Month: July 2005

Still Not Surprised

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by hilzoy From Newsweek: “An FBI agent warned superiors in a memo three years ago that U.S. officials who discussed plans to ship terror suspects to foreign nations that practice torture could be prosecuted for conspiring to violate U.S. law, according to a copy of the memo obtained by NEWSWEEK. (…) In a memo forwarded … Read more

The Rule Of Law

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by hilzoy Via a diary at dKos, ABC has this story: “Leaked emails from two former prosecutors claim the military commissions set up to try detainees at Guantanamo Bay are rigged, fraudulent, and thin on evidence against the accused. Two emails, which have been obtained by the ABC, were sent to supervisors in the Office … Read more

The Failed States Index

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by Charles A joint project between Foreign Policy magazine and the Carnegie Endowment Fund for Peace put together the 2nd annual Failed States Index, ranking sixty countries in question, using twelve military, political and social indicators.  Surprising that there are sixty of them, although the top twenty (or bottom twenty as it were) are the … Read more

My Take on Talk Radio: Part III

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by Charles

[For a little background, check out Part I and Part II]

It’s been a while since I wrote the first two parts, mainly because I lost interest, both in writing this series and in listening to talk radio in general.  I still listen frequently but the blogosphere is so much more informative, interactive, stimulating and enlightening, that I’d rather blog.  Also, the commercials on talk radio are killing me.  Like accruing mercury or lead poisoning, they’ve built up in my system to toxic levels.  They play the same ones, over and over, all day long, day after day, week after week.  Ugh.  What’s more, I’m not interested in what they’re selling.  At all.  I don’t want to try hutia and gingko biloba or some other crackpot concoction, or listen to Larry King tout health products and grape juice (Larry King?!  Health?!  He’s had more heart attacks than wives!), or buy gold, or incorporate in Nevada, or consolidate my debt, or get a credit report, or try exercises to improve my eyesight.  [To all station managers, are you getting this?  You’re not attracting new listeners with this awful pablum.]  So anyway, I’m a little down on talk radio for now.

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Energy Bill: Now With Weapons-Grade Uranium!

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by hilzoy Via a post by Russell Feingold at DKos: apparently, the energy bill that just passed both houses of Congress isn’t just a shameful grab-bag of corporate welfare provisions that does next to nothing to solve our energy problems; it also weakens our nuclear non-proliferation policies. From the Washington Post: “A provision tucked into … Read more

US Muslims Make it Clear

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by Edward we interrupt our self-imposed hiatus to bring you the following rant: Despite the likes of the so-called comedian Michael Graham, who still refuses to apologize for calling Islam a “terrorist organization” on his radio show, US Muslims are responding to the growing tension since the attacks in London with restraint, maturity, and a … Read more

Our Clueless Congress Strikes Again

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by hilzoy Yesterday the House and Senate agreed on the final version of the energy bill, and today the House passed it. I gather that the energy bill contains some good provisions — I’m all for “new efficiency standards for commercial appliances from air conditioners to refrigerators”, for instance. And the conferees did manage to … Read more

Correction (Huh??)

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by hilzoy A few days ago I linked to a New York Times article that said that the Department of Defense had defied a court order to release the rest of the photos from Abu Ghraib. Anderson (in comments) points me to this correction by the Times: “An article on Saturday about a federal judge’s … Read more

Another Gloomy Iraq Post

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by hilzoy

The BBC has a story I hope is wrong, but fear is true:

“Iraq’s new police force is facing mounting allegations of systematic abuse and torture of people in detention, as well as allegations of extra-judicial killings. The minority Sunni community in particular claims it is being targeted by the Shia-dominated police force.”

According to the BBC, Human Rights Watch has collected a number of similar stories, including a novel use for power tools that I hope I manage to repress as soon as possible:

“The camera focuses on marks all over his body including what appear to be drill holes. According to Salman al-Faraji, a human rights activist and lawyer, the use of drills is common. “Most cases are quite similar, the same methods are used,” he said. “They torture them, breaking hands and legs. They use electric drills to pierce their bodies and then the killing is carried out at close range.””

One of several nightmare outcomes for Iraq has always been the emergence of a police state like Saddam Hussein’s, but with different allegiances. It is, I think, marginally better than civil war, but that’s sort of like saying that being tortured with an electric drill is marginally better than being tortured with a belt sander. And of course the two aren’t mutually exclusive.

In the latest New York Review of Books, Peter Galbraith has an article about Iraq that is disturbing, though not surprising. I’ve posted a longish excerpt below the fold, but it’s worth reading the whole article, since Galbraith is, in my opinion, one of the sharpest observers of Iraq around.

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