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Today's Must Read
Bart Gellman and Jo Becker continue their excellent series on Vice President Dick Cheney with an exquisite piece on Cheney's role in interrogations. At every stage in the post-9/11 debate, Cheney and his staff sought to enshrine torture as official U.S. policy, relying on a legalistic distinction between "torture" and "cruelty."
David S. Addington, Cheney's general counsel, set the new legal agenda in a blunt memorandum shortly after the CIA delegation returned to Langley. Geneva's "strict limits on questioning of enemy prisoners," he wrote on Jan. 25, 2002, hobbled efforts "to quickly obtain information from captured terrorists."No longer was the vice president focused on procedural rights, such as access to lawyers and courts. The subject now was more elemental: How much suffering could U.S. personnel inflict on an enemy to make him talk? Cheney's lawyer feared that future prosecutors, with motives "difficult to predict," might bring criminal charges against interrogators or Bush administration officials.
Geneva rules forbade not only torture but also, in equally categorical terms, the use of "violence," "cruel treatment" or "humiliating and degrading treatment" against a detainee "at any time and in any place whatsoever." The War Crimes Act of 1996 made any grave breach of those restrictions a U.S. felony [Read the act]. The best defense against such a charge, Addington wrote, would combine a broad presidential direction for humane treatment, in general, with an assertion of unrestricted authority to make exceptions.
The vice president's counsel proposed that President Bush issue a carefully ambiguous directive. Detainees would be treated "humanely and, to the extent appropriate and consistent with military necessity, in a manner consistent with the principles of" the Geneva Conventions. When Bush issued his public decision two weeks later, on Feb. 7, 2002, he adopted Addington's formula -- with all its room for maneuver -- verbatim.
In a radio interview last fall, Cheney said, "We don't torture." What he did not acknowledge, according to Alberto J. Mora, who served then as the Bush-appointed Navy general counsel, was that the new legal framework was designed specifically to leave room for cruelty. In international law, Mora said, cruelty is defined as "the imposition of severe physical or mental pain or suffering." He added: "Torture is an extreme version of cruelty."
Again and again on detentions and interrogations policy, Cheney's coterie insisted on what Reagan-era Justice official Bruce Fein calls "monarchical claims." David Addington, Cheney's lawyer and now chief of staff, had set up a "private channel" with John Yoo -- the champion of near-unlimited wartime presidential authority in the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel -- at the Justice Department, squelching several of the department's concerns before they bubbled up to President Bush. Not even officials who agreed with the Cheney-Addington-Yoo line were safe from retribution:
Ashcroft, with support from Gonzales, proposed a lawyer named Patrick Philbin for deputy solicitor general. Philbin was among the authors of the post-9/11 legal revolution, devising arguments to defend Cheney's military commissions and the denial of habeas corpus rights at Guantanamo Bay. But he had tangled with the vice president's office now and then, objecting to the private legal channel between Addington and Yoo and raising questions about domestic surveillance by the National Security Agency.Cheney's lawyer passed word that Philbin was an unsatisfactory choice. The attorney general and White House counsel abandoned their candidate.
It's a side point, but it seems from the piece that after years of vilification, Yoo wants to spread some of the responsibility to Addington. Yoo says he intended a secret memorandum justifying torture in CIA interrogations for the CIA alone -- as the CIA interrogates only the highest-value al-Qaeda operatives -- but Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld insisted on allowing the military access to the same tactics.
But the "torture memo," as it became widely known, was not Yoo's work alone. In an interview, Yoo said that Addington, as well as Gonzales and deputy White House counsel Timothy E. Flanigan, contributed to the analysis.The vice president's lawyer advocated what was considered the memo's most radical claim: that the president may authorize any interrogation method, even if it crosses the line of torture. U.S. and treaty laws forbidding any person to "commit torture," that passage stated, "do not apply" to the commander in chief, because Congress "may no more regulate the President's ability to detain and interrogate enemy combatants than it may regulate his ability to direct troop movements on the battlefield."
That same day, Aug. 1, 2002, Yoo signed off on a second secret opinion, the contents of which have never been made public. According to a source with direct knowledge, that opinion approved as lawful a long list of specific interrogation techniques proposed by the CIA -- including waterboarding, a form of near-drowning that the U.S. government classified as a war crime in 1947. The opinion drew the line against one request: threatening to bury a prisoner alive.
