Human Rights Law

Open Thread: Jackson Browne's 'Going Down To Cuba'

Posted on October 04, 2008
Some smoove for your Monday listening pleasure. This is from Jackson Browne's new Time The Conqueror. Sometimes I get to feeling low Wish I could just pick up and go somewhere new Change my point of view Maybe somewhere I don't know Toss the idea to and fro Not sure what makes it come and go There it is again: sweet music on the wind Over the Gulf of Mexico I'm going to down to Cuba someday soon Following that Caribbean moon It's been too long since I've been there I'm going down to Cuba with my friends Down where the rhythm never ends Where women wear gardenias in their hair People will tell you it's not easy You're not supposed to go, they say They say that Cuba is the enemy I'm going down there anyway I'm going down to Cuba to see my friends Down where the rhythm never ends No problem is too difficult to solve Yeah times are tough down there it's true But you know they're going to make it through They make such continuous use of the verb to resolve They've got to deal with that embargo Enough to drive any country insane They might not know the things you and I know They do know what to do in a hurricane Maybe I'll go through Mexico Old Jesse Helms don't have to know Anyway all the allies of the USA Travel to Cuba everyday I'm going down to Cuba to see my friends Down where the rhythm never ends Where by comparison my trouble will just unravel I'm North American, you know Don't like to hear where I can't go Free people will insist on the freedom to travel I'm going to drink the rum mojito And walk out on the Malecon In one hand a Monte Cristo And in the other an ice cream cone I'm going down to Cuba with my band We're going to formulate a plan Whereby we obtain that cultural permission If I told you once I told you thrice It'll put a smile on your face to see a Chevrolet with a Soviet transmission I bet the country cast a spell And there are things I think of still Like the beauty of that woman that spoke to me In the Hotel Nacional I'm gonna book my flight today I'm definitely on my way Just hold my place and I'll get back in the race And I'm back in the USA

Big Victory: APA Informs Bush -- No Psychologists at Military Interrogations

Posted on October 03, 2008
Readers of this blog know that dissident psychologists, along with human rights and anti-torture organizations and individuals have been working for years now to get the American Psychological Association to change its policy of supporting the use of psychologists in interrogations at Guantanamo, CIA black-site prisons, and other governmental sites involved in Bush's Global War on Terror...

Operation Enduring Fiefdom "Doomed"; We "Have Assumed The Place Of The Soviets"

Posted on October 02, 2008
French officials mortified by President Nikolas Sarkozy's suicidal embrace of Operation Enduring Fiefdom--George II's adventure in Afghanistan--have leaked to the uppity French weekly Le Canard Enchaine a classified cable relating that the British envoy to Afghanistan has concluded that "American strategy is doomed to fail...

Jefferson's Wall Of Separation

Posted on October 01, 2008
An article in the Boston Globe  documents how Bush has claimed the right to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office.) Accomplices in this assault on our democracy include the religious right which would intrude into our personal lives to determine our rights and freedoms...

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What Is The "Cancer On The Body Democratic"?

Posted on October 01, 2008
Considering that the McSame-Obama race remains statistically close, despite eight years of Bush-Cheney lies, abuse of power and incompetence and despite all the McSame-Palin lies, gaffes and outright goofyness, and considering that things are not much better nowadays in my country Canada, I thought that it would be quite à propos to dust off an old post of mine from last year - one which I reference all-too-often in my current posts - and therefore repost it here (along with updated/refreshed links) at NION: ************************* A Cancer On The Body Democratic (Updated below) (Update II) Alternative title: The Root Of All Our Problems - In Real Life And In The Blogosphere...

Further Blurring of the First Amendment

Posted on September 30, 2008
The First Amendment statesCongress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances...

A Colonel Takes on the Torturers: More on SERE Torture Details

Posted on September 29, 2008
At the center of the bottom of the lowest circle of hell, one finds the souls abandoned to torture. They are placed so far from heaven and earth because they are totally forgotten. The witnessing of their torture is almost unnoticed, trivial, when matched against the "great" issues of the day...

