Stokes County Courthouse

Danbury, NC is a pretty little town along the Dan River, just about an hour’s leisurely drive northwest of my home. I passed through there today, and stopped to take some pictures of the Stokes County Courthouse (built in 1904).

In front of the courthouse stands this memorial to local Confederate war dead. A central monument displays the Confederate flag and an engraving of a Confederate soldier.

An inscription on the back reads, “From Manassas to Gettysburg. From Gettysburg to Appomatox.” A surrounding circle of smaller markers bear the names of Confederate army units in which Stokes County men served.

A few feet away, grimy and decrepit, stands the base of a memorial for WWI dead; whatever once stood atop the base appears to be long gone. The contrast with the shiny and well-kept Confederate memorial (erected in 1990) is striking.

While the Confederate memorial declares itself to be “In Honor of All Who Served”, that isn’t quite true. I don’t know whether there were any sons of Stokes County among the thousands of North Carolinians who fought on the Union side. But I have no doubt that Stokes County sent its share of citizens to fight in the Spanish-American War, World War II, Vietnam, the Gulf War, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Yet, the service and sacrifices of those men and women who fought for their country go entirely unmarked, while those who took up arms against it get the honors.

How Obama could earn that Nobel

Garry Wills cogently argues Obama should withdraw from Afghanistan, even at the risk of being a one-term President. I wish I had any reason to hope that Obama might heed that advice. It might make me more enthusiastic about seeing him re-elected.

The ultimate sacrifice

Just in case there was anyone left who didn’t think George W. Bush is a complete asshole:

For the first time, Bush revealed a personal way in which he has tried to acknowledge the sacrifice of soldiers and their families.

“I don’t want some mom whose son may have recently died to see the commander in chief playing golf,” he said. “I feel I owe it to the families to be in solidarity as best as I can with them. And I think playing golf during a war just sends the wrong signal.”

Bush said he made that decision after the August 2003 bombing of the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad, which killed Sergio Vieira de Mello, the top U.N. official in Iraq and the organization’s high commissioner for human rights.

“I remember when de Mello, who was at the U.N., got killed in Baghdad as a result of these murderers taking this good man’s life,” he said. “I was playing golf — I think I was in central Texas — and they pulled me off the golf course and I said, ‘It’s just not worth it anymore to do.’”

This just in: John Ashcroft is a repulsive, abusive, dissembling asshole

Sure, you already knew that. But some things bear repeating, like this exchange between Ashcroft and a Knox College student:

ME: First off, Mr. Ashcroft, I’d like to apologize for the rudeness of some of my fellow students. It was uncalled for–we can disagree civilly, we don’t need that. (round of applause from the audience, and Ashcroft smiles) I have here in my hand two documents. One of them, you know, is the text of the United Nations Convention against Torture, which, point of interest, says nothing about “lasting physical damage”…
ASHCROFT: (interrupting) Do you have the Senate reservations to it?
ME: No, I don’t. Do you happen to know what they are?
ASHCROFT: (angrily) I don’t have them memorized, no. I don’t have time to go around memorizing random legal facts. I just don’t want these people in the audience to go away saying, “He was wrong, she had the proof right in her hand!” Because that’s not true. It’s a lie. If you don’t have the reservations, you don’t have anything. Now, if you want to bring them another time, we can talk, but…
ME: Actually, Mr. Ashcroft, my question was about this other document. (laughter and applause) This other document is a section from the judgment of the Tokyo War Tribunal. After WWII, the Tokyo Tribunal was basically the Nuremberg Trials for Japan. Many Japanese leaders were put on trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity, including torture. And among the tortures listed was the “water treatment,” which we nowadays call waterboarding…
ASHCROFT: (interrupting) This is a speech, not a question. I don’t mind, but it’s not a question.
ME: It will be, sir, just give me a moment. The judgment describes this water treatment, and I quote, “the victim was bound or otherwise secured in a prone position; and water was forced through his mouth and nostrils into his lungs and stomach.” One man, Yukio Asano, was sentenced to fifteen years hard labor by the allies for waterboarding American troops to obtain information. Since Yukio Asano was trying to get information to help defend his country–exactly what you, Mr. Ashcroft, say is acceptible for Americans to do–do you believe that his sentence was unjust? (boisterous applause and shouts of “Good question!”)
ASHCROFT: (angrily) Now, listen here. You’re comparing apples and oranges, apples and oranges. We don’t do anything like what you described.
ME: I’m sorry, I was under the impression that we still use the method of putting a cloth over someone’s face and pouring water down their throat…
ASHCROFT: (interrupting, red-faced, shouting) Pouring! Pouring! Did you hear what she said? “Putting a cloth over someone’s face and pouring water on them.” That’s not what you said before! Read that again, what you said before!
ME: Sir, other reports of the time say…
ASHCROFT: (shouting) Read what you said before! (cries of “Answer her fucking question!” from the audience) Read it!
ME: (firmly) Mr. Ashcroft, please answer the question.
ASHCROFT: (shouting) Read it back!
ME: “The victim was bound or otherwise secured in a prone position; and water was forced through his mouth and nostrils into his lungs and stomach.”
ASHCROFT: (shouting) You hear that? You hear it? “Forced!” If you can’t tell the difference between forcing and pouring…does this college have an anatomy class? If you can’t tell the difference between forcing and pouring…
ME: (firmly and loudly) Mr. Ashcroft, do you believe that Yukio Asano’s sentence was unjust? Answer the question. (pause)
ASHCROFT: (more restrained) It’s not a fair question; there’s no comparison. Next question! (loud chorus of boos from the audience)

No comparison at all. When the evil Japs waterboarded our boys, they “forced” water down their throats. In contrast, when our boys waterboarded those evil raghead terrorists, they gently “poured” the water. Got it?

You set back and watch, when the death count gets higher

I wonder what it is we’ve done

Five years. Thousands of lives. Billions of dollars. No good reason.

And no end in sight.

Five years, my brain hurts a lot

In anticipation of tomorrow’s dismal anniversary.

Pacific coast port workers to shut down ports in anti-war protest

The International Longshore & Warehouse Union (ILWU), which represents dockworkers on the West Coast (and which I had the privilege of representing during my California stint), will stage a one-day shutdown on May 1st to protest the ongoing U.S. military presence in Afghanistan and Iraq.

No matter how “clean”, “modern” or “humane”, Guantánamo is wrong

IOZ, responding to this, hits the nail squarely on the head with his usual pith and aplomb:

In many aspects of our empire, we seem to believe that qualitative improvements will obviate categorical wrongs. Thus the prevalence of the idea that the “success” of the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan has some bearing on their rightness or wrongness, or the idea that the “humaneness” with which we treat our prisoners somehow negates the fact that we have imprisoned them beyond hope of release or appeal. I suppose that I would prefer sanitary solitary confinement to solitary confinement in my own filth, but after years I suspect that becomes a distinction without a difference. The concentration camp at Guantanamo may have been laid out by the architects of Candyland. That has no bearing whatsoever on the perversion that it represents.