It'll be interesting to see how the revelation that CIA wanted the authority to threaten live burial affects the nomination of John Rizzo -- a longtime CIA attorney -- to become the agency's general counsel.
Comments (57)
OleHippieChick wrote on June 25, 2007 9:20 AM:Shooter and his gang are torture freaks. Sickass pervs. Taguba is right. It's from the top down.
Dev wrote on June 25, 2007 9:26 AM:Dick Cheney is the Martin Borman of the Bush Administration. Democrats would do well to apply that label and make it stick.
Mock Turtle wrote on June 25, 2007 9:27 AM:"Why are all those men being tortured?" asked Alice in horror.
Mock Turtle wrote on June 25, 2007 9:30 AM:"Enemy combatants," answered Tweedle Dum.
"Who decided they are enemy combatants," asked Alice?
"It was decided in a Mock Trial" answered Tweedle Dee.
"Why not a real trial?" asked Alice.
"Because in a real trial they would have the right to defend themselves, whereas in a Mock Trial they are guilty until they are proven innocent, and therefore have no rights," answered the Mad Hatter.
"Isn't that a bit unfair?" asked Alice.
"Don't be silly," answered the Mad Hatter. "People will say you have been brainwashed."
"Why are all those men being tortured?" asked Alice in horror.
zebedee wrote on June 25, 2007 9:36 AM:"Enemy combatants," answered Tweedle Dum.
"Who decided they are enemy combatants," asked Alice?
"It was decided in a Mock Trial" answered Tweedle Dee.
"Why not a real trial?" asked Alice.
"Because in a real trial they would have the right to defend themselves, whereas in a Mock Trial they are guilty until they are proven innocent, and therefore have no rights," answered the Mad Hatter.
"Isn't that a bit unfair?" asked Alice.
"Don't be silly," answered the Mad Hatter. "People will say you have been brainwashed."
"Caging" is a direct-mail term.
"Bury you alive" is just a figure of speech.
Billy Pilgrim wrote on June 25, 2007 9:39 AM:Nicely done, Mock Turtle.
It is imperative that all these men (Cheyney, Gonzales, Addington, Yoo, Flanigan) be held accountable for violations of the War Crimes Act.
RandyR wrote on June 25, 2007 9:41 AM:Please call your congressman and ask them to support congressman Kucinich's bill to impeach Cheney.
Security Code: hope maybe there is still hope.
Phill wrote on June 25, 2007 9:42 AM:We need Sanators who will look at these crooks in the eye and tell them flat out that they are wrong, that they should be going to jail and that the US will not lift a finger to protect them against any other country that decides to put them on trial.
budfox wrote on June 25, 2007 9:50 AM:John Rizzo will be confirmed.
foobar wrote on June 25, 2007 9:50 AM:The rudderless Dems don't want to be accused by 'big bad ole Bush' as being weak on national security.
We have laws against cruelty to animals, for god's sake!
Steve W. wrote on June 25, 2007 9:50 AM:These people are all a bunch of fools. If any of them had even a passing familiarity with the military, they would know that torture rarely, if ever, works. It certainly isn't worth the time, energy, and risks involved. For the most part, torture lets you hear what you want to hear and believe what you want to believe. It would do them all good to experience some of these techniques. I have.
tbhull wrote on June 25, 2007 9:55 AM:Everyone posts their various and well founded bitches and moans as a catharsis, but what will Congress effectively? Nothing.
Why? Because the dems and repubs (all being the same wolf in sheep's clothing) are all so collectively drunk on power, however unconstitutional its exercise may be.
The Congress will do nothing except a few worthless soap opera hearings and will wait until '08 when they can enjoy the same priviliges/abuses of power. Our government is a broke joke at this point.
Hoppy wrote on June 25, 2007 10:00 AM:Surely committing a felony by violating the Geneva Conventions which prohibit cruelty to POW's qualifies as a "high crime". It is inconceivable that any future government official could commit a worse "high crime". So, failure to impeach Cheney and Bush, who ordered the cruelty, means the impeachment clause in the Constitution is no longer operative. Is that what our Democratic Party wants?
