Weekly Torture Action Letter 19 – Investigate For The Sake Of Our Troops

(10 am. – promoted by ek hornbeck)

Happy Monday and welcome to the Dog’s on going letter writing campaign for accountability and the rule of law for the apparent Bush Era torture programs. The premise of this campaign is the Dog will write a letter to one of the key decision makers (with carbon copies to others) and provide the links to reach these worthies. Your job, gentle reader, is to either use the letter as a jumping off point for your own letter, or just cut and paste the letter and send it off under your own signature.

“Originally posted at Squarestate.net“

The intent here is to keep a constant level of incoming pressure about this issue on the people who can move the issue forward. It is an important thing to do as there are many other issues which are getting a higher priority right now. This campaign will remind our leaders that while they can work on other things, this issue is not going away, at least if we the people have anything to say about it.

This week we will be writing to the Chair of the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. John Conyers, with carbon copies to Sen. Leahy (Sen. Judiciary Chair), Rep. Ike Skelton and Sen. Carl Levin, the respective chairs of the Armed Services Committees and Attorney General Eric Holder.

Dear Chairman Conyers;

I write you today as a citizen gravely concerned with the lack of action on the Bush Administrations apparent State Sponsored Torture program. Our nation was founded on the premise that none would be above the reach of the law, for it is only in the evenhanded and impartial application of the law it becomes clear all citizens are equal in a democracy. While Attorney General holder ponders whether he will follow the International Conventions Against Torture and the Federal anti-torture statutes, there is still important work for your committee in this regard.

The world is aware of the fact the Untied States has waterbaorded at least three of our prisoners. Waterboarding is and for more than 60 year has been universally considered to be torture. You, Mr. Chairman, have it within your prevue to begin impeachment procedures against one of the primary authors of the Bush Administrations torture justifications, Federal Judge Jay Bybee. I believe this to be a needed step, both for our reliance on the rule of law as a pillar of our Republic and for the safety of our nations soldiers.

Given the presidents policy on Afghanistan, there can be no doubt we will having a significant number of soldiers in the field for the next few years. One of the ways we have always protected our fighting men and women in times of war has been our insistence of the fair treatment of prisoners we have captured. While this is not always a guarantee of proper treatment, the example of the United States has surely prevented some mistreatment.  

Now that it is common knowledge we have, in at least some cases, abandoned this policy, there is a far greater chance any of our soldiers captured in fighting with the Taliban or Al Qaeda will be tortured under a tit-for-tat thinking.

You can take action to prevent this. By showing the world we are serious about our intolerance of torture for any reason you would go far to repairing the damage to our moral authority on world wide on this issue. You have it within your power to start a serious and open investigation into the involvement of the Department of Justice in shaping and empowering the torture of prisoners. As a citizen who believes his nation is better than this, I am asking you to being the process immediately.

Representative Conyers, this is the right thing to do. Just as it was the right thing to employ Rosa Parks in your Detroit office all those years, out of respect for her actions in the Civil Rights fight, this is the right thing to do now. You are nearing the end of your distinguished career in the Congress; please don’t let the final chapter be about what you failed to do.  

Sincerely,

CC:

Senate Judiciary Chair, Patrick Leahy

House Armed Services Chair, Ike Skelton

Senate Armed Services Chair, Carl Levin

Attorney General Eric Holder

There is the letter, now for some links:

Rep John Conyers – Judiciary Committee Chair

Chairman Leahy

Rep. Ike Skelton

Use zip code 65109-2429 to get past Chairman Skelton’s filter

Sen. Carl Levin

Department of Justice, attention AG Holder – [email protected]

Now it is all up to you. If you are pissed off about torture, then act. If you are sickened that your nation won’t follow its law, then act. If you want to be sure you will not be tortured, then act. If you care in any way shape or form about the Rule of Law, the United States of America or basic human decency, then you must act! The Dog has made it as easy as he possibly can, please, act today for accountability for torture.