SOME DARE TO CALL IT TORTURE!
Christians have historically blamed the Jews for torturing and crucifying Jesus.
Jews try to pass it off on the Romans. I think they're onto somethin' - the
Romans the were first neo-cons!
(Click on any image to enlarge)
This is a photo of the Khmer Rouge using the
"psychological interrogation technique" of waterboarding - something now
authorized and endorsed by Dick Cheney.
Andrew Sullivan has this today:
This morning's NYT has an insightful op-ed on how the interrogation techniques now used by the U.S. were actually first developed by the Communist interrogators of the Soviet-controlled world. They were designed not to get actionable intelligence but to destroy a person's soul and enforce ideological conformity.
An "Animal Farm" moment, no?
Sullivan also has this - TORTURE AND WATER:
One of the experts on torture, especially that practised in Iran, professor Darius Rejali of Reed College, emails an exhaustive account of the various techniques involved, including their gruesome nuances:
This specific water torture, often called the "water cure," admits of several variants:
(a) pumping: filling a stomach with water causes the organs to distend, a sensation compared often with having your organs set on fire from the inside. This was the Tormenta de Toca favored by the Inquisition and featured on your website photo. The French in Algeria called in the tube or tuyau after the hose they forced into the mouth to fill the organs.
(b) choking - as in sticking a head in a barrel. It is a form of near asphyxiation but it also produces the same burning sensation through all the water a prisoner involuntarily ingests. This is the example illustrated in the Battle of Algiers movie, a technique called the sauccisson or the submarine in Latin America. Prisoners describe their chests swelling to the size of barrels at which point a guard would stomp on the stomach forcing the water to move in the opposite direction.
(c) choking - as in attaching a person to a board and dipping the board into water. This was my understanding of what waterboarding was from the initial reports. The use of a board was stylistically most closely associated with the work of a Nazi political interrogator by the name of Ludwig Ramdor who worked at Ravensbruck camp. Ramdor was tried before the British Military Court Martial at Hamburg (May 1946 to March 1947) on charges for subjecting women to this torture, subjecting another woman to drugs for interrogation, and subjecting a third to starvation and high pressure showers. He was found guilty and executed by the Allies in 1947.
(d) choking - as in forcing someone to lie down, tying them down, then putting a cloth over the mouth, and then choking the prisoner by soaking the cloth. This also forces ingestion of water. It was invented by the Dutch in the East Indies in the 16th century, as a form of torture for English traders. More recently it was common in the American south, especially in police stations, in the 1920s, as documented in the famous Wickersham Report of the American Bar Association (The Report on Lawlessness in Law Enforcement, 1931), compiling instances of police torture throughout the United States.
Perhaps the main thing to remember here is that all these techniques leave few marks; they're clean tortures and so people who are unfamiliar with them are in genuine doubt as to whether there is much pain. In the absence of a bloody wound, who is to say how much pain there was?
It seems the method that the U.S. has authorized is closest to c), the Nazi one, or d), the one developed by the Dutch and deployed in the American South. Remember that this is authorized for use in the secret black sites, exposed by Dana Priest. It is this CIA-directed torture that Dick Cheney is so adamant on retaining and codifying into law.
My Pet Jawa has IRAQ GUN PORN:
Which Guns Suck, Which Guns Rock
An Iraq war vet's assessment of commonly used weapons in Iraq - by our guys and the guys who shoot at them. Revealing on several levels!
(Click on any image to enlarge)
From Salon / Broadsheet
TARGET WON'T BUDGE ON CONTRACEPTION
Planned Parenthood has been pressuring Target for more than a year to guarantee that women will be able to receive emergency contraception from the retailer's pharmacies. The campaign followed an incident in Missouri where a Target pharmacist refused to fill a woman's prescription.
Other chains, like Kmart, CVS and Costco, have no problem making emergency contraception available. But never mind the competition. Today, the official word from Planned Parenthood: Target is not budging.
In a statement released Friday, the reproductive-health advocacy group denounced the retail giant: "Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) today condemned the Target Corporation for standing by a company policy that allows pharmacists to refuse to fill valid, legal prescriptions for birth control, including emergency contraception …Pharmacist refusals are a disturbing trend that can jeopardize women's reproductive health. Denying women timely access to health care is an act of discrimination that could lead to an increased number of unintended pregnancies." Thanks for nothing, Target. [- Katharine Mieszkowski]
THE LIST: FBI MOST WANTED FUGITIVES
There are 28 listed for the month of November. 3
are non-Hispanic blacks. 2 have Arabic-sounding names. 10 are apparent Hispanics. 13
are non-Hispanic Caucasian.
How does that measure up with your expectations? 
Long before he became a Saloon Singer - he sang at the candy counter...
IT'S A BUMPER STICKER:
"A foreskin is not a birth defect!"
I concur - but I'm NOT going to make the statement on my truck. Nope. NEVER whine about your dick... I learned that back when I was... oh, SIX!
SPEAKING OF WATER TORTURE!While some pasta welfare fanatics propagate the disinformation that pasta rods feel pain when dropped into a pot of boiling water - I continue to handle the uncooked pasta gently - and I'm fully confident that the immediate softening process in boiling water is sufficiently humane.
NO MO FAUX HOLIDAYS!I should write my congressman: Grandparents Day, Mother's Day, et al., are NOT holidays for anyone. And the just-past Veterans Day SHOULD be a day for everyone to celebrate and thank a vet. I'm old enough to remember wearin' a poppy on "Armistice Day"; and I didn't have school and my Dad didn't have to show up at Wright-Pat (Air Force Base). I didn't realize 'til I was 20 that Veterans Day is not a "holiday" for all. (I didn't wear a poppy to work in the slaughter house - it would have clashed with the pig blood on my yellow neoprene apron.)
I have proposed this before - strike all "holidays" that don't officially give every wage-slave the day off. What are holidays, anyway? Certainly, Columbus Day, Veterans Day, Martin Luther King Day and Presidents Day do not meet the requirement - that EVERY worker get the day off!
We need MORE official holidays: Cinco de Mayo, Rosa Parks Day, Election Day, St. Patrick's Day, and how about a National Cruise-In on the first weekend in June?
I don't know why American workers don't get more time off - holidays and vacations. It's cheaper to give workers time off than to give 'em raises or increased benefits. Besides, holidays are good for the leisure economy.
THIS JUST __________ IN ! !
If the American people really come to a settled belief that Bush lied us into war, his presidency will be over. He won't have the basic level of trust needed to govern.
Good fortune. COMMENT! Please spread the meme.
Don't smoke in bed, Ol' Sleepy Head...