VL wrote on June 25, 2007 10:09 AM:With all due respect to Messrs. Becker and Gellman, the overall tone of the first piece on Sunday was somewhat awed and respectful. Tons of positive-trending adjectives used to describe Cheney: he "battled" the bureaucracy, Cheney the arbiter, enforcer, regulator, editor. I got the feeling it was an apologia and explanation for Cheney, not an expose. Not to mention its being, like, five or six years late.
sc free, as in what aren't they free to say about Cheney?
Angus wrote on June 25, 2007 10:13 AM:Given that Cheney is undoubtedly intelligent, or at least possessed of a certain low cunning, he must surely be aware that
a) torture is not a particularly effective interrogation method, and that the law of diminishing returns applies as the pain and cruelty of torture is ratcheted up, and that
b) '24' scenarios, where immediate answers, via torture, to avoid some tragedy or other are vanishingly rare.
So I have always found it a little nauseating that so much of his time is given to establishing and legally defending torture as a US policy. It is very, very hard–for me it is impossible–not to conclude that Cheney simply likes torture, apparently for its own sake, and not for any intelligence that might be gained.
I hate these people.
TheraP wrote on June 25, 2007 10:19 AM:Why is it that people who insist the rules do not apply to them are so ready to insist that the rules (they make) apply to everybody else?
Why is it that people who never responded well to authoritarian methods believe that is the best way to make others do their bidding?
Madness trumps logic. Dick-tatorship rules. Somebody should find an image of a potato head. And call it "Dick - Tater."
Yes, I'm outraged! But I'm trying to hang onto my humanity - and analyze the craziness - instead of add to the "run-amok-ness."
TheraP wrote on June 25, 2007 10:22 AM:We need an image of Mr. Potato Head as "Dick-Tator."
Then we need to ask why it is that some people believe historical rules do not apply to them and they
TheraP wrote on June 25, 2007 10:25 AM:We need a photo-image of a potato head as "Dick-Tater."
Word is "screw." Yes, that fits.
jeffgee wrote on June 25, 2007 10:25 AM:Impeach Cheney first. It's obvious that Bush can't function without him. Bush is a figurehead. Even though 2008 will be the beginning of the end of this mal-administration, they can do a lot of damage before 1/20/09 and are likely to do a full-court press to get their punch-list items done: Bomb Iran, set up mini Gitmos in undisclosed locations, more spying on Americans and packing the Supreme Court with more Bushies. Even without the Rove-Reich of a permanent GOP majority, a Bush Supreme Court would be able to enable many of this criminal gang's goals for years to come with no limits.
Billy Pilgrim wrote on June 25, 2007 10:29 AM:It's obvious that nothing short of impeachment will stop these criminals.
Angus
Parsing your comment: Cheyney is ... possessed...
We don't need a House of Representatives to impeach. We need an exorcist.
chabuka wrote on June 25, 2007 10:29 AM:Oh..can we torture Dicky...Please, Please...!!! Stand by with the "paddles" (make sure he doesn't "cop out" by dying!!) and torture away..now that would be PPV I would pay top dollar for
bwindrip wrote on June 25, 2007 10:34 AM:There has been a coup going on right before our eyes.
Many have not even noticed.
Some have noticed and not wanted to believe it.
Well, believe it.
Mrs Panstreppon wrote on June 25, 2007 10:37 AM:Did Bush administration ever define "enemy combatant" legally?
SteveW wrote on June 25, 2007 10:46 AM:Shooter and his gang are torture freaks. Sickass pervs. Taguba is right. It's from the top down.
Posted by: OleHippieChick
Date: June 25, 2007 9:20 AM
Absolutely! These "men" who've never fought in war, let alone likely been in a street fight, jump straight to the most heinous methods to "extract" information from "terrorists." The same methods the experts have instructed them doesn't work in extracting useful data.
Bush may be the gift that keeps on giving to the Democratic Party, however Cheney needs to be impeached immediately.
In their minds, U.S. citizens can also be labeled terrorists and are afforded the opportunity to be
NOT be tortured via their own legally tortured opinions.
All the while they get away with claiming to Timeh Russert, "we don't do torture" and the subject is dropped from interviews, when all the while we ALL know they DO TORTURE and big time!
Just as Bush simply claims he's a "Christian" and that somehow absolves him of all sin and makes everything he does righteous in the minds at least 39 percent of the country including Fox News viewers and Evangelical Christians who blindly follow the cult of G.W. Bush. Imagine that, a cult for the dumbest man on earth.
