Rules out of the Red Queen's Playbook

Prisoners designated as illegal combatants are subject to trial rules out of the Red Queen's playbook. The administration refuses to allow lawyers access to 14 terrorism suspects transferred in September from C.I.A. prisons to Guant+ínamo. It says that if they had a lawyer, they might say that they were tortured or abused at the C.I.A. prisons, and anything that happened at those prisons is secret.

That is the 8th of 12 items in a NY Times editorial entitled The Must-do List which begins

The Bush administration's assault on some of the founding principles of American democracy marches onward despite the Democratic victory in the 2006 elections.

The remaining 9 are as follows:
- Close the CIA Prison
- Account for 'Ghost Prisoners'
- Ban Extraordinary Rendition
- Tighten the Definition of Combatant
- Screen Prisoners Effectively and Fairly
- Ban Tainted Evidence
- Ban Secret Evidence
- Better Define "Classified" Evidence
- Respect the Right To Counsel

For each of these the Times explains its rationale, often offering commentary as pointed as that with which I began the diary. 

And the editorial ends with additional pointed words:

Beyond all these huge tasks, Congress should halt the federal government's race to classify documents to avoid public scrutiny - 15.6 million in 2005, nearly double the 2001 number. It should also reverse the grievous harm this administration has done to the Freedom of Information Act by encouraging agencies to reject requests for documents whenever possible. Congress should curtail F.B.I. spying on nonviolent antiwar groups and revisit parts of the Patriot Act that allow this practice.

The United States should apologize to a Canadian citizen and a German citizen, both innocent, who were kidnapped and tortured by American agents.

Oh yes, and it is time to close the Guant+ínamo camp. It is a despicable symbol of the abuses committed by this administration (with Congress's complicity) in the name of fighting terrorism.

I should be pleased with this editorial.  It is in the newspaper of record, it seems a far cry from the kind of war-mongering it supported in the runup to the war with the articles by Miller and Gordon.  It is clear, it hits many of the key points.  It makes basic points with clarify, such as

The right to legal counsel does not exist to coddle serial terrorists or snarl legal proceedings. It exists to protect innocent people from illegal imprisonment.

So why am I not happy? Is there any action the TImes could take that would satisfy me?

Well, for starters, since I believe the nation is in crisis, despite the election of a Congress officially controlled by the Democrats, I believe the response of the Times needs to acknowledge that crisis with more than words.  A signal moment in the Vietnam conflict was when Walter Cronkite, then the most trusted man in America, came out on the CBS Evening News against the continuation of the conflict in Vietnam.  Lyndon Johnson is reported to have said "if I've lost Walter Cronkite, I've lost America" and it led to his decision not to run for another term.  I have no illusions that any similar action would influence this president, but it might influence the country, and the thus the Congress, to take the actions necessary to end the continuing atrocity in Iraq - now.  Of greater importance, it might embolden the Congress to restore democracy in this nation before it is irrevocably lost, which it will be if this administration is allowed to continue its depredations against the Constitution unabated.

I am disappointed that the Times fails to make the connection with the abuses of this administration and the continuation of the entire mindset of waging war on a noun, the co-called "war on terror."  Our approach, and not just in Iraq, has been to increase the amount of terrorism and the number of terrorists, facts then used to continue the depredations and abuses that concern so many of us here.  How I wish that such a connection were clearly stated in the editorial, an editorial which for all of its power still frustrates me with omissions like this.

Besides that omission, what I want is something far more potent than being buried on the editorial page, even if it is the lead editorial.  That does not force the nation to respond.

There was only one place for this editorial.  The NY Times needed to do its own equivalent of the commentary of an Edward R. Murrow on Joe McCarthy, of a Walter Cronkite on Vietnam, of a Keith Olbermann in his "special comments."  The statement should have been above the fold, on the front page.  It should have slapped the country across the face.  A front-page location would have made it the lead story in just about every other paper, a top story on network neww. Such an action would push out stories about Ann Coulter and Anna Nicole Smith or the nasty back and forth and horse race coverage in both party's primary contests.  Does it matter who leads a country which has already been lost?  Why not force the aspirants to high office to confront the reality, which as far as I can tell none is yet doing?

The editorial is nice, it moves the ball down the field.  But it fails to make all the connections that it could.  It is not bold enough in its thinking.  And it is far too timid in how it is expressed.

I can only hope that it does get noticed.  I fear that it will not, that this will serve only as a CYA for the Times editorial board.  It will not force the Washington Post to go even this far, it will not make network news talk bluntly about the connections of the abuses addressed in the editorial and the ongoing misuse of US power, treasure and manpower in efforts that are more than counter-productive.

I hope and pray that I am wrong in my assessment of what will happen.  I fear that I am not.  This was a chance to make a real difference.  Instead the NY Times punted the ball down field. 

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