«I maintain that all great men or even men a little out of the common…must from their very nature be criminals»
Crime and Punishment, part III, chapter 5
Crime and Punishment, part III, chapter 5
Laws, ethics are tools designed by the meek to thwart the powerful and prevent them from accomplishing great and noble deeds.
Hence, neither applies to the latter since a superior imperative is at stake in Washington:
fulfilling a divine mission, imposing Pax Americana on the entire planet.
According to the Cheney world view, the anointed decide, in the end, what is legal and
what is not, so that nothing they undertake, by definition, can either be illegal or immoral, for their intentions are pure, and they serve a higher purpose: the might and greatness of the Benevolent Empire, the United States of America, that indispensable nation that God has bestowed on all humanity, and whose destiny it is to impose order and justice on a fractious and barbarous world: if we have to use force, it is because we are America. We are the indispensable nation. We stand tall. We see further into the future, Madeleine Albright had said…The Democrats had also embarked on this slippery path…Only America had the wisdom, might and moral righteousness to undertake such a civilizing mission.
In the post-9/11 context, Cheney and his colleagues went one step further: in order to reach the coveted and glorious, and now imperious objective, the end would justify the means.
In the post-9/11 world, overwhelming force, brute military power and prowess, shock and awe , constituted the sole means to cow all potential rivals into submission, and accomplish this hallowed endeavor…
After having imposed peace, justice and Jeffersonian democracy on Baghdad, the wicked and corrupt regimes in Tehran, Damascus and Ryad would be next, victims of the righteous and enlightened wrath of the forces of freedom…
For this holy project to come to fruition, The United States also had to defend itself against, and annihilate, alien, archaic and fanatical forces embodied by al-Qadae, which dared to strike the heart of the nation, in such a barbarous fashion, on September 11th, 2001.
Humiliated by a score of devious fanatics armed with nothing but box cutters, Cheney and his crusaders, terrified by the politically unpalatable prospect of another devastating attack on their watch, were keen on doing whatever it took to rout Bin Laden’s disciples…there was "before" 9/11 and "after" 9/11. After 9/11 the gloves come off, said Cofer Black, Director of the CIA's Counterterrorist Center from 1999 until may of 2002.
Hence the political imperatives of the day (extracting information from Qaeda operatives at all cost, including by extra-judicial means: secret prisons and detainees; extraordinary renditions; warrant less wiretapping; Guantanamo; Abu Ghraib; enhanced interrogation techniques; water boarding, etc ) matched the grandiose strategy: there would no longer be any restraints on US power…
As such, concerning waterboarding, and other acts of torture and abuse, Mr. Cheney told Fox News on Sunday: the judgment was made then that there wasn’t anything that was improper or illegal.
In essence, everything that serves America’s unique mission , that fosters and furthers US power, and conversely, that undermines, destroys those forces aggressively challenging US power, is ,by nature, legitimate and authorized.
International treaties, conventions, US laws, the US Constitution, are useful only if they serve the purposes of MM Cheney and Bush, and enable them to complete their signal mission. When these fail to do so, then they are simply ignored…What is one little crime or two, when so much is at stake?
As Raskolnikov said: what do you think, would not one tiny crime be wiped out by thousands of good deeds? For one life thousands would be saved from corruption and decay. One death, and a hundred lives in exchange-it’s simple arithmetic! (Part I, chapter VI).
The Raskolnikovs of the previous administration believe that they, and only they are entitled, and fit to govern and rule the world, for only they perceive what is at stake.
As such, they must be allowed to govern unfettered, for the greater good of all, naturally. To dispute their right to do so is indulging in petty politics, clearly a political move. I mean, there‘s no other rationale for why they‘re doing this, Mr. Cheney contended, following the Attorney General Eric Holder's decision to appoint a federal prosecutor to investigate the previous administration's interrogation policies.
It still ,clearly, has not dawned on him that the polices he pursued for eight years were morally repugnant and blatantly illegal…
But then surely, he knows this too well…
Many secrets, and illegal activities, no doubt remain to be unearthed. Now that an investigation will be launched, it is in his interest that its scope remain as limited as possible…
That the reputation and moral standing of the former vice president and his henchmen are in tatters is comforting, but insufficient.…
They have rendered the world we all live in a harsher, more dangerous place, by betraying the noble ideals of justice and democracy…
Raskolnikov eventually repented, and confessed his crimes, seeing the folly of his ways…
What of Mr. Cheney? We have waited long enough!
