The Obscene Face of Democracyby Jacques Vergès, one of the world’s most controversial lawyers, is a stinging political pamphlet in the tradition of Émile Zola’s J’accuse.

Vergès has made a name for himself in the international community by defending some of history’s most notorious villains: Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie, Carlos the Jackal, Pol Pot, and now the former leader of Iraq Saddam Hussein. His goal is not necessarily to win the cases, but to call into question the legitimacy of the process and the actions of some of the other involved parties, like the French abuses of power in Algeria. He hopes to do the same in the upcoming trial of Saddam Hussein and Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz (whom he also represents), and this fiery condemnation of the war in Iraq can be read as a preview of the case he plans to make against the United States.

The tract directly addresses President Bush in the second person: “For you, democracy rests on the postulate that violence, fear, and money are supreme values.” First, Vergès criticizes the Bush administration for the forceful exportation of its ideology, drawing numerous parallels to other historical abuses of power: “It is always in the name of noble ideals and grand principles that the conquerors justify robbery.” He then proceeds to expose the horrors of the prisoner abuse scandal, using the report from General Taguba as well as accounts from released Iraqi victims, all the while lambasting the United States leadership for creating the conditions under which these incidents could all too easily occur. Vergès also decries the failure of the United States and Britain to protect Iraq’s invaluable cultural treasures, notably the burned national library, as well as supplying weapons to Iraq for years before the first Gulf War. Vergès ends with a passionate and final J’accuse: “Defendant Bush, Stand Up!”

The Obscene Face of Democracy is a very radical condemnation of the Bush regime by an extremely controversial figure who now finds himself once again in the international limelight.