Abu Ghraib in America?

[babylonsister]

http://blogcritics.org/archives/2006/10/01/232009.php

American citizens can be declared enemy combatants? Sure!

While the government of the United States has repeatedly in the past argued that people accused of war crimes deserve full due process protection, under George W. Bush it has reversed course, insisting that it is their right NOT to observe due process.

That's what makes the new Military Commissions Act (MCA) all the more disconcerting. This legislation would permit an individual to be convicted on the basis of coerced testimony and hearsay, would not allow full judicial review of the conviction, and yet would allow someone convicted under these rules to be executed.

As Senator Russ Feingold said, "We would not stand for another country to try our citizens under those rules, and we should not stand for our own government to do so, either."

This isn't just a 'liberal' observation either, for as our very conservative former Attorney General John Ashcroft is quoted by the New York Times as saying at a private meeting of high-level officials in 2003, "Timothy McVeigh was one of the worst killers in U.S. history. But at least we had fair procedures for him."

more...

[Jcrowley]

1. Appalling yes

New, no. Sometimes I think it is more that WE are waking up to the brutal reality of American history and that the Bush admin has simply pulled off the blinders and forced the citizens to bear witness to what has been so neatly concealed for years.

K&R

Torture Inc. Americas Brutal Prisons

Savaged by dogs, Electrocuted With Cattle Prods, Burned By Toxic Chemicals, Does such barbaric abuse inside U.S. jails explain the horrors that were committed in Iraq?

By Deborah Davies

They are just some of the victims of wholesale torture taking place inside the U.S. prison system that we uncovered during a four-month investigation for BBC Channel 4 . It’s terrible to watch some of the videos and realise that you’re not only seeing torture in action but, in the most extreme cases, you are witnessing young men dying. 

The prison guards stand over their captives with electric cattle prods, stun guns, and dogs. Many of the prisoners have been ordered to strip naked. The guards are yelling abuse at them, ordering them to lie on the ground and crawl. ‘Crawl, motherf*****s, crawl.’ 

If a prisoner doesn’t drop to the ground fast enough, a guard kicks him or stamps on his back. There’s a high-pitched scream from one man as a dog clamps its teeth onto his lower leg. 

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article8451.htm