This is probably exactly what the photos show, because it happened. The same-sex crimes against detainees have been documented.

The Telegraph of London broke the news — because the U.S. press is in a drugged stupor – — that the photos President Barack Obama is refusing to release of detainee abuse depict, among other sexual tortures, an American soldier raping a female detainee and a male translator raping a male prisoner.

The paper claims the photos also show anal rape of prisoners with foreign objects such as wires and lightsticks. Retired Army Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba calls the images “horrific” and “indecent” (but absurdly agrees that Obama should not release them — proving once again that the definition of hypocrisy is the assertion that the truth is in poor taste).

Predictably, a few hours later, the Pentagon issues a formal denial.

It is very likely that the Pentagon lying. This is probably exactly what the photos show, because it happened. Precisely these exact sex crimes — these exact images and these very objects – — are familiar and well-documented to those of us who follow closely rights organizations reports of what has already been confirmed.

As I wrote last year in my piece on sex crimes against detainees, “Sex Crimes in the White House,” highly perverse, systematic sexual torture and sexual humiliation was, original documents reveal, directed from the top:

• President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice were present in meetings where sexual humiliation was discussed as policy.
• The Defense Authorization Act of 2007 was written specifically to allow certain kinds of sexual abuse, such as forced nakedness, which is illegal and understood by domestic and international law to be a form of sexual assault.
• Rumsfeld is in print and on the record consulting with subordinates about the policy and practice of sexual humiliation, in a collection of documents obtained by the ACLU by a Freedom of Information Act filing compiled in Jameel Jaffer’s important book The Torture Administration.

The image of the female prisoner, probably Iraqi, being sexually assaulted? That image, or a similar one, has been widely seen in the Muslim world. Reports of the rape scenes described have also appeared in rights organizations summaries since 2004.

And scores of detainees who have told their stories to rights organizations have told independently confirming accounts of a highly consistent practice of sexual torture at U.S.-held prisons, including having their genitals slashed with razors, electrodes placed on genitals, and being told the U.S. military would find and rape their mothers.

Is systemic sex crimes practiced by the U.S. in a consequence of the lawlessness of “the war on terror” surprising to those of us who work on issues of sexual abuse and war? It is totally predictable: When you give soldiers anywhere in the world the power, let alone the mandate, to hold women or men helpless, without recourse to law, kidnap them as a matter of policy — as the U.S. military kidnapped the wives of “insurgents” in order to compel them to turn themselves in — strip them naked, and threaten them, you have a completely predictable recipe for mass sexual assault. The magisterial study of rape in war, Susan Brownmiller’s Men, Women and Rape, proves that.

But what is far scarier about these images Obama refuses to release and that the Pentagon is likely to be lying about now, is that it is not the evidence of lower-level soldiers being corrupted by power — it is proof of the fact that the most senior leadership — Bush, Rumsfeld and Cheney, with Rice’s collusion — were running a global sex-crime trafficking ring with Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and Baghram Air Base as the holding sites.

The sexual nature of the torture also gives the lie to Cheney’s and others’ defense of torture as somehow functional: The sexual perversity mandated from the top reveals that it was just plain old sick sadism gratified by a very sick form of pleasure. I also pointed out in “Sex Crimes in the White House” that the escalation of the sexual abuse showed the same classic pattern shown by sex criminals everywhere — you start with stripping the victim, keeping him or her completely in your power, and then you engage in greater and more violent excesses with more and more self-justification.

The lightsticks, for instance? We in the human rights world know about the lightsticks. Probably dozens of prisoners were sodomized with lightsticks. In the highly credible and very fully documented Physicians for Human Rights report, “Broken Bodies, Broken Lives,” doctors investigated the wounds and scars of former prisoners, did analysis of the injuries, assessed the independent verification of their stories, and reported that indeed many detainees had in fact been savagely raped with lightsticks and by other objects inserted into their rectums, many sustaining internal injuries.

This same report confirms that female military or other unidentified U.S.-affiliated personnel were used to sexually abuse detainees by smearing menstrual blood on their faces, seizing their genitals violently, or rubbing them in a sexual manner against their will. In other credible accounts collected by human rights organizations, many former prisoners in U.S.-held prisons report that they had been tortured or humiliated by female agents who appeared to be dressed like prostitutes.

