Victor Medina

If you’re under the impression that the decadent scandal surrounding Abu Ghraib prison was a thing of the past, then you’re sadly mistaken.

The Associated Press reports that on Sept. 29, a district judge ordered a series of materials which depict the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib to be turned over to the public.

The ruling comes as a result of efforts by the ACLU to expose the extent of these abuses.

The ACLU will have access to 70 pictures and three video tapes that are currently being blocked from release by The Department of Defense.

The DOD was overruled in its claim that exposing these materials would lead to increased violence in Iraq, but they were also granted 20 days to file for appeal.

The DOD has been fighting the release of these materials ever since these abhorrent practices were exposed to the public two years ago.

The DOD’s opposition to full disclosure comes as no surprise given the fact that even partisans like Donald Rumsfeld have described the contents of these materials to be “blatantly sadistic.”

The DOD has also been overruled in previous arguments, making their newfound concerns seem like a final act of desperation in their attempts to keep these images concealed.

I’m not at all implying that our government officials are lying when they express concerns over how these images might affect the stability of Iraq.

On the contrary, I believe that the DOD’s claim has proven empirically true.

Without a doubt, Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib have exposed the ugly face of American hypocrisy to the entire world and these facilities have become the most effective set of recruitment tools available to terrorists throughout the world.

If the US, as an unilateral invader, ever intends to earn the trust of the Muslim world and regain the respect of the international community, we must tackle this issue head on.

We must pursue this as if it were occurring in our own backyards and to our own citizens.

Rectifying this situation will require us to be able to act without the involvement of any political interference and calls for nothing less than full transparency.

We must also be willing and able to hold accountable all officials whom by incompetence, or by compliance, acted as enablers to these atrocities.

However, in a time when every branch of government is being controlled by politicians who have relentlessly evaded any form accountability, the first step in mending these wrongs will have to be taken in the court of public opinion.

Personally, I don’t buy the self-serving, circular argument stating that we’re fighting terror by torturing people and that it might be wrong, but we can’t expose the torture because it would only help the terror that we’re trying to fight and weaken our national security. This argument is completely devoid of morality, evades all accountability and creates a never ending cycle of madness. The blame for these abuses lies with the national leaders who sought to undermine the accords of the Geneva Conventions by continuously questioning their relevance in this struggle.

If top U.S. officials are constantly undermining laws which dictate the humane treatment of prisoners, then how can we begin to blame soldiers that violate these laws?

It is troubling to note that the American public, while fully equipped with a recently replenished arsenal of “family values”, does not stand uniformly opposed to these tactics.

A placid citizenry can be a nation’s greatest threat, especially when considering the full repercussions of a favorable ruling for the DOD.

The DOD’s line of defense is essentially seeking to sacrifice our most basic liberty, the freedom speech, so that they and their political allies will not have to be held responsible for the immense catastrophe that is our foreign policy.

A ruling in favor of the DOD would also create a scenario where our government is free to continue its barbaric practices unchecked and free from public scrutiny.

This scenario makes it increasingly hard to imagine that an appeal would be successful; however, our legal system has its flaws and the permanent withholding of these items still remains a possibility.

If these materials don’t become available through legal means, I am certain that some day, by some unknown source, these items will be leaked to the media.

The truth always finds a way to reveal itself, and once the public becomes aware of the extent of these abuses, Americans will be forced to ask themselves some serious questions.