Auschwitz, Cheney, Argentina and C.P. Snow

At first glance, this looks like a strange juxtaposition of people and places. I would like to show you that it is not.
Yesterday, our Vice President, Richard Cheney:

..made an unusual personal appeal to Republican senators this week to allow CIA exemptions to a proposed ban on the torture of terror suspects in U.S. custody, according to participants in a closed-door session.

Cheney told his audience the United States "doesn't engage in torture," these participants added, even though he said the administration needed an exemption from any legislation banning "cruel, inhuman or degrading" treatment in case the president decided one was necessary to prevent a terrorist attack. (emphasis added)

Of course "cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment" is encompassed in the definition of torture, as anyone with a minimal complement of intelligence knows. So, what we have known for a long time:

Exhibit A: The Vice President of the United States condones torture.

Next, let us turn our attention to Auschwitz. Again, as many of us believe, this is the most awful example of the Nazi atrocities during World War II. While it is true that the majority of the inmates and victims of this hell hole were Jewish, it should be remembered that the Nazi regimen also targeted Gypsies and other peoples that they deemed undesirable.
This is important because, contrary to the assertion that this is solely an example of genocide against the Jews, it is much, much more. It is the single, most horrible, recent example of man's ability to suspend his better nature and treat other human's, no matter who they are, in an inhuman manner. (I realize that I will be attacked as anti-Semitic for this statement, but, so be it.) Therefore, we have:

Exhibit B: Auschwitz. Man's inhumanity to Man.

Next, please consider C.P. Snow. If you have been a reader here, you might have noticed that I have referred to Snow and his series of novels, Strangers and Brothers, in the past. I have just finished reading The Sleep of Reason, the tenth novel in this series. It is a very powerful book. The title comes from a Goya painting: "The sleep of reason breeds monsters." In the novel, two young women who have a lesbian relationship abduct and then torture and murder a young boy. It is never clear exactly why they would have done this but the trial of these young women is described in detail.
Since this takes place in prim and proper midLand England, one is shown the horror and repugnance that the characters in the novel have for this crime. Snow goes into great detail setting out the courtroom defense of the women. It is contended that the women have, because of underlying psychiatric disorders, "diminished responsibility." This is similar to the argument of "innocent because of insanity" in our legal system but much milder. Appearing at the trial were four psychiatrists, two arguing for this defense and two against.

The crux of the argument is that some people may be not responsible for their actions if they are under the sway of thoughts that are eccentric or abnormal, as were the two women. The Judge and the jury did not accept this plea and the women were found guilty and given life imprisonment. There is much discussion of this plea and of the related ideas of free will and responsibility. Since the child is tortured and killed, the concept of Auschwitz is raised. This is 1963 and it is still very fresh in the minds and eyes of the English who had liberated the camp. Many at that time believed that the German people as a whole had some responsibility for the atrocities. (There was no diminished responsibility there.)

In particular, they repeatedly bring up the scenario of the Germans going on with their normal lives while behind the walls of the concentration camp unspeakable horrors were taking place. In other words, man's ability to tolerate inhumanity. (should we also not be reminded here that Auschwitz was in Poland, not Germany. And it is in Eastern Europe that the secret CIA torture camps have recently been discovered.)

Most importantly, however, it suggested that everyone is susceptible to this suspension of concern. I will return to this, since it central to the thesis here. But please note:

Exhibit C: the concern here about Auschwitz is not the horrors that took place, but that some, ordinary humans could become inured to the horrors. It also says something about those who made the decisions to perpetrate the horrors. That they were not irrational.

Let us turn now to the response to the visit of the President of the United States to Argentina for a trade conference. He has been greeted with widespread and violent protest.
It may be that George W. Bush is the most hated American that there has ever been. Yet America itself is quiet. Coud it be that the Argentine and other peoples see the truth of what is happening in America, the World and Iraq?

Exhibit D: The people of the World are angry and have passed judgment on America. We are Goya's monsters.

Coda: Richard Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld live in my neighborhood. They eat at the restaurants in my town (and they are sealed off from the public by black SUV's). An acquaintance of mine was at an adjacent table where they were eating and they were discussing Iraq. Everyone goes on about their business in my town. We do nothing about the horrors perpetrated in our name.

Just like the Germans at Auschwitz.

[Addendum on 11/05: To see exactly how slimy this whole thing is go to firedoglake and read-and-cry.]

[Addendum 2 on 11/05: And this tidbit from Juan Cole concerning the practice of bombing "safe houses" in villages:

Collective punishment is forbidden to occupying powers by the fourth Geneva Convention of 1949, since the Nazis had used it so extensively.

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