I have occasion to receive messages from friends expressing their views on issues that concern all of us. This is a copy of the most recent letter from my good friend Kevin, (Hoople). Though I appreciate some of his insane rantings, I do not agree with him on all points. My explaination follows. I encourage every one of you to have your say. If the "comments" feature of this site still don't work, send me an e-mail at giov513@live.com
I will be sure to post it right here, without edit, for all to read. enjoy . . .
This letter from Hoople:
I haven't complained to you about the trivial stuff that fascinates the American Public in quite some time. I've been stuck on the Gitmo thing. I've written to you twice more about my thoughts surrounding the incidents and realized I was contradicting myself as each piece grew in length. I've researched this topic intensely and have come to the conclusion that we most definitely have broken international law. The articles of The Geneva Convention are very simple to understand. I think my greatest issue is with how certain members of the democratic party seem to be grandstanding an effort to bring those responsible for committing these crimes to justice. I don't know if it's a domestic political agenda they feel obligated to meet or the need to apologize to the world for our wrong doings in an effort to help create a kum-by-ya type atmosphere. We don't need to push it but justice should be allowed to run its course, and I think it would behoove us to keep this kind of stuff off page one. And do you really think the people charged with interrogating our Prisoners of War were going to say "No....I'm not allowed to do that".
They would have been fired for not doing their job as requested by The Commander in Chief. I would say what a confusing dilemma. I can't help but to think about Harry Truman when this subject is discussed. He signed an executive order giving our military permission to drop two nuclear bombs. Approximately 200,000 Japanese civilians were either vaporized or died a slow and painful death from the effects of radiation poisoning. Granted, The Geneva Convention was a work in progress at that time but should Harry have been brought to justice for conspiracy to murder for all of those innocent lives taken? He had our Nations Security on his mind just as our past administration did. They all did what they thought was necessary to insure our safety. Just a thought. A phrase was coined when we were battling with foes abroad in the 40's. "Loose Lips Sink Ships". Some things are truly a matter of National Security. For that young cub reporter looking for that big break, you know, the Big Story....look elsewhere. It could very well be his dwelling that the next plane crashes into.
- hoop
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and a response:
September 11, 2009
"He who would sacrifice freedom for security deserves neither" - Ben Franklin
"Better that a hundred guilty men are free than one innocent man is imprisoned." - British justice William Blackstone
Hoop,
It is simply unfortunate for you that I received your message less than a week after watching Anne Coulter speak her mind about the traitors and sissy-boys currently investigating the abuses at Gitmo during the previous eight years; proof that rhetorical agility is not a measure of intelligence but rather a "stupid human trick", like flame swallowing, throwing a football or moving Rush Limbaugh's lips.
I grant you neither men quoted above lived through the nightmare of Sept. 11. They, in their time, saw enough however, including the slaughter of thousands in a fight to redefine a new land and realize a radical, new philosophical promise with no concrete precedent. Integrity against Tyranny; as old a fable as David and Goliath. It was just simple men, farmers, merchants and craftsmen, dying in some field, in the water, in the snow, for a principle; for some neighbor's compelling, abstract idea of a new social order. I think these guy's saw their fair share.
The Unites States as victim on that horrible day is as heart wrenching a tale as it is void of context. The entire truth needs to be repeated for as long as it takes for sympathies such as the one expressed in your message to be validated. Silence in the face of government sanctioned aggression, in defiance to overwhelming outrage abroad, simply reaffirms an individual's complicity. I choose instead to include the unpleasant historical events into this analysis and do my part to ensure that there should never be another administration like the one we endured for the past eight years.
The United States is viewed by many cultures around the world as an obese, voracious corporation armed to the teeth. Its scale and appetite has no historical precedent. Without the confidence in our integrity, our diplomacy, nothing remains to trade but our muscle. Taming the world's resources requires guns and cunning, a fact well documented by all sides of the political aisle. We all read the same history books.
Here is a short list of some examples of our aggressive interference and intrusion into the affairs of foreign, sovereign nations for self serving objectives:
- The U.S funded government coup which brought the Shah to power in Iran;
- the backing/funding of a "regrettable" resistance movement in Cuba led by one Fidel Castro to unseat the government of Fulgencio Batista; . . . (should've done our homework here)
- the illegal funding of a paramilitary/terrorist group seeking to overthrow the legitimate government in Columbia we named "Freedom Fighters"; (remember the Iran-Contra scandal?)
- the abandonment and betrayal of Ho Chi Min, (pen pal of F.D.R.) and his Viet Cong forces (once enamored of the principles of U.S. democracy), seeking independence from growing Communist forces, just to kiss some Imperialistic French ass in our Cold War campaign. The subsequent horror of the Vietnam "conflict" resulted in sixteen years of squandered opportunity for mutual political and economic cooperation, (Twenty-four years later, the victorious Communist nation of Vietnam made the computer mouse I'm using to write this essay);
- the support of the corrupt Nigerian military dictatorship of General Sani Abacha, protecting the activities of foreign oil companies, (Shell and Chevron, Hess, Lonestar, Mobil and more), who destroy the fishing and agricultural livelihood and traditions of its people with the toxic footprint of Western-styled "progress". Protests by the people here are met by armed soldiers who maintain order through murder, rape and intimidation. Prisoners like the peaceful activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight others from the Ogani region receive scripted trials which ended predictably in execution by hanging
- the use of American military resources to provide security for the financially connected Wahhabite monarchy in Saudi Arabia. On July 31, 1987, the police force of this regime beat over four hundred visiting worshippers to death (reports vary in range to over fifteen hundred dead) in a confrontation between the ideologies of the native Sunni and visiting Iranian Shiite pilgrims, at Mecca, the Holiest site in the Moslem world. It was this single event that created the counter-revolutionary philosophy of Osama Bin Laden and subsequently, the terrorist organization we now fight known as Al Qaeda.
- the unconditional support of the United State's single minded diplomatic and military policies for Israel's genocidal behavior toward the Palestinians.
- the illegal invasion of a sovereign Iraq under false and calibrated pretenses and all associated attempts to cover-up that project;
. . . . to name a just few high profile examples.
The United States since the latter half of the nineteenth century inherited an economic appetite of such voracity, such efficiency that no example from history could serve to caution or exemplify moderation. Ours were the spoils and the Planet our playground. It is my firm conclusion that four classes of citizens remain in the United States.
