August 15, 2008 archive

cross-posted from The Dream Antilles

Just in case you thought that exercising your Constitutional Right to assemble in Denver,  engage in non-violent protest and perhaps participate in civil disobedience at the Democratic National Convention was going to be easy and humane, the NY Times informs in an article entitled, “Grim Warehouse Set To Process Convention Arrests,” that is not to be the case.  The Government has set up a mini-Gitmo to handle pesky protesters who get arrested in Denver.  And they’re telling you about it now, so you’ll reconsider your plans.  And maybe stay home.

Individuals arrested at the Democratic National Convention will be processed at an industrial warehouse with chain-link cells topped by razor wire, a facility some have compared to the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay. /snip

The Denver sheriff’s office, which operates city and county jails, insists anyone taken to the center will be there only a few hours while they’re fingerprinted, issued a court date and released after posting bail. Others will be transferred to facilities designed for longer detentions.

”Of course if the numbers are overwhelming, that’s all going to be out the door,” said Capt. Frank Gale, a sheriff’s spokesman. ”If we’re inundated with a bunch of civil unrest, it doesn’t matter how well we prepare. If we get severe numbers it’s going to take us forever” to process those in custody. /snip  A sign [at the facility] read: ”Electric stun devices used here.”

Gale said each cell will be about 20-by-20 feet. He refused to say how many people could be processed there.  /snip

ACLU-Colorado legal director Mark Silverstein said city officials told him detained protesters will be taken by bus to the facility, about 2 miles northeast of downtown. Those who are unable or refuse to post bail will be taken to a downtown city jail to await a court date.

Silverstein said warehouse cells won’t have running water, bathrooms or telephones. Gale said deputies will escort anyone needing those services.

Great.  A mini-Gitmo on the Platte.  20 x 20 cells with an unknown number of people in them, for an unknown period of time, without food, water or toilets.  And the idea that if there are too many people, whatever planning there was would be overwhelmed.  And then those incarcerated would be stuck.

1. In cahoots…

   The NY Times reports from Nancy Pelosi’s The Why-Haven’t-You-Impeached-the-President Tour!

   “When House Speaker Nancy Pelosi set out to promote her new motivational book this month, she simultaneously touched off her national why-haven’t-you-impeached-the-president tour.”

   Pelosi “has been forced to defend her pronouncement before the 2006 mid-term elections that impeachment over the administration’s push for war in Iraq was off the table.”

   Of course, Pelosi wasn’t pressed very hard by the attendees of this year’s Netroot Nation. They were skillfully played and most of them liked it.

   Pressed on ABC’s “The View” about whether she had unilaterally disarmed, [Pelosi] said she believed the proceedings would be too divisive and be a distraction from advancing the policy agenda of the new Democratic majority.

   Then she added this qualifier: “If somebody had a crime that the president had committed, that would be a different story.”

   In Pelosi’s defense, she’s probably never met Rep. Dennis Kucinich or read the 35 articles of impeachment he presented against Bush. She probably hasn’t read the new book by Ron Suskind either. She’s too busy being motivational! Besides…

   Leading Democrats argue anyway that Mr. Bush has already been tried and convicted in the court of public opinion.

   “He has been impeached by current history,” said Representative Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, chairman of the House Democratic Caucus. “He is going down as the worst president ever. The facts are in.”

   Republicans have previously shown some appetite for luring Democrats into what they see as an impeachment trap, a set of hearings they could use to portray Democrats as bitter partisans. But Republican strategists also recognize the political danger in getting too deep in defending Mr. Bush right before the election or in justifying the buildup to the Iraq war. They might not be as eager as they once were for an impeachment fight.

   Worst in history doesn’t cut it. Pelosi should be challenged and removed from the speakership… and office. Emanuel can go as well.

   There is a silver of hope, however, in an interview with Democracy Now, House Judiciary Chair John Conyers said he has opened a congressional probe into the allegations Ron Suskind revealed of the Bush Administration ordering a Iraq-9/11 connection to be faked. See Ralph Lopez’s diary at Daily Kos for more details: Conyers Calls Committee Back from Summer Recess to Investigate Suskind Allegations. Maybe this time Pelosi will see the evidence of high crimes done by Bush and Cheney? Here’s hoping.

Four at Four continues with two press narratives about how Obama and McCain are reacting to Georgia, Bush bungling his Georgia aid plan, Pentagon investigating the brain for new ways to wage war and torture, and a bonus story about a revolution in fish protection in Oregon.

This hasn’t gotten near the coverage in the traditional media nationwide as it deserves:

NEW YORK (CBS) ?  It’s called “Operation Sentinel” and it proves just how far the NYPD will go to protect this city from terrorists. The plan involves some high-tech tracking that is coming under fire from some groups.

