12 February 2009, Obama gave a speech on Lincoln’s 200th birthday. Towards the end of the Civil War the defeat of the South had become a certainty. And during this time, Obama said, Lincoln “could have sought revenge”, but instead Lincoln insisted that no Confederate troops be punished.
“All Lincoln wanted was for Confederate troops to go back home and return to work on their farms and in their shops,” Obama said. “That was the only way, Lincoln knew, to repair the rifts that had torn this country apart. It was the only way to begin the healing that our nation so desperately needed.”
“We are far less divided than in Lincoln’s day,” Obama said, but “we are once again debating the critical issues of our time.”
“Let us remember that we are doing so as servants to the same flag, as representatives of the same people, and as stakeholders in a common future,” Obama said. “That is the most fitting tribute we can pay and the most lasting monument we can build to that most remarkable of men, Abraham Lincoln.”
http://abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?section=news/national_world&id=6655426
This might actually explain something of how the Obama administration was seemingly blindsided by the partisan Republican opposition to Obama’s stimulus package. Obama may very well have sincerely thought that he could channel Abraham Lincoln and reach across the party divide and get Republicans to embrace something that is the antithesis of the Republican laissez fair worldview.
This might also explain why Obama has undergone a 180-degree reversal on his position on State Secrets abuse committed by the Bush administration and on his apparent foot-dragging reluctance to have the previous administration investigated for War Crimes. Obama says he is more interested in “looking forward” than in “looking back”, even though the US is bound by law to investigate and pursue possible war criminals. Glen Greenwald explains that part of the law here:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/01/18/prosecutions/
Glenn Greenwald also goes into all the details you need to know about Obama’s flip-flop on State Secrets here:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/02/10/obama/index.html
The short version is that innocent people who had been black bagged by US personel and suffered extraordinary rendition to various third world countries to be tortured are now trying to sue the people who committed these very real, very heinous crimes against them. Bush invoked a blanket interpretation of State Secrets law and said that even so much as talking about what happened in a court of law would reveal State Secrets and therefore the entire case must be dismissed out of hand.
One of Obama’s campaign promises was to correct the problem of this over-reaching use of State Secrets law and allow legitimate cases their day in court.
And now Obama’s administration has told the courts that they are maintaining Bush’s exact same position on State Secrets.
There are plenty of explanations flying around as to why he would do a complete reversal on his position. The hawks argue that Obama must have learned that there really were some State Secrets that would be revealed during the lawsuit. Those with a more jaded perspective believe Obama is reserving the right to maintain State Secrets because of the power it would grant himself in the future.
On a related topic, Obama has repeatedly said that he is not interested in investigating the potential crimes and war crimes of the previous administration. The hawks will argue that no crimes took place, all is fair in love and war, and all that. The jaded will say that Obama needed to say that to get elected and that he would have to expend great political capital to launch an investigation now that he’s in office.
All of those explanations may have some truth to them. Or they may be complete fiction. But since many are handing out their analysis in the dark, here’s mine.
I think Obama may think he is channeling Abraham Lincoln on this topic.
Obama explained Lincoln’s position as this: After the Civil War, Lincoln could have sought revenge, instead he sought forgiveness.
Obama may consider himself to be in essentially in the same position as Lincoln was at the end of the Civil War. Either he can seek vengeance against the previous administration or he can forgive him.
If this is part of what’s behind Obama’s position on not enforcing the rule of law against potential war criminals and in burying the crimes of the past under a blanket “State Secrets” position, if Obama sees himself as “forgiving” the previous administration the way Lincoln “forgave” the South after the Civil War, then there’s a fundamental problem there.
You cannot forgive someone for actions they committed against someone else.
Lincoln as president and political leader of the North could conceivably invoke the royal “we” and say “We the North forgive the South for their war against the North”, and then go on to push for reconciliation.
But the crimes and war crimes committed by the Bush administration weren’t committed solely against the royal “we” of America. Bush invaded two sovereign nations, one on completely cooked up intelligence. Bush ordered that the Geneva Convention on war be completely disregarded as it applies to prisoners of war.
Bush’s crimes are many, but the people seeking justice right now in court are innocent people from foreign countries who had nothing to do with Al Queda or terrorism but were black bagged, shipped off to secret prisons, and tortured for years by Americans or people working for Americans.
These are the people that Bush’s State Secrets are trying to bury the truth on.
And it may very well be that Obama thinks that it is more important to “forgive” the people who committed these crimes and bring the nation together the way Lincoln forgave the South and united the nation.
But Obama cant forgive something that was done to someone else.
Within the context of the American Civil War, the war and all its horror was essentially contained within our own borders. Americans were killing Americans. Brothers were killing brothers. And within that context, brother can forgive brother. The North can forgive the South.
But in the context of Bush’s war against the rest of the world, once you cross international boundaries, wage war against foreign citizens, and torture foreign prisoners, you must be held to acount based on the international agreements you’ve committed to. In this case, the Geneva Convention.
Obama is in no moral position to forgive the Bush administration for their crimes against the rest of the world. Obama is not the one against whom the crimes were committed. The innocent people who were tortured want their day in court, their only chance at justice, and Obama has no moral standing to block their attempt to redress their grievances.
And so, borrowing some of Dr. King’s words, I ask President Obama to discontinue Bush’s abusive use of State Secrets, to bring back the great beacon light of hope we call inalienable human rights, and allow these innocent victims, seared in the flames of withering injustice, to end the long dark night of their captivity and torture with justice reclaimed rather than justice buried.
This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.
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