- The first group understand the system well enough to promote and manipulate it.
- The second class support the government's effort and maintain, in the name of patriotism, what cherry picked pieces they benefit from, and understand of , it.
- The third group understand the complexity and compromises involved in our economy's insatiable demand for resources; deride the governing principles as hypocritical and immoral; yet coexist among the first two groups of necessity. This class however, offers little constructive rhetoric toward a vision of any consensus let alone any practical, timely alternative. Visionaries we are, salesmen we are not.
- The fourth class are the American Ex-patriots; living in the murky shadow of complicity on some foreign soil.
I have glossed over the details of the select historical subtexts above, ignoring the drama and patriotic idealism of the U.S. troops who gave their lives in these struggles, in order to expose in the fewest words my conviction that the evil forces driving our economic system use patriotic citizens from the lower economic strata like disposable condoms. They fuck the world with latex boys in uniform as protection. They convince the mothers and fathers of America to send their kids into battle because America needs Middle East oil to fill our cars, Nike sneakers made by children in Indonesia to give style to our hopeless and keep our grocery shelves stocked and surrealistically photogenic.
We, the American citizens who make the cars and guns, who mine the steel and build our cities, roads and bridges; who consume like locusts all of the world's resources, we are persuaded that one cannot live without these extra-necessary trappings. We however are never consulted when our elected leaders act to repay clandestine debts to self serving and powerful lobbyists and business associates. We are bred by the true power brokers of this country like mules, sheep and Clydesdale's in accordance to our modest choices and potential; vetted and indoctrinated by our media and our communities. Yet when the world looks down in shame, anger or disgust at the trespasses of our power elite, it is "we" they blame.
God help the African or South American nation guilty of trying to repatriate stolen land from U.S. investment companies destroying their forests to grow coffee or chocolate. We illegally fish off the coasts of Somalia and call the irate nationalist saps "pirates". We set up factories in Indonesia and Pakistan, provide inhuman working conditions for cheap peasant and child labor to produce chotchky for our suburban cravings, hiding the profits from the taxman by investing in man-made islands off the newest billionaire playground known as Kuwait. These corporate vampires push and pull American military and diplomatic forces around the globe with unprecedented arrogance, while palming taxes desperately needed to fund the very armies they hide behind. Back home they use their media resources to keep the general population needing the unnecessary, believing the dream and suspecting anyone who dissents. Its all so beautifully sinister.
The population of Guantanamo prison numbers about 300 prisoners at the time I write this. This is down from its highest number of 680 back in 2003. The prisoners at this facility were represented by the Bush administration as the most dangerous suspects in the Nation's war on global terror. The American public has watched and read the Press wring their hands over control of the two contradictory attitudes toward the Bush government's explanation of the situation. American citizens who choose to believe the reports supporting the Country's behavior during the war equate their support to a quasi-religious framework of “loyalty to Country” and bitterly defend the sacrifices made against reason to a higher plane of "faith-based" patriotism. Common sense tells us, they argue, that these backward people who threaten America have no motive outside jealousy of our standard of living; our superiority. They are hyenas in the campsite and nothing more. FOX news and the Wall Street Journal are the most accessible of these media outlets.
Some Right-wing, Conservative talking-points are:
- Osama Bin Laden and Al Qaeda worked with the Iraqi government of Saddam Hussein to plan and execute the attacks on September 11.
- Proof of Hussein's preparation for more attacks were unveiled by a collection of spy-satellite photographs clearly showing a cache of missile body tubes. Colin Powell, United States Ambassador to the U.N. used these photos in one last pitch to the international community to defend our imminent invasion of Iraq.
- Collaborating chatter on the spy networks supported this claim with evidence of a uranium purchase by Saddam from Nigeria.
- The International community overwhelmingly supports our right to defend ourselves. Those foreigners who don't like it are not worth kissing up to anyway.
- Sleeper cells of Al Qaeda terrorists were assimilated into communities across the Unites States, waiting for instructions to engage in deadly operations against our softest underbelly. American Muslims are to be regarded with a healthy suspicion.
- No one is detained in Guantanamo who doesn't belong there. They are prisoners in our struggle to defend our homes and way of life.
- Anything done by the Administration in the service of this cause is justifiable. As mere citizens, ours is not the place to force those in the position of protecting us, The Bush White House, to reveal sensitive, motivating information supporting the retraction of Constitutional rights.
- Investigations into these "abuses" is anti-American.
The other side of the media, the so-called "liberals", challenged every one of these points. The New York Times and MSNBC television are best associated with these efforts. It is a curious phenomenon that in spite of the strong evidence disproving every itemized talking point listed above, these two groups, rather than gravitating closer to consensus, have instead drifted ideologically, further apart. We can witness this venom over the Iraq war spill into the current Healthcare debate. A simple talk to school children on the importance of staying in school and avoiding drug use has been vocally challenged by "concerned" parents who fear the President is over reaching his authority by speaking on education. "Just say No" to Obama.
The scorecard :
- No link between Osama Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein existed. To the contrary, they despised each other. However thanks to the American invasion into Iraq, Al Qaeda cells have since been welcomed into the country.
- The aluminum "tubes" in the satellite photos were proven to be incompatible for use in the development, let alone manufacture of missiles. This was known by high level Administration officials before they allowed Ambassador Powell to make his presentation, and an ass of himself, to the United Nations.
- There was no uranium in Nigeria. The punishment for discovering this information was the sordid betrayal of ambassador Joseph Wilson IVth, by top level White House personnel (Scooter Libby), by exposing his wife Valarie Plame Wilson's identity as a CIA agent.
- Aside from Great Britain, I believe our only other ally in the Iraqi war was a biker gang from the Seychelles Islands. Incidentally, public outcry in Britain against the war eventually cost Tony Blair his job.
- Sleeper cells have had a decade to surface. As such, episodes of foreign terrorist activities during this period remain dwarfed by the numbers and scope of "homegrown" terrorist organizations in the same period. Terrorists are terrorists. Muslims are Muslims. Like any subset of the whole population, there are occasions for an individual to be both. The "internship" approach to this matter embarrassed us during World War II and exposed a racist streak in the highest corridors of power. I respond only to the call by the Muslim population in my community to reject such gross associations as the result of intolerance and ignorance of the tenets of the Koran; accepting that no spiritual or political denomination is without its lunatic fringe.
