National Weekend of Cleansing

The temptation will be great, once Bush is gone, to take the whole torture thing and sweep it under the carpet. And maybe that's the best thing to do.

There's a good "bloggingheads" video (about 5 minutes long) here that lays out Obama's principal options for dealing with the use of torture by the Bush Administration. The correct choice is not obvious.

Maybe there's nothing we should do on a political level. It would be very satisfying to see Dick Cheney and David Addington in prison, but the effort expended getting them there could distract us from more important business, and come at a political cost that's just not worth paying. People who are disgusted that America has become a nation that tortures, but otherwise backed Bush, might feel obligated to defend him even on this.

But even if we do nothing at a political level, I really feel a need to do something on a national level -- something that says, "We are not those people."

I therefore propose a National Weekend of Cleansing, to be celebrated in America's churches, synagogues, and mosques, on January 24-25, 2009, the first weekend after Inauguration Day. Or celebrate it in your home. The purpose of the day would be to ask forgiveness for the sins we have allowed to be committed in our name, and to dedicate ourselves to returning our government to the values that guided it for 211 of the last 219 years.

How do you ask forgiveness? That's up to you.

What a bad dream this has been.