Thursday, October 26, 2006

CIA tried to silence European complaints about torture

From the "proud-to-be-an-American" files:

The CIA tried to persuade Germany to silence EU protests about the human rights record of one of America's key allies in its clandestine torture flights programme, the Guardian can reveal.

According to a secret intelligence report, the CIA offered to let Germany have access to one of its citizens, an al-Qaida suspect being held in a Moroccan cell. But the US secret agents demanded that in return, Berlin should cooperate and "avert pressure from EU" over human rights abuses in the north African country. The report describes Morocco as a "valuable partner in the fight against terrorism".

source


Tags: war | torture | terrorism | terror | Rights | HUMAN | al-Qaida | Al-Qaeda | Abuses | Abuse | Morocco | Germany | EU | CIA

Bush Offers Sobering Assessment on Iraq


WASHINGTON, Oct. 25 — President Bush offered a sobering assessment of the war in Iraq today, acknowledging his concerns about the campaign but reaffirming his determination that United States forces stay in the country until “the job is done.”

“The events of the past month have been a serious concern to me and a serious concern to the American people,” President Bush said today in a news conference at the White House.

“There is tough fighting ahead,” Mr. Bush said. “The road to victory will not be easy.”

source

Remember when Bush said of the war against terrorism, "I don’t think you can win it"? Hmm.

Anyway, I just have a problem with any news story which combines George Bush with the word "sobering."

Tags: perma-war | war | terrorism | terror | president | Iraq | george | Bush

U.S. Generals calling for a Democratic takeover... at home

From Salon:

Oct. 25, 2006 | WASHINGTON -- Two retired senior Army generals, who served in Iraq and previously voted Republican, are now openly endorsing a Democratic takeover of Congress. The generals, and an active-duty senior military official, told Salon in separate interviews that they believe a Democratic victory will help reverse course from what they consider to be a disastrous Bush administration policy in Iraq. The two retired generals, Maj. Gen. John Batiste and Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton, first openly criticized the handling of the war last spring, when they called for the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

"The best thing that can happen right now is for one or both of our houses to go Democratic so we can have some oversight," Batiste, who led the Army's 1st Infantry Division in Iraq in 2004 and 2005, told Salon. Batiste describes himself as a "lifelong Republican." But now, he said, "It is time for a change."

source


Regime change begins at home.

Performancing

I haven't posted to this particular blog in ages. But I've just installed Performancing, a blogging tool for Firefox. Let's see if it works.


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