Al Gore Speech 5/26/2004
Part 4

This is part 4 of my fisking of Al Gore's speech from May 26, 2004 at a MoveOn.org rally. Gore's remarks are in blue.

[ Gore's Original Speech ]
[ Part 1 ][ Part 2 ][ Part 3 ][ Part 4 ][ Part 5 ][ Part 6 ][ Wrap Up ]

Tim's Note: I try pretty hard to take Bush's critics seriously enough to consider their arguments. However, the following passage from Gore is an incoherent mess. He seems to be trying to make a metaphysical/psychological/political connection between power, the abuses at Abu Ghraib and the Bush Administration.

Unfortunately, I can't extract much of a point from them. I have to let them pass with little comment. I'm open to hear from a translator.

Those pictures of torture and sexual abuse came to us embedded in a wave of news about escalating casualties and growing chaos enveloping our entire policy in Iraq. But in order understand the failure of our overall policy, it is important to focus specifically on what happened in the Abu Ghraib prison, and ask whether or not those actions were representative of who we are as Americans? Obviously the quick answer is no, but unfortunately it's more complicated than that.

So, Gore is stretching the events in Abu Ghraib to cast a pall over the mission in Iraq. I suppose this is red meat to people who loathe the military, but this is deeply unfair to all those who have done good in Iraq.

There is good and evil in every person. And what makes the United States special in the history of nations is our commitment to the rule of law and our carefully constructed system of checks and balances. Our natural distrust of concentrated power and our devotion to openness and democracy are what have lead us as a people to consistently choose good over evil in our collective aspirations more than the people any other nation.

Our founders were insightful students of human nature. They feared the abuse of power because they understood that every human being has not only "better angels" in his nature, but also an innate vulnerability to temptation - especially the temptation to abuse power over others.

Our founders understood full well that a system of checks and balances is needed in our constitution because every human being lives with an internal system of checks and balances that cannot be relied upon to produce virtue if they are allowed to attain an unhealthy degree of power over their fellow citizens.

Listen then to the balance of internal impulses described by specialist Charles Graner when confronted by one of his colleagues, Specialist Joseph M. Darby, who later became a courageous whistleblower. When Darby asked him to explain his actions documented in the photos, Graner replied: "The Christian in me says it's wrong, but the Corrections Officer says, 'I love to make a groan[sic] man piss on himself."

Generally If Gore is trying to make the point that too much power in one person's hands is a bad thing, I agree with these sentiments. However, I cringe because I know where it is going.

What happened at the prison, it is now clear, was not the result of random acts by "a few bad apples," it was the natural consequence of the Bush Administration policy that has dismantled those wise constraints and has made war on America's checks and balances.

Gore's point might have some weight if there were an official policy to abuse prisoners, or if the guards responsible were not going to jail themselves, or if President Bush had convinced Congress to convey its powers to the executive (as did Hitler). However, that isn't the case. Congress has not been dissolved, and the courts have not been suspended. Our Republic is still structurally the same as it was January 2001 when gore had to pack his office up and move out. Gore may hate the Patriot Act, but what Congress hath wrought, Congress can bring to heel. Gore's audience may not be able to see the distinction between the role of Congress as lawmakers, but he should, and acting like Bush is somehow an emperor with limitless powers is ridiculous.

The abuse of the prisoners at Abu Ghraib flowed directly from the abuse of the truth that characterized the Administration's march to war and the abuse of the trust that had been placed in President Bush by the American people in the aftermath of September 11th.

This is typical of the Vietnam era "don't blame the soldier, blame the system", which is a strain of the liberal mindset "don't blame the criminal, blame society". The Uniform Code of Crimnal Justice (UCMJ) is pretty clear about how to conduct yourself in war.

[ Gore's Original Speech ]
[ Part 1 ][ Part 2 ][ Part 3 ][ Part 4 ][ Part 5 ][ Part 6 ][ Wrap Up ]

Tim McNabb