SteveW wrote on June 25, 2007 10:48 AM:Shooter and his gang are torture freaks. Sickass pervs. Taguba is right. It's from the top down.
Posted by: OleHippieChick
Date: June 25, 2007 9:20 AM
Absolutely! These "men" who've never fought in war, let alone likely been in a street fight, jump straight to the most heinous methods to "extract" information from "terrorists." In their minds, U.S. citizens can also be labeled terrorists and are afforded the opportunity to be
NOT be tortured via their own legally tortured opinions.
All the while they get away with claiming to Timeh Russert, "we don't do torture" and the subject is dropped from interviews, when all the while we ALL know they DO TORTURE and big time!
Just as Bush simply claims he's a "Christian" and that somehow absolves him of all sin and makes everything he does righteous in the minds at least 39 percent of the country including Fox News viewers and Evangelical Christians who blindly follow the cult of G.W. Bush. Imagine that, a cult for the dumbest man on earth.
b wrote on June 25, 2007 10:48 AM:Spiro Agnew was forced to resign as Nixon's VP in 1973 for tax evasion. The violations of U.S. and international law by Dick-Tater are considerably more substantial than tax evasion. Because of this precendent, pressure by the public and the media should be sufficient to force Potato out of office short of impeachment.
Nevertheless, Rep. Joe Pitts of PA was requested to support Kucinich's bill to impeach, as RandyR above recommended.
TheraP wrote on June 25, 2007 10:52 AM:Apology for multiple posts above.
With tpm it is easy to be patient.
With cheney/bush, patience is long overdue.
plainjane wrote on June 25, 2007 10:53 AM:It sickens me, as each new article comes out, to see what this administration has stooped to. It will take a generation of moral/ethical leaders for us to regain all that has been lost under these corrupt people.
PTF wrote on June 25, 2007 10:57 AM:Laura Rozen nicely makes the point that David Addington is likely never to be able to travel outside the USA without fear of arrest:
http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/006341.html
SC wrote on June 25, 2007 11:02 AM:Maybe the reason Pravda on the Potomac, aka WaPo, chose to run an "expose" on Cheney is because it's no longer possible to stop Cheney--you can only sit back and watch (and be shocked and awed) as he creates a new reality. "Yeah, I like to torture and I'm grabbing power wherever I can. Say whatever you want about it--it's the new order of the day no matter how you flap your gums. And if you really want to object, well, just come to my office sometime and we'll have a come-to-Jesus moment."
I'm sick of the WaPo apologizing and explaninhg for the crimes of the Bush Administration. I'm tired of being called to admire so-called "investigative" reporting. It's more like announcements of the New Reality than a call to correct.
sc: rate, as in overrated
Anonymous wrote on June 25, 2007 11:03 AM:TheraP,
Dick is dick, George is a tater.
http://www.bartcop.com/dick-tater.jpg
Anonymous wrote on June 25, 2007 11:18 AM:Phill says: "We need Sanators who will look at these crooks in the eye and tell them ... the US will not lift a finger to protect them against any other country that decides to put them on trial."
Phill has this exactly right: the only thing Cheney and his crew would fear would be rendition to an international tribunal.
uncle vester wrote on June 25, 2007 11:21 AM:"Cheney's lawyer feared that future prosecutors, with motives "difficult to predict," might bring criminal charges against interrogators or Bush administration officials."
It's not very "difficult to predict" that prosecutors in a future administration a bit more grounded in reality might see a whole boatload of crimes and respond accordingly.
'motives "difficult to predict"', forsooth
this is ass-covering
jeffgee wrote on June 25, 2007 11:24 AM:Cheney is a man who never had a moral compass. He is the poster boy for Republican moral relativism, which is ironic because his party decries moral relativism when anyone else practices it. Everything he has done in his long career in government has been nothing but partisan. When he was SecDef, he got credit for "reforming" the military after the Soviets fell. He closed military bases only in Democratic districts and killed weapons programs he didn't like, regardless of whether the armed services needed them. He has had his own agenda since entering government in 1969 as Rumsfeld's assistant and has worked in the background to undermine anything that presented an obstacle to his agenda.
Anonymous wrote on June 25, 2007 11:38 AM:After heading the committee to select a VP for Bush 43, he chose himself and vetted his own records.
