<<The truth is that torture has been used for decades.>>
<<Try millennium.>>
Try millennia.
The truth is that until Bush rode into power on a stolen election, there had been a long, slow, steady campaign in the international community, through diplomacy and also through NGOs such as AI, to eradicate torture, which had made painful, step by step progress and admittedly still had a very long way to go. In a few short years, Bush managed to set the clock back to zero in the international campaign against torture. I really hope that Satan reserves a special place in Hell for this little bastard, because I can think of few people who are more deserving.
But what Bush wanted wasn't that much different than what past American leaders have done. He simply wanted to do it out in the open and wanted it to be legal. This administration no longer wanted evil little rats like Kissenger working behind the scenes, but instead wanted people like Cheney advocating torture right up front to all Americans. What they underestimated was that Americans live life comfortably numb. The majority of Americans wish to be insulated from Imperial realities.
Americans want to think:
1. We go around the world promoting democracy.
2. We have the greatest way of life known to mankind and all of history and everyone envies us.
3. The entire world wants to emulate us.
4. We don't hurt anyone who does not deserve it.
5. We are by far the most powerful nation on Earth and in all history.
The public doesn't want to know that Israel is run by an extremely racist regime. They don't want to know that we use torture, that we printed manuals like KUBARK. They don't want to know what our right-wing death squads did in South America and that we supported blatant Fascist regimes who loathed democracy. They don't want to know that our history of supporting democracies is VERY slim, that more often we support some of the nastiest, most brutal dictatorships to ever scar this planet. They cannot stomach the thought that many people don't want to emulate this country, that we aren't envied by everyone, and that yes - we have hurt millions of people and given the go ahead to slaughters, massacres, and genocides throughout history.
Most of all, the public doesn't really want to be an Empire. That is where neoconservatism failed badly. The public wants to be an Empire in everything but name. We don't want the responsibility that comes with it.
