shamsery
04-06-05, 01:42 AM
We can sometimes have a good-natured laugh about President Bush's frequent malapropisms - even his wife teased him for not being able to pronounce "nuclear" - but occasionally it would be nice if the leader of the free world actually knew the meaning of the words that he uses.
Amnesty International recently criticized the Bush administration's treatment of detainees at Guantanamo Bay, calling the facility "the gulag of our times," a reference to political prisoners held in Soviet labor camps.
Bush responded, "I'm aware of the Amnesty International report, and it's absurd - it's an absurd allegation."
Clearly, the president doesn't know the meaning of the word "absurd." It means utterly or obviously senseless, illogical or untrue; contrary to all reason or common sense; laughably foolish or false.
Let's consider how absurd this allegation actually is.
Guantanamo Bay was a facility chosen with the deliberate intention of keeping the prisoners from having access to U.S. courts. Although the men were picked up in war zones, the Bush administration has refused to call them "prisoners of war," which would have put them under the legal protection of the Geneva Convention. Instead, Bush says they're "unlawful combatants," and therefore not entitled to any protection.
The U.S. military has confirmed that an unknown number of children under age 16 are among the detainees at Guantanamo Bay, but it refused to reveal who they were or why they were arrested.
Until recently, there was no individualized legal process for determining the name of each detainee, the allegations against him or what crime he would be charged with. Detainees were not permitted to speak with lawyers, have access to courts or even tell their families where they were. They simply disappeared.
In a victory for democracy, the Supreme Court ruled last year that detainees could appeal to U.S. courts, so the Bush administration had to scramble to keep the courts at bay. Military tribunals were established to determine the status of detainees without having to face independent lawyers and independent judges.
After filling Guantanamo Bay with detainees, the president apparently was curious about just how far his interrogators could go in extracting information. So current Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who was then an outside lawyer advising the president, wrote a memo stating that "Physical pain amounting to torture must be equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death."
Soldiers guarding prisoners at Abu Ghraib never saw this memo, but somehow they got the message that it was OK to torture their captives.
Let's recap: We have a holding facility established specifically to avoid judicial oversight; detainees who were "disappeared" from their home countries and who were called "unlawful combatants" to ensure that they would have no legal rights; a memo to the president that assured him that torture wasn't illegal until a kidney failed; abuses at the American-run Abu Ghraib prison that revealed what can happen when the law is suspended - yet the president thinks it's absurd to suggest that anything might be going wrong at Guantanamo Bay.
Of the Amnesty report, Bush said, "It seemed to me they based some of their decisions on the word of - and the allegations - by people who were held in detention, people who hate America, people that had been trained in some instances to disassemble - that means not to tell the truth."
Actually, "disassemble" means "to take apart," which is what the Bush administration has done with America's reputation as a defender of freedom and democracy. The word the president intended to use was "dissemble."
The president wants us to take his word that no one has been tortured at Guantanamo, but how can we trust his word when he doesn't know what he's saying?
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0603-20.htm
When one lies, he cannot keep the consistency.
That is the truth.
You like it or not.
Amnesty International recently criticized the Bush administration's treatment of detainees at Guantanamo Bay, calling the facility "the gulag of our times," a reference to political prisoners held in Soviet labor camps.
Bush responded, "I'm aware of the Amnesty International report, and it's absurd - it's an absurd allegation."
Clearly, the president doesn't know the meaning of the word "absurd." It means utterly or obviously senseless, illogical or untrue; contrary to all reason or common sense; laughably foolish or false.
Let's consider how absurd this allegation actually is.
Guantanamo Bay was a facility chosen with the deliberate intention of keeping the prisoners from having access to U.S. courts. Although the men were picked up in war zones, the Bush administration has refused to call them "prisoners of war," which would have put them under the legal protection of the Geneva Convention. Instead, Bush says they're "unlawful combatants," and therefore not entitled to any protection.
The U.S. military has confirmed that an unknown number of children under age 16 are among the detainees at Guantanamo Bay, but it refused to reveal who they were or why they were arrested.
Until recently, there was no individualized legal process for determining the name of each detainee, the allegations against him or what crime he would be charged with. Detainees were not permitted to speak with lawyers, have access to courts or even tell their families where they were. They simply disappeared.
In a victory for democracy, the Supreme Court ruled last year that detainees could appeal to U.S. courts, so the Bush administration had to scramble to keep the courts at bay. Military tribunals were established to determine the status of detainees without having to face independent lawyers and independent judges.
After filling Guantanamo Bay with detainees, the president apparently was curious about just how far his interrogators could go in extracting information. So current Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who was then an outside lawyer advising the president, wrote a memo stating that "Physical pain amounting to torture must be equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death."
Soldiers guarding prisoners at Abu Ghraib never saw this memo, but somehow they got the message that it was OK to torture their captives.
Let's recap: We have a holding facility established specifically to avoid judicial oversight; detainees who were "disappeared" from their home countries and who were called "unlawful combatants" to ensure that they would have no legal rights; a memo to the president that assured him that torture wasn't illegal until a kidney failed; abuses at the American-run Abu Ghraib prison that revealed what can happen when the law is suspended - yet the president thinks it's absurd to suggest that anything might be going wrong at Guantanamo Bay.
Of the Amnesty report, Bush said, "It seemed to me they based some of their decisions on the word of - and the allegations - by people who were held in detention, people who hate America, people that had been trained in some instances to disassemble - that means not to tell the truth."
Actually, "disassemble" means "to take apart," which is what the Bush administration has done with America's reputation as a defender of freedom and democracy. The word the president intended to use was "dissemble."
The president wants us to take his word that no one has been tortured at Guantanamo, but how can we trust his word when he doesn't know what he's saying?
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0603-20.htm
When one lies, he cannot keep the consistency.
That is the truth.
You like it or not.