Binyam Mohamed, an Ethiopian citizen and British resident, was arrested in Pakistan in 2002 and then “rendered” by the U.S. to multiple countries (such as Morocco); held incommunicado (no access to lawyers, the International Red Cross or anyone else) and interrogated by U.S. agents until 2004; and then shipped off to Guantanamo, where he has remained ever since.

In May, 2008, Mohamed was accused in a Guantanamo military commission with various acts of Terrorism that carry the death penalty if he’s convicted. The key evidence against him are the confessions the U.S. obtained during that 2002-2004 time period. After charging him, the U.S. Government refused to provide his lawyers with documents and other evidence that would enable Mohamed to prove that those confessions were obtained via torture.

Both the Bush administration and the Obama administration leaned on the British government to stop the publication of documents that showed the US tortured Mohamed. Right wingers claimed that releasing this information would result in fire and brimstone falling from the sky, cats and dogs sleeping together, the end of the world as we know it.

But on 10 February 2010, the British courts ruled the documents must be released, that the fact that the US tortured Mohamed must be made public.

Now, I grant you that it’s only been a week, but it would appear that the world hasn’t come to an end. Though, my cat and my dog have been getting along better than usual.

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/02/19/exceptionalism/

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/feb/10/law-binyam-mohamed-case

Plain explanation: The central government in Afghanistan is corrupt. The president stole the last election. His brother may be on CIA payroll while dealing drugs and guns. The central government provides no benefits for those in the tribal regions. And to get anything done in the bureacracy, one has to resort to bribes at every level. The local warlords see no benefit to supporting the central government, and many see it as nothing more than an American puppet, just like it was a Soviet puppet in the 80’s.

Metaphorical explanation: Seperatists and survivalists in America distrust the Federal Government. They view it as corrupt, they view it as wanting to take their power away, they view it as a threat. America now has a number of private militias who are heavily armed and don’t like the federal government.

Clear so far?

In Afghanistan, American forces have occasionally fired on and killed Afghan civilians. American Predator drones have attacked wedding parties, destroyed houses with children in them, and while the generals talk loudly about the al-queda leaders they’ve killed, they don’t talk so loud about the civilians they’ve killed to get to these leaders.

What’s the metaphorical equivalent for this?

I’m starting to think that maybe the best way to describe this is to equate it to the incident at Ruby Ridge in 1992.

The basic version of Ruby Ridge: The federal government charged Randy Weaver with a weapons violation (alleging he had sold an informant an illegal sawed-off shotgun). The courts sent Weaver a letter informing of his court date, but the letter had the wrong date on it, telling Weaver he was supposed to be in court in March, when the real date was February. When Weaver failed to show up in February, the courts issued a warrant for Weaver’s arrest. Weaver believed there was a conspiracy against him and refused to leave his cabin. Marshall’s tried to talk him out but he refused.

By August, Federal marshalls approached the property at night to install cameras to observe the cabin in preparation for a raid. Weaver’s dogs started barking. Kevin Harris (a friend of Weaver) and Weaver’s son, 14 year old Daniel, came out of the cabin with rifles. The marshall’s retreated for a while, but then set up defensive positions. The exact order isn’t clear, but by the time it was over, a dog, a marshall, and Daniel were all dead.

The next day, the Federal government sent in snipers and armored personel carriers, and the rules of engagement were given as shoot-on-sight any adult with a weapon. A federal sniper shot Randy Weaver in the back and then fired a second shot through a closed door, which ended up striking the wife, Vicki Weaver, in the head killing her, and hitting Randy Weaver in the chest. Vicki was holding a baby when she was shot dead.

Within a few days, the rules of engagement were changed and shoot-on-sight was revoked. Civilian negotiators eventually got the Weavers to surrender by August 30.

The Weaver family filed a wrongful death suit. To avoid trial and a possibly higher settlement, the federal government awarded Randy Weaver a $100,000 settlement and his three daughters $1 million each in August 1995. FBI director Louis Freeh disciplined a number of FBI employees and told a senate hearing “law enforcement overreacted at Ruby Ridge”.

So, now it’s been established that the central government is corrupt and goes around murdering people. At least according to the local tribes.

And what happens as a result?

19 April 1995, Timothy McVeigh and a bunch of armed, right-wing extremists bomb the federal building in Oklahoma, killing 168 innocent people. The attack came on the second anniversary of the Waco Seige, but McVeigh also cited Ruby Ridge as a justification for his attack as well.

