Once again credit has to be given
where it is due. The Bush administration propaganda machine is
flexing its cut, bulging, muscles. Just when it appears that the
Bush team is down for the count they change the subject, distract
an already complacent media and a hypnotized public, get off the
mat and then return to the fight. The scandal and disgrace of the
Abu Ghraib torture revelations caused even Republicans to utter
words of condemnation. Donald Rumsfeld had to endure his own humiliation
as he was forced to give one mea culpa after another before Congressional
committees. Even GOP Senators tried to outdo one another expressing
outrage and disgust. Richard Lugar, Trent Lott, John Warner, Pat
Roberts and Orrin Hatch were all shocked, shocked to have been
kept in the dark about the situation at Abu Ghraib. Of course any
semi-curious web surfer knew about human rights abuses in
Iraq and Afghanistan. Only members of the United States Senate,
the most powerful legislators on earth, were unaware of them.
Does Karl Rove have a rainy day fund of issues to raise in tough
times? Did he and John Ashcroft talk about emerging cases that
would make Bush look truly compassionate, i.e. friendly to black
people? The decision to reopen the
Emmett Till murder investigation certainly challenged the Abu Ghraib
story for media attention. Did they pick Emmett Till out of a hat
or was he being held in reserve? The rightness of reopening the
case is clear. Who would argue against finding the evil killers
of an innocent child?
The story of Emmett Till was not unique. His
murder is well known because it took place as the great American
Revolution, the civil
rights movement, was beginning to take shape. Black Americans lived
under the threat of lynching for decades, our own history of terrorism.
Till was a 14-year old Chicagoan murdered in Money, Mississippi
in 1955 while visiting relatives. He allegedly spoke to, whistled
at, touched, pinched, or recklessly eyeballed a white woman in
a grocery store. Her husband, brother-in-law and perhaps other
persons abducted Till, beat and tortured him and shot him in the
head. His mother, Mamie Till Mobley, insisted on keeping her child’s
coffin open so that the world would be forced to see his tortured,
mutilated face.
The two men tried for the murder, Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam, both
now deceased, were acquitted but later admitted their guilt in
a Look magazine article. Two recently produced documentaries, The
Murder of Emmett Till and The
Untold Story of Emmett Louis Till, revealed the existence of
additional suspects who may still be living.
The apprehension of additional killers would
be a true victory for justice. No one will question the need
to resolve the unanswered
questions in this case. I certainly won’t, but I was left with
a nagging suspicion that the announcement of reopening the case
was all staged, waiting for an opportune moment, such as a drop
in approval ratings, to seize the media day.
The United States Department of Justice has had little interest
in justice ever since the Bush regime came to power. Attorney General
John Ashcroft has insisted on prosecuting old comedians who
sell drug paraphernalia, the environmental group, Green
Peace, and library card holders throughout the nation. The
ACLU can’t even publicly reveal details of its challenge to the
Patriot Act because doing so violates the
Patriot Act. Ashcroft has seen the light now that a presidential
election year and bad news overseas have arrived. Faster than you
can say Miranda Warning our intrepid Attorney General is actually
doing the job he is supposed to do.
The use of words such as genius to describe
Karl Rove and other political operatives should cease. The job
of making bad politicians
look good isn’t genius. The scientist who discovers a cure for
HIV should be called a genius. Anyone who would orchestrate a presidential
landing on an aircraft carrier only to repudiate the
stunt when it no longer has any campaign commercial or photo op
benefit, is not a genius. Rove and his ilk are more like three
card monty players who use sleight of hand to distract suckers and
prevent them from looking at the marked card.
We should not see ourselves as suckers, however.
Democratic Senator Charles Schumer of New York expressed “pleasant
surprise” when the announcement was made in the Till case.
Schumer is known for giving press conferences to announce envelope
openings. If he didn’t know that a notorious murder case was being
reopened we can only assume that it was because it hadn’t been
discussed. Bush was taking a beating on Iraq, so it was time to
get Iraq and Abu Ghraib a little further back in the paper.
The announcement of the new investigation will be a test for Ashcroft
and the rest of the Bush administration. Having raised the hopes
of millions with just one announcement the political geniuses must
now deliver. They must be watched to guarantee that justice will
truly be done in the case of Emmett Till. The war on terror should
begin at home. It should not take a back seat to saving the election
prospects of a man who cheated his way into the White House and
lied to get his nation into a disastrous war.