Indeed, early on, intelligence spokespeople boasted in the New York Times of the use of female agents to sexually abuse and humiliate prisoners: it was called in their own material “invasion of space by a female.”

Today at lunch, I happen to have sat next to the lovely and brave Dale Haddon, the “face of L’Oreal,” who is also a tireless advocate for women and children through UNICEF. She is heading for Congo, to help hold accountable rape and sex crimes institutionalized as acts of war. Those criminals will face trials and convictions.

In Sierra Leone, the soldiers and generals who used rape as an instrument of war have been tried and many convicted. In Bosnia, likewise. But at another lunch party, Haddon, who travels in many circles, may well be seated next to our own former leaders, violent and systemic sex criminals who are still at large.

When will we convict our very own global rapists, the ones who gave the U.S. the hellish distinction of turning us into the superpower of sex crime? Convictions must come, but first we must see the evidence.

And women especially, who understand how sexual abuse and rape can break the spirit in a uniquely anguishing way, should be raising their voices loudly.

Whom are we protecting by not releasing the photos? The victims? Hardly. It’s, as feminists have been saying for decades, not their shame. The perpetrators? Their crimes are archived; if not this administration, another may well obey the law and release the images, which are evidentiary (again: that rape and sodomy were directed form the top; prosecute those at the top).

These photos go to exactly why Obama is burning what is left of the shreds of the Constitution by calling for pre-emptive detention for about 100 detainees. It ain’t because they are “too dangerous,” his pathetic justification. It is because their bodies are crime scenes. It is because the torture, including possibly the sexual assault, they experienced is likely to be so horrific that if they were ever to have their day in court it is others whom Obama needs who would be incriminated.

In the 19th century, when a woman had been raped, or had experienced sexual abuse in the family, the paterfamilias would say she was crazy, get her declared “too dangerous” to be free, and lock her up forever so her story would be interred with her.

That is what Obama is trying to do with pre-emptive detention for these detainees.

Well, America? Do you want to live with this?

Remember: History shows categorically that once the state can lock “them” up without a fair trial, torture, rape them or sodomize them — well; sooner or later it will be able to do the same to your children or mine; or to you and me.

Source: AlterNet

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Home Secretary Jacqui Smith faces a claim for £100,000 damages by the American radio ‘shock jock’ she banned from entering Britain.

Broadcaster Michael Savage has employed top UK law firm Olswang to sue Ms Smith for libel after she put him on the Home Office’s 16 ‘least wanted’ list.

Mr Savage said he was ‘outraged’ the Government had put him in the same category as Islamic hate preachers and terrorists.

Michael Savage is suing Home Secretary Jacqui Smith for £100,000 damages, after she banned him from entering Britain

The letter from Olswang, due to land on Ms Smith’s desk tomorrow, accuses her of making ‘serious and damaging defamatory allegations’ against him.

It says Mr Savage, whose show The Savage Nation has eight million listeners in America, has asked for ‘substantial damages’.

The Mail on Sunday has been told he is demanding £100,000.

Mr Savage says ‘lunatic’ Ms Smith had no right to put him on the same list as a former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard, a skinhead gang leader and a Hezbollah militant who served 30 years in prison.

The lawyers’ letter states: ‘Our client requires the payment of a substantial sum in damages to be agreed and retraction of the allegations.

He also requires a personal apology from you and an acknowledgement that the Home Office has agreed to pay a substantial sum in libel damages.’

The letter says Ms Smith must also provide a ‘written undertaking from you and the Home Office not to repeat the allegations complained of and the payment of our client’s legal costs’.

It continues: ‘This matter is extremely urgent as the false and defamatory material concerning our client has had enormous circulation both inside and outside the UK.’

Mr Savage said last night he will not give up his battle to make Ms Smith pay damages and say sorry.

‘I am living in fear and have had to employ security guards after being outrageously named on this list of terrorists and killers.

‘The first I knew about it was when it was issued as a Press release and I was absolutely shocked.

