Post American
20051212
 
I'm am so sick of all the god damned fucking lies. I know I should not watch, but I am hypnotized by the lies broadcast by the US Corporate media. Today they are playing up how great Iraq is, race riots, and the accidental explosions in the UK. Where are the truck bombs we were promised? If there really were terrorists or a war on X mas why wouldn't they drive a truck bomb up to Rockefeller Center live on the Today Show? I live amongst slaves, lazy hard working American Slaves. I give up!
I guess people get the Government they deserve. People are suckers for the truth? I want to see the liars and politicos swinging dead from lamp posts back and forth@

According to the Center for American Progress, the war is Iraq is costing $177 million per day, $7.4 million per hour, and $122,820 per minute. The Center has available a Cost of Iraq War Ticker that can be added to websites.

Bush unexpectedly invited questions from the audience and immediately was asked about the number of Iraqi casualties in the war.

http://dailynews.att.net/cgi-bin/news?e=pri&dt=051212&cat=news&st=newsd8eerhkg0&src=ap

"I would say 30,000 more or less have died as a result of the initial incursion and the ongoing violence against Iraqis," the president said. "We've lost about 2,140 of our own troops in Iraq."


About 100,000 Iraqi civilians - half of them women and children - have died in Iraq since the invasion, mostly as a result of airstrikes by coalition forces!http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1338749,00.html

"US General Tommy Franks is widely quoted as saying 'we don't do body counts'!"

US Torture victim: 'They would cut me 30 times in two hours'
Benyam Mohammed al-Habashi is accused by the US government of planning a dirty bomb attack in America. He says he was tortured until he admitted the crime.
He was arrested at Karachi airport in April 2002, with a passport under the name of Fouad Zouawi, a friend, and with a ticket to Zurich and then on to London.
In documents compiled by the human rights lawyer Clive Stafford Smith, he describes an encounter with someone he believes to be an MI6 officer and details the horror of his torture. Mr Habashi says the officer told him 'I'll see what we can do with the Americans'. "They gave me a cup of tea with a lot of sugar in it. He said 'Where you're going you need a lot of sugar'."
He was taken to Morocco and questioned, then tortured after refusing to admit links al-Qa'ida links.
"They took the scalpel to my right chest. One of them took my penis in his hand and began to make cuts. I was in agony. They must have done this 20 to 30 times in maybe two hours. They would do it to me about once a month."
The treatment continued in the so-called "Prison of Darkness" in Kabul, where he was kept from January to May in 2004.
"The US military told us 'Bin Laden had his laugh on 9/11 so it is now our time to have our laugh'," he said. "They would hang me up. I was allowed a few hours' sleep on the second day, then I was hung up, this time for two days. My legs had swollen. My wrists and hands had gone numb.
"Then I was taken off the wall and left in the dark. There was loud music, Slim Shady and Dr Dre, for 20 days. I heard this non-stop over and over, and they changed the sounds to horrible ghost laughter and Hallowe'en sounds. The only light I saw came from guards using flashlights to bring inedible food.
"I lost 20kg in the weeks of my stay. They used to come and weigh us every other day; it seemed like they were making sure we were losing weight."


Abuse Cited In 2nd Jail Operated by Iraqi MinistryOfficial Says 12 Prisoners
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/11/AR2005121101002_pf.html
The abuse alleged at the prison found this week appeared to have been more severe. Asked specifically what types of torture were found in the commandos' prison, the official cited breaking of bones, torture with electric shock, extraction of fingernails and cigarette burns to the neck and back. International law, including the U.N. Convention Against Torture, bans torture in all cases. U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad issued a sharp public rebuke of the Iraqi government after the secret prison was discovered last month, demanding in a statement that all detainees nationwide be treated in accord with human rights.