New York City is going to great lengths to make sure that bomb-toting terrorists can’t reach us.

This sounds great; a pro-active approach to stopping terrorists.

If you wish to understand the problem with this, follow me onward through the fog…

What is the next move in the chess match?  First Georgia launches an overnight blitzkrieg into South Ossetia. Next the Russians respond with overwhelming force to push out Georgian forces from South Ossetia and Abkhazia and then advance to occupy the east-west highway at Gori and the military and commercial port facilities at Poti. Then the U.S. and Poland sign an agreement for basing U.S. radars and antimissile systems in Poland.

So what is likely to happen next?

It’s about the rockets, stupid.

Expect early sales of Russian anti-ship missiles and anti-aircraft missile systems to Iran and Syria.

The Sunburn (Moskit) anti-ship missile can be launched from a variety of platforms, and it is lethal at ranges of up to 250 kilometers, especially when fired in salvos.

The Iranians already have the Russian Tor 1 anti-aircraft system in their arsenal. It seems likely that the Russians would now move swiftly to provide them also with the longer range (up to 90 kilometers) A-300 system.

The Russian Government

Is Paranoid

So Let’s Take Their Paranoia

To Higher Plane By

Installing Missiles In Countries Which Boarder Russia

Pakistani President Expected to Resign

Musharraf, Facing Impeachment, Likely To Step Down Within Days, Officials Say

By Candace Rondeaux and Karen DeYoung

Washington Post Foreign Service

Friday, August 15, 2008; Page A01

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Aug. 14 — Faced with mounting pressure from former political allies and dwindling support from his international backers, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, once a top U.S. ally, is expected to resign in the next few days, according to Pakistani officials.

A week after leaders of the ruling coalition said they planned to impeach Musharraf, the capital was abuzz with speculation that he would step down before formal impeachment charges are filed in Parliament on Monday

Bush Aides Say Russia Actions in Georgia Jeopardize Ties  



 By STEVEN LEE MYERS and THOM SHANKER

Published: August 14, 2008

WASHINGTON – Russia’s military offensive into Georgia has jolted the Bush administration’s relationship with Moscow, senior officials said Thursday, forcing a wholesale reassessment of American dealings with Russia and jeopardizing talks on everything from halting Iran’s nuclear ambitions to reducing strategic arsenals to cooperation on missiles defenses.

The conflict punctuated a stark turnabout in the administration’s view of Vladimir V. Putin, the president turned prime minister whom President Bush has repeatedly described as a trustworthy friend. Now Mr. Bush’s aides complain that Russian officials have been misleading or at least evasive about Russia’s intentions in Georgia.

USA

Anthrax scientist Bruce Ivins slipped under the radar because of FBI obsession

Records show agents overlooked a series of early clues pointing to Ivins as the source of the 2001 deadly anthrax mailings and that the investigation remained locked on a former Army researcher.

By David Willman, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

August 15, 2008  

WASHINGTON — As federal authorities pursued the wrong suspect in the deadly anthrax mailings of 2001, they ignored or overlooked a series of early clues that pointed to Army scientist Bruce E. Ivins, a review of investigative records by the Los Angeles Times shows.

Law enforcement documents unsealed by a federal judge last week, along with other materials reviewed by The Times, show that within a few months of the mailings, FBI leaders were positioned to know important details spotlighting Ivins, who killed himself last month and has now been identified as the government’s prime suspect.

The information available to investigators in those early months included:

Night flight to San Francisco.  Chase the moon across America.  God!  It’s been years since I was on a plane!

When we hit thirty-five thousand feet, we’ll have reached the tropopause.  The great belt of calm air.  As close as I’ll ever get to the ozone.

I dreamed we were there.  The plane leapt the tropopause, the safe air and attained the outer rim, the ozone, which was ragged and torn, patches of it threadbare as old cheesecloth, and that was frightening…

But I saw something only I could see, because of my astonishing ability to see such things:

Souls were rising, from the earth far below, souls of the dead, of people who had perished, from famine, from war, from the plague, and they floated up, like skydivers in reverse, limbs all akimbo, wheeling and spinning.  And the souls of these departed joined hands, clasped ankles, and formed a web, a great net of souls, and the souls were three-atom oxygen molecules, of the stuff of ozone, and the outer rim absorbed them, and was repaired.

Nothing’s lost forever.  In this world, there is a kind of painful progress.  Longing for what we’ve left behind, and dreaming ahead.

At least I think that’s so.

Angels In America: Perestroika, by Tony Kushner.