Advice From God

Dear God,

As I’m sure you know, well you’re God so of course you know, but anyway Congress just passed a bill forbidding the U.S. military or intelligence services from using torture. Bush signed it, but in a signing statement he said that the bill would not interfere with his ability to exercise his power as president, which makes me think he’s still going to do it.

Is torture always wrong, or is it sometimes OK to torture someone if he’s a really really bad guy?

-Farley

Farley,

Sure, torture is OK sometimes, as long as you’re reasonably certain whoever you’re torturing is a really, really bad person.

Cannibalism is OK on occasion too. When you’ve got friends in the mortuary business, why pay for liver?

Rape is OK every once in a blue moon, as long as she’s dressed provocatively and asking for it.

Adultery is also OK every now and then. If nobody finds out, who’s the wiser?

Blowing up buildings is OK, as long as you drop bombs onto them from airplanes.

(Never crash airplanes directly into buildings, because that is evil.)

Stealing is OK, if someone else has something sitting around that you could put to better use.

Heck, as long as you can come up with a half-ass excuse, go ahead and do whatever you feel like. Just pray to me afterward and everything’s forgiven anyway.

See you in Heaven!

-God

Dear God,

Over the last two years, I’ve been hearing and seeing some very disturbing things about torture. Those pictures from Abu Ghraib just turned my stomach, and apparently there is a woldwide network of American “black site” prisons nobody knows anything about. I shudder to think what might happen behind those walls. Now I hear that the new Iraqi government that two thousand Americans died to establish has its own network of secret torture prisons, organized with the help of Iranian agents. As an American citizen, I feel a terrible sense of responsibility for these barbaric acts carried out by my government in my name. Sometimes I feel like we’re sliding back into the Dark Ages, and there’s nothing I can do to stop it. What can I do?

-Terry

Terry,

Ah, the good old days. Don’t tell me you’ve got something against the Dark Ages. Christianity dominated Europe, and it was a good thing.

Come on, Terry. Major retail chains this very minute are wishing people “Happy Holidays,” for My sake! And you’re hung up on this torture business?

Seriously, torture? There’s no torture going on. What you’ve got at Abu Ghraib is a few bad apples on the night shift, doing fraternity hazing types of things. Other than that, what we’re talking about are innovative and unique ways of extracting information, unorthodox interrogation techniques, setting the conditions for successful debriefings.

If I hadn’t meant for you to passively accept unthinkably horrible behavior on the part of your own government, I wouldn’t have granted politicians and their lawyers the gift of the misleading euphemism, now, would I?

Besides, the End Times are coming. There’s nothing you can do but sit back, slap on some SPF 2000, and watch Ragnarok roll.

Cheers.

-God

Dear God,

I have recently heard reports that President George W. Bush has set up secret prisons in old Soviet-era gulags in Eastern Europe, in Poland and perhaps Romania. There are credible allegations that President Bush is having people tortured at those prisons.

I understand that George W. Bush talks to you a lot. What has Mr. Bush told you about what happens to people in those secret prisons of his?

- Edmund

Edmund,

Sorry, I can’t tell you. You see, I have to respect the will of the American people. They, or their representatives, have spoken. Just a couple of days ago, in the United States Senate, Senator Carl Levin introduced Senate Amendment 2430, which would have created an independent commission to investigate allegations of torture and other forms of abuse of prisoners in George W. Bush’s international network of secret prisons.

Although many senators voted in favor of the amendment, not a single Republican voted to approve commission. So, because the Republican majority of the U.S. Senate voted to block the commission to investigate torture, I feel obliged to keep my mouth shut. As long as the Republican majority in your Congress says that it’s going to refuse to ask any questions about the torture being conducted by the Bush Administration, I’ll go along with their decision.
You see, George W. Bush isn’t the only Republican who talks to me. Jack Abramoff talks to me too, and he has arranged some pretty nice favors to come my way over the years.

- God