Bet you think this is about Iraq, right?
Wrong. This is about San Bernardino County in California, USA. That's right, US Marines assisted the California Highway Patrol with a DUI checkpoint on a public highway. Now, this isn't like tanks rolling into Tianamen Square, I admit. But if you've heard of Posse Comitatus you know that the military isn't supposed to be used for police actions inside our own borders.
This is definitely a bad trend....
via Clint.
One of my chief peeves with the auto bailout has been the persistent assertion that the "Big 3" are the last hope for American manufacturing. But Newsweek has an article about the other automotive sector in this country - the non-union southern-based "foreign" cars made in America.
MSNBC has posted another article talking about how prisoners were tortured as part of the war on terror. Honestly, it makes me sick to my stomach to read things like this:
Ruhal Ahmed, a Briton who was captured in Afghanistan, describes excruciating sessions at Guantanamo Bay. He said his hands were shackled to his feet, which were shackled to the floor, forcing him into a painful squat for periods of up to two days.
"You're in agony," Ahmed, who was released without charge in 2004, told Reprieve. He said the agony was compounded when music was introduced, because "before you could actually concentrate on something else, try to make yourself focus on some other things in your life that you did before and take that pain away.
"It makes you feel like you are going mad," he said.
and....
[Donald Vance of Chicago, held at a detention center in Iraq: ] "I had no blanket or sheet. If I had, I would probably have tried suicide," he said. "I got to a few points toward the end where I thought, 'How can I do this?' Actively plotting, 'How can I get away with it so they don't stop it?"'
Asked to describe the experience, Vance said: "It sort of removes you from you. You can no longer formulate your own thoughts when you're in an environment like that."
He was released after 97 days.
Those are the stories of the people that the US couldn't earn a conviction against. Welcome to the treatment you can expect at the hands of the "greatest country on earth" as some "patriots" like to claim. Here's a news flash for you - Donald Vance was a US citizen, held by the US, with no recourse to the courts. What does that mean? It means each and every one of us better realize that it could happen to us.
If you believe America should be a beacon of freedom to the world, then it's time to start getting our government to believe in the freedom and dignity of individuals.
It's sad but true that so many people in America have no real experience outside of their culture. For a family in Houston, this manifested itself as policy harassment when their house was broken into. When I was a kid, I pretty much bought the "cops are your friends" line. And even when I was a young adult, I more or less trusted the police, even though I was dimly aware that there were bad apples out there.
But the sad truth is, the vast majority of people in general are plain 'ole afraid of people different than them. And when you put people in a position of power, that fear needs to be confronted and addressed on an institutional level. Unfortunately, with sheriffs' offices having a hard time affording bullet resistant vests, I don't foresee a jump in sensitivity training anytime soon.
Link via Clint.
