The Same Old Song: Attack on Civil Liberties Continues

As we enter another year under the oil-stained boot of the Bush Regime, the Project would like to offer a recap of Dubya and crew’s ever-growing list of dirty deeds committed in the name of the “war against terror.” While Democrats sigh and countdown the days until the next presidential election, we hope the following will serve as ample proof that Bush, along with his blood sucking cabal of vampires, need to pack their bags and head back to Texas or the subterranean netherworld from whence they came, pronto.

I.Extraordinary Rendition (a.k.a. KIDNAPPING)

Ever wanted to imitate the great Houdini, vanish into thin air and then reappear in another country? That’s what happened to Canadian citizen Maher Arar during a stopover at JFK airport October 2002. Without so much as a phone call to a lawyer or being charged with a crime, the CIA flies Arar to Damascus where he spends the next year in a 3-foot wide prison cell and being routinely beaten and tortured.

Not to be outdone by our allies/enemies (depending on the day) in Syria, while vacationing in Macedonia, December 2003, German citizen Khaled El-Masri is snatched up by our boys at the CIA, stripped, hooded, beaten, and dragged onto a plane headed for Afghanistan where he spends the next 6 months receiving less than loving treatment. Released later with a big “Oops, we got the wrong guy”, but without an apology, the Project would like to ask, does the “I” in “CIA” actually stand for “Idiocy” or “Insensitivity”?

And finally, in February of 2003, Muslim cleric Hassan Osama Nasr also known as Abu Omar is grabbed off the streets in Milan, Italy, thrown into a white van, and quietly shipped to Egypt where he is, you guessed it, beaten and given electrical shocks on his genitals.

Despite a plethora of lawsuits by the ACLU, criminal charges filed against the CIA, and the fact that it’s just plain illegal, to date, Dubya and crew are still defending the practice as necessary in order to “protect American lives.” Or as George Carlin once mused, “If you can’t beat them, arrange to have them beaten.”

II. Chemical Weapons Found In Iraq!

While Saddam Hussein’s mysteriously disappearing stock of Weapons of Mass Destruction were never found let alone used against the U.S.-Led “coalition forces” that rolled into Bagdad Spring 2003, over a year later, the U.S. Army didn’t seem to have any problem using a chemical weapon known as White Phosphorous against the civilian population of Fallujah in late 2004.

Although technically not Napalm, the effects of getting “Whiskey Pete” (as affectionately known within military circles) on you are pretty much the same -your skin cooks through your clothing down to the bone while you drown in the blood of your lungs. As shown in the documentary “Fallujah, the hidden massacre,” hundreds of women and children were killed by White Phosphorous during the siege of Fallujah, in direct violation of the international Chemical Weapons Convention.

After all that Bush-shit about Weapons of Mass destruction, the white house has finally gotten its wish, albeit with a stinking dose of irony. Memo to the Pentagon: The word hypocrite means “one who puts on a mask and feigns himself to be what he is not,” the phrase “lying murderous criminal sack of shit” just has your boss’ picture.


III. American Gulags (up from the 36 Chambers)

Perhaps the neo-fascist-cons took a cue from LL Cool Jay’s infamous lyrics “Don’t call it a comeback, I’ve been here for years!” when they decided to hit up ex-Soviet East European countries to play host to their oh-so-secret prisons. The revelation only two months ago that the CIA is running secret “black sites” (i.e prison camps) in foreign countries so to avoid charging detainees with crimes, thereby denying their rights as citizens of sovereign nations, came just in time for the holidays.

Much like the third installment of a Hollywood trilogy, this recent revelation comes on the heels of such blockbuster hits as 2004’s “Abu Ghraib shit-smearing homophobic house of horrors” and the “Great Guantanamo Bay non-escape.”

Speaking of Summer, as if to put a disturbing post-script to the Terry Schiavo hysteria, just last July, Guantanamo guards violently shoved feeding tubes into the noses of over 100 detainees engaging in a 3 month hunger strike. To date, more than 20 Guantanamo detainees have attempted suicide after 3 years of being held without charges, incommunicado, from the outside world.

p.s. To all the History Channel buffs who split hairs about whether the current horrors perpetrated by the Pentagon are on par with the horrors perpetrated by the KGB, one things for certain – one person tortured and killed under the guise of fighting terrorism is one person too many. p.p.s. Fuck the history channel.


IV. Suspension of Habeas Corpus (You Have the Right to Jack & Shit)

Long established as one of the founding principles of Western democracy, the basic human right to not be held by any government without charge, is thrown out the door courtesy of the “War On Terror”. It doesn’t even matter if you are a U.S. citizen – If the government decides to label you an “enemy combatant” as happened to accused dirty-shoe bomber Jose Padilla, your ass is toast.

After 3 years in solitary confinement in South Carolina, the native of Illinois was formally charged with a series of crimes just in time for Thanksgiving 2005. Although none of the original accusations are outlined in the charges, as his attorneys are quick to point out, the justice department only filed charges because an appeal was scheduled for the Supreme Court and the government is trying to avoid any confrontations over its detention policies.
And for all you students who plan to study abroad but are unfortunate enough to be of Arab or Persian descent, remember Houston born Ahmed Omar Abu Ali, picked up while taking his final exams in Medina, Saudia Arabia, June 2003. With the assistance of U.S. officials, Abu Ali is arrested without charges by the Saudi government and spends the next 20 months reportedly being tortured. After his parents sue the U.S. government to get him back, Ali is flown in early February 2005 back to the states where he is formally charged with plotting to assassinate the president.

On a side note, such egregious disregard for international law and domestic civil liberties seems to turn the tables on the Simpson’s Halloween episode where Lisa intervenes when the Devil (Ned Flanders) tries to take Homer’s soul claming, “Wait, doesn’t he have a right to a fair trial?” To which, a frustrated Devil snorts, “Oh you Americans with all your due process, this stuff is always so much easier in Mexico.”


V.Attacks on Free Speech

While domestically, the White House has practiced a subtle form of censorship and propaganda (paying pundits to promote the war, issuing video news releases that get played verbatim on national television, etc), internationally, the Pentagon has used considerably less finesse.

Take the U.S. military’s attack on the Palestine Hotel in April 8th, 2003. Knowing full well that the hotel in Bagdad housed over 300 journalist (albeit, un-embedded non-American journalists from networks like Al-Jazeera and Telecinco), a U.S. tank fires on the unfortified building killing Spanish journalist Jose Couso and Ukrainian cameraman Taras Protsyuk.
To be sure, the U.S. military doesn’t seem to discriminate when it comes to suppressing freedom of the press - After being held hostage for a month by insurgents, Italian anti-war journalist Giuliana Sgrena is released from captivity only to be shot by
U.S. soldiers as she’s being driven back to safety. Sgrena’s life is saved by intelligence agent Nicola Calipari who shields her body from U.S. bullets with his own – he doesn’t make it. The Italian government, along with so many other European countries fumes, and the Pentagon issues yet another Britney Spear’s inspired, “Oops, we did it again.”

And last but not least, only 3 months ago, a confidential memo was leaked to the British press detailing how during a meeting with Tony Blair in 2004, that little rascal Dubya suggested bombing the headquarters of Arab TV-news station Al Jazeera. The British government has retaliated by threatening to sue any media outlet that publishes any more of the memo just as the international community is catching it’s breath from screaming about the last American fiasco. But as George would insist, we’re doing it all in the name of “Fweedom.” Sure we are Georgey, sure we are.