If that ain't a oxyMORON I don't know what one is . . .

Methodism, Torture and the Presidential Library

Methodism began as an 18th century spiritual renewal movement in the Church of England. At the time of the American Revolution only a few hundred Americans identified with Methodism. By the Civil War, Methodism was by far the largest church in the United States with one in three church members calling it their faith community. No other institution has done more good in shaping the ethos of American religion and culture than the Methodist Church.

Southern Methodist University is one of 123 educational institutions that are related to the modern day United Methodist Church. SMU is the only major university that has Methodist in the name. Because of this fact we were particularly troubled to read the November 27, 2006, report by United Press International that associates of George W. Bush are in the process of raising $500 million for his presidential library and think tank at SMU.

Anyone who thinks that the name Methodism or Southern Methodist University should be associated with George W. Bush needs to read the book, Oath Betrayed: Torture, Medical Complicity, and the War on Terror by Dr. Steven Miles, professor of medicine at the University of Minnesota.

Professor Miles has based this volume on painstaking research and highly-credible sources, including eyewitness accounts, army criminal investigations, FBI debriefings of prisoners, autopsy reports, and prisoners’ medical records. These documents tell a story strikingly different from the Bush administration version presented to the American people, revealing involvement at every level of government, from the Presbyterian Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld to prison health-care personnel. The book also shows how the highest officials of government are complicit in this pattern of torture, including Episcopal Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez, United Methodist Vice President Dick Cheney and United Methodist President George W. Bush.

While much of the use of torture by the Central Intelligence Agency and Special Forces troops remains concealed, Dr. Miles documents how nineteen prisoners have been tortured to death by American military personnel. The book tells of an Afghan prisoner named Dilawar, an innocent 22-year-old, who drove his taxi to the wrong place at the wrong time. At the U.S. detention center in Bagram, Afghanistan, in December 2002, Dilawar was smothered, shackled and then suspended by his arms. When he was beaten with a baton, he cried out “Allah, Allah,” which amused the soldiers and triggered more merciless blows. The official report reads that he was beaten over a five day period until his legs were, in the words of the coroner, "pulpified." He was then chained to the ceiling of his cell, where he died. Although an autopsy stated that Dilawar's death was a homicide, General Daniel McNeil told reporters that Dilawar had died of natural causes on the grounds that one of his coronary arteries was partly occluded. The words "coronary artery disease" were typed in a different font on the prisoner's death certificate.

Up to 90 percent of the prisoners detained in the Bush “war on terror” have been found to be unjustifiably imprisoned and without intelligence value. In addition, much of the hideous work of torture is out-sourced by the Bush administration to countries like Uzbekistan, Syria and Egypt, where torture is a long-standing and common practice. In July 2004, the British ambassador to Uzbekistan, Craig Murray, who grew up in a devout Methodist home, protested the Uzbek intelligence service's interrogation practices: "Tortured dupes are forced to sign up to confessions showing what the Uzbek government wants the U.S. and U.K. to believe. . . . This material is useless --- we are selling our souls for dross."

Torture is a crime against humanity and a violation of every human rights treaty in existence, including the Geneva Conventions which prohibit cruel and degrading treatment of detainees. Torture is as profound a moral issue in our day as was slavery in the 19th century. It represents a betrayal of our deepest human and religious values as a civilized society.

David Hackett Fischer describes in his Pulitzer Prize winning book, Washington's Crossing, how thousands of American prisoners of war were “treated with extreme cruelty by British captors,” during the Revolutionary War. There are numerous accounts of injured soldiers who surrendered being murdered and Americans dying in prison ships in New York harbor of starvation and torture.

After crossing the Delaware River and winning his first battle at Trenton, New Jersey, on Christmas Day, 1776, George Washington ordered his troops to give refuge to hundreds of surrendering foreign mercenaries. "Treat them with humanity," Washington instructed his troops. "Let them have no reason to complain of our copying the brutal example of the British army."

Contrast this with the September 15, 2006, Washington Post lead editorial titled “The president goes to Capitol Hill to lobby for torture.” “President Bush rarely visits Congress. So it was a measure of his painfully skewed priorities that Mr. Bush made the unaccustomed trip yesterday to seek legislative permission for the CIA to make people disappear into secret prisons and have information extracted from them by means he dare not describe publicly.”

If the Bush Library and think tank are placed at SMU, The United Methodist Church should withdraw its association from the University and demand that the good name of Methodism be removed from the name of the school. If The United Methodist Church cannot take a stand against the use of torture and those who employ it, including President Bush, what does it stand for?

Andrew J. Weaver, Ph.D., is a United Methodist minister and research psychologist living in New York City. He is a graduate of The Perkins School of Theology, SMU. He has co-authored 12 books including: Counseling Survivors of Traumatic Events (Abingdon, 2003) and Reflections on Grief and the Spiritual Journey (Abingdon, 2005).