The ubiquitous Right-wing, conservative deluge of meticulously scripted quasi-information and the consequent, carefully cultivated public tensions merely greased the rails of the Bush Administration's earliest experiments in the strange field of "disclosure". The White House, unable to resist an opportunity to switch a bishop for a pawn during a national "bathroom break", illegally eavesdropped on American telephone conversations. Miscalculating the press, a proactive attempt to come clean was met with unanticipated venom. The so-named "Domestic Spying Program" was forced back into the shadows, but not before a symbolic yet effective pardon for AT&T and Verizon for their collaboration; or as Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahey would describe it, the Bush White House wants "to immunize past illegal conduct . . because they know it was illegal conduct."
So much more needs to be said about this subject, but not at this time; I want to remain on topic and address your concerns about the treatment by the current Attorney General's office of Armed Service personnel with respect to charges of war-time abuses of prisoners at Guantanamo over the previous eight years.
- On the subject of Guantanamo:
When “Someone” claims a crime was committed at Gitmo, that “Someone” must be prepared to enter into an enigma of conflicting truths all held to be of simultaneous authority. The invasion of a country to round up "enemy combatants" is neither the same thing as declaring war upon a sovereign nation and taking enemy prisoners, nor is it arranging through diplomatic means the extradition of known criminals taking refuge on foreign soil. As I have come to learn over the past eight years it is something else entirely.
In this new War on Terrorism, then Attorney General Alberto Gonzales advised the Bush team to dispose of both Miranda and the Geneva convention. Should the press shout "Miranda!", Rumsfeld would simply answer "War!". If on the other hand some liberal International-Law professor from Columbia University should grab the Op-Ed page in the Times and yell "Geneva Convention", Cheney would just yell "This ain't a war, so these guys ain't covered!"
Its really insulting that these guys would use the same strategy to screw up the the Human Rights issue that they used to screw up the first six and a half years of their military invasion. What a waste of lives, money and sirloin diplomatic leverage. Men like these cannot be wholly faulted however. I firmly believe in G. W.'s commitment to protecting the United States from terrorists. I've just learned through this experience however, that his America and my America are on separate plains of consciousness. His definition of a "terrorist" would include the liberal media, the left wing activists and Independent scrutinizers dissatisfied with his policies. I don't believe those men in the White House during the first eight years of the 21st century had a clue as to how one might begin to accomplish the same task within the boundaries of U.S. and International Law. Pretending to save the public from the ugly truth was and is "double-speak" for an Ivy League class of frat boys who'd never consider entering a contest without hedging it with a fix. As the scorpion said to the fresh stung Fox, "It is my nature."
So without Miranda, Abdul Rahim Abdul, recently released for insufficient evidence of ties to any terrorist activity, was sent to Guantanamo for six and a half years. Like his colleagues, Abdul enjoyed the twenty hour flight in arm and leg irons, a strong dose of sedatives and a hood. I don’t believe there was a movie on that flight. I urge you to research this man's story by following the URL: http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/06/23/Judge-orders-Gitmo-detainees-release/UPI-86661245766496/
Rewards for information leading to the capture of suspected Al Qaeda terrorist's became a lucrative source of income for other unscrupulous informants. A large number of civil disputes were resolved by simply using the U.S. military to arrest and detain civilians whose only crime was a disagreement with a neighbor, one who related a fabricated history of insurgent complicity, collected his reward and went home with one less pain in the ass to worry about. In this way many detainees were abducted from their innocent lives back in Iraq or Afghanistan to spend years in a cell half way around the world. Proof of innocence is near impossible when the chain of command has no clear idea how to orchestrate a trial.
Salahidin Abdulahat, one of seventeen detainees from the Uyghur’s community in western China, a Muslim worshipping ethnic minority persecuted by the Chinese government for years, spent close to seven years in Guantanamo before the Obama administration finally ended the gridlocked details of his release. After years of CIA-style interrogation, Salahidin is a valuable encyclopedia of U. S. covert information:
- What were their points of interest?
- What were their methods?
- Who was in there with you?
Releasing him back home was not a humanitarian option. Obama understood repatriation would have been a death sentence as the Government of Hu Jintao will have him executed for membership in the Uyghur’s resistance effort.
So he spends his life now in permanent exile in Bermuda. Another fine mess. Jealous FOX news pundits are having a field day.
After arriving to Camp X-Ray (aka: Camp Iguana or Guantanamo), barefoot detainees are escorted along coarse stone paths from one cage to the next where they pass the time in a crouched kneeling position, waiting for a medical exam and processing. Then the fun begins.
- Prolonged Isolation
- Prolonged sleep deprivation
- Sensory deprivation
- Stress positions
- Sensory bombardment (lights, noise . .)
- Forced nakedness
- Sexual humiliation (women guards are employed here)
- cultural humiliation (flush a Koran in the toilet)
- Extreme cold (hypothermia)
- Exploitation of phobias (how about being buried alive?)
- Water-boarding (near drowning)
The Third Geneva Convention guarantees humane treatment to prisoners of War and their release after the war’s end. The Geneva Convention also restricts a prisoner’s responsibility of disclosure to name, rank and serial number. In a memo released in December of 2002, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld approved the use of “aggressive techniques” during these interrogations, convinced in the preeminence of the United States Justice system before some Silly, Toothless Paper from Switzerland . It was also declared at this time that the Third Geneva Convention did not apply to al-Qaeda or Taliban prisoners. This was quite a shock to our NATO allies who maintain and recognize the authority of due-process under that Silly, Toothless Rag, which restricted such heavy handed interpretation to an International Tribunal. It was apparent that the United States had an independent agenda and was going to provide any anemic legal foundations for an “unconventional” approach to an “unconventional” war, regardless of the damage to international and domestic relationships or policies.
Our own Forth Amendment prohibits unwarranted searches and seizure with a conscience toward the tyrannical abuses endured by the shapers of our Constitution. They did after all, lest we continue to forget, experience their very own “9/11“.
The Sixth Amendment is pretty clear on a few other points: “ . . . the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed . . And to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of Counsel for his defense.”
