I am to the point that I think publishing any additional photos in the press about abuse in Abu Gharib is now irresponsible. The constant drip-drip of photos makes it appear as if the abuse is still occurring, and I don;t see why this needs to be done.
And before the jackasses start braying in the comments, I am not saying they can’t publish the pictures, I am saying they shouldn’t. No cover-up- they can follow the story all they want. Just quit making photos available for the Al Jazeera agitprop machine.
Andrew J. Lazarus
We don’t need more of the same. When (not if) the even worse stuff turns up (e.g. the child rape videos) I suppose we’ll have to see enough that Rush Limbaugh can explain they did the same at his fraternity.
On top of the general license to torture, it’s clear that Cpt. Graner is a sick sadist. Frankly, I think a life sentence is in order, because there isn’t rehabilitation for people like him.
HH
The WaPo said they have many, many photos weeks ago… so the news is no longer driving these pictures being released… the WaPo is dripping them out on their timetable.
Justin R. Ogren
Irresponsible?
Oh so then the government can cover-up more shit? Which they are trying I bet as much as they can as I bet there are lots and lots more photos and probably video that will never see the light of day. I’m glad this is getting all the attention it is. Because it sure represents the problems in current humanities, and it shocks many people, as alot of this people in this country will need grizzly photos like this to actually portray how indeed disgusting war is.
-Justin
Patrick
Justin,
If you think pyramid of bungholes and getting a light stick stuck up your ass is indicative of “how indeed disgusting war is”, perhaps you missed a young American getting his fucking head chopped off while he was still alive. Anything short of having limbs and appendages hacked off is fair game. You see, the folks we’re trying to get information on would like to come here and chop your head off and kill your family (except for the women folk, of course.)
JKC
Patrick-
You have the moral IQ of a baboon.
My apologies to any baboons insulted by the above remarks.
CadillaqJaq
“You see, the folks we’re trying to get information on would like to come here and chop your head off and kill your family…”
I can’t vouch for Patrick’s IQ, I never met him JKC, but he is right on with his last statement.
The folks with IQ problems are the ones that don’t believe our current global adversaries are intent on killing all of us and destroying our way of life.
JKC
Unfortunately, the folks abused in Abu Ghraib were not the ones who butchered Nick Berg. If the ICRC and the US military are correct, up to 90% of them were innocent civilians in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Dave
JKC – by the actual, y’know, reports I’ve read, as opposed to the articles, the abuse was NOT prison-wide. Isn’t it rather fallacious to assume that
the ‘90%’ (which number I only seem to see quoted by those on the left, everything else seems to say at most 60%)
that were ‘innocent’ (read: not the worst folks, just regular insurgents, criminals, etc)
were involved? Taking out the parentheses, isn’t it fallacious to assume the ‘90%’ were among the ones being abused (which is not necessarily torture), without some kind of direct non-contraindicated evidence?
Oh, and a BTW for Andrew Lazarus: remember any of the ‘hazing horror stories’ of.. a few years, maybe six years, ago?
JKC
Dave:
The 90% number came from the ICRC. That’s why I said UP TO.
I suggest you go and read the WaPo story.
After you do, come back and tell me what happened to the apparently quaint notion that Americans don’t do that sort of thing because we’re better than that?
Terry
At this point in time, given what has happened to Berg and nearly 800 Americans in Iraq, who really gives a shit what happens to these prisoner scum. Death would have been a much better reward for them. And, please leave out all that crap about the Geneva Convention and how our own prisoners are put further at risk by the abuses that occured at Abu Ghraib. Our own prisoners were and continue to be treated essentially as was Mr. Berg, so I say to Hell with them. Enough is enough!
JKC
Read these comments, John.
This is why we need to see every image, every clip of video from Abu Ghraib.
Not to give aid and comfort to al Jazeera. They can (and will) get their own video.
Not to further shame decent people like you, who feel that what happened there disgraced the uniform they wore. People like you served honorably, and have no cause for shame.
No, these pictures are for morally bankrupt limpdick armchair warriors like Terry and Patrick, who need to have their shitty little noses rubbed in this every day until they understand the evil done in their name.
