Guantánamo Career Suicide

Feb 24, 2007 | Democracy, Freedom of Speech, Legal, OzPol Values, Terrorism, USPol, Values, War

Guantánamo Career Suicide

 Guantánamo Policy Chief Pulls Plug on Career:
Spills Government Beans in Radio Interview

 

 

Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Guantánamo Policy, Charles “Cully” Stimson, resigned following uproar over a 12 January interview on Federal Newsradio, a propaganda front for the Bush administration. In the interview Stimson stated,

“I think the news story that you’re really going to start seeing in the next couple of weeks is this: As a result of a FOIA [Freedom of Information Act] request through a major news organization, somebody asked, ‘Who are the lawyers around this country representing detainees down there? And you know what, it’s shocking.”

When the interviewer asked who was paying for the legal representation, Stimson replied,

“It’s not clear, is it? Some will maintain that they are doing it out of the goodness of their heart, that they’re doing it pro bono, and I suspect they are; others are receiving moneys from who knows where, and I’d be curious to have them explain that.”

And then:

“I think, quite honestly, when corporate CEOs see that those firms are representing the very terrorists who hit their bottom line back in 2001, those CEOs are going to make those law firms choose between representing terrorists or representing reputable firms, and I think that is going to have major play in the next few weeks. And we want to watch that play out.”

This was enough not only to offend everyone who believes in and supports western democratic values, justice and the rule of law but also to incense large numbers of professional legal practitioners across the USA.

However, it’s not the first time US military officials have criticized Guantánamo defense lawyers.

In March of last year, Col. Moe Davis, chief prosecutor for the Guantánamo tribunals, told journalists that several major law firms that have defense contractors as paying clients are providing pro bono lawyers to defend Guantánamo detainees in habeas petitions.

“It’s somewhat ironic that the weaponry that we use in the war on terrorism is helping fund the defense of the alleged terrorists,” Davis said at the time.

This is the same Col. Moe Davis who is the Prosecutor in David Hicks’s case, who has lately been in the news in Australia, insisting that Hicks is the world’s blackest murderer since Hitler, and on Insight1 with Jenny Brockie on SBS2.

The Administration and the Pentagon effected to be embarrassed by Stimson’s loyal fervour.

A Pentagon spokesman, Lt. Col. Brian Maka, said Stimson was not speaking for the Bush administration.

Stimson’s comments “do not represent the views of the Department of Defense or the thinking of its leadership,” Maka said.

Stimson apologised within days claiming that

“those comments do not reflect my core beliefs”

Of course what he said does clearly express his core beliefs.

He was comfortable, relaxed and confident in the radical right wing atmosphere of the radio station with its right wing propagandist presenters. He was comfortable, relaxed and confident that he was expressing administration policy, thinking and attitudes.

It was no slip of the tongue, no moment of passion, no mad aberration. He was under no duress, and was very definitely not being flustered by tough questioning. He offered the information quite unprompted. He arrived at the interview intending to say what he said. He came prepared with a list of at least 12 of the 14 the law firms who had been disclosed as representing Guantánamo inmates.

There can be no doubt that he planned to say what he said and that what he said expressed his core beliefs. He is a practised, experienced propagandist who was repeating the company message which he had delivered almost word for word elsewhere and more than once:

GENE ROBINSON, Washington Post columnist (from audiotape): “…calls into question, really, the United States’ commitment to the values and ideals that we said we want to spread throughout the world, such as due process and rule of law. And Guantánamo seems to mock those values.”

 

KUR: How do you answer that?

 

MR. STIMSON: He’s wrong. That doesn’t mock those values at all. Indeed, we’re giving more rights to these terrorists than our own soldiers got during any conflict when they were detained or the Nazis got when they were detained during World War II. During war, you’re not entitled to a trial. You’re not entitled to criminal charges.

Stimson has consistently over time reinforced his message about the treatment of prisoners in Guantánamo:

  • It is transparent and humane
  • Prisoners are not entitled to a trial
  • They get more than they deserve or have a right to
  • There is minimal opposition to the holding of these prisoners
  • They release a lot of people
  • The media are irresponsible in their reporting
  • The inmates are unquestionably guilty

In fact…

  • These are “the very terrorists” who are personally responsible for the financial losses incurred by American companies after 9/11.

Stimson claims that over 2000 journalists, 500 media outlets have been there to see what goes on to the point that Guantánamo is

“probably the most transparent and open location in the world”.

