Underwear...
posted by Aaron Turpen @ 7:54 AM
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Thursday, June 10, 2004
Wednesday, June 09, 2004
Lawyers Told Bush He Could Order Suspects Tortured
By Staff and Wire Reports
Jun 8, 2004, 07:32
Administration lawyers concluded in a policy paper last year that a president can legally order interrogators to torture terrorist suspects.
The lawyers, who were not identified by name, were part of a working group writing a policy governing interrogation techniques to be used at the prison for terrorist suspects at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
However, Pentagon spokesman Lawrence Di Rita said Monday that the final set of interrogation methods adopted for use at Guantanamo in April 2003 are humane, legal and useful - and more restrictive than the methods some had proposed.
Di Rita described the paper as a staff legal analysis that was part of an internal administration debate on how to obtain intelligence...
...click here for more!
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Jun 8, 2004, 07:32
Administration lawyers concluded in a policy paper last year that a president can legally order interrogators to torture terrorist suspects.
The lawyers, who were not identified by name, were part of a working group writing a policy governing interrogation techniques to be used at the prison for terrorist suspects at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
However, Pentagon spokesman Lawrence Di Rita said Monday that the final set of interrogation methods adopted for use at Guantanamo in April 2003 are humane, legal and useful - and more restrictive than the methods some had proposed.
Di Rita described the paper as a staff legal analysis that was part of an internal administration debate on how to obtain intelligence...
...click here for more!
-----
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posted by Aaron Turpen @ 7:50 PM
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Tuesday, June 08, 2004
Can't Help You, But Sure Can Hurt You
by Bob Wallace
Even a stopped clock is occasionally right. I am of course referring to Chief Wiggum of "The Simpsons," when he said, "I didn't say the government couldn't hurt you. I said it couldn't help you."
I have decided to elevate his saying to the status of a Natural Law, inherent in the universe and human nature, and unalterable no matter how many law books politicians and lawyers beat it with.
Why did I decide this? Because I recently saw two police officers X-ray a T-shirt and a newspaper. This is what Dubya's Warren Terrism has come to: searching for Weapons of Mass Destruction in T-shirts and the Daily Birdcage Liner.
The State has taken leave of reality, and now dwells in the Twilight Zone of total paranoia. Every time anyone goes inside a State building, he becomes subject to a cluster-bomb-type search-attack.
The T-shirt was in a package. I swear--and as Dave Barry says, I am not making this up--I stood there and watched a police officer run the transparent package, containing one T-shirt, through an X-ray conveyor belt.
What exactly can you hide in a folded up T-shirt? I mean, really? That's not a rhetorical question. What can you hide in a T-shirt? What would he have done if he had taken the T-shirt out of the package and found a picture of Osama bin Laden on the front of it? Whipped out his sidearm and told all of us to lie on the floor with our hands on our heads? Thank God he didn't have a machine gun! He probably would have shot the place up like a drunken bandit!
Could have been worse, though. It could have been a picture of Ché Guevara on the T-shirt, although both cops might have scratched their heads and wondered why Jesus was wearing a beret.
Then I saw them X-ray a newspaper.
Click here to read the rest.
-----
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Even a stopped clock is occasionally right. I am of course referring to Chief Wiggum of "The Simpsons," when he said, "I didn't say the government couldn't hurt you. I said it couldn't help you."
I have decided to elevate his saying to the status of a Natural Law, inherent in the universe and human nature, and unalterable no matter how many law books politicians and lawyers beat it with.
Why did I decide this? Because I recently saw two police officers X-ray a T-shirt and a newspaper. This is what Dubya's Warren Terrism has come to: searching for Weapons of Mass Destruction in T-shirts and the Daily Birdcage Liner.
The State has taken leave of reality, and now dwells in the Twilight Zone of total paranoia. Every time anyone goes inside a State building, he becomes subject to a cluster-bomb-type search-attack.
The T-shirt was in a package. I swear--and as Dave Barry says, I am not making this up--I stood there and watched a police officer run the transparent package, containing one T-shirt, through an X-ray conveyor belt.
What exactly can you hide in a folded up T-shirt? I mean, really? That's not a rhetorical question. What can you hide in a T-shirt? What would he have done if he had taken the T-shirt out of the package and found a picture of Osama bin Laden on the front of it? Whipped out his sidearm and told all of us to lie on the floor with our hands on our heads? Thank God he didn't have a machine gun! He probably would have shot the place up like a drunken bandit!
Could have been worse, though. It could have been a picture of Ché Guevara on the T-shirt, although both cops might have scratched their heads and wondered why Jesus was wearing a beret.
