OnFebruary 5 theAssociated Press ran a story about a case in Cuba:
Prosecutors are charging jailed U.S. contractor Alan Gross with “acts against the integrity and independence” of Cuba and requesting a 20-year prison term, state news media reported Friday, dimming hopes he would be allowed to go home soon.
Further down, as one would expect, is a response from the United States:
Gloria Berbena, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Interests Section in Havana, which Washington maintains instead of an embassy, said his “imprisonment without charges for more than a year is contrary to all international human-rights obligations.”
Now that is rich. A news outlet might want to point out the well-known fact that elsewhere on Cuba, the United States has built a detention facility to do precisely that toprisoners under U.S. control. But the AP is not that impolite.
(h/t JJ, who spotted the piece in his local paper)
Makes one wonder what those at the Associated Press thought of José Padilla.
Humorous, a must read, and a must share.
This says everything you need to know about AP. Period. Nice catch.
Yeah….Hate to say it but America lost a lot of the moral high ground with Gitmo and waterboarding.I have often wondered if other countries not friendly to us- will take are denial of this technique as torture as a green light to use it against people THEY consider enemy combatants.People with a card that says US citizen.
What is wrong, stays wrong – even if some apologist calls it right. For America to have the moral high ground, Americans need to take it, and keep it. Let’s be consistant in our support for human rights at home and abroad: No double-standards or feigned ignorance.
Cuba and the US deserve each other. For anyone who has lived under both regimes, it truly is a comedy of horrors and, at the end of the day, they are both exactly the same. Next?
Let’s not mention the fact that Bradley Manning, who has not been convicted of anything yet, is in solitary confinement 23 hours of every day and is not allowed to sleep during the day, as well as other types of atrocious treatments for his “alledged” crimes related to Wikilleaks leaked info. The USA is such a god**ned hypocrit.
RAY Manning is in deep doo-doo.He is being tried under the uniform code.What he did is tantamount to spying.Lucky if he isn’t shot.He is in solitary.For his own safety.Marine corp is not a good place for traitors.He is not sleep deprived ,or tortured in any way.He is supplied daily with Jag officers,and his case is slated for court marsh in May.Till then you can call his crimes “alledged”.
You’re exactly right, Raymond. Manning is being tortured, and the hypocrisy of our government on this is breath-taking. There’s no need to place quotation marks around the word “alleged”; he’s alleged to have done something, but we know not what, and so far he’s as innocent of anything as you and me. He’s been found guilty of nothing, yet is being held under harsh, vile, illegal conditions, those conditions roundly condemned by free men and women everywhere. Isn’t it funny that the Tea-bag Right (the right in general) have no problem with Mr. Obama at all when his administration is in it’s punitive, warring mode (dropping drones on civilians, killing innocent men, women, and children by the score; holding people indefinitely and possibly forever without charges or trial), but other-wise think he’s a liberty-stealing monster? The Right hate Obama when he’s acting sincerely like a Liberal (helping average and working people, trying, in very, very small ways, to rein in the thieves and mountebanks on Wall Street), and love him when he’s acting extra-Constitutionally, stomping on the rights and the live of the powerless and the weak everywhere. The rank and file Right are simply boot-lickers and toadies and water-carriers for the powerful Corporate and Business interests that largely run this country. It’s sad to witness their grovelling and witless, self-deprecating bowing and scraping before their masters, but what can you do?
I would like to criticize Scott Pelley of the CBS Evening News and Byron Pitts for his reporting on the Pope’s visit, and Cuban/American’s comments that “repression is still very bad after 45 years of dictator” simply because a demonstrator was removed by State Security forces. He was not “dragged away” when he shouted “down with Communism” but he was removed, and with less violence than the demonstrators of the “Occupy” movement here. Does this mean our government is repressive too?