However, the Washington Post has reported that

“Journalists could not talk to detainees, they had to be accompanied by a military escort and their photos were censored. Now, the Pentagon has shut down access entirely _ at least temporarily.”

Stimson claimed that media organisations are “irresponsible” for not showing the new prison at Guantánamo but continue to show Camp X-ray footage. After all, they have access to “B-roll” footage of the new facility but they don’t show it. “Ask yourself why?” he said, “Are they fair and balanced, or do they have an agenda?”

It is a reasonably safe bet that news organisations are not permitted to originate their own footage and that what Stimson describes as the “B-roll footage” is shot by the Defense Department and is entirely sanitised, showing only what Defense wants outsiders to see and nothing that they would not want outsiders to see.

Meanwhile, FBI agents have documented more than two dozen incidents of possible mistreatment at Guantánamo. In one, a detainee’s head was wrapped in duct tape because he chanted the Quran; in a second, a detainee pulled out his hair after hours in a sweltering room.

In a December 2006 court ruling, a federal judge in Washington decried the plight of “some of the unfortunate petitioners who have been detained for many years in the terrible conditions at Guantánamo Bay.”

Stimson characterises local and international public opposition to the Guantánamo detentions as

“…small little protests around the world – really quite minor – drummed up by Amnesty International trying to get their loyal, ardent followers to show up – these are a couple dozen here, a couple dozen folks there…”

Can detainees be released without trial?

CAUSEY: You have about 395 detainees there and I believe something like 340 others have previously been released to their home countries.?

 

STIMSON: 377 detainees, Mike, have been transferred or released from Guantánamo. Just in 2006 alone we transferred 114. We’re on track to transfer or release, you know, 70, 80, 90, 100 in the coming year. Now those numbers are hard to guess because of the diplomatic negotiations. What’s important to know is that those 395 that are there on the island now, roughly 70 to 80 have already been approved for transfer or release. So we’re just waiting for those countries to step up and accept responsibility and mitigate the threat that these guys pose.

Obviously detainees can be, and are, released without trial. It’s just a matter of “diplomacy”. As far as the American Administration is concerned they, but particularly those concerned with Guantánamo, are constrained by no laws. They can hold or release inmates on a whim. Even the politically careful Australian Prime Minister John Howard has said as much, insisting that if David Hicks is not brought to trial before the end of the year he will have him repatriated. He will not ask. He will require.

(This is directly contrary to Mr Cheney’s claims in Sydney (24 February) that “he cannot speed up the process”. One of them is a liar or both of them are liars. Place your vote here.)

And here is what has become of the presumption of innocence in the American justice system as expressed by Cuddly Stimson:

NORRIS: Is there a possibility that there are some folks on Guantánamo that don’t belong there?
STIMSON: Not now.

Referring to Stimson’s lame apology before his ultimate (forced) resignation, the Ethics Scoreboard says:

Stimson’s apology is a lie, and obviously so. What he calls his “core beliefs” are nothing of the kind. They are his official beliefs, the principles that he is required to support officially (that is, give lip service to) as a member of the bar and a high-ranking official in a democracy. True core beliefs are what you reveal when your guard is down, not what you contradict.

The reaction to Stimson’s vilification of Guantánamo defenders was swift and strident. Just a few of these will give the flavour.

The National Lawyers Guild

The undersigned organizations call for the censure of Mr. Charles “Cully” Stimson, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Detainee Affairs, for statements attacking the lawyers who are defending the Guantánamo detainees. Mr. Stimson’s remarks are aimed at chilling the willingness of lawyers to represent those persons imprisoned at Guantánamo, and are contrary to bedrock principles of the right to counsel and the presumption of innocence.

The threats by Mr. Stimson are not subtle. They imply these pro bono lawyers are terrorists. They exhort corporations to pull business from the firms where these lawyers are employed. These remarks are slanderous, and violate the free association rights of these lawyers and their firms.

The Society of American Law Teachers (representing over 800 members at 165 law schools):

Mr. Stimson – who, as a lawyer, should know better – has violated the highest standards of our profession by challenging the lawyers engaged in pro bono representation of Guantánamo detainees and calling on the clients of their law firms to withhold their business from those firms. Lawyers are essential to upholding the rule of law in our country, and the rule of law is precisely what the President claims the United States is defending in the “war on terror.”

