The Bush Administration’s major failure:Setbacks in human rights and democracy [Archives:2004/742/Opinion]

For all the rhetoric about seeking to bring democracy throughout the world, the Bush Administration seems to be the least qualified world leadership to adopt such a campaign in a world that is seething with tyranny and oppression. In fact, the Bush Administration may have caused more harm than good to spreading the good word on democratic practice and freedom. For one thing the obvious backing that the Bush Administration gives to some notorious dictators or rulers with a notorious record on human rights and peaceful coexistence is inescapable. Surely, the removal of a democratically elected President in Haiti or the blind support of a dogmatic Zionist like Ariel Sharon have done great harm in America's image as champion and trendsetter in civilized state behavior or concern for human rights. On the other hand, the unforgivable behavior of American forces, in battle as well as in interaction with occupied civilians has often led to a poor display of superpower decorum and reflects an unwelcome arrogance that has set the fight for democratic governments and political rights decades back. Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay and the obvious use of third party regimes to do the dirty work on American prisoners surely cannot be said to be within the bounds of civilized state behavior or sincere and genuine intentions on the part of the White House to disseminate freedom and liberty for all. Even the attempted efforts to play down the seriousness of the Abu Ghraib and other prison tortures, which apparently were carried out under a systematic program, as evidenced by the exchange of personnel with more “experience from one operations theater to the next in the global network that the Bush Administration has set up to wage its “war on terror”, have underscored the widespread belief that there is policy at play here and not just a few disgruntled soldiers “having fun”.
The obvious blow of the Abu Ghraib horrors to the many who have long advocated for the removal of tyranny and oppression that exists in many third world countries, in general, and many Arab States in particular can never be over exaggerated. This is what has literally allowed third world tyrants to say, “So, you see it is not just us, even so-called democracies freely engage in torture and humiliation of people”. They will even add by saying, “At least we focus on our opponents, or suspected conspirators, whereas most of the American prisoners, by their own admission, are innocent victims chosen without due cause or process. For an added plus, we “minimize on sexual humiliation”. Some will even boast that they respect international opinion and will often release prisoners at the first sign of international displeasure. With the Americans, the Red Cross critical reports to the highest levels of authority were ignored or reacted upon with superficial effect or simply as a nuisance. This in itself reflected a clear contempt for established international community oversight and a poor communications of adherence to the minimum humane standards of treatment that human beings have a right to expect from a democracy set out to instill human rights and moral conduct of government. Many Arabs were quick to comment that the Arab leaders voiced very little outrage at the outset of the Abu Ghraib disclosures, as they would easily be exposed also by the Americans for their own abuses of their constituent's right to humane treatment. One would have hoped that Washington would work diligently to prevent the manufacture or sale of torture gear by the many western firms that supply most of this horrific equipment to third world countries. But to actually engage in the use of such equipment or services (electrical wiring of humans, sound and light torture gear, etc, and of course hiring “interrogating” contractors), the Americans have really made the challenges facing human rights advocates so difficult.
In the occupation of Iraq, one does not hear of meaningful strides in governance sensed by the Iraqis, to what they had under the regime of Saddam Hussein. In fact, little consideration is given for any feedback from the Iraqis as to their state of affairs, under an American administrative authority. This authority is not even equipped with a clear legal mandate setting forth its responsibilities and the performance standards for gauging its success, especially in delivering the message of democratic rule and human rights. This was probably not oversight on the part of the Bush Administration, but a deliberate venue intended to give the Civilian Provisional Authority to set its own rules and standards as the situation on the ground dictates and to avoid any possibility of being evaluated on the basis of the legal authorizations meted out to the CPA. Needless to say, this CPA never showed any intent or desire to involve the Iraqis in any of the decisions that primarily affected them n now and in the future, nor that this American occupation was anything more than being just that, an occupation. Whatever symbolic image was there of Iraqi participation in “running their affairs”, even the makeshift Provisional Government Council, set up as the Iraqi storefront symbol of the occupation must have its meetings agendas approved by the CPA before any of its topics could be discussed and dealt with by the Council. Even such matters as economic and social affairs were left to the discretion of L. Paul Bremmer III, and thus little was there to show any hopes of real sovereignty for Iraq in the present and the future. Of course, the free hand of the CPA was extended to contracts for the “reconstruction” of Iraq, and very little effort was made to set out ways to enhance the Iraqi economy by engaging Iraqis in many of these contracts, not to mention the apparent lack of transparency or oversight at the way such contracts are meted out.
The domestic picture in the United States has also shown retractions under the Bush Administration on a number of fronts, thus giving little weight to the claim of disseminating liberty and democratic government elsewhere.
Accordingly, the Bush Administration's credibility, even as far as its declared aims, for all the havoc created in Iraq and elsewhere, is not worth all the ink and air of the ideological rhetoric that has been blared out. The fact of the matter is that much harm has been done to the struggle for freedom and democratic governance, not to mention the failure in eliminating global terror.
Only if the American people can show that their democratic process will be able to undo the harm that the Bush Administration has wrought, to both the image of the United States as a champion of human rights and to the genuine efforts of advocates for a democratic world everywhere, will there be hope that maybe all is not lost.
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