It took the nightmare two World Wars and the devastation of half of Europe and Japan to get a group of the most powerful nations to collect the wisdom necessary to draft that paper in Geneva. It held no partisan advantage but defended instead the principles of “all” humanity against such storms as brought about in the madness of war. Likewise, our pretense to defend, protect and spread the principles of American democracy against Terrorism, by engaging in the tactics of Orwellian tyranny is as short sighted as it is blatantly sanctimonious. Are we illustrating any such altruism through these extraordinary renditions, unwarranted invasions, unsubstantiated arrests, torture tactics, warrantless domestic wire taps, or sanctions on nations brave and insubordinate enough to betray American loyalty and ratify the proposed International Criminal Court ?
Our behavior clearly tells the world instead that when a situation challenges the basic, fundamentals of “homeland security“, the United States has lost confidence in its own Constitution as a reference for effective protection and control . The same has been publicly stated about the Bush administration’s lack regard for the International code of cooperation and civility. Our own Ninth Circuit Court ruled on December 18th, 2003 that the Executive Branch may not indefinitely imprison foreign nationals at Guantanamo without charge or a means to challenge their detention. Apparently the Federal courts must re-audition for relevance in a post-9/11 society. It is now the eleventh day of September, six years after this ruling and over three hundred detainees still wait in their six by eight foot cells for the decision of the 9th Circuit Court to reach the White House.
When such behavior is thrust onto center stage before a troubled world, it behooves the Nation to define with equal clarity and emphasis this New World Order. Failure to do so would simply confirm the vulgarity of this fresh arrangement and neutralize the effectiveness of the very code of law we claim to defend. The failure of the Bush White House to convince its skeptics was the price of maintaining its grip on our flag’s hem as it worked to deconstruct the government and society it stands for. I cannot see the logic in this without introducing motives, sub-textual agendas, that have yet to be disclosed. If your job is to protect the United States and the situation dictates the use of methods clearly restricted by the Constitution, than serve it up for what it is. Having the Country eat its vegetables by hiding them under gravy, by lying about the vegetable truth of their being, by insulting our intelligence and denying our right to the full equation for our best interests deserves less allegiance than the obediant, spoon fed conservative movement has demanded. Questioning such recklessness has been successfully sold to many patriotic Americans as counter productive and bad form. To this claim I add that America has adopted a process which allows a majority of its citizens to choose a King if it pleases. I regret only that I had to live in the age where this situation would be tested.
The recent interest in prisoner abuses during our past eight years of operations in Iraq and Afghanistan have agitated America’s patriots once again. This may well be the most effective program the AMA has yet witnessed to get overweight Americans to put down the remote, get off the couch and drive their outsized SUV’s to join fellow pharisaic patriots in the town square for a brief, loud protest rally. Attorney General Eric Holder has apparently misplaced the memo from his predecessor to overlook such indiscrete and enthusiastic inquisition. Its simply time to remind this insolent man who’s fighting and for what. Treat the terrorists like people and you disgrace the memory of Nine-eleven. Treat the detainees like convicted Terrorists and you have order. Treat some of the brave men and women in uniform like suspects and you disgrace that “last true measure of devotion.” This is exactly why broad classifications are so useful in debate. They include the sword onto which rebuttals must fall or lose integrity. Unkle Remus gave us a tar baby for Brer Rabit to wrestle; Bush gave us a war that is fought by brave soldiers on our side and “enemy combatants” on the other.
The investigation will fail. In 2004, the Justice department set up an examination into nineteen instances of possible CIA abuses. In spite of the authorization by top level officials to broaden our interpretation of allowable interrogation techniques, parameters limiting these practices only from the very threshold of death, it has been suggested that some CIA interrogators found even this latitude prohibitively restrictive.
Some examples of this claim include:
- the agent who used a gun to intimidate a suspect
- Threats by interrogators to bury their subjects alive
- the agent who received 8 years in prison for beating a detainee to death with a flashlight during “harsh interrogation”
- The undercover agent who received a promotion to Chief of Station in Baghdad after stripping a prisoner, dousing him with water and leaving him in a frigid cell overnight in Kabul, where he was found dead the following morning of hypothermia. (I don’t believe this worked to free any new information in the War on Terrorism)
- The Afghan prisoner who died of asphyxiation after being suspended by chains wrapped around his arms, forced behind his back. No one was convicted on this one.
- The agents who disregarded instructions from the Justice Department authorizing water-boarding with the warning that “the repetitions should not be substantial because the techniques generally lose their effectiveness after several repetitions.” Abu Zubaydah was water-boarded 83 times in August 2002; Kalid Shaikh Mohammad was water-boarded 183 times in March, 2003. (Kalid Mohammad was the self-proclaimed mastermind of the September 11 attacks.)
Additional hurdles confronting efforts to bring specific individuals out from the cover of patriotic duty and into the light of sanity, exposing them for the submissive, sadistic vigilantes they proved to be and sentenced accordingly, will be met and neutered by impossibly difficult metrics of accountability. According to U.S. anti-torture statutes, to convict someone of torture, the prosecution must establish that an interrogator intended to inflict “severe physical pain or mental suffering.” Proving this much to the satisfaction of the court and jury will prove more than difficult. Without witnesses or substantiating medical documentation such as autopsy reports or physicals, evidence unavailable to prosecutors who lost these same cases between 2002 and ‘06, cases that were ultimately rejected by the Bush Justice system, this second attempt doesn’t stand a chance. So you can all relax. After all, we “can’t handle the truth” anyway.
However by opening this inquiry the Obama Administration begins a period of long overdue therapy for a nation traumatized and divided by the malignant strategies of the previous government. Taking the Constitution off of life-support, letting it stretch its legs and walk on its own again is just the prescription our country needs to finish the job in Afghanistan and get back to problems here at home. And nobody loses.
The “Patriots” who defend America’s right to lynch foreigners on the closest limb will feel vindicated by Eric Holder’s high profile loss. This will allow them to get back to other issues like stopping the communists from passing a bill on Healthcare and closing the gates of America from brown skinned immigrants. The Liberals, who will continue to trash the White House’s menacing manipulation of the legal system, will have some short-lived satisfaction from their long awaited day in court before complaining that the inevitable decision to dismiss was sold to Right-wing lobbyists before the trials began. The world will be happy to welcome home a sorely missed multi-lateral business partner and NATO ally after eight long years of fever.
We as a nation have learned that we are no safer by amputating the Constitution. We simply lost some time, a great deal of diplomatic leverage and many young soldiers in the Middle East and Asia. As they say in Afghanistan, “American’s think in years, we think in generations.” If patience is the key to success here, I'm concerned that we had better figure out how to read Arabic.
