Wednesday, January 26, 2005

Cruel and Inhumane Treatment = Official Policy

Because I am the glutton for punishment that I am, I watched some the President's confab with his tame pet White House reporters, when one of them threw an honest to God curve ball at the Prez. Check this:

Q Mr. President, I'd like to ask you about the Gonzales nomination, and specifically, about an issue that came up during it, your views on torture. You've said repeatedly that you do not sanction it, you would never approve it. But there are some written responses that Judge Gonzales gave to his Senate testimony that have troubled some people, and specifically, his allusion to the fact that cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment of some prisoners is not specifically forbidden so long as it's conducted by the CIA and conducted overseas. Is that a loophole that you approve?

THE PRESIDENT: Listen, Al Gonzales reflects our policy, and that is we don't sanction torture. He will be a great Attorney General, and I call upon the Senate to confirm him.


Yeah, Al Gonzalez spoke accurately. The policy of this White House is to sanction the inhumane and cruel treatment of prisoners, as long as it is being done by the CIA (or soon Rummy's Raiders) overseas or someplace "not technically the United States."

Is there anyone who really thinks that this White House doesn't actually sanction torture or that the Sec. of Defense and the President don't give direct orders for this activity to take place? Great so now Sparky is the official policy of the United States. But you must remember that whatever it is, it is not torture

Sunday, January 23, 2005

Wanted: Narcissitic abusive loser for meanginful long term position

So there I am scanning through today's edition of the WaPo, when what should to mine wondering eye should appear, an article detailing what Seymour Hersh already told us about last week in his New Yorker article. Primarily that Minister of War, Donald Rumsfeld, as completed his seizure of the nation's intelligence apparatus while realizing his sploogiest Tom Clancy wetdreams.

This unit will only be answerable to Rummy and will have no congressional oversight and will operate completely in secret, and can -- by all accounts -- potentially operate domestically. I just don't see how this can get any worse, unless they just decide to start placing tanks on every corner and issuing national ID and loyalty oaths before one can conduct commerce.

Now, on "The Wire" -- which I swear by the hand of the everliving and almighty God of my fathers that I will update here on the blog very soon -- we have recently discussed some of the problems with this nonsense. We have bemoaned the supervisory role given to Lt. General William G. "The 'G' is for God-told-me-to-kill-the-satanic-Musselman" Boykin.

But this caught me weird when I read the sidebar on the controversial operational commander of this new Strategic Support Branch in the DoD:

Col. George Waldroup, an Army reserve officer who commands the Defense Intelligence Agency's Strategic Support Branch, is described by associates as a colorful Texan who refers to himself in the third person, as "GW."


This was the lead and the whole thing about being "colorful" and referring to himself in the third person got me thinking. So I googled "Pathology" + "himself in the third person" and among the first responses you get is a page devoted to clinically describing hardcore, nearly sociopathic, narcissists and another devoted to indentifying "abusers."

In both, they mention that there is a pronounced tendency to refer to one's self in the third person. But in the abuser article, there was this bit.

Abusers are divorced from their emotions. The abuser intellectualizes, rationalizes, or speaks about himself in the third person. Most abusers get enraged when required to delve deeper into their motives, fears, hopes, wishes, and needs. ...

Seriousness and sense of intrusion and coercion – No matter how good his sense of humor, the abuser is never self-deprecating. This is the outcome of the abuser's sense of grandiosity, his fantasies and delusions, and his confabulation.

The abuser is easily hurt and insulted (narcissistic injury). Even the most innocuous remarks or acts are interpreted by him as belittling, intruding, or coercive slights and demands. His time is more valuable than others' – therefore, it cannot be wasted on unimportant matters such as social intercourse, family obligations, or household chores. Inevitably, he feels constantly misunderstood.


Then I went back to the WaPo article, and re-read one particular passage dealing with the time he was under fire in 1995 for attempting to deceive Congress. Waldrup's primary career was as a mid level manager at INS, when in the mid-90s, he was caught trying to cover up manpower shortages at Miami Airport.

This from the WaPo story, again:

The Justice Department inspector general's office, which concluded its probe the following year, quoted in its report sworn statements from subordinates that Waldroup, then assistant district director for external affairs, helped orchestrate a temporary doubling of immigration screeners on the day of the visit, instructed subordinates not to discuss staff shortages and physically confronted a union leader to prevent him from reaching members of Congress. Waldroup told the investigators that he was following an order from a superior in Washington to withhold information.

During the investigation, according to the inspector general's final report, Waldroup refused to disclose the password to his e-mail files, refused to sign an affidavit summarizing his testimony and, in a subsequent interview, "stated that he would not answer any questions" because "he wished to protect himself from exposure to criminal sanctions." The authors of the Justice Department report found insufficient evidence to file charges but said they were troubled by "recurrent failures to provide documents."


Hmmm...defensive about his place in the world, physically confrontational, feels persecuted and misunderstood...

Let me bottom line this for you. The guy tapped to head the special unit tasked with secretly fighting the war on terror is a abusive narcissist who doesn't believe in accountability, which is, I guess, the sort of war Rummy wanted to fight in the first place.

Great, this is the guy in charge of the death squads and torture teams...errr ... I mean Liberty Teams and Freedom Persuaders.

This is turning into a freekin' Greek tragedy.