With the rockets red glare, and the bombs bursting in air, the Washington Post reported, last week, that an arcane piece of legislation, the War Crimes Act of 1996, which was passed by a Republican Congress ten years ago, and not his morning's cup of Starbucks, is giving Attorney-General Al Gonzales the jitters as administration lawyers work overtime to revise the law so that military brass, and troops, have immunity from prosecution. The War Crimes Act, passed by neo-cons like Newt Gingrich, criminalizes violations of the Geneva Conventions, as well as raising the possibility of exercizing the death penalty if detainees die in custody. Additionally, and even more ominously, this attorney-general may indeed be changing the job description of his office permanently when he redefines his relationship as the enabler of a runaway executive branch.
Gonzales' primary concern, with respect to potential war crimes charges, is to figure out a way to "shield" his president, and all American military personnel, using the 2002 presidential order which the Supreme Court declared illegal a few weeks ago. (WaPo) To circumvent the court ruling, as well as the War Crimes Act, administration lawyers are seeking to empower the unitary executive, and the United States, by reinterpreting this paradigm of international law in ways that best suit this president's errant foreign policy. So, in effect, new legislation is currently being drafted which will tweak the current definiition of torture such that the concept of war crime will be sufficiently neutralized in such a way that exclusion from criminal liability by any member of this administration, for crimes against a prisoner of war, will be a legal (and lethal) certainty.
Take a deep breath, stand back, and consider, for a moment, the irony in this administration's attempts to protect those who have violated international law, outsourced torture, and mute the murder (asymmetrical or otherwise) of those confined in jails in Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantanamo Bay, and secret cells around the world while, at the same time, repudiate efforts for a federal shield laws to protect journalists from prosecution for refusing to divulge confidential sources. What kind of government protects war criminals, and imprisons those who don't buckle to the pressure to rat out their sources? What kind of government shows contempt for the First Amendment, its Constitution, and international law with impunity? Moreover, to whom is the attorney-general of the United States, and this president's legal eagles, answerable if not to the American people who pay their salaries.
Arlen Specter currently has a bill, "The Freedom of Information Act," before Congress which would make demanding that journalists turn over their records, and deny confidentiality to their sources, a last resort, insisting that the courts exhaust all other options before demanding that reporters volate their oath of confidentiality. American Journalism Review reported yesterday that "antagonism toward the media on Capitol Hill is rising," and compromising passage of Specter's bill.
So, in essence, the message this government is sending to its people, the international community, and future generations is that it will shield, and protect, its president, and military officers, from potential prosecution for war crimes, even if it means rewriting the Geneva Accord to serve its own agenda, but will not provide a federal shield law to protect its journalists, writers, and thinkers from having to be accountable to the court, and federal government, for its privileged information, or face incarceration.
What monstrous absurdity to drape those whose actions, in the battlefield, constitute "degrading and inhuman punishment" behind a flag while, at the same time, neutralizing a free press in the name of national security. In these dangerous times, inertia is and can only be, in the best sense of the word, actionable.
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