Thank You For Not Smoking.
Though American officials had linked Mr. Mohammed to the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and to several others, his confession was the first time he spelled out in his own words a panoply of global terror activities, ranging from plans to bomb landmarks in New York City and London to assassination plots against former Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton and Pope John Paul II. Some of the plots he claimed to plan, including the attempt on Mr. Carter, had not previously been publicly disclosed.
Mr. Mohammed indicated in the transcript that some of his earlier statements to C.I.A. interrogators were the result of torture. But he said that his statements at the tribunal on Saturday were not made under duress or pressure.
[snip]
By tribunal rules, Mr. Mohammed was aided by a “personal representative,†not a lawyer. His attempt to call two witnesses was denied. And the tribunal indicated that it would consider classified evidence not made available to Mr. Mohammed.
Hasn’t Muhammad confessed before? Well, yes he has: back in 2006. So what’s the point of releasing all these transcripts NOW, presenting last year’s news as some sensationalistic breaking story?
If I was a cynic, I might think it was to keep Alberto Gonzalez off the front pages. If Muhammad’s guilty I’m glad he’s incarcerated, but I have no faith in this conviction. No lawyer? Secret evidence? No defense witnesses? Where are we, the USSR? Saddam Hussein had better representation.
At this point, you’d have to be a 23-percenter to take anything this administration says at face value. For the past six years, we’ve been fed lie after lie: WMD in Iraq; Saddam’s ties to al Qaeda; Medicare Part D; the attorney purge; the abuse of National Security Letters; obstructing justice; Zarqawi’s multiple deaths; Abu Ghraib. Personally, I’m having trouble even believing Mr. Muhammad is who the government claims he is. How do I know he’s not the guy that used to sell falafels on UPenn’s campus? Or the guy who owns South Street Souvlaki? Who can you believe in this steaming pile of happy horseshit we call “the Bush Administration”?
And then there’s the timing: “Gee, everyone’s calling for the resignation of the Attorney General, the President’s bosom buddy since the 1990s, for lying to Congress and implementing a political purge. Quick, break out the crazy bearded guy to confess to crimes and terrah! terrah!”
Orwell: Goldstein had fled and was hiding no one knew where, and of the others, a few had simply disappeared, while the majority had been executed after spectacular public trials at which they made confession of their crimes. Among the last survivors were three men named Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford. It must have been in 1965 that these three had been arrested. As often happened, they had vanished for a year or more, so that one did not know whether they were alive or dead, and then had suddenly been brought forth to incriminate themselves in the usual way. They had confessed to intelligence with the enemy (at that date, too, the enemy was Eurasia), embezzlement of public funds, the murder of various trusted Party members, intrigues against the leadership of Big Brother which had started long before the Revolution happened, and acts of sabotage causing the death of hundreds of thousands of people. After confessing to these things they had been pardoned, reinstated in the Party, and given posts which were in fact sinecures but which sounded important. All three had written long, abject articles in The Times, analysing the reasons for their defection and promising to make amends.
And like Emmanuel Goldstein, the Administration trots out Mr. Muhammad and the “debatable results” of information obtained via torture.
Sheik Khalid Muhammad is last year’s news, a non-issue: he will never be set free. The re-release of last year’s confessions shouldn’t be taking the corrupt Attorney General, who is still walking free, off the front pages. Sniff — what’s that smell? Could it be administration blowing smoke up the nation’s ass?