- jeff
© Jeff Thomas 2009
I will be sure to post it right here, without edit, for all to read. enjoy . . .
This letter from Hoople:
I haven't complained to you about the trivial stuff that fascinates the American Public in quite some time. I've been stuck on the Gitmo thing. I've written to you twice more about my thoughts surrounding the incidents and realized I was contradicting myself as each piece grew in length. I've researched this topic intensely and have come to the conclusion that we most definitely have broken international law. The articles of The Geneva Convention are very simple to understand. I think my greatest issue is with how certain members of the democratic party seem to be grandstanding an effort to bring those responsible for committing these crimes to justice. I don't know if it's a domestic political agenda they feel obligated to meet or the need to apologize to the world for our wrong doings in an effort to help create a kum-by-ya type atmosphere. We don't need to push it but justice should be allowed to run its course, and I think it would behoove us to keep this kind of stuff off page one. And do you really think the people charged with interrogating our Prisoners of War were going to say "No....I'm not allowed to do that".
They would have been fired for not doing their job as requested by The Commander in Chief. I would say what a confusing dilemma. I can't help but to think about Harry Truman when this subject is discussed. He signed an executive order giving our military permission to drop two nuclear bombs. Approximately 200,000 Japanese civilians were either vaporized or died a slow and painful death from the effects of radiation poisoning. Granted, The Geneva Convention was a work in progress at that time but should Harry have been brought to justice for conspiracy to murder for all of those innocent lives taken? He had our Nations Security on his mind just as our past administration did. They all did what they thought was necessary to insure our safety. Just a thought. A phrase was coined when we were battling with foes abroad in the 40's. "Loose Lips Sink Ships". Some things are truly a matter of National Security. For that young cub reporter looking for that big break, you know, the Big Story....look elsewhere. It could very well be his dwelling that the next plane crashes into.
- hoop
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and a response:
September 11, 2009
"He who would sacrifice freedom for security deserves neither" - Ben Franklin
"Better that a hundred guilty men are free than one innocent man is imprisoned." - British justice William Blackstone
Hoop,
It is simply unfortunate for you that I received your message less than a week after watching Anne Coulter speak her mind about the traitors and sissy-boys currently investigating the abuses at Gitmo during the previous eight years; proof that rhetorical agility is not a measure of intelligence but rather a "stupid human trick", like flame swallowing, throwing a football or moving Rush Limbaugh's lips.
I grant you neither men quoted above lived through the nightmare of Sept. 11. They, in their time, saw enough however, including the slaughter of thousands in a fight to redefine a new land and realize a radical, new philosophical promise with no concrete precedent. Integrity against Tyranny; as old a fable as David and Goliath. It was just simple men, farmers, merchants and craftsmen, dying in some field, in the water, in the snow, for a principle; for some neighbor's compelling, abstract idea of a new social order. I think these guy's saw their fair share.
The Unites States as victim on that horrible day is as heart wrenching a tale as it is void of context. The entire truth needs to be repeated for as long as it takes for sympathies such as the one expressed in your message to be validated. Silence in the face of government sanctioned aggression, in defiance to overwhelming outrage abroad, simply reaffirms an individual's complicity. I choose instead to include the unpleasant historical events into this analysis and do my part to ensure that there should never be another administration like the one we endured for the past eight years.
The United States is viewed by many cultures around the world as an obese, voracious corporation armed to the teeth. Its scale and appetite has no historical precedent. Without the confidence in our integrity, our diplomacy, nothing remains to trade but our muscle. Taming the world's resources requires guns and cunning, a fact well documented by all sides of the political aisle. We all read the same history books.
Here is a short list of some examples of our aggressive interference and intrusion into the affairs of foreign, sovereign nations for self serving objectives:
- The U.S funded government coup which brought the Shah to power in Iran;
- the backing/funding of a "regrettable" resistance movement in Cuba led by one Fidel Castro to unseat the government of Fulgencio Batista; . . . (should've done our homework here)
- the illegal funding of a paramilitary/terrorist group seeking to overthrow the legitimate government in Columbia we named "Freedom Fighters"; (remember the Iran-Contra scandal?)
- the abandonment and betrayal of Ho Chi Min, (pen pal of F.D.R.) and his Viet Cong forces (once enamored of the principles of U.S. democracy), seeking independence from growing Communist forces, just to kiss some Imperialistic French ass in our Cold War campaign. The subsequent horror of the Vietnam "conflict" resulted in sixteen years of squandered opportunity for mutual political and economic cooperation, (Twenty-four years later, the victorious Communist nation of Vietnam made the computer mouse I'm using to write this essay);
- the support of the corrupt Nigerian military dictatorship of General Sani Abacha, protecting the activities of foreign oil companies, (Shell and Chevron, Hess, Lonestar, Mobil and more), who destroy the fishing and agricultural livelihood and traditions of its people with the toxic footprint of Western-styled "progress". Protests by the people here are met by armed soldiers who maintain order through murder, rape and intimidation. Prisoners like the peaceful activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight others from the Ogani region receive scripted trials which ended predictably in execution by hanging
- the use of American military resources to provide security for the financially connected Wahhabite monarchy in Saudi Arabia. On July 31, 1987, the police force of this regime beat over four hundred visiting worshippers to death (reports vary in range to over fifteen hundred dead) in a confrontation between the ideologies of the native Sunni and visiting Iranian Shiite pilgrims, at Mecca, the Holiest site in the Moslem world. It was this single event that created the counter-revolutionary philosophy of Osama Bin Laden and subsequently, the terrorist organization we now fight known as Al Qaeda.
- the unconditional support of the United State's single minded diplomatic and military policies for Israel's genocidal behavior toward the Palestinians.
- the illegal invasion of a sovereign Iraq under false and calibrated pretenses and all associated attempts to cover-up that project;
. . . . to name a just few high profile examples.
The United States since the latter half of the nineteenth century inherited an economic appetite of such voracity, such efficiency that no example from history could serve to caution or exemplify moderation. Ours were the spoils and the Planet our playground. It is my firm conclusion that four classes of citizens remain in the United States.
- The first group understand the system well enough to promote and manipulate it.
- The second class support the government's effort and maintain, in the name of patriotism, what cherry picked pieces they benefit from, and understand of , it.