During the Gulf War, he set up his secret "Team B" to undermine General Powell. Cheney urged Bush 41 to go to war without congressional approval. Fortunately, Bush 41 was not as weak and stupid as his son and rejected Cheney's plan. If Cheney had run the Gulf War the way he has run the Iraq war, that war would not have been the success that it is seen to be today.
The Office of Special Plans is a perfect metaphor for how Cheney has behaved for his 38 years in government.
I've been trying to figure out what motivates him. He has plenty of money. Is it power? Is it lingering resentment over Nixon's resignation and the subsequent limits on executive power set by Congress? More than one Republican has admitted that long-lasting grudges over Nixon's Watergate coverup downfall motivated the Clinton impeachment.
Glenn Greenwald warns us of becoming like the right wing by seeing the GOP in stark black-and-white the way Bush sees the world. He's right but it's a tall order.
Geneva bans abuse. How the US defines "torture" is meaningless: "Non torture-abuse" can still be a war crime. Cheney and Addington did the classic red herring argument: "We're meeting the (irrelevant) standard."
No, these are war crimes, and Addington and Cheney well knew the standards that applied. They ignored them, and pretended they could get everyone to agree with their non-sense.
The game is over.
bwindrip wrote on June 25, 2007 11:56 AM:TheraP
I appropriated your idea and did a lunchtime quickie.
http://thumb9.webshots.net/t/50/550/7/98/80/2914798800101613009QXtLnK_th.jpg
Anonymous wrote on June 25, 2007 12:00 PM:The only thing that can be permitted to save Cheyney from a cell at The Hague is a fatal stroke.
bwindrip wrote on June 25, 2007 12:05 PM:Maybe the clot
is all we've got.
johnnydoughey wrote on June 25, 2007 12:32 PM:Question for the more knowledgeable;
There are several incidents now, and possibly several more to come, where the administration has taken action which was later halted (at least publically) due to court decisions that they were illegal.
My question: Are there legal reasons that impeachment (or other penalties) have not been forthcoming already? The democrat leadership has stated that impeachment is off the table... that we need to work with the administration for whatever reasons.
Just as a legal issue, would these actions taken by the administration be classified as "high crimes and misdemeanors", so that, given enough congressional votes (with only legal issues, not political issues considered), the president would be convicted?
It just seems to me, given the president's low rating and the fact that there are millions of republicans who are law abiding, just misinformed, that if the democrat leadership promoted the "law breaking" aspects of the administration more, and came up with some good PSAs which appealed more to the republican voters as allies, rather than enemies, the republican leadersip would be pressured into supporting an impeachment or face losing their district (even if to another republican) next time.
I guess it's naive for me to think the leadership (republican or democrat) would ever put patriotism above their own agendas, isn't it...
BA wrote on June 25, 2007 12:46 PM:Seven years into the eight years of Bush/Cheney, and only now the W. Post gets around to dissecting Cheney.
Pathetic.
TheraP wrote on June 25, 2007 1:12 PM:bwindrip:
Good Going!!!
A rogue's gallery of these would be lovely. How about a contest?
I've sent this out to my list.
pt bridgeport wrote on June 25, 2007 1:12 PM:BA - "dissecting cheney"... another interesting image to play with.
I've been trying to figure out what motivates him. He has plenty of money. Is it power?
My theory is that, in Cheney's case, it all springs from a deep-seated sense of entitlement. He grabs power, because he is offended at the personal insult implied by any suggestion that he doesn't deserve to be the S/M master of all he surveys.
Remember how he quelled suggestions that the first big tax cut give a little smidgen to the middle class, rather than throwing everythig to the tenth of a percenters? "We won the election. It's our due."
"It's our due" is the "Dieu et mon droit" equivalent that's presumably stamped on the Cheny coat of arms. Just as winning the election was, to him, "our due", regardless of wheteher the votes actually went to Gore or not.
parrot wrote on June 25, 2007 1:15 PM:So, let me get this straight:
Since the Geneva Convention was the law of the land, Cheney and his henchmen hatched a plan to get around that by redefining the definition of 'torture' to 'cruelty'? Did they ever read the US Constitution or take their oaths towards it seriously...because, doesn't the Constitution forbid cruel and unusual punishment? I mean, I thought that it said that on its face. Call in the Constitutional literalists!