And from the American Bar Association:

Lawyers represent people in criminal cases to fulfill a core American value: the treatment of all people equally before the law. To impugn those who are doing this critical work — and doing it on a volunteer basis — is deeply offensive to members of the legal profession, and we hope to all Americans.” She is right. Stimson should be immediately fired for what he said last week and, furthermore, he should be investigated for breaching the code of professional ethics. Not only were the remarks nasty, they were politically and diplomatically unwise.

 

What Stimson said, and why, and how, constitutes conduct unbecoming a member of government and a member of the bar. One hand may be acting aggressively, if not mercifully and justly, toward prosecuting suspected terrorists. But the other hand, Stimson’s hand, is undercutting the very principles we fight for. This is how our government waged the legal war on terror in our name last week.

 

As Thomas Paine wrote of the United States years ago, “This is a government of laws, and not men” – the unchecked power of even the President is not part of democracy or our system of justice.

Shortly after his apology, which was not accepted by any but the most hardline in the Bush Administration, Stimson resigned.

Some see the direct hand of John Yoo in the authorship of the letter of “apology”.
John Yoo’s position can be described as “justice in the service of politics”, rather than what we would normally expect, “politics in the service of justice”.
John Yoo’s judicial politics can be traced to Dick Cheney.

Salon reported an interview with Yoo regarding torture. The interviewer asked:

“If the president deems that he’s got to torture somebody, including by crushing the testicles of the person’s child, there is no law that can stop him?”

 

“No treaty,” replied John Yoo, the former Justice Department official who wrote the crucial memos justifying President Bush’s policies on torture, “war on terror” detainees and domestic surveillance without warrants. Yoo made these assertions at a public debate in December [2005] in Chicago, where he also espoused the radical notion of the “unitary executive” — the idea that the president as commander in chief is the sole judge of the law, unbound by hindrances such as the Geneva Conventions, and possesses inherent authority to subordinate independent government agencies to his fiat. This concept is the cornerstone of the Bush legal doctrine.

Salon also says

Yoo, who left the Justice Department two years ago and is now a law professor at Boalt Hall at the University of California at Berkeley, was the prolific writer. But he was not the author of the process…Then, as now, the driving force was Vice President Cheney.
Cheney’s idea of the head of state invested with absolute power is a venerable one. Bush’s presidency is the latest experiment to achieve it…

 

The original commentary on it appeared in a pamphlet published in 1776, “Common Sense,” written by Tom Paine:

 

“But where say some is the King of America? I’ll tell you Friend, he reigns above, and doth not make havoc of mankind like the Royal Brute of Britain. Yet that we may not appear to be defective even in earthly honors, let a day be solemnly set apart for proclaiming the charter; let it be brought forth placed on the divine law, the word of God; let a crown be placed thereon, by which the world may know, that so far as we approve as monarchy, that in America THE LAW IS KING. For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law ought to be King; and there ought to be no other. But lest any ill use should afterwards arise, let the crown at the conclusion of the ceremony be demolished, and scattered among the people whose right it is.”

So what does Stimson believe to be “Truth, Justice and the American way”?

“DoD official says some Guantánamo detainees may be imprisoned for life”. More than 300 prisoners now held by the US at Guantanamo Bay could remain there under US military detention for the rest of their lives, DoD Deputy Assistant Secretary for Detainee Affairs Charles “Cully” Stimson told Reuters during a routine visit to the base last week.

Ethics Scoreboard has named Charles “Cully” Stimson Liar of the Month for January 2007

 

1 The Insight webpage has a poll which asks “Should David Hicks be brought home?”
Voting is 93% in favour of Hicks’s immediate return.

 

UK’s ‘Morale Muscular’ Withdrawal

Feb 21, 2007 | Australian Values, Democracy, OzPol Values, USPol, Values, War

UK’s ‘Morale Muscular’ Withdrawal

‘

“…under no circumstances should we allow ourselves to lose morale muscular and to step back from this…”  [Brendan Nelson]

 

Values Australia, in partnership with the Ministry of Mateship, notes the recent declaration by the British Government that it will shortly begin withdrawing its forces from Iraq. We understand that a lot of people will criticise the British for this and claim that they are “Cutting and Running”, not “Staying the Course” and not staying till “The Job is Done”. They will say that they are not “Standing By Their Mates”, and that their withdrawal will “Give the Terrorists Heart” and “Unleash Terrorism” on a scale unimagineable until now. They will say that withdrawal will mean utter defeat which will terminally damage the prestige and influence of the West and create instability in the Middle East.