- The third group understand the complexity and compromises involved in our economy's insatiable demand for resources; deride the governing principles as hypocritical and immoral; yet coexist among the first two groups of necessity. This class however, offers little constructive rhetoric toward a vision of any consensus let alone any practical, timely alternative. Visionaries we are, salesmen we are not.
- The fourth class are the American Ex-patriots; living in the murky shadow of complicity on some foreign soil.
I have glossed over the details of the select historical subtexts above, ignoring the drama and patriotic idealism of the U.S. troops who gave their lives in these struggles, in order to expose in the fewest words my conviction that the evil forces driving our economic system use patriotic citizens from the lower economic strata like disposable condoms. They fuck the world with latex boys in uniform as protection. They convince the mothers and fathers of America to send their kids into battle because America needs Middle East oil to fill our cars, Nike sneakers made by children in Indonesia to give style to our hopeless and keep our grocery shelves stocked and surrealistically photogenic.
We, the American citizens who make the cars and guns, who mine the steel and build our cities, roads and bridges; who consume like locusts all of the world's resources, we are persuaded that one cannot live without these extra-necessary trappings. We however are never consulted when our elected leaders act to repay clandestine debts to self serving and powerful lobbyists and business associates. We are bred by the true power brokers of this country like mules, sheep and Clydesdale's in accordance to our modest choices and potential; vetted and indoctrinated by our media and our communities. Yet when the world looks down in shame, anger or disgust at the trespasses of our power elite, it is "we" they blame.
God help the African or South American nation guilty of trying to repatriate stolen land from U.S. investment companies destroying their forests to grow coffee or chocolate. We illegally fish off the coasts of Somalia and call the irate nationalist saps "pirates". We set up factories in Indonesia and Pakistan, provide inhuman working conditions for cheap peasant and child labor to produce chotchky for our suburban cravings, hiding the profits from the taxman by investing in man-made islands off the newest billionaire playground known as Kuwait. These corporate vampires push and pull American military and diplomatic forces around the globe with unprecedented arrogance, while palming taxes desperately needed to fund the very armies they hide behind. Back home they use their media resources to keep the general population needing the unnecessary, believing the dream and suspecting anyone who dissents. Its all so beautifully sinister.
The population of Guantanamo prison numbers about 300 prisoners at the time I write this. This is down from its highest number of 680 back in 2003. The prisoners at this facility were represented by the Bush administration as the most dangerous suspects in the Nation's war on global terror. The American public has watched and read the Press wring their hands over control of the two contradictory attitudes toward the Bush government's explanation of the situation. American citizens who choose to believe the reports supporting the Country's behavior during the war equate their support to a quasi-religious framework of “loyalty to Country” and bitterly defend the sacrifices made against reason to a higher plane of "faith-based" patriotism. Common sense tells us, they argue, that these backward people who threaten America have no motive outside jealousy of our standard of living; our superiority. They are hyenas in the campsite and nothing more. FOX news and the Wall Street Journal are the most accessible of these media outlets.
Some Right-wing, Conservative talking-points are:
- Osama Bin Laden and Al Qaeda worked with the Iraqi government of Saddam Hussein to plan and execute the attacks on September 11.
- Proof of Hussein's preparation for more attacks were unveiled by a collection of spy-satellite photographs clearly showing a cache of missile body tubes. Colin Powell, United States Ambassador to the U.N. used these photos in one last pitch to the international community to defend our imminent invasion of Iraq.
- Collaborating chatter on the spy networks supported this claim with evidence of a uranium purchase by Saddam from Nigeria.
- The International community overwhelmingly supports our right to defend ourselves. Those foreigners who don't like it are not worth kissing up to anyway.
- Sleeper cells of Al Qaeda terrorists were assimilated into communities across the Unites States, waiting for instructions to engage in deadly operations against our softest underbelly. American Muslims are to be regarded with a healthy suspicion.
- No one is detained in Guantanamo who doesn't belong there. They are prisoners in our struggle to defend our homes and way of life.
- Anything done by the Administration in the service of this cause is justifiable. As mere citizens, ours is not the place to force those in the position of protecting us, The Bush White House, to reveal sensitive, motivating information supporting the retraction of Constitutional rights.
- Investigations into these "abuses" is anti-American.
The other side of the media, the so-called "liberals", challenged every one of these points. The New York Times and MSNBC television are best associated with these efforts. It is a curious phenomenon that in spite of the strong evidence disproving every itemized talking point listed above, these two groups, rather than gravitating closer to consensus, have instead drifted ideologically, further apart. We can witness this venom over the Iraq war spill into the current Healthcare debate. A simple talk to school children on the importance of staying in school and avoiding drug use has been vocally challenged by "concerned" parents who fear the President is over reaching his authority by speaking on education. "Just say No" to Obama.
The scorecard :
- No link between Osama Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein existed. To the contrary, they despised each other. However thanks to the American invasion into Iraq, Al Qaeda cells have since been welcomed into the country.
- The aluminum "tubes" in the satellite photos were proven to be incompatible for use in the development, let alone manufacture of missiles. This was known by high level Administration officials before they allowed Ambassador Powell to make his presentation, and an ass of himself, to the United Nations.
- There was no uranium in Nigeria. The punishment for discovering this information was the sordid betrayal of ambassador Joseph Wilson IVth, by top level White House personnel (Scooter Libby), by exposing his wife Valarie Plame Wilson's identity as a CIA agent.
- Aside from Great Britain, I believe our only other ally in the Iraqi war was a biker gang from the Seychelles Islands. Incidentally, public outcry in Britain against the war eventually cost Tony Blair his job.
- Sleeper cells have had a decade to surface. As such, episodes of foreign terrorist activities during this period remain dwarfed by the numbers and scope of "homegrown" terrorist organizations in the same period. Terrorists are terrorists. Muslims are Muslims. Like any subset of the whole population, there are occasions for an individual to be both. The "internship" approach to this matter embarrassed us during World War II and exposed a racist streak in the highest corridors of power. I respond only to the call by the Muslim population in my community to reject such gross associations as the result of intolerance and ignorance of the tenets of the Koran; accepting that no spiritual or political denomination is without its lunatic fringe.
