Occultatio: The Bush Administration's Rhetorical War

Abstract

Debate roiled in the early months of Barack Obama's presidency surrounding the use of “enhanced interrogation” techniques and their relation to torture. In this essay we argue that the Bush White House bequeathed to the incoming administration a citizenry haunted by the paradox of torture enacted in the name of freedom. To account for this legacy, we introduce the trope of occultatio, a device of imperial mystification. Through key examples of legalese, signing statements, redaction, and stonewalling, we show how the Bush administration's occultic political style actively exploited the gaps of which democracy is made.

Keywords:

• Legalese
• Redaction
• Signing Statements
• Stonewalling
• Torture

Notes

Of the many works on George W. Bush's imperial presidency, see in particular Johnson (2004), Foster (2006), Hartnett and Stengrim (2006), and Savage (2007).

For more on additional Bush administration scandals, see Kucinich (2008, June 10), and the Conyers (2007).

Dick Cheney's Energy Task Force “proceeded in complete secrecy” before the events of September 11, 2001, and was the source of conflict between the Office of the Vice President and the General Accounting Office (Fenster, 2006; Kirtley, 2006; Pozen, 2005).

For an insider's recounting of the peculiar care taken to keep the legal memos that justified the use of “enhanced interrogation” secret, see Goldsmith, J. (2007).

For a complete breakdown of the functions of Executive Order 13292, see Public Citizen (2003).

This includes, of course, the tens of thousands of pages of government and military documents obtained by the ACLU, especially concerning the memorandums that justified the use of the waterboard and other methods. See ACLU (2008a, b).

It should be noted, however, that Cheney's representation of the Bush administration's policy on matters of “enhanced interrogation” was skewed in his own favor. Indeed, as David Brooks points out, several officials in Bush's cabinet either expressed dissent toward the policies of “enhanced interrogation” or actively worked to abolish them in the latter years of his presidency (Brooks, 2009).

“Pass through” in a very material sense. Take, for example, protest reenactments of the horrors at Abu Ghraib (May, Kuruvila, & Ustinova, 2008); artworks by Steve Powers (waterboard “thrill-ride” at Coney Island; Adler, 2008), and Jenny Holzer (redaction paintings; Storr & Holzer, 2007); and journalists such as Christopher Hitchens who was himself waterboarded (Hitchens, 2008).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Donovan Conley

Donovan Conley (Ph.D., University of Illinois, 2004) is Associate Professor of Communication Studies at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

William O. Saas

William O. Sass (M.A., University of Nevada, Las Vegas) is a doctoral student in the Department of Communication Arts and Sciences at the Pennsylvania State University.