Category: The Dish

Yes, they still exist. It’s just a shame there are so few of them.

Ross Douthat and Damon Linker are having a spirited debate at The New Republic. Linker’s book on the radical ambitions of the theocons is extremely good. He once worked for and with them – until he saw the full consequences of their theological politics for a diverse, modern society. Now, like so many, he’s fighting back – for faith unsullied by partisan politics and for a politics that can actually address social issues with reason, rather than theology.

The U.S. Congress has approved this president’s extraordinary powers to detain any one at will, without charges, keep them indefinitely, and torture them if the president wants to. Some have argued that this can only happen to non-citizens. That is untrue. Glenn Greenwald has new and important data on what was done to Jose Padilla, a U.S. citizen and terror suspect, captured by the government, detained for almost three years in isolation with ever being formally charged, and, of course, tortured on the president’s orders. Money quote from his lawyer’s brief:

Mr. Padilla was often put in stress positions for hours at a time. He would be shackled and manacled, with a belly chain, for hours in his cell. Noxious fumes would be introduced to his room causing his eyes and nose to run. The temperature of his cell would be manipulated, making his cell extremely cold for long stretches of time. Mr. Padilla was denied even the smallest, and most personal shreds of human dignity by being deprived of showering for weeks at a time, yet having to endure forced grooming at the whim of his captors…

He was threatened with being cut with a knife and having alcohol poured on the wounds. He was also threatened with imminent execution. He was hooded and forced to stand in stress positions for long durations of time. He was forced to endure exceedingly long interrogation sessions, without adequate sleep, wherein he would be confronted with false information, scenarios, and documents to further disorient him. Often he had to endure multiple interrogators who would scream, shake, and otherwise assault Mr. Padilla.

Additionally, Mr. Padilla was given drugs against his will, believed to be some form of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) or phencyclidine (PCP), to act as a sort of truth serum during his interrogations.

We live in a country where one man – the president – now has the power to detain any one at will, without being charged for years at a time, and tortured. This isn’t an emergency provision, to be revoked when a conflict ends. Since this war has no fixed enemy and no fixed end, it is now our permanent reality. America as we have known it, is over. Al Qaeda never had the power to do this damage to constitutional liberties. We did it to ourselves.

The latest on Foley’s cruising the dorms in the evening from Brian Ross. Then there’s this:

The former page, who spoke to ABC News on the condition he not be identified, said he then began receiving instant messages and e-mails from Foley which became sexually explicit immediately following his 18th birthday.

He said he has not retained any of the messages or e-mails.

"I would turn on my instant messenger, and he would be online at all hours of the day or night. The talk would quickly turn sexual," he said. He says Foley requested that he send photos of himself performing sexual acts.

A source who was a page back in the mid 1990s also recounted to me Foley’s well-known cruising of pages almost from the day he got to Congress. One conversation had the congressman talking about the size of his own private parts within minutes of meeting a 17-year-old page. If the House leadership didn’t know about any of this, then they should have known. This guy was given almost free rein for a decade.

It’s me, Arianna, Dennis Prager and Ed Schultz – debating the Republican crack-up. 9 pm. CNN. And Amazon seems to have come back online and able and willing to sell books. Their link is here. If you live in NYC, I’ll also be on the Brian Lehrer radio WNYC show tomorrow morning in the 10 am slot, and reading and signing books at Barnes and Noble at 82d Street at 7 pm.

A reader writes:

"When Not Seeing is Believing" was eloquently written. If you haven’t yet, go see "Doubt", John Patrick Shanley’s only play to make it to Broadway, subsequently sweeping the awards and receiving a Pulitzer. It asks what you so persuasively argue: Can anyone know with utter certainty what happened in a room besides those two people in the room? Can anyone know the mind of God, but God?

I too had an Irish grandmother (one of 12 children) who could rattle off the rosary with alarming alacrity; but her piety was never vehement. She was as humble about the church as she was about everything else. Was her faith a crutch at times? Sure. Better that than a sword.

I know it wasn’t your intention, but your article reminded me of just how beautifully gentle the practice of Catholicism can be in the right hands; not the hand of a Sister Aloysius (Shanley’s nun who is utterly certain that a priest molested a young boy) but the rosary rendering hands of grandmothers like ours, or the humble hands of most of the Christians living in the Middle East today, who cling not to certainty – knowing that it is an illusory trap – but, like you, embrace the fact that there can be no experience of faith without doubt.

The second installment in my Cato debate with David Brooks: my account of doubt as a political argument, from Hobbes and Locke to the American constitution. If you believe in a conservatism that restrains government power, rather than unleashing it, that backs checks and balances rather than an executive branch on steroids, then you might find plenty to agree with. You can buy the book behind the debate here.

Hastings Wyman is a very shrewd observer of Southern politics and he sees major damage to the GOP from the Foley affair. His report is behind a subscriber firewall, but here’s the money quote:

Across the South, beginning with Foley’s own 16th District – where voters have to cast a ballot for Foley for it to count for the GOP‚Äôs new nominee, Joe Negron – the Democrats should be major gainers. Southern Political Report now ranks the 16th as Likely Democratic; safe Democratic might even be more appropriate. In Florida, the 13th and 22nd Districts, both with competitive races before the scandal broke, are adjacent to Foley’s district and voters have been subject to the same media onslaught. In the 13th (Sarasota, etc.), Katherine Harris’s (R) district, Democrat Christine Jennings (R) has released a poll showing her lead has increased from 8 points to 12 points in the past three weeks. My best guess is that both the 13th and 22nd will join the 16th in electing Democrats next month. And Florida’s 8th District, with another competitive race, is further north, but could still be affected by the story. After all, Foley was the leading Republican US Senate contender in Florida for months in 2004 and is not unknown.

In Oklahoma, a campaign aide to Republican gubernatorial nominee Ernest Istook (R) resigned because of allegations that he was one of the pages who exchanged sexually oriented instant-messages with Foley. Istook’s campaign was already suffering; it’s now in free-fall.

Finally, the Foley issue – especially when combined with a variety of other voter complaints about the Bush Administration – could help the Democrats in a number of other congressional races across the South. In Kentucky’s 2nd District, which was already hotly contested, GOP incumbent Ron Lewis canceled a fundraiser featuring Speaker Hastert because of the scandal. And in Kentucky 4, ex-US Rep. Ken Lucas (D) is using the issue against freshman Geoff Davis (R). In Virginia 2, freshman Thelma Drake (R) must depend on the votes from an area heavily influenced by Pat Robertson‚Äô’s resident headquarters and educational establishments; will they vote this time? Indeed, all of the competitive races in the South – such as North Carolina‚Äôs 8th and 11th districts – are likely to be affected to some degree.

Wyman predicts that the GOP may respond by purging all gays from their ranks in order to protect their right flank. Openly gay and closeted Republicans in Washington are now besieged by both the gay-hating religious right and the Republican-hating gay left. I hoped it wouldn’t get this ugly. But it has.

From the creators of the Onion, a video presentation of the forthcoming unauthorized autobiography of George W. Bush. Money quote:

"I wanted to give folks a chance to see what’s inside my heart, and less importantly, my brain. The only impression the American people have of their President at the moment is through the filter of the media criticizers. I want to counter that propaganda with a little bit of common-sense biographizing."

Please don’t miss the video.

Merton College, Oxford, 2 pm.