a bit of distance.A few weeks ago we shared a picnic lunch (she brought the drinks), which was a chance to get to know her better as a person, and especially to discover how much time she spent in prayer.During the picnic we asked if we could entrust to her all of the people who had recently asked for our prayers.I can’t describe how her face lit up when today I brought her the list of people and situations to pray for… and that look on her face that made me think, who knows how many zillions of opportunities I have missed not only to help, but also to connect and be enriched?It was a chance to ask forgiveness for the modern sin of constant busy-ness, and for the grace to pay more attention. Amy
In response to Rick’s sadness over the assisted suicide case in Germany, on a more hopeful front, today Zenitreported that Pope Benedict authorized the promulgation of a decree recognizing that together with seven others, Servant of God Chiara Badano lived a life of heroic virtue.One of the Focolare youth, she died in 1990 at the age of 18, of a particularly painful form of bone cancer, after leaving an extraordinary witness of light and faith, accompanied and sustained by the whole community and especially friends of her same age who lived the spirituality of unity together with her.More about her life here and here. In a world where the sick are often marginalized and profound isolation and loneliness often lead to desperation, her life shines as a ray of hope, and perhaps even helps to illumninate a path for healing the cultural maladies that lead to assisted suicide as well. Amy