The ubiquitous Right-wing, conservative deluge of meticulously scripted quasi-information and the consequent, carefully cultivated public tensions merely greased the rails of the Bush Administration's earliest experiments in the strange field of "disclosure". The White House, unable to resist an opportunity to switch a bishop for a pawn during a national "bathroom break", illegally eavesdropped on American telephone conversations. Miscalculating the press, a proactive attempt to come clean was met with unanticipated venom. The so-named "Domestic Spying Program" was forced back into the shadows, but not before a symbolic yet effective pardon for AT&T and Verizon for their collaboration; or as Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahey would describe it, the Bush White House wants "to immunize past illegal conduct . . because they know it was illegal conduct."
So much more needs to be said about this subject, but not at this time; I want to remain on topic and address your concerns about the treatment by the current Attorney General's office of Armed Service personnel with respect to charges of war-time abuses of prisoners at Guantanamo over the previous eight years.
- On the subject of Guantanamo:
When “Someone” claims a crime was committed at Gitmo, that “Someone” must be prepared to enter into an enigma of conflicting truths all held to be of simultaneous authority. The invasion of a country to round up "enemy combatants" is neither the same thing as declaring war upon a sovereign nation and taking enemy prisoners, nor is it arranging through diplomatic means the extradition of known criminals taking refuge on foreign soil. As I have come to learn over the past eight years it is something else entirely.
In this new War on Terrorism, then Attorney General Alberto Gonzales advised the Bush team to dispose of both Miranda and the Geneva convention. Should the press shout "Miranda!", Rumsfeld would simply answer "War!". If on the other hand some liberal International-Law professor from Columbia University should grab the Op-Ed page in the Times and yell "Geneva Convention", Cheney would just yell "This ain't a war, so these guys ain't covered!"
Its really insulting that these guys would use the same strategy to screw up the the Human Rights issue that they used to screw up the first six and a half years of their military invasion. What a waste of lives, money and sirloin diplomatic leverage. Men like these cannot be wholly faulted however. I firmly believe in G. W.'s commitment to protecting the United States from terrorists. I've just learned through this experience however, that his America and my America are on separate plains of consciousness. His definition of a "terrorist" would include the liberal media, the left wing activists and Independent scrutinizers dissatisfied with his policies. I don't believe those men in the White House during the first eight years of the 21st century had a clue as to how one might begin to accomplish the same task within the boundaries of U.S. and International Law. Pretending to save the public from the ugly truth was and is "double-speak" for an Ivy League class of frat boys who'd never consider entering a contest without hedging it with a fix. As the scorpion said to the fresh stung Fox, "It is my nature."
So without Miranda, Abdul Rahim Abdul, recently released for insufficient evidence of ties to any terrorist activity, was sent to Guantanamo for six and a half years. Like his colleagues, Abdul enjoyed the twenty hour flight in arm and leg irons, a strong dose of sedatives and a hood. I don’t believe there was a movie on that flight. I urge you to research this man's story by following the URL: http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/06/23/Judge-orders-Gitmo-detainees-release/UPI-86661245766496/
Rewards for information leading to the capture of suspected Al Qaeda terrorist's became a lucrative source of income for other unscrupulous informants. A large number of civil disputes were resolved by simply using the U.S. military to arrest and detain civilians whose only crime was a disagreement with a neighbor, one who related a fabricated history of insurgent complicity, collected his reward and went home with one less pain in the ass to worry about. In this way many detainees were abducted from their innocent lives back in Iraq or Afghanistan to spend years in a cell half way around the world. Proof of innocence is near impossible when the chain of command has no clear idea how to orchestrate a trial.
Salahidin Abdulahat, one of seventeen detainees from the Uyghur’s community in western China, a Muslim worshipping ethnic minority persecuted by the Chinese government for years, spent close to seven years in Guantanamo before the Obama administration finally ended the gridlocked details of his release. After years of CIA-style interrogation, Salahidin is a valuable encyclopedia of U. S. covert information:
- What were their points of interest?
- What were their methods?
- Who was in there with you?
Releasing him back home was not a humanitarian option. Obama understood repatriation would have been a death sentence as the Government of Hu Jintao will have him executed for membership in the Uyghur’s resistance effort.
So he spends his life now in permanent exile in Bermuda. Another fine mess. Jealous FOX news pundits are having a field day.
After arriving to Camp X-Ray (aka: Camp Iguana or Guantanamo), barefoot detainees are escorted along coarse stone paths from one cage to the next where they pass the time in a crouched kneeling position, waiting for a medical exam and processing. Then the fun begins.
- Prolonged Isolation
- Prolonged sleep deprivation
- Sensory deprivation
- Stress positions
- Sensory bombardment (lights, noise . .)
- Forced nakedness
- Sexual humiliation (women guards are employed here)
- cultural humiliation (flush a Koran in the toilet)
- Extreme cold (hypothermia)
- Exploitation of phobias (how about being buried alive?)
- Water-boarding (near drowning)
The Third Geneva Convention guarantees humane treatment to prisoners of War and their release after the war’s end. The Geneva Convention also restricts a prisoner’s responsibility of disclosure to name, rank and serial number. In a memo released in December of 2002, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld approved the use of “aggressive techniques” during these interrogations, convinced in the preeminence of the United States Justice system before some Silly, Toothless Paper from Switzerland . It was also declared at this time that the Third Geneva Convention did not apply to al-Qaeda or Taliban prisoners. This was quite a shock to our NATO allies who maintain and recognize the authority of due-process under that Silly, Toothless Rag, which restricted such heavy handed interpretation to an International Tribunal. It was apparent that the United States had an independent agenda and was going to provide any anemic legal foundations for an “unconventional” approach to an “unconventional” war, regardless of the damage to international and domestic relationships or policies.
Our own Forth Amendment prohibits unwarranted searches and seizure with a conscience toward the tyrannical abuses endured by the shapers of our Constitution. They did after all, lest we continue to forget, experience their very own “9/11“.
The Sixth Amendment is pretty clear on a few other points: “ . . . the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed . . And to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of Counsel for his defense.”
It took the nightmare two World Wars and the devastation of half of Europe and Japan to get a group of the most powerful nations to collect the wisdom necessary to draft that paper in Geneva. It held no partisan advantage but defended instead the principles of “all” humanity against such storms as brought about in the madness of war. Likewise, our pretense to defend, protect and spread the principles of American democracy against Terrorism, by engaging in the tactics of Orwellian tyranny is as short sighted as it is blatantly sanctimonious. Are we illustrating any such altruism through these extraordinary renditions, unwarranted invasions, unsubstantiated arrests, torture tactics, warrantless domestic wire taps, or sanctions on nations brave and insubordinate enough to betray American loyalty and ratify the proposed International Criminal Court ?