Then I saw them X-ray a newspaper.
Click here to read the rest.
-----
Got comments? Email me, dammit!
posted by Aaron Turpen @ 10:14 AM
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Monday, June 07, 2004
Sunday, June 06, 2004
Stupidity Virus Strikes In Big Sky Country
M-Lib Note: Not sure where this comes from originally, but the news story is legitimate.
June 2, 2004
Good grief. It appears a national epidemic has broken out in recent weeks. But when this kind of anti-gun paranoia nonsense hits in MONTANA, you know we REALLY have a big problem.
Here's the latest: An 11-year-old kid finds an unloaded .22-caliber pistol with a part missing which rendered the gun inoperable. Not knowing what to do with it, he took it to his school principal's office and turned it in. The principal then turned kid in...to the cops.
The Havre Daily News (http://www.havredailynews.com/articles/2004/06/01/local_headlines/student.txt) reported on Tuesday that "police responded at 8:51 a.m. and took the juvenile to the police station for questioning...(where he was) issued a summons on a charge of possessing a weapon in a school building." The paper says the local police chief maintains the grade-school kid should have taken the gun to the police station rather than the principal's office.
What in the wide, wide world of sports is going on here? Do any government bureaucrats anywhere in the country possess any level of common sense any more? And has anybody else noticed that whenever extreme examples of adult stupidity occur, it's usually in a government-run school? Is that cause...or effect?
I attempted to reach Principal Linda Kaze this afternoon; however, I was informed that she was tied up conducting various end-of-year award ceremonies all day...ceremonies which, by the way, the young lad in question is NOT a part of. All the adult powers-that-be agreed that the boy shouldn't attend the final two days of the school year (but at least he wasn't "officially" suspended!).
I also tried to reach School Superintendent Kirk Miller, who was referenced in the Daily News story, but he was "in a meeting." However, the person answering the phone did verify that what was reported in the paper accurately reflected what actually happened and seemed surprised that I was so upset about it. Go figure.
I'm sure Principal Kaze and Dr. Miller have perfectly logical explanations for how and why this whole thing was handled. I can hardly wait to hear them...
BRUSHFIRE ALERT: Principal's Name: Linda Kaze. Principal's email address: kazel@ss.havre.k12.mt.us. Ms. Kaze's phone number is: (406) 265-9671. Dr. Miller's phone number: (406) 265-4356.
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Got comments? Email me, dammit!
June 2, 2004
Good grief. It appears a national epidemic has broken out in recent weeks. But when this kind of anti-gun paranoia nonsense hits in MONTANA, you know we REALLY have a big problem.
Here's the latest: An 11-year-old kid finds an unloaded .22-caliber pistol with a part missing which rendered the gun inoperable. Not knowing what to do with it, he took it to his school principal's office and turned it in. The principal then turned kid in...to the cops.
The Havre Daily News (http://www.havredailynews.com/articles/2004/06/01/local_headlines/student.txt) reported on Tuesday that "police responded at 8:51 a.m. and took the juvenile to the police station for questioning...(where he was) issued a summons on a charge of possessing a weapon in a school building." The paper says the local police chief maintains the grade-school kid should have taken the gun to the police station rather than the principal's office.
What in the wide, wide world of sports is going on here? Do any government bureaucrats anywhere in the country possess any level of common sense any more? And has anybody else noticed that whenever extreme examples of adult stupidity occur, it's usually in a government-run school? Is that cause...or effect?
I attempted to reach Principal Linda Kaze this afternoon; however, I was informed that she was tied up conducting various end-of-year award ceremonies all day...ceremonies which, by the way, the young lad in question is NOT a part of. All the adult powers-that-be agreed that the boy shouldn't attend the final two days of the school year (but at least he wasn't "officially" suspended!).
I also tried to reach School Superintendent Kirk Miller, who was referenced in the Daily News story, but he was "in a meeting." However, the person answering the phone did verify that what was reported in the paper accurately reflected what actually happened and seemed surprised that I was so upset about it. Go figure.
I'm sure Principal Kaze and Dr. Miller have perfectly logical explanations for how and why this whole thing was handled. I can hardly wait to hear them...
BRUSHFIRE ALERT: Principal's Name: Linda Kaze. Principal's email address: kazel@ss.havre.k12.mt.us. Ms. Kaze's phone number is: (406) 265-9671. Dr. Miller's phone number: (406) 265-4356.
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Got comments? Email me, dammit!
posted by Aaron Turpen @ 10:36 AM
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