Now, expand this to a much larger scale, make the central government completely corrupt and ineffective, turn the local armed militias into warlords and their own private armies, and you have something on par with Afghanistan.

The United States is not going to stop right wing extremists in America by creating more Ruby Ridge type incidents or by creating more Waco type incidents.

And the US isn’t going to achieve any kind of real peace in Afghanistan by bombing wedding parties and killing bystanders.

To stamp out the McVeigh’s in America, the government must operate with the most extreme care to make sure they don’t create more innocent deaths and give some paranoid angry nutjob a warped justification to murder more people.

In Afghanistan, America must operate with extreme care to make sure that we don’t kill civilians and create recruiting posters for the Taliban and Al Queda. But more importantly, and more problematically, America must at some point realize that its very presence as a foreign occupying army is a recruiting poster.

Principles like due process, trial by jury, protection from cruel and unusual punishment, stuff like that.

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2009/11/18/weekly_standard/index.html

One muslim extremist is condemnation of an entire religion and proof that all its followers are terrorists. One Jewish or Christian extremist is portrayed as either a misguided individual among the sane religious followers or as an individual hero among the cowardly religious followers.

The Professional Moron, Joe Lieberman, has called for an investigation into why Islamic extremists are allowed to remain in the US military. Yet “Tail Gunner Joe” hasn’t called for a similar investigation into why the US military is recruiting neonazis and white-supremicists. Blackwater CEO Erik Prince views himself as a Christian fighting a holy war against Islam.

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2009/11/12/terrorism/index.html

Now that we’ve gotten the “amnesia episode” out of the way, we’re still waiting for the “Evil Twin” episode, and the “Dream Sequence” episode. Dick Cheney, after all, is a soap opera.

http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2009/10/22-things-dick-cheney-cant-remember-about-plame-case

This is how Fox “News” works. One of the Fox “opinionators” expresses outrage at something the Democrats did. Then Fox “News” people report that “Some have expressed outrage at this thing that Democrats did”, without mentioning that the Vinn Diagram of that “some” is the set of people who are opinionators at Fox networks.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Seccessionists in Texas hate America.

In March 2009, Texas Governor Rick Perry, a republican, came out publicly in support of a resolution affirming Texas sovereignty. “We think it’s time to draw a line in the sand and tell Washington that no longer are we going to accept their oppressive hand in the state of Texas.”

In August 2009, right wing extremists protested that Perry should make good on his promise. A couple of them are trying to run for governor of Texas.

“We hate the United States! Get out of our lives! Get off our backs!” — Larry Kilgore (running for governor of Texas)

“We are aware that stepping off into seccession may in fact be a bloody war. We are aware. We understand that the tree of freedom is occaissionally watered with the blood of tyrants and patriots.” — Debra Medina (running for governor of Texas)

I’m not sure what “oppressive hand” they’re talking about. Way, way, way back in April of 2009, Governor Perry accepted 17 Billion dollars of federal money from Obama’s stimulus package. I think if Texas wants to put an end to this sort of “oppressive” behaviour, then it could start by demanding that the governor return the 17 billion dollars in federal money. After that, they can discuss the merits of seccession from the US of A.

As a side note, protestors at the rally were carrying signs of Obama with Joker makeup and the word “Socialist” underneath. At one point, a counter protester shouted “Healthcare for anyone who can’t pay for it.” To which a protester with a Obama-Joker poster walked up to him and said “Health care? You know… Get a job! Just get a job! Get a job!”

Which I think is an interesting insight into why some people really oppose any kind of health care reform: They’re afraid that any attempt at helping their fellow man will do nothing but enable the lazy to live off their hard earned money. Well, Texas, I want my 17 billion dollars of hard earned federal money back from you lazy bunch of no-good slackers.

Put up or shut up. Return the 17 billion of “oppressive” federal money, get a job, and stimulate your own damn economy, or shut your ignorant pie hole.