Our behavior clearly tells the world instead that when a situation challenges the basic, fundamentals of “homeland security“, the United States has lost confidence in its own Constitution as a reference for effective protection and control . The same has been publicly stated about the Bush administration’s lack regard for the International code of cooperation and civility. Our own Ninth Circuit Court ruled on December 18th, 2003 that the Executive Branch may not indefinitely imprison foreign nationals at Guantanamo without charge or a means to challenge their detention. Apparently the Federal courts must re-audition for relevance in a post-9/11 society. It is now the eleventh day of September, six years after this ruling and over three hundred detainees still wait in their six by eight foot cells for the decision of the 9th Circuit Court to reach the White House.
When such behavior is thrust onto center stage before a troubled world, it behooves the Nation to define with equal clarity and emphasis this New World Order. Failure to do so would simply confirm the vulgarity of this fresh arrangement and neutralize the effectiveness of the very code of law we claim to defend. The failure of the Bush White House to convince its skeptics was the price of maintaining its grip on our flag’s hem as it worked to deconstruct the government and society it stands for. I cannot see the logic in this without introducing motives, sub-textual agendas, that have yet to be disclosed. If your job is to protect the United States and the situation dictates the use of methods clearly restricted by the Constitution, than serve it up for what it is. Having the Country eat its vegetables by hiding them under gravy, by lying about the vegetable truth of their being, by insulting our intelligence and denying our right to the full equation for our best interests deserves less allegiance than the obediant, spoon fed conservative movement has demanded. Questioning such recklessness has been successfully sold to many patriotic Americans as counter productive and bad form. To this claim I add that America has adopted a process which allows a majority of its citizens to choose a King if it pleases. I regret only that I had to live in the age where this situation would be tested.
The recent interest in prisoner abuses during our past eight years of operations in Iraq and Afghanistan have agitated America’s patriots once again. This may well be the most effective program the AMA has yet witnessed to get overweight Americans to put down the remote, get off the couch and drive their outsized SUV’s to join fellow pharisaic patriots in the town square for a brief, loud protest rally. Attorney General Eric Holder has apparently misplaced the memo from his predecessor to overlook such indiscrete and enthusiastic inquisition. Its simply time to remind this insolent man who’s fighting and for what. Treat the terrorists like people and you disgrace the memory of Nine-eleven. Treat the detainees like convicted Terrorists and you have order. Treat some of the brave men and women in uniform like suspects and you disgrace that “last true measure of devotion.” This is exactly why broad classifications are so useful in debate. They include the sword onto which rebuttals must fall or lose integrity. Unkle Remus gave us a tar baby for Brer Rabit to wrestle; Bush gave us a war that is fought by brave soldiers on our side and “enemy combatants” on the other.
The investigation will fail. In 2004, the Justice department set up an examination into nineteen instances of possible CIA abuses. In spite of the authorization by top level officials to broaden our interpretation of allowable interrogation techniques, parameters limiting these practices only from the very threshold of death, it has been suggested that some CIA interrogators found even this latitude prohibitively restrictive.
Some examples of this claim include:
- the agent who used a gun to intimidate a suspect
- Threats by interrogators to bury their subjects alive
- the agent who received 8 years in prison for beating a detainee to death with a flashlight during “harsh interrogation”
- The undercover agent who received a promotion to Chief of Station in Baghdad after stripping a prisoner, dousing him with water and leaving him in a frigid cell overnight in Kabul, where he was found dead the following morning of hypothermia. (I don’t believe this worked to free any new information in the War on Terrorism)
- The Afghan prisoner who died of asphyxiation after being suspended by chains wrapped around his arms, forced behind his back. No one was convicted on this one.
- The agents who disregarded instructions from the Justice Department authorizing water-boarding with the warning that “the repetitions should not be substantial because the techniques generally lose their effectiveness after several repetitions.” Abu Zubaydah was water-boarded 83 times in August 2002; Kalid Shaikh Mohammad was water-boarded 183 times in March, 2003. (Kalid Mohammad was the self-proclaimed mastermind of the September 11 attacks.)
Additional hurdles confronting efforts to bring specific individuals out from the cover of patriotic duty and into the light of sanity, exposing them for the submissive, sadistic vigilantes they proved to be and sentenced accordingly, will be met and neutered by impossibly difficult metrics of accountability. According to U.S. anti-torture statutes, to convict someone of torture, the prosecution must establish that an interrogator intended to inflict “severe physical pain or mental suffering.” Proving this much to the satisfaction of the court and jury will prove more than difficult. Without witnesses or substantiating medical documentation such as autopsy reports or physicals, evidence unavailable to prosecutors who lost these same cases between 2002 and ‘06, cases that were ultimately rejected by the Bush Justice system, this second attempt doesn’t stand a chance. So you can all relax. After all, we “can’t handle the truth” anyway.
However by opening this inquiry the Obama Administration begins a period of long overdue therapy for a nation traumatized and divided by the malignant strategies of the previous government. Taking the Constitution off of life-support, letting it stretch its legs and walk on its own again is just the prescription our country needs to finish the job in Afghanistan and get back to problems here at home. And nobody loses.
The “Patriots” who defend America’s right to lynch foreigners on the closest limb will feel vindicated by Eric Holder’s high profile loss. This will allow them to get back to other issues like stopping the communists from passing a bill on Healthcare and closing the gates of America from brown skinned immigrants. The Liberals, who will continue to trash the White House’s menacing manipulation of the legal system, will have some short-lived satisfaction from their long awaited day in court before complaining that the inevitable decision to dismiss was sold to Right-wing lobbyists before the trials began. The world will be happy to welcome home a sorely missed multi-lateral business partner and NATO ally after eight long years of fever.
We as a nation have learned that we are no safer by amputating the Constitution. We simply lost some time, a great deal of diplomatic leverage and many young soldiers in the Middle East and Asia. As they say in Afghanistan, “American’s think in years, we think in generations.” If patience is the key to success here, I'm concerned that we had better figure out how to read Arabic.
- jeff
© Jeff Thomas 2009