Terry
I say Hip, Hip, Hooray for good old asshole, “JKC.” I am totally worn out listening to all this horseshit about Abu Ghraib. He (JKC) hasn’t the slighest interest or concern about the prisoners…he only wants to denigrate our efforts and that of our soldiers in Iraq. May he and his whole family take it up the ass in the next terrorist attack.
Kimmitt
“After you do, come back and tell me what happened to the apparently quaint notion that Americans don’t do that sort of thing because we’re better than that?”
Simply put: conservatives aren’t.
JKC
Kimmit- don’t lump all conservatives in with inbred mouthbreathers like Feith, Ashcroft, and Rumsfeld, and their little pinhead cheering section here.
There are decent conservatives out there, even if you and I disagree with them on policy. People like John McCain, Lindsey Graham, and others are decent people.
Kimmitt
I hear you, but since their efforts are badly drowned out by their opponents’ near-total control of the Party (and, by extension, the country) . . . it’s almost irrelevant.
Al Maviva
Interesting AP article linked from Drudge yesterday. It seems most of the photos were taken on a 24 – 36 hour abuse binge by the MPs. The “widespread pattern of abuse” alleged by Hersh apparently mostly occurred over a day or two, as retaliation against the prisoners for a couple very hard days faced by the troops in the field.
It has nothing to do with integrity, or our love of humanity (my God, if it had anything to do with that the left would have been demanding Bush I & II, Clinton’s & Reagan’s impeachment for failure to knock off Saddam) or with caring about the law or international opinion.
For the left, it is simply a tool with which to bash Bush.
The fact that the rule of law matters, as does treating prisoners of any sort in a humane manner, is irrelevant. If this was a liberal or lefty president, there wouldn’t be a peep from the left side of the spectrum. I hate to do it… but see, e.g. Waco.
Cheerio.
Kimmitt
“God, if it had anything to do with that the left would have been demanding Bush I & II, Clinton’s & Reagan’s impeachment for failure to knock off Saddam”
Can we PLEASE dispense with the “objectively pro-Saddam” bullshit? The Left was calling for us to do things about the former Yugoslavia, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Sudan before two planes flew into buildings and the Right suddenly realized that brown people mattered, too.
Justin O.
Bows my head in shame at Patricks comment.
Damn, have you heard the latest report…?
You know I gotta watch out for people in jackets on hot days now….and people who are clenching their fists….
We’re sure waiting and keeping our asses alert for another attack, this time at the shopping malls, because when I think about attacking another country, I think about blowing up a shopping mall……
Shit, this is what is gonna make a few people replicate a character from a bad movie, Collateral Damage anyone?
Dean
Nice, Kimmitt—real classy.
“Care about brown people, too.”
All Republicans are racists, eh? Or just most of them?
Kimmitt
They are, at minimum, incapable of mastering the copy/paste commands on the common PC.
CadillaqJaq
It’s such a freekin’ pleasure to check in here daily to see how we dumb-as-a-rock insensitive conservative types are doing and what Kimmitt has to say in judgment… sort of makes my day to realize what a worthless POS I am, (or am I basking in transference?)
We should be thankful that the Kimmitts of the world even bother to visit this site.
JKC
Jaq-
Not to pick on you, but…
It would help if, just once, a conservative commentator here said to some little weasel like “Terry” upthread that they’re idiots and they’re not helping the cause. That would take the wind out of Kimmitt’s argument that all canservatives are racist. (Which I vehemently disagree with.)
Dean
JKC:
I’d ALMOST buy that.
But then, many liberals, on a thread about Michael Moore or ANSWER, will simply say, “Of course we don’t believe that, and you’re just trying to tar us in the same breath.”
Perhaps Terry is the same as ANSWER: we don’t believe what he says, but he’s real good at getting parade permits, yaddayaddayadda.
Terry
What can one say about a completely useless idiot like, “JKC?” It clearly does no good to attempt to enter into a reasoned discussion about the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal; “JKC” chooses to view the Abu Ghraib issue through the prism of his own distaste for the Iraqi war, probably leavened by his personal self-hatred of America.
As disgusting as what happened at Abu Ghraib was, the incident has not elicited much condemnation from Iraq’s Arab Shiites and Sunni Kurds, who represent about 80% of the country’s population. There are a number of reasons for this. Both the Shia and the Kurds, not to mention the Arab Sunnis who were on the receiving end of Sadam Hussein’s wickedness, know very well what real bestiality is. They know real sexual torture–Saddam institutionalized rape as a means of destroying and preemptively neutering individual male and tribal pride.
