Let your conscience be your guide
The founding chairman of the Democratic Party, Martin Lee Chu-ming, has every right to draw attention to China's poor human rights record. Indeed, if his conscience has called on him to do so, he should ignore political exigencies and simply do the right thing.
Conscience is a universal demand that goes beyond politics, ethnicity and nationality. But isn't he getting in bed with the devil? First, consider the forum in which he aired his views. The Wall Street Journal is a national treasure for the US, its business reporting unrivalled in the world and a must-read for investors worldwide.
But its editorial pages are something else. The most rabid, extreme, sometimes deranged right-of-right-wing views find their home there. 'Free Market American Capitalism' is capitalised, like a religion, like God; everyone and everything else that don't agree with its extremist ideology are trashed.
Then consider the man he sought help from. There are US presidents and there are US presidents. Did Mr Lee appeal to George W. Bush because he admires the man, or because any sitting US president would do? Does he think Mr Bush stands for human rights, freedom and civil liberty?
With the possible exception of Richard Nixon, it would be hard to find a post-war president who has been as polarising at home and abroad. Mr Bush came to power in a hotly contested election without a clear mandate. He has trampled on domestic constitutional rights at home and unleashed terrifying violence and bloodshed overseas, all in the name of fighting terror.
Mr Lee is a distinguished barrister, so he understands these legal concepts far better than I do. The Geneva Conventions, a myriad of international conventions against torture and habeas corpus, have all been suspended in this 'war on terror' under an imperial presidency with convoluted legal arguments that fly in the face of two centuries of US constitutional interpretations.
Kangaroo military courts are used to legitimise detaining terror suspects indefinitely without trial or charges. Black sites were being used - and perhaps still are - with friendly allies across Europe to hold, interrogate and torture terror suspects without any legal accountability.
Rendition, once a perfectly legal form of extradition of suspects to the US from a third country, has been used as a legal excuse to kidnap suspects on foreign soil, not a few of whom have turned out to be completely innocent.
Torture is sanctioned by deliberately obscure US Justice Department definitions of 'harsh interrogation techniques', such as 'water boarding' - in which a suspect has water poured over his mouth and nose to stimulate a drowning reflex. This method was popularised, if not invented, by the Spanish Inquisition.
No one knows how many civilians have died or become refugees as a result of US and British military action in Iraq and Afghanistan. The word 'million' is sometimes cited. The 'war against terror' has itself become an exercise in terror.
On September 11, 2001, we were all Americans. Today, we are all anti-American. But, for many people around the world, the US Constitution and the Declaration of Independence remain the most sublime political documents ever penned. They express in the most eloquent terms people's yearning for liberty and free government. No person who is not completely cynical can read them without being moved. So perhaps it is the cunning of history, or one of history's cruellest jokes, that Mr Bush was sworn into office to defend the US Constitution. I guess it's all a matter of interpretation by a partisan US Justice Department.
So I am baffled. If Mr Lee really is a man of conscience, perhaps he should consider meditating with the Dalai Lama or protesting alongside Amnesty International. He should, perhaps, go all the way.
Alex Lo is a senior writer at the Post