‘Why me? I’m not a terrorist. I’m one of America’s most popular radio hosts and a happily married father of two.

‘Maybe Jacqui Smith just plucked my name out of the hat because I’m controversial and white – to counter-balance all the Arabs named on her list.

‘It is totally preposterous but it’s deadly serious because she has made me a target.

‘My lawyers have told me I have a very strong case for defamation.’

Source: Daily Mail

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Since the Sept. 11 attacks, the FBI’s top priority has been tracking and stopping potential terrorist attacks against the United States.

But, a new report Wednesday from the Justice Department’s Inspector General says the FBI has been lax in updating the nation’s terror watch list, CBS News correspondent Bob Orr reports.

The report, which looked at 216 terrorism investigations, reveals the FBI has often been late in submitting names of suspected terrorist to the watch list, and in a few cases, has never added the names.

And the report says 12 suspects, who should have been added to the list, may have traveled into or out of the United States.

In addition, Inspector General Glenn Fine also found in 8 percent of the cases the FBI failed to remove names of terror suspects who had been cleared for one reason or another.

In releasing the findings Fine said, “The FBI needs to ensure that it makes timely nominations to the terrorist watch list – failure to do so can have significant consequences for public safety.”

FBI Assistant Director John Miller did not dispute the report, but said the FBI has already taken steps to improve watch list procedures by implementing all 16 recommendations received from the IG.

Source: CBSNews

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The commander of Fort Campbell army base in Kentucky has ordered a three-day suspension of regular duties to focus on a spike in suicides among his troops amid concern over a wider trend across the armed services.

The “stand-down” on Friday entered its third day at Fort Campbell, which is home to the famed 101st Airborne Division and has recorded the highest rate of suicide in the army, with at least 11 confirmed or suspected suicides.

Brigadier General Stephen Townsend announced the stand-down to focus attention on the problem after two more soldiers took their lives last week.

“It’s bad for soldiers, it’s bad for families, bad for your units, bad for this division and our army and our country and it’s got to stop now. Suicides on Fort Campbell have to stop now,” he told troops.

“Suicide is a permanent solution to what is only a temporary problem,” Townsend said.

“No matter how bad your problem seems today, trust me, it’s not the end of the world. It will be better tomorrow. Don’t take away your tomorrow.”

The trauma of combat combined with the effect of repeated tours has led to a record rise in suicides across the armed services and particularly the US Army — which has carried the heaviest burden in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Last year 128 soldiers took their lives, up from 115 in 2007, as tours of duty since 2001 have come ever more frequently and last longer.

With 64 confirmed or suspected suicides so far this year, the army looks likely to surpass last year’s record numbers.

The 20.2 per 100,000 suicide rate among US soldiers is above the national record of 19.5 per 100,000 in 2005 in the United States.

Earlier this month a US soldier, Sergeant John Russell, allegedly sprayed his comrades with lethal gunfire at a mental health clinic at a US base in Baghdad, and he has been charged with five counts of murder.

The case has underlined concerns about the psychological well-being of those serving in the military.

Due to worries over the state of Russell’s mental health, his commanding officer about a week earlier had ordered that the soldier’s weapon be confiscated and that he should go for counselling, officials said.

Admiral Mike Mullen, the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, has said he believes the suicides are tied to the repeated deployments that have put a strain on soldiers and their families.

In his visits to US military posts, Mullen regularly appeals to troops to look out for comrades that seem troubled and has acknowledged soldiers are reluctant to seek counselling because they worry it might hold back their career.

In a 2008 poll by the American Psychological Association (APA), 61 percent of servicemen and women said that asking for help to treat psychological problems would have a negative impact on their career, and 53 percent said it would decrease their status among their peers.

“Our stress levels are up, and we have to realize that stress is driving a lot of this, and we?ve got to look at ways to relieve that stress,” Mullen said last month during a visit to a Texas military base.

“The first big step in taking care of our problem is acknowledging that you have one — and we do,” Mullen said. “Suicide is never easy, (and) solving it won?t be easy. But everyone in leadership is focused on it.”