Most Iraqis have had some contact with American soldiers, sufficient to know that American personnel, with the rarest exceptions, aren’t rapists, sexual deviants or by reflex or training particularly violent people. If this weren’t the case, the senior clergy would have long ago declared a holy war against the American occupation, as they did against the British some 75 years ago.
All that I ask is for some perspective in the reporting and discussion of the Abu Ghraib scandal. I have seen very little of this from the major media, and absolutely none from such odious, ignorant and pompously pious fools as “JKC.”
JKC
Terry,
Until you prove conclusively that you can read minds, don’t try to guess what I believe about anything. You have no right to question my patriotism, and the insinuation that I want my country to fail in Iraq, especially when I have friends in theater, is proof only that you’re an idiot.
Fortunately for all of us, you’re no more representative of conservative thought (an oxymoron in your case) than Michael Moore is of liberal thought.
JKC
Dean-
Let’s face it: there’s plenty of fringebaiting on both sides of the ideological divide. I know I’ve been guilty of it in the past, but I do try to avoid it, as I think it tarnishes whatever validity my arguments might have.
As for Terry, I don’t think he could organize zipping his fly after he pees, let alone getting a parade permit. But that’s just my opinion… : )
Terry
“JKC”: “…there’s plenty of fringebaiting on both sides of the ideological divide. I know I’ve been guilty of it in the past, but I do try to avoid it, as I think it tarnishes whatever validity my arguments might have.”
Right. With every post you (JKC)reinforce the obvious conclusion that you are really not even worthy of disdain.
Andrew J. Lazarus
Terry, here is an intellectual exercise. Refute the following:
A valid alternative explanation for the silence of the Iraqi Shiites on Abu Ghraib is fear that if they criticize the Americans, they will be imprisoned in Abu Ghraib and will suffer similar treatment.
Mind you, I’m not even saying I *believe* this statement. I’m just curious whether you have any ability whatsoever to marshal evidence in favor of an argument that isn’t mere flag-wrapping nonsense and raw insults. I see no sign of that yet.
Terry
Mr. Lazarus, you may know something about “game theory,” but you appear to be totally cluless relative to Iraqi history and/or current developments.
To elaborate: The Shiites and Kurds are almost assuredly assuming that the humiliated prisoners in Abu Ghraib are Sunnis (which is most likely the case based on reporting from the scene). Though the Shiites and Kurds have so far been remarkably restrained in their desire for revenge, which is SOP in Iraqi culture, they probably are not above enjoying schadenfreude. They clearly want the Americans to beat the ex-Baathists, Sunni fundamentalists, and foreign Sunni holy warriors who are trying to drive us out of Iraq and stop the drive to democracy.
They recognize that democracy will inevitably empower Shiites and frustrate the Sunni Arab penchant for kicking the Kurds. As contrasted with much of the Washington DC politicos and major media types, they have not lost sight of the larger objective: creating a democratic Iraq where they and their children will never again know the abject horrors of a Sadam Hussein-style dictatorship.
You will note that the Shiite clergy has been focused throughout the Abu Ghraib matter on the guerrilla campaign of al-Sadr, who is totally detested by the traditional clergy since he is challenging their religious leadership and Sistani’s decision to cooperate with us.
These views are derived from years of study in the applicable region and reporting under a non-pseudonymous name. As for “raw insults,” I leave the determination of who cast the first stone in that regard to others.
Andrew J. Lazarus
Well, Terry, you did better than I expected. Of course, you assume you know what the Shiites and Kurds want and will be satisfied with, and your claim that the Shiites want democracy has a pretty big component of projection. And nothing in your essay suggests that my hypo could not also be true. I’m not sure we know yet how free the Shiites other than al-Sadr (the Kurds are really a different case) feel to protest against us.
As far as proof as an anonymous authority, if you count Israel, I’ve got years of living in the region myself. And given your nauseating indifference to torture (7:57 PM posting above), I do see why you use a pseudonym. It would be the end of “reporting” for a great many publications under your full name.