Fred W. Kandeler M.Div. is a retired United Methodist pastor living in New Braunfels, Texas. He was the founding pastor of Christ UMC in Plano, Texas and a United Methodist District Superintendent. He is a graduate of the Perkins School of Theology, SMU.

Remember his stadium ? the land that was built on was eminant domained from some poor people because he wouldn't pay their price if I remember correctly

A library consiting of coloring & Connect the Dots books . . .

Rush is an oxycontinmoron

If some people feel that he deserves a library, and I don't, let them clear some scrub on his Crawford ranch and build it there. After all, for all the traffic it will generate, it may as well be isolated and behind a fence.

Maybe there should be a poll taken to see how many people actually feel that he deserves such an honour. I'll bet a pound to a lump of poop that the nay's would far outnumber the yea's.

#5 Czar... Hehehehehehe

What are they going to do, bus in and pay people to tour the fake "presidential" library.

Maybe some day they can turn it into an roller rink for fake Christians.

Come see the big vault door. . . . . That hides all the evidence of murder & corruption on a monumental scale. . . . . you poor bastards . . .

Remember its all about gwb and was always about gwb . . . . . always about gwb. . .

These people, seem to me, to be entirely accustomed to bullying and intimidating until they get what they want. Why they still support this jackass, however, is beyond me. What's to memorialize? Oh, maybe, a shrine to the puppet that allowed them to realize THEIR dreams of power and riches? Realized on the backs of the worlds working class, bought and paid for with lies and deceit, murder and manipulation.

Perhaps Bush's legacy IS something that should be memorialized, but not to glorify, rather to warn others what happens when corporate interests take over their government for them.

This, I believe, would be a far better use of the Bush memorial Library.

Not to minimize the atrocities of WWII, but..

even Auschwitz became a memorial of sorts...a warning against evil.

Thank you Andrew, for the article in comment #2.

Has a presidential library ever been burned to the ground?

Will the Dubya preznitial library include water boarding tools?

Merry Christmas everybody!

At least it's only in texas . . .

Here's a cool monument. . .

http://seedsofdoubt.com/...bush_baghdad_square1.jpg

Will the library be closed when the book's checked out?

If they do make a Bush library, it will serve as a shrine of this administration's propaganda. A tombstone for "truth". It may not be such a bad thing. Decades from now, people can examine a library full of spin and propaganda, it may serve a purpose. They should have everything in it, like NVR fake news releases, the false drum-up to the Iraq War, how they manipulated the willing corporate mainstream media, how they ran up the deficit, how they let Israelis interests trump American interests, the "liars wing" with all of them: Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Ashcroft, Cherthoff, Wolfowitz, Perle, Hadley, Libby, Hughes, Rice. The WHIG room, the PNAC room. The "media shill" room with Kristol, Novak, Coulter, Hannity, Limbaugh, FOX News, O'Reilly. The "ruin the environment" room, the "wealthy tax cut" room, you can get a coffee to go with your Medicare "donut holes". The "stolen election" room, and the "electronic vote machine" room. The "wiretap room" and "trashing the constitution room", explaining how they revoked Habeus Corpus, and the whole library will be wiretapped.

I don't see how they're gonna stock the damned place. After all, everything with any relevance will be classified, not for our eyes. Some library!

Speakers On!

http://takebackthemedia.com/bushnonazi.html

Karma is so cool. The land is stolen by the methodist church for the illegal prez.My family is so methodist. My grand father sold the family cow to start a methodist church. Then all the kids went without milk. My uncle retired as a methodist minister to the church retirement home. Had to sell his antiques and give them most of his savings for that honor. He had chest pains for two days(the Dr. went on her honeymoon) and then died of a heart attack. His son, my cousin was superintendent of the east coast methodists of N.C., was asked if he could recommend the retirement home ...He cursed....and refused.You can count on Karma.

Ah Brad.....

This place should be called the Chicken George Bu$h LIEbrary

After the cruel, crooked life Bush has led and all the innocent blood he has shed, they'll have to steal ground bury him in. I suggest this awful guy lie anywhere in the world except in the United States, a country he has shamed and dishonored.

Saudi Arabia seems as good a place as any. How much you wanna bet they won't want the bastard either?

As a last resort, there's always the dumpster out back of that phony library.

Screw Worst President Ever. . . . . bush shouldn't lead a Cub Scout pack . . .
Finally bush is getting his wish "The execution of saddam hussein"...

So he can ask,,, NOW Do you Love Me daddy 41?

he should be the one to open the trap door on saddam hussein

& OH YES THE LEGACY, INDEED,,, THE ULTAMATE FUNDY OF FUNDIES . . .

I wouldn't vote for that yuckstick for dogcatcher - who wants a dogcatcher who likes and codifies torture???