Oh, and just as a side note to all the right wing insane nut jobs out there who have suddenly taken a shine to quoting Thomas Jefferson and that whole tree of liberty getting watered with the blood of tyrants and patriots: Jefferson was a signer of the US Constitution. He was an architect of the federal government. Nowadays, people quote this line from Jefferson and forget everything else Jefferson stood for. Nowadays, it’s people like Timothy McVeigh who wear tshirts with this quote while being arrested for bombing the federal building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people, including 19 children. Nowadays, when people shout about “spilling the blood of tyrants and patriots” they’re talking about the blood from people like that. Nowadays, when people actually spill blood, it’s people like Timothy McVeigh.

http://www.theeagle.com/PrinterFriendly/Governor-accepts-stimulus-

No laws were broken, according to Phoenix police. Arizona is an “open-carry” state, which means anyone legally allowed to have a firearm can carry it in public as long as it’s visible.

During Obama’s health care town hall in Portsmouth, N.H., a man carrying a sign reading “It is time to water the tree of liberty” stood outside with a pistol strapped to his leg.

A reference to a quote by Thomas Jefferson “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”

And why are right wing extremists making open threats against the president’s life? Because he’s is trying to reform healthcare. Because he’s trying to make sure people who have insurance don’t get thrown under the bus by an insurance company who decides you’re no longer profitable and people who do not have insurance can get some.

Seriously, people? This is what you’re going to go to war over? You’re going to murder a president and wage a revolution against your own government because you don’t want everyone to have health care? Because you want insurance companies to keep the right to ditch patients if they cost too much? Of all the evils in the world, this is what you decide to stand up against? Will you be expanding your war to include Medicare too? Will you kill your fellow Americans to stop food programs that help feed Americans who are starving? Will you murder to put an end to unemployment benefits?

The mind boggles at the murders people are willing to commit to prevent anyone from helping their fellow man.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090817/ap_on_re_us/us_obama_protesters_guns

The allegations also include Blackwater killing Iraqis cooperating with a State Department investigation into Blackwater, weapon smuggling, and use of weapons outlawed by the Geneva Convention.

The US government should never have outsourced its war to a mercenary corporation. And the reason is demonstrated in Blackwater’s behaviour in Iraq.

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090817/scahill

The spark for her shpeel is that she didn’t like a speech Obama gave in Russia recently because it wasn’t sufficiently full of nonsensical black/white delineations between the USSR and USA during the Cold War.

Liz Cheney says:

The truth, of course, is that the Soviets ran a brutal, authoritarian regime. The KGB killed their opponents or dragged them off to the Gulag. There was no free press, no freedom of speech, no freedom of worship, no freedom of any kind.

One wonders how Liz could possibly have managed to miss the fact that her father, as Vice President of the United States, spread lies to invade Iraq under false pretenses. Could Liz possibly not know that her father approved a torture program that dragged people off to black site Gulags (Guantanamo, Bagram, and Abu Graib) without due process and tortured them for months and sometimes years. Could Liz possibly not know that her own father was behind the massive wiretapping scheme that violated the civil rights of innocent Americans?

Later on, Liz says:

America was an unmatched force for good in the world during the Cold War.

Could Liz possibly not be aware of America’s hand in “Operation Ajax” during the Cold War? Does she not know the CIA was behind overthrowing the democratically elected government of Iran in 1953 and installing the brutal dictator, the Shah, who had his own secret police and Gulags? Is she ignorant of how America kept the Shah in power for a quarter century, until 1979, even as the Shah expanded his torture prisons?

Is she completely clueless? Or is she willfully ignoring the facts? Or is she totally aware of the facts and yet manages to believe a black-and-white version of reality that only exists in the insane minds of neocon nutjobs?

Liz then finishes her article with an interesting strawman. She portrays Obama’s approach as nothing more than an attempt to make America appear meek and mild and inoffensive to our enemies. This couldn’t be further from the truth.

What Obama is doing is applying a little honesty to history and to international relationships. America has clearly NOT been the white knight who does no wrong, while America’s enemies such as the USSR during the cold war are purely black hearted devils.

No, what Liz can’t seem to wrap her mind around is that an honest reporting of history means that she must give up her America-is-perfect-and-everyone-else-is-evil-incarnate version of history. And what Liz has done is argue that the world should continue her fantasy, black and white, version of history, and to portray anything that represents the realities of history as the shades of grey that they are as making America “weak” and bowing to our enemies to make ourselves look “inoffensive”.

There is no weakness in honesty. There is great weakness in dishonesty.

And in that, Liz and her father are some of the weakest individuals in America.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124744075427029805.html