War crimes and cats

Elderly woman driver
hits scooter rider, drives off
to keep hair appointment.

Is the die cast? It would seem to me that now that Bush/Cheney have admitted to condoning waterboarding, and waterboarding, according to our new Attorney General-to-be is torture, and torture is against U.S. law as well as International law, we will have no choice but to prosecute them, and some others, for war crimes. Would it not be completely unacceptable in the eyes of the world not to do so? What excuse could we possibly offer for such a failure? I don’t think explaining that we’re just too busy with other things is going to cut it. I doubt that claiming it is too expensive will work either. The way things are developing it looks like Obama and Holder are going to be compelled to prosecute, even if they might prefer not to do so for whatever reasons. Personally, I think prosecution is obviously the right course, and it certainly will be well-deserved. I hope I live long enough to see these criminals in prison where they belong.

Bush/Cheney have three days left before leaving office. They could do further irreparable damage in that amount of time, but what about pardons? So far Bush has not pardoned anyone we might have expected him to pardon. Some have said he might attempt to pardon himself along with others involved in the torturing and other crimes. I don’t know how he could do that as it would violate all common sense and logic to have a system whereby a President could pardon those he directed to commit crimes he was involved in as well as absolving himself from responsibility. I suppose he might try something like this, knowing that at the very least it would tie itself up in the courts so long he would be probably dead and gone before it was settled. Our justice system doesn’t seem to work very well, or very fast, when it comes to serious white collar crimes. If you have enough money, and can hire enough lawyers, you can keep a case alive virtually forever, and sometimes win even though you are admittedly and obviously guilty. Will Eric Holder be able to restore justice to the Department of Justice? Let us hope so.

Changing the subject entirely, let me say a few words about cats. We currently have four of these strange creatures here at Sandhill. I say “we” even though I am a pretty much an unwilling participant. It’s not that I don’t like cats, or find them interesting, I just would prefer not to have any. But that aside, let me describe these four strange creatures. Our oldest, Ceci, is a calico that was found when very small and left in a parking lot. The woman that found her took her home but her other cats didn’t like her so she gave her to us. Ceci is now about 13 years old. We have two all gray cats, sisters, that have been raised together since birth. They are now about 3 or 4 years old. One of them, Claire, is twice the size of her sister, Kate (I have no idea why). These three were getting along well until recently when Midnight showed up about six months ago. Midnight is now about 1 year old. We did not seek out this almost all black animal, he just showed up in our house, coming in uninvited through the cat door in the basement. He had obviously tried out at two of our neighbors houses but finally settled on ours (my wife is a real sucker for cats). Now we have a sort of cat chaos, even though we spent good bucks getting him fixed. The problem is he is too young to know how to behave. He wants to play with the other cats, but they don’t want to play with him. They don’t like him. He’s big and he sometimes chases both Claire and Ceci. He never hurts them, but he sometimes corners them and then just stands there not knowing what else to do. Ceci, especially, reacts like a hysterical old lady and starts screaming the moment she sees him, even if he doesn’t chase her. Claire also screams but not so much. Kate, however, by far the smallest of all, has his number. When he approaches her she chases him away and he does run from her. It is quite amazing how this littlest one can dominate all the others. Ceci is a grouch and does not like to be picked up, although she will let my wife pet her at times. Claire and Kate are affectionate enough when outside, but not in the house. Neither one likes to be picked up although you can briefly pet them otherwise. Midnight is the only one that is truly affectionate and will allow himself to loll in your arms or on your lap and cannot be petted enough. He is just a big dumb brute of a cat, Ceci and Claire are fat and relatively inactive, Kate is slim and elegant and fears absolutely nothing. She seems to have the metabolism of a hummingbird. They are all spoiled and rip up the furniture which has now badly deteriorated. I refuse to buy new until we rid ourselves of the cats. My wife will never agree to this so we just put up with our shredded furniture and the chaos. Someone said that “a house without a cat, is like life without sunshine.” I believe I might prefer the darkness. Such is life here at Sandhill. My son is away at University, the rest of us just slowly grow old together.

LKBIQ:
Cats and monkeys; monkeys and cats; all human life is there.
Henry James

TILT:
Gerald Brenan, to spite his father who wanted him to attend Sandhurst, set off with a friend to walk to China. They only made it to Bosnia where they ran out of money.