Politics and the English Language

Posted on September 28, 2008
In 1946 George Orwell published an essay entitled Politics and the English Language.  Orwell's words ring true today as they did more than  60 years ago.Most people who bother with the matter at all would admit that the English language is in a bad wayWe hear our leaders misuse and abuse the language on a daily basis...

Action: Protest burial of women in Pakistan? Get buried.

Posted on September 28, 2008
Please join me in protest: Three more women allegedly buried in same way as five women buried in Balochistan. Source: ICAHK The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) is shocked to learn that three more women have been buried alive in Balochistan province, a few days after they protested against the live burial of five women taking place in the same province...

Muslim Children Gassed At Ramadan Prayer in Ohio

Posted on September 28, 2008
Tuesday marks the final day of this year's Ramadan, the month-long observance by Muslims of fasting and prayer. The observance of Laylatul Qadr, the Night of Degrees or Night of Measures designates the Angel Jilal bringing the Book of Allah, the last book of the Qur'an to the world, and is always observed on the 27th day of Ramadan...

Detention and Immigration in the Closing Society

Posted on September 27, 2008
What do these terms mean, a "closed society" or "closing society?" The most obvious example of a present day closed society I can think of is Burma. The violent crackdown in September 2007 was first reported with images from cell phone cameras. Bloggers posted photographs while their internet connections were alive...

Action: Support Ban on Chinese Food Imports

Posted on September 27, 2008
Tip of the sombrera to Asinus Asinum Fricat at Daily Kos for alerting us to the European ban on food products from China. It started as thus: all the sick babies were fed a formula produced by the San Lu group, which is based at Shijiazhuang in Hebei, the province surrounding Beijing...

Water Music

Posted on September 26, 2008
The New York Times is reporting that Condoleezza Rice, Donald Rumsfeld, and John Ashcroft participated in meetings convened to discuss which methods of torture should be inflicted on Abu Zubaydah, the "insane, certifiable" Al Qaeda "gofer" who has, in our names, been imprisoned and abused for more than six years...

SASC Hits Paydirt: Full Story on SERE Torture Timeline Emerges

Posted on September 26, 2008
I have not had enough time to digest the wealth of new documents recently declassified by the Senate Armed Services Committee, in conjunction with their hearings today constituting Part II of an investigation into the organization of torture and abuse of detainees in Bush's "war on terror...

Aunt Sarah

Posted on September 26, 2008
There's more than one kind of freedom. Freedom to and freedom from. In the days of anarchy, it was freedom to. Now you are being given freedom from. Don't underestimate it. -- Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale The Christian Heritage Week Sarah Palin signed into law in Alaska sounds like a far milder version of a state-sanctioned Prayvaganza...

GITMO Prosecutor Quits

Posted on September 25, 2008
Defense attorneys for Mohammed Jawad say a Guantanamo prosecutor has resigned in the face of exculpatory evidence being withheld by the Justice Department.  If there ever were any hope of justice being the outcome in these military tribunals the wee small glimmer that once was that hope continues to fail as more evidence comes to light...

Genius at Work: Maya Lin and the Confluence Project

Posted on September 24, 2008
I wonder why there isn't more buzz about Maya Lin's current project. Maybe because it treads so lightly on the earth, even though it is her most monumental to date, its seven component sites scattered across 465 miles of river and two states. So many things to love, like the perfectly functional fish cleaning table and sink at the completed Cape Disappointment site...

Hurricane Ike, Eight Days Later

Posted on September 24, 2008
Cuba, devastated by 4 hurricanes, could unleash a mass migration in weeks In fact, Cuba sustained damage from four hurricanes: Fay, Gustav, Hanna and Ike. Gustav hit the western end of Cuba as a Category 4 storm. Ike entered the east of Cuba as a strong Category 3, then shredded the full length of the island for three days...

