Thursday, November 08, 2007

Lt Col Couch Cannot Testify on Torture

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-MI) received a letter from Marine Lt Col V Stuart Couch, according to AP , which stated,

"The Department of Defense has decided I cannot testify. Please be advised that I am willing to testify before the subcommittee in the event I am allowed to do so."
The super secret issue at hand? Whether he iced the prosecution of Mohamedou Ould Slahi, accused of helping assemble a terrorist cell that included the hijacker who steered United Flight 175 into the World Trade Center due to incriminating statements obtained through beatings and psychological torture. As a prosecutor he believed, "In our zeal to get information, we had compromised our ability to prosecute him." How secret is that information? That was his statement to the WSJ.

To be sure a sworn statement before a House sub-committee is different than an attributed statement to the WSJ, but the story is out and the difference is that it would not only be a matter of public knowledge, but sworn into evidence in the Legislature. The government is rather obviously scared spitless about torture, a condition that need not exist except for a certain difficulty- they do it. George II can stand on the White House steps all day long and intone, 'we don't torture,' but nobody believes they do not use at least one technique known as torture since the Inquisition. So we no longer need worry about the Bush Administration, we can now call it the BushCo Inquisition.

You may think BushCo Inquisition is a bit strong, but consider his government's stance, George II can determine that a US citizen is an enemy combatant, hold that citizen incommunicado, not bring them to trial, and torture them, possibly to death and have no responsibility to the citizenry for such action. The effect of George II's signing statements and legislation passed by his Republican Congress is that if he decides that Blogger 'X' has made him sufficiently uncomfortable to be of aid to "the enemy" that blogger will be disappeared and tortured and that's all there is to it. Like that idea?

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