Torture victim: 'They would cut me 30 times in two hours'
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/legal/article332481.ece
Benyam Mohammed al-Habashi is accused by the US government of planning a dirty bomb attack in America. He says he was tortured until he admitted the crime.
He was arrested at Karachi airport in April 2002, with a passport under the name of Fouad Zouawi, a friend, and with a ticket to Zurich and then on to London.
In documents compiled by the human rights lawyer Clive Stafford Smith, he describes an encounter with someone he believes to be an MI6 officer and details the horror of his torture. Mr Habashi says the officer told him 'I'll see what we can do with the Americans'. "They gave me a cup of tea with a lot of sugar in it. He said 'Where you're going you need a lot of sugar'."
He was taken to Morocco and questioned, then tortured after refusing to admit links al-Qa'ida links.
"They took the scalpel to my right chest. One of them took my penis in his hand and began to make cuts. I was in agony. They must have done this 20 to 30 times in maybe two hours. They would do it to me about once a month."
The treatment continued in the so-called "Prison of Darkness" in Kabul, where he was kept from January to May in 2004.
"The US military told us 'Bin Laden had his laugh on 9/11 so it is now our time to have our laugh'," he said. "They would hang me up. I was allowed a few hours' sleep on the second day, then I was hung up, this time for two days. My legs had swollen. My wrists and hands had gone numb.
"Then I was taken off the wall and left in the dark. There was loud music, Slim Shady and Dr Dre, for 20 days. I heard this non-stop over and over, and they changed the sounds to horrible ghost laughter and Hallowe'en sounds. The only light I saw came from guards using flashlights to bring inedible food.
"I lost 20kg in the weeks of my stay. They used to come and weigh us every other day; it seemed like they were making sure we were losing weight."


The Bush administration defends its policy of "extraordinary rendition." Everyone who has survived the policy has testified to experiencing brutal torture.
http://www.antiwar.com/roberts/?articleid=8243
So we have the entire Western world complicit in kidnapping and torture. The entire non-Western world surely notices the unbridgeable gap between the Bush administration's immoral practices and Bush's moral posturing about "freedom and democracy." The prestige of the Western world is gone forever. People will say anything under torture, which is why the practice and the "evidence" it provides were ruled inadmissible centuries ago.