The Australian Govermint wishes Australians, by which it means the Voting Public, to know that it will never make such accusations, and has never – and it has always been absolutely consistent in this – never made any such accusations in the past. The Australian Government has never suggested that anyone who advocates withdrawal from Iraq is on the side of the terrorists, or is playing into their hands.

On the other hand, Australia will never leave Iraq because to do so would be to cut and run, not stay the course, not stand by their mates, give the terrorists heart and unleash terrorism on a scale unimagineable until now.

For Australia (by which we mean the Labor Party) to withdraw from Iraq would be to side with the terrorists and play into their hands. An Australian withdrawal would mean utter defeat which would terminally damage the prestige and influence of the West and create instability in the Middle East.

Is that crystal clear?

Then let us make it clear. CRYSTAL!

JOHN HOWARD: Kerry I do know this, that if we are out in a year’s time it will be in circumstances of defeat. When I say we, I mean all the Coalition forces and obviously if the Americans go, then other forces will go as well. Now that would be circumstances of defeat and I know that the consequences of that for the West, its prestige, American prestige and influence in the Middle East, to spur that would give the terrorism in the Middle East, the implications it would have for the stability of other countries in the Middle East and also in our part of the world, the spur to terrorism, I think the consequences of that for Australia would be very great indeed.

[…]

I think we owe it to our greatest and strongest ally to stick by them in their hour of trial and pressure and need.

 

BRENDAN NELSON: Well, in fact what the Prime Minister is saying, that if Senator Obama or anybody else for that matter were to unilaterally and prematurely withdraw American and coalition forces from Iraq before the Iraqis can look after their own affairs, you are of course handing victory to the terrorists.

[…]

…our generation is engaged in a struggle which is going to last a long time against disparate groups of Islamic extremists throughout the world, principal amongst them being al Qaeda, and if anybody in any position of credibility were to say a particular date – in this case March and 2008 – coalition and US troops would be withdrawn, of course those terrorists are going to say, “Let us hope that that’s the policy outcome”, because that’s what these people are doing day to day in the bloodiest, cruelest, inhumane way in Iraq and it’s absolutely essential that all of us and the United States in particular prevail over that kind of outrageous and heinous behaviour.

[…]

BRENDAN NELSON: Well whatever the motives of those who are demanding that the coalition withdraw from Iraq, that is precisely what al Qaeda and the terrorists want us to do as well, Tony. And the reason why Osama bin Laden, al Qaeda, formerly al-Zarqawi, and a whole variety of terrorists are so determined to see that we leave Iraq and leave so prematurely before democracy can take hold, before an Iraqi security force is trained and Iraqis have the same democratic rights and freedoms enjoyed by Americans and Australians, is because they are determined to see defeat for the United States.

 

ALEXANDER DOWNER: I don’t think it would be right for us as an ally and a friend of America’s and of Britain’s, for us just to say to them well, you can do the dirty work, you can do the tough job, we’re not going to bother, but we’d like you to help us in South East Asia with the difficult things we’re doing1.

[…]

TONY JONES: Mr Downer, here’s what the American colonel who’s in charge of training said. He said, “Another advantage is that if it’s staffed by foreign officers they don’t have to come into Iraq and become targets in order to teach.”

 

ALEXANDER DOWNER: Yeah, but most training look, to be frank with you, you can find an American colonel – not a very senior officer in America – you can find an American colonel who would say almost anything. But to be honest with you -there are thousands of American colonels…

 

And just to make it even clearer if it could possibly be, the Australian voting public needs to understand exactly what is at stake. Iraq’s democracy is at stake in this and our credibility as a result because WE elected it.

 

BRENDAN NELSON: There is most certainly a coincidence of interest, if you want to call it Tony, between the United States, Britain, Australia and almost 30 other countries that democratically elected the Iraqi Government…

Got that?

 

1Mr Downer has not made it clear exactly what help the United States and Britain have been giving us up to now in South East Asia with “the difficult things we’re doing”.

Government Gets ‘F’ on Values

Feb 11, 2007 | Australian Values, Cultural Values, Democracy, OzPol Values, Values, War

Government Gets ‘F’ on Values

‘F’ is for Effed

 

We are devastated to have to report that the Government – which instituted the Australian Values campaign – has failed its own test.

A Government website, Values Education, has provided a list of the nine most important Australian values which should be taught to Australian kiddies.

