Bob Morris @ Jan 24th 2006 16:25 - Category: Unfiled ;
Michelle Bachelet just became president of Chile. Her father was tortured to death, and she herself was tortured. Now she’s president.
Democrats are saying that they won’t filibuster even though they have the votes because it might backfire.
No guts, no glory.
Bob Morris @ Jan 24th 2006 09:02 - Category: Torture ;
A European investigator looking into allegations of secret, CIA-run prisons in Europe said today that “a great deal” of evidence pointed towards the existence of a US system of “outsourcing” torture.
Swiss senator Dick Marty said it was also highly likely European governments knew what the US had been doing, and that more than 100 prisoners may have been involved in recent years.
New evidence demonstrated in 2005 that torture and mistreatment have been a deliberate part of the Bush administration’s counterterrorism strategy, undermining the global defense of human rights.
Human Rights Watch World Report 2006 provides massive and useful documentation.
The evidence showed that abusive interrogation cannot be reduced to the misdeeds of a few low-ranking soldiers, but was a conscious policy choice by senior U.S. government officials. The policy has hampered Washington’s ability to cajole or pressure other states into respecting international law, said the 532-page volume’s introductory essay.
“Fighting terrorism is central to the human rights cause,” said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. “But using illegal tactics against alleged terrorists is both wrong and counterproductive.”
Roth said the illegal tactics were fueling terrorist recruitment, discouraging public assistance of counterterrorism efforts and creating a pool of unprosecutable detainees.
Bob Morris @ Jan 24th 2006 00:05 - Category: Anti-war, Imperialism ;
Bush is a symptom, the problems go much deeper than him. The US has been invading other countries, generally under made-up pretexts, for decades. It’s a war economy, and it’s been that way since WWII. It’s no mistake that a country where, what, 40% of the federal spending goes for military, defense, and the like, gets preoccupied with using all those shiny war toys. Best way to do that is invade other countries. Got to keep the economy pumping along.
Plus, all those wars for empire gives the US new markets for finished goods, new sources of raw materials, and whole new populaces to try to control.
At least that’s the theory. In practice, it’s not working too well, is it? Two wars, Iraq and Afghanistan, are going badly, the economy is starting to sputter, the national debt is hitting intolerable heights. It’s not sustainable. Then there’s all the countries who used to like, or at least tolerate the US, who now are unfriendly at best, thanks to the neocons, who really are just extreme examples of a foreign policy that has been in place for years.
Liberals and progressives should not get pulled into the 2006 mid-term elections, because this just sucks energy out of the movement, rendering it harmless. The Democrats have clearly, repeatedly, and unmistakably shown they have few substantive differences with Republicans (except for a few social issues) so only the naive will think they’d do anything different if they controlled Congress. Oh, they’ll pretty it up a bit, sticking a kinder, gentler, Happy Face on top of the unprovoked invasions and the tortures, but the wars will continue.
Then’s there’s 2008. It might well be McCain vs.Hillary. Oh yeah, there’s some progressive people for you. Sounds like third and fourth party time coming, as the Religious Right rejects McCain and liberals/progressives reject Hillary.
But real change will not come through electoral politics, nor will it come by howling that Bush, noxious as he is, is the problem. The problem is an avaricious economic system that feeds on war. That’s what we need to change.
Bob Morris @ Jan 24th 2006 00:04 - Category: Torture ;
A military jury recommended a simple reprimand Monday for an Army officer who killed an Iraqi general by stuffing him headfirst into a sleeping bag and sitting on his chest during an interrogation.
He got a reprimand for negligent homicide… No prison.
Lynddie England got several years in prison, and she didn’t kill anyone. With this ’sentence’, the Army has greenlighted more torture. Sickening.
And 1,000 more former moderates in the Middle East read about this and decide to join al Qaida.
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