The president would like us to believe the Iraqi insurgency against U.S. occupation forces 10,000 miles away that is fought with small arms and homemade bombs is a grave and imminent security threat to the United States.
http://interventionmag.com/Primary/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=63
Lies Versus TruthsLie #1: "These extremists want to end American and Western influence in the broader Middle East, because we stand for democracy and peace."Truth #1: The Islamist extremist groups want to limit American and other Western influence in the Middle East and their ideology is not in favor of democratic institutions or peaceful means to advance their goals. But what radical Islamists have against Americans in the Middle East is not related to America's stand in support for democracy and peace. Their Islamist extremists' manifestoes make it clear (as do recorded interviews with their leaders) that the radical Islamist opposition to America stems mostly from: 1) U.S. support for autocratic Arab governments; 2) the invasion of Iraq; 3) the ongoing U.S. military presence in the region; 4) U.S. backing for the Israeli occupation; and 5) related concerns which have nothing to do with democracy and peace.Lie #2: "Al-Qaeda's leader, Osama bin Laden has called on Muslims to dedicate, quote, their 'resources, sons and money to driving the infidels out of their lands.' Their tactic to meet this goal has been consistent for a quarter-century: They hit us, and expect us to run. They want us to repeat the sad history of Beirut in 1983, and Mogadishu in 1993 -- only this time on a larger scale, with greater consequences."Truth #2: Al-Qaeda has existed for less than 15 years. There was no Al-Qaeda network anywhere 25 years ago. Also, they never "expect us to run" when hit. Indeed, all evidence points to their hope and expectation that the U.S. will continue to overreact through disproportionate and misapplied military force. This, in turn, will exacerbate the explosive increase in anti-Americanism throughout the Islamic world, thereby helping them to recruit new members.Bush's "sad history of Beirut in 1983 and Mogadishu in 1993" was not the belated withdrawal of U.S. forces but rather the U.S. militarily intervention in those countries in the first place. The resistance fighting against U.S. Marines in Lebanon had been mainly composed of Shiite and Druze militiamen who never had any affiliation with al-Qaeda (a Salafi Sunni organization). In Somalia, U.S. forces battled militiamen affiliated with a number of Somali clans, but none of them had any connection with al-Qaeda.Lie #3: "The militant network wants to use the vacuum created by an American retreat to gain control of a country, a base from which to launch attacks and conduct their war against non-radical Muslim governments. Over the past few decades, radicals have specifically targeted Egypt, and Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan, and Jordan for potential takeover. They achieved their goal, for a time, in Afghanistan. Now they have set their sight on Iraq....We must recognize Iraq as the central front in our war on terror."Truth #3: Small groups of radical Islamists indeed engaged in a series of terrorist bombings and assassinations in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and Jordan in recent years. However, these groups never had a popular following and were never a serious threat to the survival of any of those regimes.The main reason they succeeded in Afghanistan resulted mainly from the U.S. government sending some $5 billion in military aid to radical Islamic groups back in the 1980s. This U.S. policy to aid radical Islamists was for supporting their fight with Afghanistan's Communist government and its Soviet backers, for weakening the latter.The "vacuum" enabling radical Islamists to effectively challenge the Iraqi government took place as a direct result of the removal of Saddam Hussein's regime from power by U.S. forces. Before Bush invaded Iraq, the only significant base of operations for such radical Islamists was Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi's encampment in the far northeastern corner of Iraq. Located within the autonomous Kurdish areas, Saddam's government couldn't control Al-Zarqawi. But now, following the U.S. invasion of Iraq and toppling Saddam's government, Al-Zarqawi's militants operate throughout Sunni central Iraq and, in the meantime, their numbers have increased dramatically. Lie #4: "The militants believe that controlling one country will rally the Muslim masses, enabling them to overthrow all moderate governments in the region, and establish a radical Islamic empire that spans from Spain to Indonesia. With greater economic and military and political power, the terrorists would be able to advance their stated agenda: to develop weapons of mass destruction, to destroy Israel, to intimidate Europe, to assault the American people, and to blackmail our government into isolation."Truth #4: Maybe the Salafi Sunni revivalists harbor Bush's fantasies, but they are just that -- fantasies. The United States has more than a dozen allied governments in the region, motivated and able to resist these fanatics -- who, outside of Iraq, have very few adherents in other countries of the Islamic world.Dozens of armed Iraqi groups are battling U.S. occupation forces and the U.S.-backed government. These include: supporters of Saddam Hussein's former regime; other Baathists; independent nationalists; various Shiite factions; an assortment of tribal-based groups; a number of Sunni Arab factions; and even several legions of old fashioned bandits. Bush's focus in his speech that the al-Qaeda-inspired jihadists may be mostly responsible for the majority of terrorist attacks against Iraqi civilians is simply not true. Truthfully, they represent a very small minority of the insurgency. These jihadists may produce the "biggest bang for the buck," but in the unlikely event that the Iraqi government is overthrown, there is no chance these extreme elements could ever end up in control. Lie #5: "Our enemy is utterly committed. As Zarqawi has vowed, 'We will either achieve victory over the human race or we will pass to the eternal life.' And the civilized world knows very well that other fanatics in history, from Hitler to Stalin to Pol Pot, consumed whole nations in war and genocide before leaving the stage of history."Truth #5: Bush's suggestion that Al-Zarqawi could somehow acquire the power of an Adolf Hitler or Josef Stalin is completely absurd. Al-Zarqawi lacks: the human and military resources; the state apparatus; the popular support; the propaganda machinery: the