In March, military leaders ordered a stand-down at every US Army installation to focus on preventing suicides.

The Fort Campbell event was designed to free up soldiers and their officers from daily routines to ensure the problem received their undivided attention, spokeswoman Kelly Tyler said.

The stand-down was meant to remind soldiers “that they have an accountability to themselves and to their peers” and “to remind leaders they are also accountable for the well-being of their soldiers,” she told AFP.

Source: Raw Story

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“Neutral facial expressions” are required at departments of motor vehicles (DMVs) in Arkansas, Indiana, Nevada and Virginia. That means you can’t smile, or smile very much. Other states may follow.

The serious poses are urged by DMVs that have installed high-tech software that compares a new license photo with others that have already been shot. When a new photo seems to match an existing one, the software sends alarms that someone may be trying to assume another driver’s identity.

But there’s a wrinkle in the technology: a person’s grin. Face-recognition software can fail to match two photos of the same person if facial expressions differ in each photo, says Carnegie Mellon University robotics professor Takeo Kanade.

Dull expressions “make the comparison process more accurate,” says Karen Chappell, deputy commissioner of the Virginia DMV, whose no-smile policy took effect in March.

Elaine Mullen of Great Falls, Va., bristled at the policy while renewing her license until she heard the reasoning. “It’s probably safer from a national-security point of view,” she says.

Arkansas, Indiana and Nevada allow slight smiles. “You just can’t grin really large,” Arkansas driver services chief Tonie Shields says.

A total of 31 states do computerized matching of driver’s license photos and three others are considering it, says the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators. Most say their software matches faces regardless of expressions. “People can smile here in Pennsylvania,” state Transportation Department spokesman Craig Yetter says.

In Illinois, photo matching has stopped 6,000 people from getting fraudulent licenses since the technology was launched in 1999, says Beth Langen, the state head of Drivers Services.

Source: USA Today

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Obama Supreme Court pick Sonia Sotomayor believes that suspects captured on the battlefield must receive all rights afforded to American citizens under the Constitution. That’s the good news. Now here’s the bad. She thinks American citizens don’t have the right to own firearms.

As a graduate student at Princeton University, Sotomayor wrote a these entitled “Deadly Obsession: American Gun Culture.” In the text, Sotomayor makes the argument that the Second Amendment does not actually afford individual citizens the right to bear arms. She believes only the military has this right. According to Sotomayor, it has been illegal for individuals to own firearms since the passing of the Bill of Rights.

In 2004, in U.S. v. Sanchez-Villar, a three-judge panel that included Sotomayor wrote that “the right to possess a gun is clearly not a fundamental right.” In another case, Sotomayor ruled that it is illegal for citizens to keep nunchakus in their homes.

Alan Gottlieb, chairman of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, said on Wednesday that “Judge Sotomayor’s position on the Second Amendment is a clear signal that Mr. Obama’s claim that he supports gun rights is nothing but lip service,” reports CBS News.

“Judge Sotomayor’s record suggests hostility, rather than empathy, for the tens of millions of Americans who exercise their right to keep and bear arms,” said Dave Kopel of the Independence Institute.

Ken Blackwell of the Family Research Council believes her nomination amounts to “a declaration of war against America’s gun owners.”

Earlier this year, Sotomayor ruled that states do not have to obey the Second Amendment’s commandment that the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed, according to CNSNews. In Maloney v. Cuomo, Sotomayor signed an opinion of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit that said the Second Amendment does not protect individuals from having their right to keep and bear arms restricted by state governments.

Sonia Sotomayor would be a perfect Supreme Court justice for the Obama administration. Obama the supposed constitutional scholar is a notorious gun-grabber, although the corporate media refuses to underscore this fact. He endorsed the unconstitutional Illinois gun ban. In classic doublethink fashion, he has declared support for the Second Amendment in principle but backed local gun bans. Obama wants to ban “all forms” of semi-autos. But it is not simply semi-automatics — he would even ban most common rimfire target pistols, including those used in Olympic competition. For more on Obama’s gun-grabbing philosophy, see Barak Obama’s Gun Control Positions.

