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The Abu Ghraib scandal has shocked the world and created an incredible recruitment tool for the war against the war against terror. But fear not my fellow Americans, this is an administration that centers itself on personal accountability. The privatization president has been holding educators' collective feet to the fire for their failure to correct society as a whole in their under funded classrooms by preaching (quite effectively) for ACCOUNTABILITY. The same can be said about the president's vision (not plan, but vision) to undo the New Deal's safety net in Social Security. By creating private accounts, citizens will be able to be more ACCOUNTABLE for their own retirement.

Somewhere around the Potomac, the buzzword accountability loses its power. Exit strategy for Iraq? We don't need one because we're not leaving until that oil is gone. Apparently, the WMDs are at the bottom of the reserves. However, we are holding accountable the persons responsible for the prisoner abuse scandal (no, not Guantanamo Bay, the other one).

In a rare show of tokenism, Brigadier-General Janis Karpinski has been busted down to a Colonel. Proving to the world just how serious the Bush administration is about this scandal, they have really nailed their scapegoat by brutally punishing the person in charge of the prison. This will effectively end her career and according to the Army’s website (given her years of service), this demotion which came from the Oval Office, will cost her personally $1100 a month. She will go from $109,162.80 a year to a measly $95,878.80.

Meanwhile, the troops we supposedly support by purchasing yellow ribbon magnets at the gas stations (ironically enough) are being sentenced up to 10 years in federal prison for their part. Never mind the fact that Phil Zimbardo’s famous studies at Stanford have proven that humans will devolve to such brutality when it is allowed and especially when it is encouraged. This is not to justify the actions of men like Charles Graner, but rather an indictment on the lack of ACCOUNTABILITY at the upper echelons of the Army that was supposed to be showing leadership and not allowing such conditions to fester under foot. If a dog is left locked up inside for days, who is to blame when the dog voids his bowels on the carpet? Now to carry a bad analogy further, if that dog is actually praised for ruining the figurative carpet and encouraged to do so, is it even moral to then rub the dog’s nose in its mess?

But Karpinsky will likely have to budget a little bit tighter to make up the $1100 a month pay cut. Evil has been punished. A few bad apples, a just war, a free Iraq and other slogans will aptly band-aid over the slashed jugular of our nation’s international leadership, pride and respect. Of course, the Bush tax cut will nearly offset this “punishment” anyway.

Isn’t accountability a wonderful thing?