disciplined political party; the armies; the industrial base; or any other attribute that could conceivably give him that kind of power. Bush has repeatedly, cynically played on the fears of the American people with his hyperbolic and fantastic images. He also shows a callous disrespect, by trivializing their tragic deaths, for the millions of people who were victims of Nazism and Communism.Lie #6: "Some have also argued that extremism has been strengthened by the actions of our coalition in Iraq, claiming that our presence in that country has somehow caused or triggered the rage of radicals. I would remind them that we were not in Iraq on September the 11th, 2001--and al-Qaeda attacked us anyway. The hatred of the radicals existed before Iraq was an issue, and it will exist after Iraq is no longer an excuse. The government of Russia did not support Operation Iraqi Freedom, and yet the militants killed more than 180 Russian schoolchildren in Beslan."Truth #6: This is yet another of Bush's interminable straw men. No one claimed that the Islamist radicals responsible for the massacre in Beslan were in any way motivated by the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Those Chechen terrorists were nationalists fighting against the Russian occupation of their homeland. The CIA, top Pentagon officials and other U.S. government agencies have openly acknowledged that the U.S. invasion of Iraq and the bloody counter-insurgency operations that followed has greatly enhanced the appeal of radical Islamist groups and enhanced their recruitment. Russians and Chechens are completely irrelevant.Lie #7: "Over the years these extremists have used a litany of excuses for violence -- the Israeli presence on the West Bank, or the U.S. military presence in Saudi Arabia, or the defeat of the Taliban, or the Crusades of a thousand years ago... No act of ours invited the rage of the killers -- and no concession, bribe, or act of appeasement would change or limit their plans for murder."Truth #7: There are no major opponents of the U.S. war in Iraq and other U.S. policies in the Middle East calling for concessions, bribes or appeasement to influence al-Qaeda and like-minded extremists. Truthfully, a strong case has been made that many U.S. policies strengthened these extremist movements by encouraging the growth of anti-Americanism in the Islamic world. The violence unleashed against the Iraqis by Bush's military intervention directly led to an increase of the appeal of extremist ideologies in the Islamic world.Lie #8: "Some observers also claim that America would be better off by cutting our losses and leaving Iraq now. This is a dangerous illusion, refuted with a simple question: Would the United States and other free nations be more safe, or less safe, with Zarqawi and bin Laden in control of Iraq, its people, and its resources? Having removed a dictator who hated free peoples, we will not stand by as a new set of killers, dedicated to the destruction of our own country, seizes control of Iraq by violence."Truth #8: This is a totally false argument. Reports by scholars and journalists familiar with the various constituent elements of the Iraqi insurgency consistently conclude that the vast majority of the insurgents are not dedicated to the destruction of the United States. They simply want all foreign occupation forces out of their country (and their sacred Islamic sites). The radical Islamist elements led by Al-Zarqawi and other supporters of Osama bin Laden had virtually no presence in Saddam Hussein's Iraq until after the United States invaded the country. Radical Islamist influence grew in subsequent months as a reaction to the large-scale civilian casualties ("collateral damage") resulting from massive U.S. counter-insurgency military tactics. Clearly, a strong case can be made -- by extrapolation - that by continuing the war the chances that Al-Zarqawi and like-minded radicals could take over the country is actually increased.Lie #9: "If the peoples of that region are permitted to choose their own destiny, and advance by their own energy and by their participation as free men and women, then the extremists will be marginalized, and the flow of violent radicalism to the rest of the world will slow, and eventually end. By standing for the hope and freedom of others, we make our own freedom more secure."Truth #9: Bush's foreign policies are doing almost nothing to advance the cause of self-determination, the rule of law, religious freedom and equal rights for women in the Middle East, North Africa and Central Asia. In Saudi Arabia, for example, the U.S. trains its repressive internal security apparatus and annually sells billions of dollars worth of weapons to the family dictatorship that rules the country. Saudi Arabia has no constitution, no legislature, and nothing resembling popular representation. It bans the practice of any faith besides Islam, practices torture on an administrative basis, and is possibly the most repressive country in the world towards denying women's rights.The Egyptian dictatorship of Hosni Mubarak remains the second largest recipient of U.S. economic and military assistance despite ongoing repression of pro-democracy movements and their leaders while suppressing freedom of the press.Similarly, Bush's policies continue to maintain close military and political ties between the U.S. and autocratic regimes in: Oman; the United Arab Emirates; Bahrain; Qatar; Kuwait; Azerbaijan; Pakistan; Tunisia; and Morocco - and there are many among others. The U.S. is the world's number one supplier of military and police training to autocratic regimes and occupation armies in the Middle East, North Africa, and Central Asia. Also, Bush's claim is untrue that the U.S. supports the right of self-determination in the Middle East. After all, the Bush administration continues to support Morocco's occupation of Western Sahara. Bush's administration continues to deny the Iraqi government full sovereignty by controlling key areas of fiscal, security and economic policy. Moreover, the proposed constitution being pushed by the Bush administration allows fewer rights for women and less religious freedom generally than what Saddam Hussein's dictatorship had permitted.
 
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Location: Albuquerque, The Homeland

So when do we get invaded to remove the rogue government that spies on its own people, gases its own people during anti War protests, stages "terrorist" attacks, holds crooked elections, attacks other nations without cause, and uses torture on innocent people looking for WMD that don't exist?

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