Many Americans understand Obama wants to outlaw guns and in response they are purchasing guns and ammo in record numbers. “Gun sales are on the rise across the U.S. and many dealers are having trouble keeping guns and ammunition in stock. Sales of guns moved sharply upward last November, the same month voters chose a new president,” reports VOA News.

A growing number of states understand the federal government is gearing up to not only outlaw firearms and trash the Second Amendment, but possibly confiscate them as well.

For instance, Tennessee governor Phil Bredesen has promised to sign a bill today making it legal to possess a firearm during martial law. “Sponsors say martial rule is the same as martial law at the federal level. They say the law is necessary after law enforcement in New Orleans went door to door seizing weapons in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina,” reports the Associated Press.

Source: InfoWars

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The Pentagon plans to create a new military command for cyberspace, stepping up preparations by the armed forces to conduct both offensive and defensive computer warfare, the New York Times said on Friday.

The military command will complement a civilian effort President Barack Obama plans to announce on Friday that will overhaul the way the United States safeguards its computer networks, the newspaper said on its website.

Citing Obama administration sources, the Times said the president will detail on Friday the creation of a White House office that will coordinate a multi-billion-dollar effort to restrict access to government computers, protect systems that run U.S. stock exchanges, clear global banking transactions and manage the air traffic control system.

The Times said the civilian office would be responsible for coordinating private sector and government defenses against thousands of cyber-attacks mounted every day against the United States, largely by hackers but sometimes by foreign governments.

Administration sources said the president would not discuss the Pentagon plan on Friday. But Obama is expected to sign a classified order in the coming weeks that will create the military cyber-command.

The need for improved U.S. cyber-security was driven home in April when the Wall Street Journal reported that cyber-spies had penetrated the U.S. electrical grid and left behind software programs that could be used to disrupt the system.

The Times said the United States already has a growing number of computer weapons in its arsenal and must prepare strategies for their use as a deterrent or alongside conventional weapons in a wide variety of possible future conflicts.

Reuters has reported that companies in the cyber-security market range from security-software makers Symantec Corp and McAfee Inc, to traditional defense contractors such as Northrop Grumman Corp and Lockheed Martin Corp, to information technology companies such as CACI International.

The Pentagon had been working on a cyberspace strategy for several months. It was completed weeks ago, but was delayed because of ongoing arguments over the authority of the White House office and budgets for the entire effort, the report said.

Source: Reuters

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Cell phone video shows highway patrol grabbing paramedic by the throat

A scuffle between two highway patrol officers and an EMT was captured on video after the police pulled over an ambulance on route to the hospital with a patient on board.

The incident occurred on Highway 62 near Boley in Okfuskee County, Oklahoma.

The video begins with the patient’s son, Mr Kenyada Davis, explaining “Highway Patrol have pulled my mom’s ambulance over because he’s mad we didn’t pull over.”

The troopers were responding to a call of their own and were evidently annoyed that the ambulance did not yield and give way to them on the road.

“He’s trying to arrest the EMT taking my mother to the hospital.” Davis explains.

The video then shows one of the troopers pointing at the paramedic and yelling “You are under arrest, you are under arrest”.

As the patient begins to scream inside the ambulance, the EMT, Mr Maurice White, Jr., tries to explain that he is trying to get to the hospital.

As he raises a hand in gesture, one of the troopers is seen to grab Mr White in an attempt to put him in an arm lock and cuff him. Mr White resists and a scuffle breaks out. Mr White attempts to get back into the ambulance, at which point the trooper grabs him by the throat.

“I’m going to the hospital.” Mr White again says, while Mr Davis pleads “he’s a doctor”.

The troopers then relent and return to their vehicle.

Mr White has given a statement in which he explains how he told the trooper he had a patient in the ambulance and that they were on their way to the hospital.

“He ignored my statement, became even more belligerent, and demanded my partner come to his patrol car so he could write him a ticket,” White says. “I calmly told the officer that we were transporting a patient and we could continue this at the hospital.”

White also writes that the trooper told him they could continue on to the hospital, but that he would be under arrest once they arrived. White was not arrested, but states that the troopers told him he should be prepared to turn himself in if a warrant was issued.

