We got the guy who got Sama's kidneys;so of course he's at Gitmo. Kafka, we need you

[Banquet_Bear]

@Sage Rat

Civilian as opposed to what? Enemy combatant?

…its been four years now, you would expect that the evidence that those held at Guantanemo Bay were “Enemy Combatants” would be pretty overwhelming.

Instead, we get stories like this one regarding Badr Zaman Badr and his brother Abdurrahim Muslim Dost:

For months, grim interrogators grilled them over a satirical article Dost had written in 1998, when the Clinton administration offered a $5-million reward for Osama bin Laden. Dost responded that Afghans put up 5 million Afghanis – equivalent to $113 – for the arrest of President Bill Clinton

[…]

The interrogators, some flown down from Washington, didn’t get the joke, he said. “Again and again, they were asking questions about this article. We had to explain that this was a satire.” He paused. “It was really pathetic.”

It took the brothers three years to convince the Americans that they posed no threat to Clinton or the United States, and to get released – a struggle that underscores the enormous odds weighing against innocent foreign Muslims caught in America’s military prisons.

[…]

The United States for years called Badr and his brother “enemy combatants,” but the men say they never saw a battlefield. And for an America that seeks a democratized Afghanistan, they seem, potentially, allies. Americans “have freedom to criticize your government, and this is very good,” said Badr. Also, “we know that America’s laws say a person is innocent until he is proven to be guilty,” although "for us it is the reverse.

[…]

Badr and Dost were humiliated routinely. When being moved between prisons or in groups, they often were thrown to the ground, like that night at Peshawar airport. “They put our faces in the dust,” Badr said.

Like virtually all ex-prisoners interviewed, he said he felt deliberately shamed by soldiers when they photographed him naked or gave him regular rectal exams.

Newsday | Long Island's & NYC's News Source

It would be reassuring if the brothers story was one that could be taken in isolation, but it can’t. We have stories of people locked up because they were turned in for a finders fee. Two British citizens were taken from a hotel in Gambia. Another one was snatched from his bed in Pakistan in front of his wife and kids. Five more were taken from the courtrooms of Bosnia. People that were sent in error. People sent to Guantanemo because US troops didn’t want to upset a superior or because they didn’t want to cause more paperwork.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/2968458.stm

Guantánamo Bay - the story of three British detainees

http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/programmes/panorama/transcripts/insideguantanamo.txt

Many Held at Guantanamo Not Likely Terrorists

@From the LA Times

But from the beginning, prisoners who didn’t meet those criteria were sent, sources said. In some cases, military police seemed to have more influence over flight lists than intelligence officers, lobbying commanders to ship out troublesome detainees.

Other detainees seemed to get caught up in the military’s bureaucratic machinery. In many cases, low-value prisoners caught early in the war were placed at the bottom of prioritized lists. But as planeloads of prisoners were sent to Cuba, names at the bottoms of the lists drifted to the top, and some started showing up on flight manifests.

Once they appeared on the manifests, sources said, removing them proved almost impossible. Doing so required senior intelligence officers in Kuwait or Afghanistan to work through thickets of military red tape. It also required them to trust the judgment of junior intelligence officers, something they were loath to do given the stakes.

…we have people like Murat Kurnaz, according to a secret military tribunal,

The three military officers on the panel, whose identities are kept secret, said in papers filed in federal court that they reached their conclusion based **largely on classified evidence that was too sensitive to release to the public. **

…BUT…

In fact, that evidence, recently declassified and obtained by The Washington Post, shows that U.S. military intelligence and German law enforcement authorities had largely concluded there was no information that linked Kurnaz to al Qaeda, any other terrorist organization or terrorist activities.

In recently declassified portions of a January ruling, a federal judge criticized the military panel for ignoring the exculpatory information that dominates Kurnaz’s file and for relying instead on a brief, unsupported memo filed shortly before Kurnaz’s hearing by an unidentified government official.

**Kurnaz has been detained at Guantanamo Bay since at least January 2002. **

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3868-2005Mar26.html

…its really up to the US Administration to prove that Guantanemo Bay is populated by “Enemy Combatants.” I believe their may be some Al-Quada and some Taliaban there, but I hold a strong belief from the wealth of evidence that has been made available to the public over the last four years that many, if not the majority, shouldn’t be there. In effect, as Diogenes the Cynic has stated, “We basically just kidnapped civilians.” The “baddest of the bad” and “caught on the battlefields of Afghanistan” mantra is a lie.

[nd_n8]

@Johanna

@Originally Posted by alaricthegoth

There’s also usually a perod after Kakfa

A what? A French apéritif?

