[Peace-discuss] Bush admin torture policy

[C. G. Estabrook]

You're welcome; I entirely agree.  If most US citizens actually knew what was 
being done in their names, they would be appalled.  That shows what groups like 
the well-named AWARE should be doing. --CGE


Sarah Tedrow-Azizi wrote:
> Thank you for putting this so eloquently.
> 
> It's a dangerous path to write off an entire population as "idiots," or 
> even "willingly ignorant," and takes the tone of elitism. We only have 
> access to the information we are given, and often that access is a 
> product of privilege. It makes little sense that anyone would make a 
> deliberate choice to be uninformed.
> 
> 
> C. G. Estabrook wrote:
>> Given that policy is largely insulated from politics in the US, why 
>> don't we pay attention to what US citizens actually think, rather than 
>> what the media tell us they think -- and rather than dismissing them 
>> as "idiots" on the basis of that very policy?
>>
>> Both political parties and the media are far to the right of the 
>> general population on a whole host of issues and the population is 
>> purposely atomized and kept apart from political issues; they know 
>> they can't really affect them -- which is why they don't care too much 
>> if Gore/Bush, Kerry/Bush. or Clinton/Obama/McCain become president.  
>> Specifically on foreign policy, the point has been made recently by 
>> Benjamin Page and Marshall Bouton in their book, "The Foreign Policy 
>> Disconnect."
>>
>> "Drawing on a series of national surveys conducted between 1974 and 
>> 2004, Page and Bouton reveal that -— contrary to conventional wisdom 
>> -— Americans generally hold durable, coherent, and sensible opinions 
>> about foreign policy. Nonetheless, their opinions often stand in 
>> opposition to those of policymakers, usually because of different 
>> interests and values, rather than superior wisdom among the elite ... 
>> [For example] the public consistently and overwhelmingly favors 
>> cooperative multilateral policy and participation in international 
>> treaties. Moreover, Americans’ foreign policy opinions are seldom 
>> divided along the usual lines: majorities of virtually all social, 
>> ideological, and partisan groups seek a policy that pursues the goals 
>> of security and justice through cooperative means."
>>
>> "Sometimes government-media propaganda dupes the public -- on Saddam 
>> and 9/11, to take a dramatic example. We know the means very well: 
>> huge government-media propaganda exercises, which do have detectable 
>> effects. But quite often the public is not duped and continues to 
>> oppose the policy decisions of the government, the media, and elite 
>> opinion, as public opinion studies reveal."
>>
>> "The Chicago Council on Foreign Relations, which regularly monitors 
>> American attitudes on international issues, illustrates the 
>> disconnect. A considerable majority of Americans favor 'working within 
>> the United Nations, even when it adopts policies that the United 
>> States does not like.' Most Americans also believe that 'countries 
>> should have the right to go to war on their own only if they (have) 
>> strong evidence that they are in imminent danger of being attacked,' 
>> thus rejecting the bipartisan consensus on 'pre-emptive war.'
>>
>> "On Iraq, polls by the Program on International Policy Attitudes show 
>> that a majority of Americans favor letting the UN take the lead in 
>> issues of security, reconstruction and political transition in that 
>> country."
>>
>> We see what voters actually say on these matters in countries like 
>> Venezuela and Spain, which are more democratic than ours.  Even after 
>> the intense media campaign that was the "Reagan revolution" (in no 
>> election did more than one fourth of the eligible voters vote for 
>> him), polls showed that about 80 percent of the public thought that 
>> the government works for the few and the special interests, not for 
>> the people. (The numbers have undoubtedly gone up in the Bush years.)
>>
>> So we can pay attention to what serious survey data reveals about the 
>> real political views of Americans, or we can trust what we "know" 
>> about those "idiots" (so different from us) -- our knowledge being a 
>> product of the US media...  --CGE
>>
>>
>> Jenifer Cartwright wrote:
>>> I agree absolutely, from "idiots" (maybe "willingly ignorant voters" 
>>> would be more accurate?) thru "get their attention." I do think that 
>>> a large head shot with very large letters saying, e g, EXPOSED 
>>> TORTURE AT ABU GRAHIB might work. Short, and legible from a distance. 
>>> Also gets my vote because he's a Fillipino who experienced 
>>> discrimination from fellow officers during his military career and 
>>> knew he'd have no career if he blew the whistle. Definitely a hero.
>>>
>>>  --Jenifer
>>>
>>> --- On *Wed, 6/18/08, LAURIE /<LAURIE at ADVANCENET.NET>/* wrote:
>>>
>>>     From: LAURIE <LAURIE at ADVANCENET.NET>
>>>     Subject: RE: [Peace-discuss] Bush admin torture policy
>>>     To: peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net
>>>     Date: Wednesday, June 18, 2008, 5:09 PM
>>>
>>>     Well, if they weren't, we would never have been in these wars and 
>>> Bush would
>>>     not have been re-elected.  Arguably, there would be an influx of 
>>> anti-war
>>>     floats in the July 4th parade, protesting the war rather than 
>>> celebrating
>>>     wars and the military, patriotic duty to support the troops while 
>>> they
>>>     engage in maiming and killing in the name of making the world 
>>> safe for
>>>     Democracy and U.S. corporations, among numerous other inane 
>>> things like
>>>     capitalism (i.e., the JM Jones and two trucks) rather than merely 
>>> the birth
>>>     of the country.  Also arguably, if the public were not idiots, we 
>>> would not
>>>     need to even have a float - never mind one that presents them 
>>> with anti-war
>>>     heroes and people of courage to stand up against their 
>>> government's wrong
>>>     doing.
>>>     I am willing to wage that if you polled most of the public on the 
>>> names that
>>>     you are proposing, over half would not know who the hell you are 
>>> talking
>>>     about and half of those would not get the message even if you 
>>> conveyed it on
>>>     the float.  Before you can get their attention to educate them, 
>>> you have to
>>>     get their interest and the easiest way is through things that 
>>> they have some
>>>     familiarity with. I doubt if many know who the hell Major General 
>>> Antonio
>>>     Taguba, USA (Ret.) is or that he was not in support of the 
>>> administration
>>>     stand. 
>>
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