Values Australia has assessed the Government, and the Groveller General, Lord Water Cunntiham, against these benchmarks and to our great embarrassment and shame they have failed comprehensively, by not a whisker but, really, entirely.

The key indicators include such core Australian values as a fair go, compassion, honesty and respect.

The assessor remarked that the Government failed largely on account of its policies regarding the Iraq War and David Hicks but also on account of its Industrial Relations legislation and its amendments to the Crimes Act.

For example, the Integrity test requires the applicant to

“Act in accordance with principles of moral and ethical conduct, ensure consistency between words and deeds.”

The Government was unable to provide any evidence to satisfy this requirement.

The full marking sheet is shown here.

John Howard: Strong or Weak?

Feb 9, 2007 | Australian Values, Corruption, Democracy, Legal, OzPol Values, Terrorism, USPol, Values, War

John Howard: Strong or Weak?

Choose Your Favourite War Criminal

 

What extraordinary influence our Groveller General enjoys with US President Bush. 
Mr Howard said he will raise the Hicks issue when he meets the US President George W Bush on Tuesday…Mr Howard says he will urge the US Government to hear the case as soon as possible.

That was as recently as 2005 – 16 July – only a year and a half ago!

Mr Howard has been “relaxed and comfortable” that the Military Commissions process is appropriate, legal and being handled justly and sensitively. Because the Americans have assured him so.

“George, I am concerned.”
“Wha, don’t be concerned, little buddy.”
“George, do you torture people?”
“John, Ah am shocked! How could you aks such a thang?”
“Do you?”
“Little Johnnie buddy, I assure you we do not.”
“Then George, (mmm, I like it there, yes just there…) you will have a perfectly acceptable explanation for these photographs taken at Abu Ghraib?”
“John (would you mind just reaching around there for a moment? Aaaah! That is goood!) These were bad apples who should never have obeyed ma orders or revealed our secret and systematic interrogation techniques which we do not and never have used or sent people to secret prisons in Syria, Pakistan, Egypt and Poland and such, to render them speechful.”
“Really?”
“I promise! Would I tell a lie? Oh! Oh! Oh my God!”
“Oh! Oh! Oh George! Oh! I love you George!”
“Have you got a cigarette, darling?”

Guantánamo chief, Rear Admiral Harry Harris, has told the ABC’s PM program that Hicks poses a real security threat and there are no innocent detainees.

Greens leader Bob Brown says he is “outraged” that the head of the Guantánamo Bay detention centre has described David Hicks as a dangerous terrorist, prejudging him guilty without any legal process and

“the rights of Hicks have been removed, he’s had no legal rights – he’s been judged guilty by Admiral Harris himself.”

He should not be outraged. This is old news. Brown is so behind the times.

Said Hicks’s lawyer, David McLeod,

“This suggestion, that because detainees are there, that that is in itself evidence of terrorism, or their being a terrorist, simply puts the lie to any attempt to deal with them in a fair and open manner.

“To suggest that a prisoner in the Australian criminal courts is guilty would in itself amount to a mistrial or an inability to proceed appropriately and fairly before a court.”

They should not be outraged. It has all been said before. Charles Stimson, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defence in charge of detainee policy at Guantánamo Bay said as much in an interview in January:

Jane Norris: Is there a possibility that there are some folks on Guantanamo that don’t belong there?
Stimson: Not now.

He claimed in the interview that the roughly 400 prisoners in Guantánamo Bay are

“the very terrorists who hit [American corporations’] bottom line back in 2001”.

This came as quite shock. The Australian Government had not realised that there were an additional 400 evil dudes plotting 9/11 and that the US had rounded up every last one of them and these ones are the very ones who slammed the planes into the buildings. But they said nothing at the time. Americans are so modest!

(Stimson says in this interview that

“something like 340 others have previously been released to their home countries”.

Countries like Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Britain. But John Howard has stood strong and insisted that a citizen of his own country should be made an example of to the recalcitrant …um…Saudis and Pakistanis…?)

In a previous interview, June 2006, Stimson said Guantánamo prisoners are

“not entitled to anything more than determining whether they’re enemy combatants or not, which we’ve done”.

See, what Brown doesn’t seem to get is that guilt or innocence has already been determined. There was no need for a trial. Hicks is guilty and that’s that. And we’ve known it for years. We decided it years ago. Even John Howard has been saying so for years.