I believe he meant there is a period after Kafka. I also experience a period after reading Kafka during which I think “Oh Lord, here comes another breath, and another one… dammit, there goes my heart again, just beating away. Why me Lord, what have I done to deserve this?” Oddly enough I experience the same sensation from most media reports and from people debating the “Virtues vs. Atrocities” of the war. I ask myself, “Where would we be today anyway? Would we still be in this situation if not for the false reports of WMDs? What is this thing growing from the side of my foot? Why do so many people from other countries hate the US?” The answers I find are, in order: “The same place and the same situation, but without as much scrutiny and distrust”, “Yes, the Iraq conflict should have been settled 14 years ago, finishing the job was inevitable”, “Looks like a bunion, or scaly callous” and “Because, like us, they trust in what is reported about a situation without looking deeper into the facts.”

Media is perceived as a trusted resource, both here and abroad. But trusting their “Impartial Judgment” is like trusting RJ Reynolds to publish a paper on the dangers of tobacco, or Merck’s claim of the safety of Vioxx. The New York Times and The Washington Post are interested in selling papers. CNN is interested in selling commercial air space, as is Al-Jazera, with the latter also interested in not being blown up by George W. (possibly also the former). While ethics dictates that stories be reported truthfully and accurately, they do not mandate that the whole story be told. To paraphrase Hee-Haw, “If it weren’t for bad news, we’d have no news at all”

As for Mr. Turkistani, while his plight seems as bright and hopeful as the above mentioned Kafka novels, I’m sure there are a lot worse places he can be than a minimum security base in southern Cuba and considering his reported record and history, if released to the world, he may end up in one of them. Unless, of course, he is being made to watch “Bruce Almighty” on DVD, in which case immediate action must be taken to end the torture and suffering at Gitmo.

@Johanna

Sexual techniques are usually posted in IMHO and MPSIMS, the “party” forums. GQ and GD are the “serious” forums.

Sorry, can’t keep a straight face while mentioning this, but as long as it says StraightDope on the top of this board, I reserve the right to season my facts and “serious” opinions with the occational sarcasm and unrelated segway for levity. Oh, and a pinch of basil, mmmm basil.

[alaricthegoth]

@Banquet Bear

…its been four years now, you would expect that the evidence that those held at Guantanemo Bay were “Enemy Combatants” would be pretty overwhelming.

Instead, we get stories like this one regarding Badr Zaman Badr and his brother Abdurrahim Muslim Dost:
http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/ny-wobadr094492447oct31,0,1261397.story?coll=ny-worldnews-headlines
It would be reassuring if the brothers story was one that could be taken in isolation, but it can’t. We have stories of people locked up because they were turned in for a finders fee. Two British citizens were taken from a hotel in Gambia. Another one was snatched from his bed in Pakistan in front of his wife and kids. Five more were taken from the courtrooms of Bosnia. People that were sent in error. People sent to Guantanemo because US troops didn’t want to upset a superior or because they didn’t want to cause more paperwork.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/2968458.stm
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,,1275478,00.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/programmes/panorama/transcripts/insideguantanamo.txt
http://www.latimes.com/la-na-gitmo22dec22,0,2294365.story
…we have people like Murat Kurnaz, according to a secret military tribunal,
…BUT…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3868-2005Mar26.html

…its really up to the US Administration to prove that Guantanemo Bay is populated by “Enemy Combatants.” I believe their may be some Al-Quada and some Taliaban there, but I hold a strong belief from the wealth of evidence that has been made available to the public over the last four years that many, if not the majority, shouldn’t be there. In effect, as Diogenes the Cynic has stated, “We basically just kidnapped civilians.” The “baddest of the bad” and “caught on the battlefields of Afghanistan” mantra is a lie.

THANK YOU!

It does not seem to compute in the moral algebra of these americans drunk on chauvinism(I refer to thos dopers justifying the continued incarceration of men long since CLEARED) we OWE something to people when we trash their lives on a humbug.

The exceptionalism meme is getting so out of hand that you start to imnagine torchlight parades and moody cinematography.

I swear before Jesus if Clint Eastwood signs on as Bush’s Riefenstahl, it’s game over, head for canada.

You’ld think the world will end if Al q snuffs another cohort equallihng 1 and 1/2 percent of those who have died on the roads since 9/11.

NB:the car victims were ALSO americans (o sacred race, o precious blood, o skin that holds such special stuff…)

I am not going to ventilate at the moment over the circumstances of the brothers’ dentention, which, shame on me, I ws ignorant of until now.

but, short version:

WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON HERE!!!

[alaricthegoth]

!spending three years at gitmo for an OBVIOUSLY satirical work really should bring Kafka out of retirement, because no one else can begin to do this justice…