More Cover-up? Senate Committee Renews Hearings on SERE Torture

Posted on September 22, 2008
There will be a meeting of the Senate Armed Services Committee [SASC] this Thursday, September 25, 9:30 AM in Room SD-106, Dirksen Senate Office Building. The meeting represents "Part II of the Committee's inquiry into the treatment of detainees in U...

Scratching my head

Posted on September 22, 2008
Maybe it is the nearness of the event we've been anticipating all year - yes, the annual Ig Nobel Awards will be given out on October 2nd - or maybe it's just something in the air - and it turns out there are some unpleasant possibilities there - but for the last few days there seem to be odd science stories - headscratchers - on every side...

269-269: The Nightmare Scenarios

Posted on September 21, 2008
All right, Chicken Littles.  You wanna play "the sky is falling?"  Okay, I'll bite.  How 'bout these possible outcomes?: Cheney becomes Temporary President in January, 2009...or... casts a tie-breaking vote in Senate balloting to determine who will be Succeeder to the Decider...

Executive Power Grab in Bank Bail-Out Bill

Posted on September 20, 2008
(propinas to Larry Madill at Daily Kos) Though I can't pretend to understand the ongoing financial meltdown of the last week, two items seem apparent. As a disclaimer, I don't know if these events signal a Second Depression or not. If you know, please comment...

We Stand For Nothing

Posted on September 19, 2008
As a nation, as a people, what exactly do we stand for now? I'm not talking about the very commendable work done every day by individuals, activists, groups working for change as opposed to waiting for change. Let's be honest. If Obama is elected and inaugurated, change won't happen on "day one...

Center for Biological Diversity gives Palin the Bird

Posted on September 18, 2008
Award season is upon us already. Kicking it off, the Center for Biological Diversity has given Alaska governor Sarah Palin its coveted Dodo Award for 2008 for her denial of human-caused global warming and her extraordinary efforts to fight off any legal protection for the polar bear...

USGS: Freshwater biodiversity collapsing in North America

Posted on September 18, 2008
(Also posted at Truth & Progress.} Nearly 40 percent of fish species in North American streams, rivers and lakes are now in jeopardy . . . The 700 fishes now listed represent a staggering 92 percent increase over the 364 listed as "imperiled" in the previous 1989 study ...

Insurgent Psychologists Win Key Anti-Torture Vote

Posted on September 17, 2008
The Election Committee of the American Psychological Association announced today that the referendum of APA members, in regards to prohibiting psychologist participation in settings where human rights violations take place, has passed with almost 60% of the vote...

Bad Moon Rising

Posted on September 17, 2008
I see a bad moon rising, I see trouble on the way. The good news is that U.S. President George W. Bush is not going to invade Iran before he leaves office. The bad news is that he is attacking Pakistan instead. Pakistan is a U.S. ally, even though the great majority of Pakistanis wish that it wasn't...

Aafia Siddiqui Update

Posted on September 15, 2008
Some background here on the strange and horrifying story of imprisoned Dr. Aafia, but the disappearance of her husband and three children is still very much a developing story. Cage Prisoners has much more information. What do I mean by "developing" story? The facts are in dispute and involve the United States, Pakistan and Afghanistan...

Sarah Palin; Science or Survival of the Fittest

Posted on September 15, 2008
Brutal copyright © 2008 Betsy L. Angert.  BeThink.org The Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund asks each of us to consider our values and the ethics of Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin.  Environmental experts also join these protectors of the natural world when they inquire, would we rather have science survive or the ideology of a singular prominent person, Alaskan Governor, Sarah Palin...

Sand and Fog and Cupcakes

Posted on September 14, 2008
So, gente, think you would eat a cupcake with chili peppers, cinnamon and bitter dark chocolate? Banana and guava cupcakes with plantains? Pretty zesty, no? I think there's an unspoken competition among tween mamis and Lawd haf mursy on the pobrecito who brings chocolate cupcakes, even with sprinkles or anything made from a quick mix to play/study dates...

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