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POPS23 Americans Convicted in Italy for CIA Kidnapping The Americans were accused of kidnapping Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr, also known as Abu Omar, on Feb. 17, 2003, in Milan, then transferring him to U.S. bases in Italy and Germany. He was then moved to Egypt, where he says he was tortured. He was released after four years in prison without being charged. The trial is the first by any government over the CIA's extraordinary rendition program, which transferred suspects overseas for interrogation. Human rights advocates charge that renditions were the CIA's way to outsource the torture of prisoners to countries where it is permitted. Italy's government has denied involvement. Among the Americans acquitted was Jeffrey Castelli, a former Rome CIA station chief, who prosecutors had alleged coordinated the abduction. The two other acquitted Americans were also assigned to the U.S. Embassy in the Italian capital and thus were covered by broad diplomatic immunity.
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POPSShould Inmates Pay Rent ? "If the court determines that sheriffs have the authority " as part of their duties and responsibilities " to institute fees, there are millions of dollars in savings to the taxpayers as a result of inmates paying a very small portion of their fees and services," Assad said. Walker said the majority of inmates are indigent, so the money in their canteen accounts is sent to them by family members so they can buy basic items that are not supplied by the jails.To deduct money from those accounts is like placing an unlawful tax on prisoners' families, she said
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POPSRepublican Representatives Saying Bring Troops Home Senator Warren Hatch (R) - Most of all, the administration must learn the lesson that the United States should put its troops in harm's way only if our vital and critical interests are at stake and should send enough forces so that they can achieve their mission rapidly and with the least risk to American lives. Senator Strom Thurmond (R) - Madam Speaker, the mission has steadily sucked us into a situation that now offers no good options. Americans are dying in an ill-defined mission that bears no clear relation to the national interest. I agree that this is intolerable, and must not continue. We all want to get out of this quagmire. Yet we do not know how, for no matter how ill-advised it was to get engaged in a tribal war; now that Aideed and his thugs have killed Americans, it is in our national interest to punish them. In other words, what is at stake is not just.
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POPSEinstein's Essays on Society Unknowingly prisoners of their own egotism, they feel insecure, lonely, and deprived of the naive, simple and unsophisticated enjoyment of life. Man can find meaning in life, short and perilous as it is, only through devoting himself to society. The economic anarchy of capitalist society as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evil. (Albert Einstein, 1949)
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POPSTorture Interferes with Memory Among other things, torture can interfere with the brain's memory retrieval apparatus, making it counterproductive to the aim of producing useful information.
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POPSThey Thought They Were Free 4. Supremacy of the Military - Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized. 5. Rampant Sexism - The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Divorce, abortion and homosexuality are suppressed and the state is represented as the ultimate guardian of the family institution. 6. Controlled Mass Media - Sometimes to media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common. 7. Obsession with National Security - Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.
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POPS19 Female Palestinian Prisoners to be Released in Exchange for Sign of Life From Gilad Shalit
From there, they were handed over to the Red Cross at 11:30 am, where they awaited the green light from Israel's envoy to Shalit talks Hagai Hadas' authorization before being released via Bitunia Checkpoint near Ramallah and Erez crossing between the Gaza Strip and Israel and the Bitunia Checkpoint near Ramallah. At around 1 pm, Hadas is slated to take the tape to the Prime Minister's Office in Jerusalem, to present it to Netanyahu. A copy of the tape will be delivered to the Shalit family by helicopter. Brigadier General Avi Zamir, head of the army's Human Resources Branch, will present the video to the Shalit family at around 3 pm. The video may even be flown in a helicopter to the family so as not to expedite its arrival. The family requested to watch the video in private. Copies of the video will also be delivered to the defense minister, the IDF chief of staff and the Shin Bet chief. Who will see the tape? After watching the videotape, Jerusalem will have . .
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POPSWhy should prisoners be denied the right to vote? More: One of the most important aspects of human rights is that they are unearned. Being of the human species is all that is required, and for a perfectly sound reason: it is intended to prevent governments oppressing unpopular or difficult individuals or groups. No human should be vulnerable to being misused by the mob or the government. That is the essence of human rights and has been for 50 years, and yet the debate about prisoners (and criminals in general) fails to appreciate this simple point. Just because you don't like someone or they make your life difficult, that is not a reason to leave them vulnerable to misuse. …If human rights had to be earned, if the unpopular could be legally misused, who would decide who has rights and who has none? All governments have an inherent urge to usurp power and to lean heavily on those who stand out from the crowd.… All have rights, even those we despise.
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POPS"Girl From Ipanema": Plenty Time To Get Toned and Tanned And I have a sneaking suspicion that after the hobnobbing is done, the IOC members will check their gift bags, look at the boxset of DVDs from Obama … Anyway, Obama probably just thinks this a fun, feel-good sideshow, stepping up for the home team. Doesn’t seem like that big a deal. What he probably hasn’t figured out is that, taken with a health-care failure, an Iran debacle, bucking the generals on Afghanistan, and that climate change thing that has “health-care redux” written all over it, being dissed by the IOC is going to make him look like an Olympic-sized loser. Can’t get anything done. Especially since the wife said it’s “gloves off” and “take no prisoners.” It’s a big gamble. This idea that you can treat not only your own top agenda items but actual serious national security concerns with less apparent interest than a big, expensive party for your hometown, and think there won’t be consequences.
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POPS "it's a disgrace ". says Mrs Witherall widow of Mr. Witherall. Mr Witherall's family said it makes a mockery of the justice system. However, A Prison Service spokesman said if a prisoner is found to have a mobile it is confiscated and they are placed in solitary confinement and have any privileges taken away. Sounds to me like they didn't find it.
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POPSParboiling American Prisoners I'm not really surprised at how we treat foreign detainees, especially when one looks at how we treat our home folks. Seems like anytime we get someone in a position where they must totally rely on our sense of fairness and mercy, we treat them with neither. I'm starting to feel like I belong to a nation of bullies.
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POPSsodomized to protect our freedoms this is from a report by physicians for human rights- "Broken Laws, Broken Lives" accounts of how US personal tortured men in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo
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