THINKING FOR OURSELVES

No Laughing Matter

By Shea Howell

Michigan Citizen, May 27-June 2, 2007

I was not interested in the recent debate by Republican presidential hopefuls broadcast on Fox TV. I barely glanced at the front-page picture in the New York Times and laughed when a friend sent it around with the caption, "These guys oppose cloning?"

Later, however, I heard the NPR report on the exchange between Brit Hume and the candidates over the issue of torture. All but two endorsed torture, the use of something called extreme measures, and the expansion of Guantanamo prison. What caught my attention and was most disturbing was not the callous, pandering rhetoric of the candidates, but the response of the audience. They cheered, applauded and stomped approval. As candidates tried to outdo one another with pseudo-macho get toughness, the audience became increasingly boisterous. John McCain, who has shamelessly courted the far rightwing of the party, could not bring himself to abandon his long-standing objection to torture. He reminded the audience, "It's not about the terrorists, it's about us. It's about what kind of country we are." His remarks were met with stony silence.

I have been unable to shake the sound of that audience. Their wild joy echoes in my head and heart.

It would be comforting to think that this is just more of the hysteria whipped up for political purposes in the post 9-11 world. But there was something hauntingly familiar in their laughter. It echoed the crowds of people gathered at lynchings, the gangs of men who cheer on rapes, the bravado of teenagers on a night of gay bashing, and the crowds in Germany cheering on the torture of Jews. It is a laughter that comes from the worst in us. Now it is an ordinary part of what some Americans believe qualifies you to become president.

Long before September 11, 2001 or before the 1995 bombing of the Federal Building in Oaklahoma City, a growing number of people in the rightwing of the Republican party justified the use of extreme physical punishment. They denied that there are any constitutional protection against it and refused to extend protections to all individuals.

The most notable public repudiation of this view came in 1992 when the Supreme Court ruled 7-2 that the use of excessive force against an inmate in prison is unconstitutional, even when it does not cause serious or permanent injury. Dissenting from this decision were Justices Thomas and Scalia.

In the case of Hudson v. McMillian, Keith Hudson, a black Louisiana prisoner, said he had suffered "cruel and unusual punishment" when he had been beaten by guards. The beating left him with a "cracked lip, a broken dental plate, loosened teeth, and cuts and bruises." The supervisor had looked on telling the guards not "to have too much fun."

In Thomas's dissent he said, "In my view a use of force that causes only insignificant harm to a prisoner may be immoral, ... but it is not 'cruel and unusual punishment.'" Thomas and Scalia were laying the groundwork to bring mob violence into the mainstream.

There was nothing new in Rudy Giuliani endorsing water boarding and saying, "It shouldn't be torture, but every method they can think of." Or Mitt Romney roaring," My view is, we ought to double Guantanamo...Enhanced interrogation techniques have to be used."

What is new is that the ideas that once reflected the worst in us are no longer confined to mobs in the streets. They have found champions among those who wish to be our most public and powerful officials.

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