Prosecute #Torture via @ACLU - Best of the Left Activism

You’ve reached the activism portion of today’s show. Now that you’re informed and angry, here’s what you can do about it. Today’s activism: Prosecute Torture.

I know. It seems like this topic wouldn’t require any activism. Why would we ever need to demand that the Department of Justice seek…well…justice? Apparently, for all the reasons covered in today’s show and all the reasons you already knew and all the reasons that don’t even surprise us now that more than a decade has gone by since our government lied to our faces to obtain support for an illegal war.

We already knew about the torture; but now the government has spent three years and $40 million, finally proving the thing we knew — that the CIA understood torture isn’t an effective information gathering tool, but encouraged its use anyway. And it doesn’t appear it took much for our elected officials at the time to be convinced. The report also makes clear once and for all that the illegal and torturous actions carried out in the name of patriotism did not help locate Osama bin Laden or thwart any terrorist plots. They were, in fact, counterproductive. Just don’t tell that to Dick Cheney — his robot heart might not be able to take it.

Murtaza Hussain at The Intercept and Marcy Wheeler at EmptyWheel.com do solid break downs of the report, how it came about, the worst things in it and other details to stoke your rage should you be into digging deeper.

The ACLU told the following to The Intercept:

“Even though we previously knew many details about the torture program, the brutality this landmark report documents is breathtaking...The release of this report is a call to action for the Justice Department, Congress, and the White House. We cannot make a clean break from this nation’s history of state-sanctioned torture without accountability for the terrible human rights violations committed in our name.”

I couldn’t agree more.

Visit ACLU.org and click on the impossible to miss "No Free Pass For Torture” action to sign the petition asking Attorney General Eric Holder to appoint a special prosecutor — as is not only his right, but his duty as the highest law enforcement official in the country. As the petition states: "Accountability for torture today is critical for stopping it tomorrow” — and, I don’t know about you, but I’d rather not have any of this happen again.

Also — as it is the holidays — we’re bringing you a positive torture related action via the ACLU. Not everyone who was commanded to use the “enhanced interrogation techniques” followed orders. There were dissenters among our public officials and our military rank and file. Some prosecutors resigned rather than bring cases founded on coerced evidence. Others, like the Navy’s general counsel Alberto J. Mora, stayed and led an effort to end the practices which he argued to his superiors were ineffective and unlawful.

Still others endured ridicule and bullying by their bosses for daring to question what they were told was their job and patriotic duty. Lt. Col. Darrel Vandevelde was placed under house arrest for refusing to participate in torture. Please sign the ACLU petition titled "Honor Those Who Said No To Torture” asking the president to “formally honor the members of the military, the CIA and other public servants who — when our nation went off course — stayed true to our most fundamental ideals.”