05 September 2012 By Jacob G. Hornberger When Republicans talk about the exceptional nature
of the U.S. government, they might well be referring
to both its brutality and its hypocrisy. Such
characteristics are on full display in a just-released
report by Human Rights Watch, which details how the
CIA during the Bush administration renditioned people
to Libya for the purpose of torture. Libya? Yes, I know what you're thinking, if you're
a statist. You're thinking that it's just not possible
that the CIA would rendition people to Libya because
Libya was headed by the brutal dictator Muammar
Qaddafi. You'll recall that he's the brutal tyrant
that the U.S. military and CIA under the Obama
administration helped oust from power on the ground
that he was a brutal tyrant who was oppressing his own
people. Given that the U.S. government professes to be
anti-dictator and pro-democracy, then how is it
possible that the CIA, which is, of course, a
principal agency within the U.S. government, would
rendition people to a brutal tyrant so that he could
be tortured there? Well, that's the point of the exceptionalism —
brutality and hypocrisy. While the State Department is
out there preaching the U.S. government's devotion to
freedom and democracy, the CIA is operating under the
table and partnering with brutal dictators who are
amenable to torturing people on behalf of the U.S.
government. Unfortunately, this harsh reality regarding the
federal government's exceptionalism is just something
that all too many Americans don't wish to confront.
From the first grade in the public schools their
parents are forced to send them to, people are
inculcated with the notion that the federal government
is devoted to freedom and democracy. And so people
simply refuse to consider that another part of the
government is devoted to the exact opposite. What did the CIA and Qaddafi do to people pursuant
to their rendition-torture partnership? The Human
Rights Watch report, as summarized by the New York
Times, details the account of Mohammed Shoreiya.
He said that when he was taken captive in Afghanistan,
"his American captors had put a hood on his head and
strapped him to a wooden board, then poured water over
his face until he felt like he was asphyxiating. An
American man who appeared to be a doctor was present
during the sessions, he said." One interesting aspect of Shoreiya's account is
that the CIA has long maintained that it waterboarded
no more than three prisoners. Shoreiya's account, of
course, indicates that the CIA has been lying the
entire time. A particularly horrific aspect to this is that
Shoreiya was a Libyan. He, along with other Libyans
whom the CIA renditioned to Libya for torture, were
opponents of the Qaddafi regime. Yes, you read that
right. They were committed to ending Gaddafi's brutal
tyranny in Libya long before Obama's military and CIA
decided to end it with a military intervention. So,
the CIA knowingly, deliberately, and intentionally
sent Libyan citizens to Qaddafi who were committed to
ousting him from power, which, of course, meant that
Qaddafi had even more incentive to subject them to
extreme forms of torture. How's that for brutality and hypocrisy? How's that
for the exceptional nature of the U.S.
national-security state? Unfortunately, it's not the only instance of the
federal government's exceptionalism. Recall that the
CIA also renditioned a Canadian citizen named Mahar
Arar to Syria during the Bush years. You recall Syria,
right? It's the regime, headed by dictator Bashar al-Assad,
that the U.S. military and the CIA under Obama are now
trying to oust from power. But during the Bush years,
the military and the CIA were singing a different
tune. During that time, the CIA renditioned Arar to
Syria precisely to take advantage of its brutality and
expertise when it came to torture. How did the rendition-torture partnership between
Syria and the CIA get negotiated? What were its terms?
Who were the negotiators? Did Bush himself approve the
deal? Was the contract put into writing? Alas, we don't know the answers to any of these
questions because the mainstream press has never cared
enough to even ask the questions, maintaining the
traditional deferential role it assumes when it comes
to the military and the CIA. The same hold true for
Congress. And of course, when Arar sued the U.S.
government for damages, the federal courts continued
their long-established position of deference and
subservience to the CIA and the military. And let's not forget the CIA's rendition-torture
partnership with the brutal military dictatorship in
Egypt. Why Egypt? Since the Egyptian military
dictatorship has long been the recipient of billions
of dollars in cash and armaments from the U.S.
government, which has enabled it to maintain its
dictatorial oppression of the Egyptian people, it has
also long been willing to do whatever the U.S.
government asks of it. Since the Egyptian military and
intelligence forces are renowned for their expertise
in torture and their willingness to utilize such
expertise, it was logical for the CIA and the U.S.
military to make Egypt one of its principal torture
partners. Long ago, the United States rejected the statism
that characterized the rest of the world: no welfare
state, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, farm
subsidies, education grants, drug war, economic
regulations, foreign aid, public schooling, torture,
war on terrorism, foreign empire, standing army,
foreign wars, CIA, national security state, national
police (FBI), or warfare state. Now that truly was an exceptional country, in a
positive sense! Unfortunately, today exceptionalism has come to
mean the federal government's extreme brutality and
hypocrisy, as manifested by its torture partnerships
with brutal foreign dictators. It's just one more sign
of the wrong road that our country is on. Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of the
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