Rendition, Torture and Government Hypocrisy

In relation to my last post - about newly released documentation:

The following article was published yesterday to coincide with the ACLU's publication of the documentation. Here's the first three paragraphs of a two page article written by Jason Leopold:

Quote :

Newly declassified Defense Department documents describe a pattern of “abusive” behavior by U.S. military interrogators that appears to have caused the deaths of several suspected terrorists imprisoned at a detention center in Afghanistan in December 2002, just two days after former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld authorized the use of "enhanced interrogation" techniques against prisoners in that country.

The previously secret pages were part of a wide-ranging report into detainee abuse in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay known as the Church Report, named after Vice Admiral Albert T. Church, the former Naval inspector general, who conducted the investigation at the request of Rumsfeld. That report, released in March 2004, said there was "no policy that condoned or authorized either abuse or torture," which critics of the Bush administration believed was a cover-up.

But the declassified Pentagon documents, coupled with a report issued last December by the Senate Armed Services Committee, tell a different story and lend credence to claims by civil libertarians and critics of former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld that refusal to release a fully classified version of the Church Report several years ago amounted to a cover-up.

Article can be found here: LINK.

Shannon is indeed an issue, but in comparison to a huge percentage of one's taxes supporting an actual war, it is, comparatively, a very small problem.

Interesting stuff from the Guardian today, the lawyers representing the Briton in Guantanamo sent a letter to Obama telling them what happened to their client, seems Obama only gets to read what's not censored for him...

Quote :

Stafford Smith tells Obama he should be aware of the "bizarre
reality" of the situation. "You, as commander in chief, are being
denied access to material that would help prove that crimes have been
committed by US personnel. This decision is being made by the very
people who you command."It is understood US defence officials
might have censored the evidence to protect the president from criminal
liability or political embarrassment.The letter and its
blanked-out attachment were disclosed as two high court judges
yesterday agreed to reopen the court case in which Mohamed's lawyers,
the Guardian and other media are seeking disclosure of evidence of
alleged torture against him. Mohamed's lawyers are challenging the
judges' gagging order, claiming that David Miliband, the foreign
secretary, changed his evidence.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/feb/11/binyam-mohamed-release-torture-letter

expat girl wrote:

Shannon is indeed an issue, but in comparison to a huge percentage of one's taxes supporting an actual war, it is, comparatively, a very small problem.

There are very few issues at the moment that could possibly see any of our government ministers being tried in an international court for crimes against humanity. Shannon is one of them. This issue cannot and should not have a dollar or a euro sign in front of it and that be considered the only thing in examining it. This whole financial meltdown is very much due to the debt incurred by the US in its supposed war against terror. True our banks have been acting the maggot, but had the proverbial shit not been hitting the fan, they would have continued on, business as usual, for years to come. Shannon was our government doing their bit. They've done more that's for sure, but Shannon's the key.

So when folks are starving, riots are a daily occurence and medicine is a thing of the past - look to Shannon, that was our sacrifice to bring it all about.