By Kenneth J. Theisen, 5/11/07
In still another move by the Bush regime to restrict
information available to Congress and the public, the Department of Defense
(DOD) has placed new restrictions on who can appear to testify before
Congress. Robert Wilkie is the assistant
Secretary of Defense for legislative affairs.
According to the Boston Globe, he sent an April 19, 2007 memo to the House
Armed Services Committee outlining the new restrictions.
The new rules prevent most military
personnel from appearing at Congressional hearings, except for full colonels
and above. Even colonels and generals who
are allowed by the regime to testify would need to be accompanied by a civilian
official from the Bush administration, such as Robert Gates or one of his
top-level aides. In countries such as Iraq under
Saddam these people were called “political minders.” They are routine in
fascist states.
In order for lower level officers or
enlisted personnel to meet with members of Congress or their staff for personal
briefings they must be “deemed appropriate” by the Pentagon and the new
guidelines prohibit any recording of the proceedings in order to provide
deniability later. These new rules also
apply to DOD civilian employees as well.
They are obviously designed to eradicate whistle blowers and others who
wish to enlighten Congress on the nefarious doings of the Bush regime.
If these rules had been in effect at
the time of the recent hearings on the Pat Tillman and Jessica Lynch affairs,
many of the witnesses would not have been allowed to testify, sparing the
regime much embarrassment.
The Bush regime has already used
these guidelines in the latter part of last month. A captain, major, and a
lieutenant colonel were to appear at a closed-door hearing to describe their
experience training Iraqi security forces. Training Iraqis to replace Americans is a
vital component of the Bush regime’s strategy to “win” the Iraq war. Unfortunately for the administration, reports
on the training indicate that it is not going well. A DOD official stated that the officers could
not testify if the meeting was recorded.
When the Congressmen insisted that the meeting would be recorded the DOD
official and the three officers left the hearing.
Members of Congress are angry about
the new restrictions and there is talk of using subpoenas to get around
them. Generally Congress has not had to
resort to compelling testimony or getting witnesses to appear before
Congressional panels. But in the more
than six years of the Bush regime, the administration has continually resisted
providing information to Congress and the public. The regime is notorious for failing to comply
with Freedom of Information requests. When Congress passes legislation
requiring regular reports from the administration, the president has
consistently issued signing letters stating that he will do so only if it does
not interfere with his role as Commander-in-Chief or otherwise conflict with
his views of executive power.
For this administration information
is a powerful political weapon.
Therefore it restricts who has access to information whenever it
can. The regime also realizes that when
light is shed on its actions, whether it be about torture memos, massive NSA spying
operations, restrictions of what government scientists can say, or any of it
war crimes or other crimes against humanity,
more and more people see the real fascist nature of the regime’s
program.
World Can’t Wait will continue to
follow this conflict between Congress and the Administration as it continues. I am sure that the new
restrictions will be used frequently.