Oddly enough, elsewhere the US is reported to be having trouble releasing detainees because of “the refusal of other nations to accept Guantanamo prisoners“. Strange that John could claim to be finding it so hard to have Hicks return home to Australia to be dealt with.

How Long Would Jesus Keep Hicks in Guantánamo?

Feb 6, 2007 | Australian Values, Cultural Values, Democracy, OzPol Values, Values, War

How Long Would Jesus Keep Hicks in Guantánamo?

Love your enemies and be good to them” –

Direct Orders From the Mouth of God:

“Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you,

Bless them that curse you, and pray for them which despitefully use you.”

Christianity is one of the “revealed” religions, meaning that adherents believe the “truth” has been revealed through their sacred texts. Oddly enough, Jews, Muslims and Christians all share the same belief in the revealed truths of the same texts – the old testament.

There are those who believe that the bible is the inspired word of their god. Among these are some who believe that the bible is a guide to morals; others believe that every single word in it is literally true.

President Bush and his evangelical supporters are amongst this group.

Happily, the following passage works for both those seeking a guide and those obedient to specific instruction, all the more so because these words are the literal words spoken by Jesus Christ.

We offer this passage as a service to christians who are considering what their responses ought to be in relation to Iraq, the war on terror, and the incarceration of fellow human beings – even possibly terrorists – in Guantánamo Bay.

We offer this reading because it has come to our attention that there are very many christians whose hearts have been hardened against the heathen; christians who lack compassion and humility; devout christians who seem preoccupied with their own salvation at the expense of the lives of others, little realising that their selfishness and lack of compassion will see the gates to heaven slammed shut against them and cost them eternal life…

So here are the orders from the highest. It could not be more clear. These are the strict and literal instructions of Jesus.

Christians who disobey these direct orders without repentance will go to hell.

Luke 6: 27-38

27   But I say unto you which hear, Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you,
28   Bless them that curse you, and pray for them which despitefully use you.
29   And unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other; and him that taketh away thy cloak forbid not to take thy coat also.
30   Give to every man that asketh of thee; and of him that taketh away thy goods ask them not again.
31   And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.
32   For if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them.
33   And if ye do good to them which do good to you, what thank have ye? for sinners also do even the same.
34   And if ye lend to them of whom ye hope to receive, what thank have ye? for sinners also lend to sinners, to receive as much again.
35   But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil.
36   Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful.
37   Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven:
38   Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again.

You Are a Threat to US Security

Feb 3, 2007 | Corruption, Democracy, Legal, Terrorism, USPol, Values, War

You Are a Threat to US Security

Boulleda Hadj

If you can use a computer,
you are a threat to the United States

 

 

Melissa Hoffer is one of those lawyers intentionally slandered in January by Charles Stimson, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense, the subject of our next post. Hoffer, a Boston lawyer, represents six Guantanamo detainees. Read their story. Read her story.

This is a little known piece, at least to us. Just read it. It is chilling.

Read Hoffer’s description of how our “big friend”,  John Howard’s masturbation mate, really goes about “doing its business”. See how the US really considers the rest of the world, including us. Understand the difference between this Administration’s values, in practice, and the values it claims it wants to export to the Middle East, like the rule of law, like liberty, like human rights, like human decency, like human dignity. Compare the claims of the US Defense Department and the Bush Administration (with the collusion of the Howard Government) about the treatment of prisoners, with the reality of what they do.

The U.S. position is that it may seize anyone, anywhere, at any time, if there is reason to believe that person is an “enemy combatant” someone who is part of or “supporting” (even unwittingly) Al Qaeda, the Taliban, or forces “associated” with these groups.

The global dragnet cast by this definition is so broad that an attorney for the U.S., arguing before Judge Green in December 2004, admitted it would include a little old lady from Switzerland who gave money to an Afghan charity organization that – unbeknownst to her – funneled the contribution to Al Qaeda.

And equally, it should be said, you and I could suffer the same fate.

Hoffer’s closing words in an (unavailable) speech:

“If we extinguish that humanity with lawlessness and cruelty, we extinguish hope for the future of humankind. For when we degrade others, we degrade ourselves, and when we take away a another person’s freedom without just cause, we erode our own freedom. But as we join with others around the world, working, fighting, unjust imprisonment and torture, we honor and preserve our humanity. This is the lesson of Guantanamo.”