Paul Franks, the driver of the ambulance, has also provided a written statement.

According to reports, the troopers have claimed that the paramedic assaulted one of them before the camera started rolling.

The district attorney in Okfuskee County is expected to take a look at the video and may file charges against Maurice White as soon as this week.

The Oklahoma Highway Patrol have refused to comment on the video while it is still under review.

Thankfully the patient was treated at the hospital and was released later the same day.

Source: PrisonPlanet

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Photographs of Iraqi prisoner abuse which U.S. President Barack Obama does not want released include images of apparent rape and sexual abuse, Britain’s Daily Telegraph newspaper reported on Thursday.

The images are among photographs included in a 2004 report into prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib prison conducted by U.S. Major General Antonio Taguba.

Taguba included allegations of rape and sexual abuse in his report, and on Wednesday he confirmed to the Daily Telegraph that images supporting those allegations were also in the file.

“These pictures show torture, abuse, rape and every indecency,” Taguba, who retired in January 2007, was quoted as saying in the paper.

He said he supported Obama’s decision not to release them, even though Obama had previously pledged to disclose all images relating to abuses at Abu Ghraib and other U.S.-run prisons in Iraq.

“I am not sure what purpose their release would serve other than a legal one,” Taguba said. “The sequence would be to imperil our troops, the only protectors of our foreign policy, when we most need them, and British troops who are trying to build security in Afghanistan.

“The mere depiction of these pictures is horrendous enough, take my word for it.”

The newspaper said at least one picture showed an American soldier apparently raping a female prisoner while another is said to show a male translator raping a male detainee.

Others are said to depict sexual assaults with objects including a truncheon, wire and a phosphorescent tube.

The photographs relate to 400 alleged cases of abuse carried out at Abu Ghraib and six other prisons between 2001 and 2005.

Source:  LONDON (Reuters)

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A decision by the Supreme Court on Tuesday easing rules on police interrogations led the oldest member on the bench to read his dissent aloud in front of the court, the first time that’s happened this term.

“The Supreme Court on Tuesday made it easier for the police and prosecutors to question suspects, lifting some restrictions on when defendants can be interrogated without their lawyers present,” David Stout reports for the New York Times.

The Times adds,

In a 5-to-4 ruling, the court overturned its 1986 opinion in a Michigan case, which forbade the police from interrogating a defendant once he invoked his right to counsel at an arraignment or a similar proceeding.

That 1986 ruling has not only proved “unworkable,” Justice Antonin Scalia wrote for the majority, but its “marginal benefits are dwarfed by its substantial costs” in that some guilty defendants go free. Justice Scalia was joined by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Anthony M. Kennedy, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr.

However, the paper notes, “In an angry dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens, who wrote the 1986 decision, said that contrary to the majority’s assertion, that decision protected ‘a fundamental right that the court now dishonors.’”

The Associated Press reports, “The Michigan v. Jackson opinion was written by Justice John Paul Stevens, the only current justice who was on the court at the time. He and Justices David Souter, Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg dissented from the ruling, and in an unusual move Stevens read his dissent aloud from the bench. It was the first time this term a justice had read a dissent aloud.”

Stevens said that the “police interrogation in this case clearly violated petitioner’s Sixth Amendment right to counsel,” and that overruling the 1986 Michigan v. Jackson ruling “can only diminish the public’s confidence in the reliability and fairness of our system of justice.”

“The Obama administration had asked the court to overturn Michigan v. Jackson, disappointing civil rights and civil liberties groups that expected President Barack Obama to reverse the policies of his Republican predecessor, George W. Bush,” the AP notes.

At The National Law Journal, Marcia Coyle observed, “The timing and contrast were striking: As President Barack Obama introduced Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the nation as his U.S. Supreme Court nominee, Justice Antonin Scalia, sitting on the high court bench, read parts of a 5-4 decision overruling a 23-year-old precedent on the right to counsel.”

“It was business as usual for the justices Tuesday but also a reminder of the importance of one vote on a Court still closely divided in key areas of the law,” Coyle noted.

A PDF of the opinion can be accessed at this link.

Source: Raw Story

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