Perhaps cynicism comes with age; perhaps it has to do with my work and my interest in politics but I have become a cynic when it comes to politics, politicians and their motives. When Barack Obama announced his intentions to publicize the latest US Senate report on the torturing that happened during the George W. Bush era, I tried to find his motives for doing so. I mean the American president was going to publicize something that would totally embarrass his own country.

And it is not only that. He actually gives proof to all those, including the most extreme elements of radicalism all around the word, to excuse their acts. In the eve of the publication of the report, the US State Department felt forced to warn or diplomatic missions abroad, especially in troubled areas, for expecting troubles.

It might all be about legacy. Obama wants to be remembered as the most transparent and democrat western leader. I have my reasons for saying western and not US. So democrat that he is able to publicize something that will totally embarrass his country and might endanger its citizens abroad, but which is a mistake, wrong doing that we ought to know and talk about it. Actually it is a crime.

Whatever his motives Obama publicized the report shocking everybody including the far-right John McCain who has excused everything George W. Bush has done. But this is not my issue. After all for the next few weeks hundreds perhaps thousands of articles are going to be publish about the torture report and thousands analysts all around the world are going to explain it. The same time media and simple people will express their shock. And this is my issue.

I’m shocked that people are shocked.

In the era of information there is little we can miss, so there is no day that goes by when we don’t read about another victim of torture making headlines. Usually it is an infant because an infant murdered by its own parents after brutal torturing makes better headlines and sells more. But the victims of torturing are thousands of thousands all around the world with most of them living in constant torture circumstances and not even 1% of them ends in a police station or at least in the offices of an NGO. And this is something we all know.

Every each one of us knows a victim of torture, either in a domestic violence incident, bulling or actual an intentional torture. Please don’t tell me that you have never suspected or read somewhere, that when an immigrant is arrested, his/hers time in the police station is not exceptionally comfortable. There are reports from Italy, Spain and Greece; three places where there is a huge entrance of dispirit immigrants, where police brutality and torture in police stations is simply inhuman.

Actually what happens all around the world in police stations is terra incognita. Is something no government or state really dares to touch. For the simple reason that in most cases police doesn’t serve the people but serves the interests of the governments. They are part of a corrupted  establishment in its heart.

Do the governments know about all these cases? Of course they know but they have the luxury to pretend that they don’t. Did government all around the world knew about the torturing practiced by CIA? Of course they did. The Greek, the Italian, the German, the British, the Saudi, the Egyptian, the Turkish government all of them knew. Actually a lot of this torturing has happened in bases in their countries. But were they limited into accepting that something inhuman and illegal was happening in their soil or they practice the same methods in their countries?

Egypt and Turkey are part of the midnight express. Opposition, demonstrators, Kurds, intellectuals, reporters, journalists have felt what torturing means in those countries first handed. You don’t expect much from Pakistan, Afghanistan, North Korea or Saudi Arabia but what about out democratic, transparent and champion of the human rights west?

For the next few weeks everybody will accuse USA for barbaric and inhuman acts and all will show their shock and disgust with the tortures. But what about looking at the mirror? Would Great Britain, France and Germany accept an independent committee to investigate and come with a report? And I mean really investigate and find the truth not another huge cover up.

From my involvement in human rights NGOs I have seen thousands of reports about torturing and police brutality from all around Europe. From all the democratic and civilized nations that make the united Europe. If Angela Merkel and David Cameron accepted things like that happening in their countries – even if that happened from foreign soldiers to foreign enemies – what really happens in their own countries? Don’t the media know about it?

Another question. Is it different when CIA tortures a Taliban and it is different when a poor immigrant is tortured in an Italian cell? What makes the difference? What about the poor infant, the girlfriend, the wife, the daughter? What about the black boy who looked like a gangster and the guy with the beard that looked like a terrorist? Or our disgust is limited to the surroundings of the Guantanamo?

I’m not trying to clear out Barack Obama, he is equally a hypocrite with the whole thing. If he really wanted transparency he should also want punishment to the guilt and for that there are international courts and especially The Hague. But USA doesn’t accept The Hague’s jurisdiction with US citizens. Why? Shouldn’t Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney who supposed to be the ones who gave the orders to follow the same way with other criminals? And wouldn’t be The Hague international court the best place to give them a fair judgment? That’s Obama’s hypocrisy that makes me wander what are his real motives.

For the rest of us …well I’m shocked we are shocked!