According to Wikipedia:

“The six men were formally arrested by Bosnian authorities, tried before the Bosnian Supreme Court, and acquitted of all charges. Even so, upon their release from legitimate Bosnian incarceration, following their acquittal, they were captured by American security officials who transported them to detention and interrogation in the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The conduct of the Bosnian authorities was formally condemned as illegal by the Human Rights Chamber of Bosnia Herzegovina, the relevant Bosnian court at the time.

The Associated Press has made the Combatant Status Review Tribunals of four of the six men available for download. Transcripts within these documents record the Bosnians reporting to their tribunal officers that interrogators did not believe that there had ever been any substance to the US allegations that they had planned to bomb the US embassy.

And according to the Washington Post:

Since then, the military has conducted annual reviews of the six men’s status.

Each time, court officers have upheld the original decision.

Records from tribunal sessions in December 2005 show the U.S. military is no longer accusing the Algerians of conspiring to attack the U.S. Embassy in Sarajevo. No explanation for the change is given.

The military has listed other factors in its decision to label the men a security threat.

One detainee was judged a threat in part because he was a karate expert and had taught martial arts to Bosnian orphans, tribunal records show. He was also classified as potentially dangerous because he was familiar with computers.

Another detainee was flagged because he had performed mandatory service in the Algerian army more than a decade ago, as a cook.

Boudella was accused by the U.S. military of joining bin Laden and Taliban fighters at Tora Bora, Afghanistan, the mountain hideout where the al-Qaeda leadership escaped from U.S. forces in December 2001. In fact, at the time, Boudella was locked up thousands of miles away in Sarajevo, after his arrest in the later-discredited embassy plot.

One fresh allegation filed against Boudella last year was that he wore a ring “similar to those that identified the Red Rose Group members of Hamas,” the radical Palestinian movement, according to tribunal records.

Boudella’s wife, Nadja Dizdarevic, responded in an interview that the ring is a common anniversary band worn by thousands of Bosnian Muslims. She said she obtained an affidavit from the jeweler in Sarajevo where he bought the ring and submitted it to the U.S. military in hopes that they will drop the charge at his next hearing.

If it is a mark of belonging to Hamas, then 98 percent of the Bosnian Muslims belong to Hamas,” she said. “For every claim they make against him, I have proof to show them they are wrong, so they have to invent something new.”

The Defense Department declined to answer specific questions about the case, saying that some evidence against the men remains classified.

But a Pentagon spokesman defended the decision to apprehend the six Algerians.

“There was no mistake in originally detaining these individuals as enemy combatants,” said Navy Lt. Cmdr. J.D. Gordon. “Their detention was directly related to their combat activities as determined by an appropriate Defense Department official before they were ever transferred to Guantanamo.”

So be careful. You Are a Threat to US Security

The decision will not be made by a court of law, it will be made by “an appropriate Defense Department official” whatever that might be – you’ll never know or ever be able to find out – on the basis of unquestionable, unreviewable, “classified” information, which you will never be allowed to see. In fact, it is so secret that they can do what they like with no information whatever – because its existence cannot be tested – especially if to reverse a decision would be an embarrassment. There is no accountability whatever and that leads to the brazen corruption we see today at all levels of the Bush Administration.

This is American justice and American law at work under this illegitimate neo-con junta which is so beloved by John Howard and his toadying supporters in the coalition.  

 

Who are the true cowards?

The cowards are not those who “do not have the stomach for the war” (as Cheney puts it when blaming the American people for his own failure); not those who publicly oppose, or privately work against, an illegal, unjust, unsupportable, unethical adventure predicated on deliberate lies by an unutterably stupid President and his unbelievably cruel, greedy and dishonest Vice-President.

The real cowards are those in the administration, the bureaucracy and the military who are too afraid to stand up against obvious, monstrous injustice; who would willingly sacrifice other people’s lives in order to protect themselves from embarrassment; who would sacrifice everything that is, or has been, good and great about their country for the sake of their own careers.

The real cowards are those ordinary people who, although they oppose the war and the excesses of the American, Australian and British governments, do not speak up; who say, “she’ll be right”.

The real cowards include those leaders of nations, like John Howard and Tony Blair, who go along with a madman for the sake of the hope of a little better trade deal, and so are complicit in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent people and the destruction of the lives of millions more; who have participated in and even applauded the ruination of an entire country, the creation of a more dangerous world, a surge in terrorism and the destabilisation of the entire Middle East.

These are the real cowards. These are the real “evil-doers”.