This article kind of reminded me of Bo’s famous sign at the lib anti-war rally. War is bad unless your a democrat. Seems the same goes for torture. Its bad unless your a democrat. Anyone recall any great outcry from the left over this?
http://volokh.com/2010/04/19/waco/
Waco
Kenneth Anderson • April 19, 2010 11:48 pm
Bill Clinton’s invocation of Timothy McVeigh in connection with the Tea Party movement caused me to recall my review of a book on the Waco massacre that was a motivation for McVeigh. The book under review was Reavis, The Ashes of Waco, and it appeared in the Times Literary Supplement in 1995. Re-reading it for the first time in many years, I was struck by this section:
[T]here is the post hoc justification for the use of CS tear-gas in the raid offered by the US Justice Department and senior Clinton administration officials. The public generally, and even the Congressional hearings, seem to have accepted that the children at Waco were gassed and then died as, in effect, “collateral damage” in the course of a raid aimed at their parents.
This is not quite the case, however, by the Clinton administration’s own admissions. CS gas was used at the compound, in order, as senior White House adviser George Stephanopoulos said, echoing senior Justice Department statements, to “try and pressure” those in the compound. It was hoped, he said, that as this “pressure was increased, the maternal instincts of the mothers might take over and they might try to leave with their kids” (Washington Times, April 23, 1995).
But the FBI knew beforehand that adults in the compound had gas masks; the gas therefore would not put pressure on them. On whom, then? If the FBI knew that the adults had gas masks, but went ahead with the gas attack anyway, it is plain that this “pressure” was brought directly against the children because, as the FBI knew, they could not fit into adult– size gas masks. “Maternal feelings”, the FBI hoped, would be unleashed in the mothers by watching their children choking, gasping and blistering from the gas.
The plan Reno approved and took to President Clinton for approval contemplated the children choking in the gas unprotected for forty-eight hours if necessary, to produce the requisite “maternal feelings”. By taking aim at the children with potentially lethal gas, their mothers would be compelled, according to the FBI plan repeatedly defended by the Clinton administration afterwards as “rational” planning, to flee with them into the arms of those trying to gas them. [Emphasis added.]
An independent report on Waco written by the Harvard Professor of Law and Psychiatry, Alan A. Stone, for the then Deputy Attorney General Philip Heymann, says it “is difficult to believe that the US government would deliberately plan to expose twenty-five children, most of them infants and toddlers, to CS gas for forty-eight hours”. Unfortunately, however, that appears to have been exactly the plan.
The effect of CS gas on an unprotected infant exposed for only two to three hours is discussed in the report; in that case report, dating from the early 1970s, the child’s symptoms during the first twenty-four hours were upper respiratory; but, within forty-eight hours his face showed evidence of first degree burns, and he was in severe respiratory distress typical of chemical pneumonia. The infant had cyanosis, required urgent positive pressure pulmonary care, and was hospitalized for twenty– eight days. Other signs of toxicity appeared, including an enlarged liver.
Professor Stone’s report is measured, careful and damning. It is hard to know whether Heymann’s courage in commissioning it was a reason for his subsequent departure from the Justice Department. In the mean time, questions about the performance of the Justice Department are treated by the Clinton administration not as serious allegations of criminal activity, but as little more than a below-the-belt salvo in the culture wars.
I was shocked to read in Stone’s report that the Justice Department had undertaken, and had defended in the press as such, activities which if conducted in wartime would constitute war crimes. Because exposing the children to CS gas was the point of the FBI exercise: no children exposed, no pressure.
I was living in Poland at the time of the Waco massacre. I remember the absolutely stunned feeling watching the compound engulfed in flames. Since then, I’ve seen documentaries on this event, but I never heard of Professor Stone’s report until now. Perhaps I wasn’t paying close enough attention.
For those who are interested in primary sources, here’s a link to the Stone report.
After a cursory skimming of it, I agree with Kenneth Anderson that the report is “measured, careful and damning.” Stone does a good job of being impartial, but the evidence is clear nonetheless.
One last thought about McVeigh, Waco and the Tea Party movement: No matter how heinous the Waco massacre may have been, absolutely nothing justifies what Timothy McVeigh did in Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995. I personally feel that at least part of the reason that McVeigh reacted the way he did was because he was a loner. Had he shared his outrage with someone other than his fellow nutcase Terry Nichols, that outrage might have been channeled into something constructive.
Fast forward to 2010. The parallels that are attempted to be drawn between Oklahoma City and the Tea Party movement fall short on at least two major points: the source of the outrage; and the nature of the movement. As harmful as the policies of the Obama Administration are to our country’s economic and social future, there’s no one violent event like Waco that would invoke a violent response of comparable magnitude. Secondly, the sense of community within the Tea Party movement tends to have a moderating effect on any potential violence. Notwithstanding the isolated incidents following the passage of healthcare “reform,” the Tea Parties have been a largely peaceful, albeit outspoken, events.
Perhaps I wasn’t paying close enough attention.
That was my problem also I think, as I had never heard all this either. As is almost always the case when the government goes after some group like this, accusations of child molesting precede. When I hear that, I fall in line to support government action. The next time something like this happens I’m going to look at things much harder.
After reading this I can’t help but think of Ruby Ridge. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_Ridge