A Tale of Two Presidents

This article was published in slightly edited form in the March issue of the Indiana Peace and Justice Journal

In early February 2011, George W. Bush was forced to cancel a planned visit to Switzerland after Amnesty International sent a memo to the Swiss authorities advising them of their obligation under international law to investigate and prosecute Bush for torture and war crimes. The indictment of George W. Bush presented by Amnesty International is extensive and damning. You can read the entire document here.
News that Bush and his closest associates have been involved in war crimes has been known for several years among peace and justice activists in the U.S. and throughout the world. I think it is even fair to say that most people who care about justice and human rights are repulsed by the idea that Bush is somehow above the law and could, with impunity, authorize torture and other crimes. Many had called for his impeachment while he was still president and are still dismayed that attorney general Eric Holder and the Obama administration have so far refused to prosecute him.

Meanwhile, earlier this year the web site warisacrime.org released a petition titled: We Will Oppose Obama As Long As He Supports War. This petition has already been signed by several hundred prominent peace and justice activists, including Medea Benjamin of Code Pink, Frida Berrigan of the War Resisters League and Jeffrey St Clair of Counterpunch. The indictment of Barack Obama by the activists is extensive and damning. You can find it here.
The behavior of Obama and his administration is particularly disheartening to peace and justice activists because many, if not most, had bought in to his message of hope and expected that the dark period of the Bush administration would give way to a new era in which the U.S. would again stand for justice and human rights. When Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, peace and justice activists could have proudly thought that this represented a vindication of all their efforts to oppose the Bush wars. Instead, Obama sided with his Generals, contemptuously thumbed his nose at the entire peace movement and used the occasion to justify the Bush wars. This petition is thus but one expression of the frustration and disenchantment toward Obama felt by people who are involved in peace and justice activities.

However, an incongruity remains: While most readers of this publication would applaud Amnesty International’s actions for requesting that Bush be brought to justice, opinions about Obama have remained much more subdued. Given the extensive indictment against Obama in the “War Is a Crime” petition, wouldn’t one expect calls for his immediate impeachment, if not for his outright prosecution? Instead, the signatories to the petition merely threaten to withhold their support in the next primary election. Wouldn’t any impartial observer conclude that it is an extreme violation of justice for a world leader to authorize an official list of people who are to be targeted for assassination without due process? Would that opinion be different if it was revealed that the world leader who authorized such a list was named Barack Obama instead of Hosni Mubarak? When a brave American soldier allegedly blew the whistle on American atrocities in Iraq and Afghanistan, did the Obama administration pledge to prosecute those responsible? Bradley Manning should have been given a hero’s medal; instead he has been languishing in solitary confinement in conditions amounting to torture. In Obama’s world, it seems to be a worse offense to reveal atrocities than to commit them. Read the two indictments and then tell me whether you see a qualitative difference between Bush and Obama’s behavior. Why the resolute confrontation of Bush’s crimes, and the timid warning (we’ll withhold support in the next primary unless you change your ways) to Obama? Is this implying that if Obama wins his party’s nomination, peace and justice activists will support him anyway as the lesser evil in the next election? If we’re willing to be such doormats, no wonder cynical politicians addicted to power like Obama couldn’t care less how much we protest.
The way I see it, for the peace and justice movement to have a lasting impact in bringing about a better world, we must focus on pointing out injustice wherever we see it regardless of ideology, and regardless of whether the injustice is committed by a known despot, an allied dictator or even an American President. This requires avoiding partisan bias. For example, when Bush was in power so-called liberal organizations like MoveOn.org were routinely sending urgent calls for mobilization to oppose the Bush wars. Then once Obama became President and continued, even amplified the worst of the Bush policies, these same wars and nefarious activities were no longer worth mentioning. In hindsight many of these calls for action turned out to be partisan ploys to drum up support for the Democrats. They also misled many Americans into thinking that if we just elected a Democrat, everything would be better. We will not have a lasting impact on public opinion if we let short-term electoral considerations affect what we say.