[Reformatted] James Bovard On Fighting Terrorism, Saving Tyrants

[Anonymous]

jei at alpha.hut.fi (Jei) writes:

> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> Date: Mon, 14 Jan 2002 10:17:53 -0500
> From: Matthew Gaylor <freematt at coil.com>
> To: Matthew Gaylor <freematt at coil.com>
> Subject: James Bovard On Fighting Terrorism, Saving Tyrants
> 
> Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2002 23:21:08 -0800
> To: freematt at coil.com
> From: Jim Bovard <jbovard at his.com>
> Subject: Matt - Fighting Terrorism, Saving Tyrants
> 
> Matt:
> Thought you might enjoy this bouquet for the war on terrorism.
> take it easy,
> Jim
> 
> USA Today January 10, 2002
>
> Don't bed down with tyrants to fight terrorism By James Bovard
>
> President Bush recently declared: "So long as anybody's terrorizing
> established governments, there needs to be a war." Bush rightfully
> sought international support for the campaign to put the al_Qaeda
> terrorist network out of business. But the war on terrorism threatens
> to become a license for tyranny. The United Nations is concerned that
> an expansive call for governments to crack down on terrorism - a crime
> that is not clearly defined - is spurring a surge of oppression around
> the world. Los Angeles Times writer William Orme detailed some of the
> ways governments are exploiting the new war to repress their citizens:
>
> The Cuban government, as part of its war on terrorism, added a new law
> allowing the death penalty for anyone who uses the Internet to incite
> political violence.
>
> Zimbabwe's war on terrorism includes a proposal to criminalize any
> critical comment about President_dictator Robert Mugabe.
>
> Syria bragged to the U.N. that financial support for terrorists
> was effectively curtailed by the absence of any private banking
> system or independent charities, Orme reported. In other words, a
> government that totally destroys freedom expects to be applauded as an
> anti_terrorist superstar.
>
> Bacre Waly Ndiaye, a chief U.N. human_rights officer, recently
> complained: "In some countries, non_violent activities have been
> considered as terrorism, and excessive measures have been taken to
> suppress or restrict individual rights, including the presumption of
> innocence, the right to a fair trial, freedom from torture, privacy
> rights, freedom of expression and assembly, and the right to seek
> asylum."
>
> Many of these complaints, in fact, apply to the actions of the Bush
> administration. A new law decimates individual privacy by giving the
> FBI the de facto right to vacuum up practically anyone's e_mail.
> Permanent resident aliens who publicly criticize the U.S. government's
> war on terrorism can be banned from re_entering the United States.
> Some have floated the suggestion that permitting the torture of
> suspects could help avert future terrorist attacks. And Bush's
> executive order for military tribunals threatens to bring unsavory
> aspects of Third World "justice" to American shores.
>
> A myopic focus on private_sector criminals risks giving a green light
> to more dangerous government abuses. A core fallacy of the war on
> terrorism - as opposed to attacking and destroying al_Qaeda - is that
> terrorism is worse than anything else imaginable. Unfortunately,
> governments have committed far worse abuses than al_Qaeda or any other
> terrorist cabal.
>
> Official murderers Mass murder was the most memorable achievement of
> some 20th_century governments. The Black Book of Communism, a 1997
> scholarly French compendium, detailed how 85 million to 100 million
> people came to die at the hands of communist regimes in the Soviet
> Union, China, Cambodia and elsewhere. In Death by Government, R.J.
> Rummel declared that some 170 million people were killed in one of
> "the myriad ways governments have inflicted death on unarmed, helpless
> citizens and foreigners."
>
> By raising terrorist attacks to the pinnacle of political evil, the
> war on terrorism implicitly sanctifies whatever tactic governments use
> in the name of repressing terrorism. But, in the long run, people have
> far more to fear from governments than from terrorists.
>
> Bush's labeling of attacks on any "established government" as
> a justification of counterterrorism ignores the fact that some
> governments are little more than criminal conspiracies against
> their victims. The United States was created as a result of popular
> uprisings and attacks on an established government that was far less
> oppressive than many current regimes in Africa and Asia.
>
> The Bush administration must find a way to fight terrorism without
> sanctifying tyranny. The word "terrorism" must not become an
> incantation that miraculously razes all existing limits on government
> power. The fact that governments such as Syria and Zimbabwe can
> justify their oppression by invoking the war against terrorism is an
> embarrassment to anyone who both opposes terrorism and favors human
> rights.
>
> James Bovard is the author of Lost Rights (St. Martin's Press, 1994)
> and Freedom in Chains (St. Martin's, 1999).
>
> http://www.usatoday.com/news/comment/2002/01/10/ncguest2.htm
>
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