Terry
Mr. Lazarus, anybody who has visited Iraq in the last six months, or even watched television scenes from there, would know beyond doubt that the Iraqi Shiites have not been silent on the Abu Ghraib matter because of a concern that criticism of America could lead to their own imprisonment and abuse at Abu Ghraib. My comments above on that aspect of the matter are validated by numerous independent reports out of Iraq.
As to my “nauseating indifference to torture,” I made it quite clear in many earlier posts that I rejected the abuses at Abu Ghraib. However, what I am most clearly reacting to is the continual attacks on our government by every two-bit moralizing sanctimonious moron in the universe, including a number that regularly post comments here. Yes, I and virtually all Americans abominate the Abu Ghraib crimes but we will not accept your (and others) forgetting what this country has paid to liberate Iraq, will not allow you and others to slander the US, will not permit you and your kind to forget what we and others have accomplished: a world without Saddam Hussein…a vastly and profoundly better world. And NO ONE will be allowed to dishonor American soldiers and this nation by telling us, or intimating, “You’re just as bad as Saddam.” Those lies will not go unchallenged!
Anyone (think Teddy Kennedy) who equates Saddam’s bloody decades of torture and mass murder to the crimes at Abu Ghraib is the same kind of fool who once preached the moral equivalence of America and Soviet Russia, or of America in Vietnam and Hitlerism (think John Kerry in 1971). Imbecility is eternal, perpetually reincarnated.
At the beginning of World War II, other “moralists” of that long ago period cited America’s “sins” as the reason for keeping the nation out of the war against Nazism. Reinhold Neibuhr, a theologian and socialist critic of liberal democracy, nevertheless saw the fascist threat for what it was. “We never have the chance to choose between pure tyranny and pure freedom,” he said. “We can only choose between tyranny and relative democracy.” The cynical and manipulative outrage at the Abu Ghraib abuses suggests that many today still balk at the choice.
Andrew J. Lazarus
As I understand it, most of the opposition to America’s entry into WW2 wasn’t based on moralizing about America’s sins, but on (1) isolationism based in fatigue with European wars and politics, and (2), less important but not insubstantially, anti-Semitism and pro-fascism in certain segments of the population, (3) still less importantly, American Communists’ following the Soviets’ accommodation to the Germans prior to Operation Barbarossa, and (4) less important than all the three preceding, naive pacificism arising in reaction to the carnage of World War One, not to American sins in particular.
The rest of your post is just “Mommy, Saddammy did it worser.” Unfortunately, Saddam’s torture, even though it was more widespread, was at least consistent with his goal, viz., perpetuation of his own power, while our torture is completely antithetical to our professed goal of establishing a free and democratic Iraq. But perhaps that isn’t our real goal, after all.
No one could dishonor American soldiers more than the cretinous sadists wearing their uniform, and the officers (now reaching at least as high as General Miller) who condoned or encouraged the torture. Stop shooting the messenger.
Terry
Mr. Lasarus, you are so little informed on history (among many, many subjects) that further attempts at discussion would be a waste of time.
Andrew J. Lazarus
So far, Terry, you’ve made a pseudonymous claim to expertise in the Middle East (just where did you live and for whom did you report?), and a wildly inaccurate claim about opposition to WW2. Frankly, I know somewhat more about that topic than my previous post suggested, as my grandmother was a leader of one of those naive pacifist groups (not a political belief I share).
Assuming you want to keep anonymity, would you at least try providing some links for your claim that guilt over American “sins” were a major force behind the opposition to WW2? (It’s worth pointing out that opponents of Jim Crow, certainly a great American sin of that era, were surely MORE likely to be anti-Nazi than LESS.) Here’s a book you might read about the isolationist and pro-Nazi movement.
You’re trying to play a game of poker where we take your word on your hand.
What’s that French word again? Bluffeur??
JKC
TRANSLATION: I’m incapable of mounting any sort of serious argument, so I’ll fall back on pathetic name-calling, attempted bullying, and, when that fails, running away.
Terry
“JKC,” another fool heard from that knows more than he/she/it understands.
S.W. Anderson
Brace yourself for this. I agree.
No censorship, just some editorial judgment all around that the point has been made in spades and endless repetition is unhelpful and perverse.