Grievous crimes have been committed, the time for punishment has arrived…
(the photograph is from:http://www.nationalgalleries.org/whatson/exhibition/5:368/5113/5336)
Hence, neither applies to the latter since a superior imperative is at stake in Washington:
fulfilling a divine mission, imposing Pax Americana on the entire planet.
According to the Cheney world view, the anointed decide, in the end, what is legal and
what is not, so that nothing they undertake, by definition, can either be illegal or immoral, for their intentions are pure, and they serve a higher purpose: the might and greatness of the Benevolent Empire, the United States of America, that indispensable nation that God has bestowed on all humanity, and whose destiny it is to impose order and justice on a fractious and barbarous world: if we have to use force, it is because we are America. We are the indispensable nation. We stand tall. We see further into the future, Madeleine Albright had said…The Democrats had also embarked on this slippery path…Only America had the wisdom, might and moral righteousness to undertake such a civilizing mission.
In the post-9/11 context, Cheney and his colleagues went one step further: in order to reach the coveted and glorious, and now imperious objective, the end would justify the means.
In the post-9/11 world, overwhelming force, brute military power and prowess, shock and awe , constituted the sole means to cow all potential rivals into submission, and accomplish this hallowed endeavor…
After having imposed peace, justice and Jeffersonian democracy on Baghdad, the wicked and corrupt regimes in Tehran, Damascus and Ryad would be next, victims of the righteous and enlightened wrath of the forces of freedom…
For this holy project to come to fruition, The United States also had to defend itself against, and annihilate, alien, archaic and fanatical forces embodied by al-Qadae, which dared to strike the heart of the nation, in such a barbarous fashion, on September 11th, 2001.
Humiliated by a score of devious fanatics armed with nothing but box cutters, Cheney and his crusaders, terrified by the politically unpalatable prospect of another devastating attack on their watch, were keen on doing whatever it took to rout Bin Laden’s disciples…there was "before" 9/11 and "after" 9/11. After 9/11 the gloves come off, said Cofer Black, Director of the CIA's Counterterrorist Center from 1999 until may of 2002.
Hence the political imperatives of the day (extracting information from Qaeda operatives at all cost, including by extra-judicial means: secret prisons and detainees; extraordinary renditions; warrant less wiretapping; Guantanamo; Abu Ghraib; enhanced interrogation techniques; water boarding, etc ) matched the grandiose strategy: there would no longer be any restraints on US power…
As such, concerning waterboarding, and other acts of torture and abuse, Mr. Cheney told Fox News on Sunday: the judgment was made then that there wasn’t anything that was improper or illegal.
In essence, everything that serves America’s unique mission , that fosters and furthers US power, and conversely, that undermines, destroys those forces aggressively challenging US power, is ,by nature, legitimate and authorized.
International treaties, conventions, US laws, the US Constitution, are useful only if they serve the purposes of MM Cheney and Bush, and enable them to complete their signal mission. When these fail to do so, then they are simply ignored…What is one little crime or two, when so much is at stake?
As Raskolnikov said: what do you think, would not one tiny crime be wiped out by thousands of good deeds? For one life thousands would be saved from corruption and decay. One death, and a hundred lives in exchange-it’s simple arithmetic! (Part I, chapter VI).
The Raskolnikovs of the previous administration believe that they, and only they are entitled, and fit to govern and rule the world, for only they perceive what is at stake.
As such, they must be allowed to govern unfettered, for the greater good of all, naturally. To dispute their right to do so is indulging in petty politics, clearly a political move. I mean, there‘s no other rationale for why they‘re doing this, Mr. Cheney contended, following the Attorney General Eric Holder's decision to appoint a federal prosecutor to investigate the previous administration's interrogation policies.
It still ,clearly, has not dawned on him that the polices he pursued for eight years were morally repugnant and blatantly illegal…
But then surely, he knows this too well…
Many secrets, and illegal activities, no doubt remain to be unearthed. Now that an investigation will be launched, it is in his interest that its scope remain as limited as possible…
That the reputation and moral standing of the former vice president and his henchmen are in tatters is comforting, but insufficient.…
They have rendered the world we all live in a harsher, more dangerous place, by betraying the noble ideals of justice and democracy…
Raskolnikov eventually repented, and confessed his crimes, seeing the folly of his ways…
What of Mr. Cheney? We have waited long enough!
Grievous crimes have been committed, the time for punishment has arrived…
(the photograph is from:http://www.nationalgalleries.org/whatson/exhibition/5:368/5113/5336)
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