Klsy wrote on June 25, 2007 1:15 PM:Doesn't Rasputin come to mind?
TheraP wrote on June 25, 2007 1:21 PM:anonymous above - sorry to have missed your entry.
That is amazing! Yes, we have the beginning of a nice gallery here.
Comment from a friend:
Dick Tater - "features removable ears and eyes to more easily ignore reality. Pacemaker sold separately."
TheraP wrote on June 25, 2007 1:23 PM:What motivates cheney?
Sadism?
phreezin wrote on June 25, 2007 2:05 PM:Interesting bit of info from The Nation:
Illinois Congressman Rahm Emanuel has come up with the right response to Dick Cheney's attempt to suggest that the Office of the Vice President is not part of the executive branch.
The House Democratic Caucus chairman wants to take the Cheney at his word. Cheney says his office is "not an entity within the executive branch," so Emanuel wants to take away the tens of millions of dollars that are allocated to the White House to maintain it.
RW wrote on June 25, 2007 2:07 PM:Click my name to see full article.
I will state this with all due confidence. Either the US through whatever means is legally appropriate investigates and impeaches or indicts and holds for trial this Cheney cabal...or the Hague will. The question for the US will be whether we can emotionally allow the US sovereignty to hand over Cheney and cabal for a World Court trial.
The only reason Cheney and WH Admin is stonewalling all the efforts..(AG...National Archives et cetera) is that they know they are legally liable.
What is worse is that 25% or so of the US citizenry will back them to the hilt as John Dean outlined in his book Conservatives Without Conscience. This a time when great courage must come forward. Knock on wood...(code word)
Anonymous wrote on June 25, 2007 3:43 PM:What motivates cheney?
Declining health can occasionally make people really bold.
Billy Pilgrim wrote on June 25, 2007 3:50 PM:RW wrote
"The question for the US will be whether we can emotionally allow the US sovereignty to hand over Cheney and cabal for a World Court trial."
Think back to the late 1930s, when an another advanced nation was controlled by a similar madman. Had the Germans risen up and turnd over their dictator to a higher authority, that nation would have been spared the devastating losses it endured as a result of World War II.
The emotional hardship of giving up a piece of "sovereignty" seems like a small price to pay, compared the monstrosities that malignant creatures like Cheyney are capable of.
tekel wrote on June 25, 2007 4:37 PM:He says "we don't torture." But that depends on what the definition of "we" is.
johnnydoughey wrote on June 25, 2007 4:46 PM:"The question for the US will be whether we can emotionally allow the US sovereignty to hand over Cheney and cabal for a World Court trial."
The United States gave up that argument when we went down to Panama, captured Noriega, and tried him for drug trafficking.
Oops, I forget. That was THEIR sovereignty, not OURS.
John Wilson wrote on June 25, 2007 5:08 PM:n the 30's Hitlers Germany was in financial ruin..
Hitler was loved (for a while) as unemployment
ended and the Mark became stable...
=======
At the G7...notice how few times Bush called Putin "Puootie" Like, never :-)
Wonder if Bush got another chaqnce to look into Putin's soul...
Torture: What this government has done to the treatment by foreign powers in the future
to our soldiers...
Death by interrogation...
...it should make McCain shudder...
==========
"There never was a democracy that didn't commit
suicide" --John Adams 1814
Billy Pilgrim wrote on June 25, 2007 5:49 PM:John Wilson
By your comment, are you implying that it's acceptable to coddle tyrants during periods of prosperity? Are you proposing giving free reign to a tyrant like Cheyney, because the U.S. is not (yet) the ravaged vassal state that Cheyney would turn it into?
johnnydoughey wrote on June 25, 2007 8:00 PM:Hmm...
I'm really surprised. All this time, I thought Cheney would have been one of the LAST to bail the executive branch...
I guess even HE couldn't tolerate what those clowns were doing anymore...
DCB wrote on June 27, 2007 11:49 AM:Tell me again why impeachment is off the table?
cryptodemocrat wrote on June 28, 2007 6:16 AM:Let all the poisons that lurk in the mud hatch out.
Torture's purpose is terror, not intel. Cheney and his crew advocate torture as part of the larger program of scaring everyone into obedience. Do you think it's working?