May 06, 2004

Rumsfeld

Problem: "His Pentagon ruled that the United States would no longer be bound by the Geneva Conventions; that Army regulations on the interrogation of prisoners would not be observed; and that many detainees would be held incommunicado and without any independent mechanism of review. Abuses will take place in any prison system. But Mr. Rumsfeld's decisions helped create a lawless regime in which prisoners in both Iraq and Afghanistan have been humiliated, beaten, tortured and murdered -- and in which, until recently, no one has been held accountable." -- Washington Post editorial Solution: "For the good of our country, the safety of our troops, and our image around the globe Secretary Rumsfeld should resign. If he does not resign forthwith, the president should fire him." -- Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa However: WASHINGTON -- President Bush said Thursday that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld "will stay in my Cabinet" despite Democratic calls for his departure over abusive treatment of Iraqi prisoners by American military guards. -- Associated Press

Posted by tbrown at 12:58 PM

Hersh: 'It's going to get much worse'

Seymour Hersh of The New Yorker, who wrote a major piece on the prison abuse of Iraqis in the current issue, had this to say last night on Bill O'Reilly's show: "First of all, it's going to get much worse. This kind of stuff was much more widespread. I can tell you just from the phone calls I've had in the last 24 hours, even more, there are other photos out there. There are many more photos even inside that unit. There are videotapes of stuff that you wouldn't want to mention on national television that was done. There was a lot of problems. "There was a special women's section. There were young boys in there. There were things done to young boys that were videotaped. It's much worse. And the Maj. Gen. Taguba was very tough about it. He said this place was riddled with violent, awful actions against prisoners."

Posted by tbrown at 12:56 PM

Weird

Yesterday I linked to a profile at Salon of Ahmed Chalabi, the one-time Neoconservative answer to all problems in Iraq, in which Marc Zell had this to say: "Ahmed Chalabi is a treacherous, spineless turncoat. He had one set of friends before he was in power, and now he's got another." Today, he denies having said that – or anything else that the Salon author, John Dizard, quoted him as saying.

Posted by tbrown at 12:53 PM