Levin Comments on his Own Report

Carl Levin (D-Michigan Socialist Republic) has come out and publicly blamed George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld for the abuses that took place at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. His comments followed the release of a report issued by the Senate Armed Services Committee, a committee that Comrade Levin chairs.

"In my judgment, the report represents a condemnation of both the Bush administration's interrogation policies and of senior administration officials who attempted to shift the blame for abuse - such as that seen at Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay and Afghanistan - to low-ranking soldiers," said Senator Carl Levin, the committee chairman.

Claims that detainee abuses could be chalked up to the unauthorised acts of a "few bad apples", were simply false, he said.

"Authorisations of aggressive interrogation techniques by senior officials resulted in abuse and conveyed the message that physical pressures and degradation were appropriate treatment for detainees in US military custody," he said.

Carl, why don't we get all of this over with right now and have you put on an enemy uniform? Well, that is, if our enemy in this fight actually wore enemy uniforms.

What Carl would like us all to forget or ignore is that the military was conducting an investigation into the Abu Ghraib fiasco long before the infamous pictures of prisoners with women's panties on their heads were ever made public and used by the press to promote outrage against the US around the Muslim world. Clearly the treatment of prisoners at that prison fell outside of authorization hence the investigation, and those that perpetrated the actions were held accountable.

Guantanamo is another story. I have still not read a single unbiased report that convinces me that the "harsh" interrogation techniques used there amount to torture, or that any of the techniques used there were administered recreationally for sadistic kicks. Even if it is proven later that recreational torture took place at Guantanamo, the relative absence of widespread abuse in this war proves to me that the problem was not systemic, which it would have to be for Levin's charges to be even close to plausible. With hundreds of thousands of people serving in our armed forces it would be a virtual impossibility that each and every member of the services would be above engaging in unauthorized and illegal treatment of prisoners. For Levin to think otherwise is a pretty lofty ideal from anyone serving in the congressional fraternity given its own small body's dismal performance in following the letter of the law.

Not only does Levin want us to believe that there are no bad apples in our military capable of bad judgment and willing to act without a wink wink from the Secretary of Defense, he also wants us to believe that the government blessed whatever bad judgments were made by ignoring them, a position that is silly on its face and disproved by the military investigations into the alleged abuses, investigations that predate public awareness.

It is a sad state of political affairs when a leftist schmuck such as Levin that has zero credibility when it comes to fair mindedness, can maneuver a divisive report through his own committee and then comment on the report as if it were as fresh and clean as the wind driven snow. Beware the book review that is written by its own author.

It is time for Levin to get out of the Armed Services Committee and get back to doing what he is most successful at--nurturing the domestic auto industry.

On the bright side, Levin is still the smartest senator from Michigan.