UPDATE: Maj Gen. Taguba’s Denies Statements:

White House reporters received an unusual email on Saturday, with a subject line stating, “Important Please Read: From White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs.”

In the email body, Gibbs wrote:

“A number of you have asked about or reported on a recent article in the Telegraph that inaccurately described photos which are the subject of an ongoing lawsuit. Both the Department of Defense and the White House have said the article was wrong, and now the individual who was purported to be the source of the article has said it’s inaccurate. Given that this false report has been repeated around the world, and given the impact these negative reports have on our troops, I felt it was important for you to see this correction.”

Gibbs included the full text of a story by Salon.com’s Mark Benjamin, which features retired Army Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba denying reports that he has seen the photos of prisoner abuse that the Obama administration is trying to keep secret.

Mr Gibbs, this doesn’t explain away the other statement that the Maj. Gen made in that same interview:

Maj. Gen Taguba saw the horrors first hand during his Abu Ghraib investigation and he believes the Bush administration is guilty of war crimes.

It also doesn’t explain away the fact that General Petraeus himself said we Americans violated the Geneva Conventions:

“When we have taken steps that have violated the Geneva Conventions, we rightly have been criticized, so as we move forward I think it’s important to again live our values, to live the agreements that we have made in the international justice arena and to practice those.”

See previous Posts on this website for links.

Gen Petraeus: We Violated the Geneva Conventions

Gen. Petraeus joined FOX News and Martha MacCallum today and gave a blockbuster interview today – Which probably SHOCKED FOX NEWS:

MacCallum: Where do you think those people should go?

Gen. Petraeus: Well, it’s not for a soldier to say. What I do support is what has been termed the responsible closure of Gitmo. Gitmo has caused us problems, there’s no question about it. I oversee a region in which the existence of Gitmo has been used by the enemy against us. We have not been without missteps or mistakes in our activity since 9/11 and again Gitmo is a lingering reminder for the use of some in that regard.

MacCallum: What about the concern that a Khalid Sheikh Muhammad or anybody of that ilk might be tried here in a US court and the possibility that some of the treatments that were used on them that they could go free.

Gen. Petraeus: Well, first of all, I don’t think we should be afraid of our values we’re fighting for, what we stand for. And so indeed we need to embrace them and we need to operationalize them in how we carry out what it is we’re doing on the battlefield and everywhere else. So one has to have some faith, I think, in the legal system. One has to have a degree of confidence that individuals that have conducted such extremist activity would indeed be found guilty in our courts of law.

MacCallum: So you’re confident that they will never go free.

Gen. Petraeus: I hope that’s the case.

MacCallum: (Ticking time bomb scenario)

Gen. Petraeus: ….T here might be an exception and that would require extraordinary but very rapid approval to deal with, but for the vast majority of the cases, our experience downrange if you will, is that the techniques that are in the Army Field Manual that lays out how we treat detainees, how we interrogate them — those techniques work, that’s our experience in this business.

MacCallum: So is sending this signal that we’re not going to use these kind of techniques anymore, what kind of impact does this have on people who do us harm in the field that you operate in?

Gen. Petraeus: Well, actually what I would ask is, does that not take away from our enemies a tool which again have beaten us around the head and shoulders in the court of public opinion? When we have taken steps that have violated the Geneva Conventions, we rightly have been criticized, so as we move forward I think it’s important to again live our values, to live the agreements that we have made in the international justice arena and to practice those.

Ok people — What Else Do We Need to Convict The Bush Administration of War Crimes?

More Evidence of Torture/Abuse in Prisons

The Pentagon is denying the facts: Photographs of Abu Ghraib torture are even more sexually explicit than first reported, including rape and sodomy, writes The Daily Beast’s Scott Horton, who has obtained specific and detailed corroboration of the photos.

The Daily Beast has confirmed that the photographs of abuses at Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison, which President Obama, in a reversal, decided not to release, depict sexually explicit acts, including a uniformed soldier receiving oral sex from a female prisoner, a government contractor engaged in an act of sodomy with a male prisoner and scenes of forced masturbation, forced exhibition, and penetration involving phosphorous sticks and brooms.

These descriptions come on the heels of a British report yesterday about the photographs that contained some of these revelations—and whose credibility was questioned by the Pentagon….

What is it going to take for Americans to wake up?  For me it’s the THOUGHT that my child, neice or nephew could EVER be treated in such a manner.

They’re Coming Out of Woodwork Now

BENTON HARBOR, Michigan (CNN) – Former President George W. Bush gave a speech to an audience in Michigan on Thursday saying that after the September 11 attacks, “I vowed to take whatever steps that were necessary to protect you.”…

“Nothing I am saying is meant to criticize my successor,” Bush said. “There are plenty of people who have weighed in. Trust me, having seen it firsthand. I didn’t like it when a former president criticized me, so therefore I am not going to criticize my successor. I wish him all the best.”

So with Mr. Bush saying he won’t CRITICIZE Obama, isn’t he actually implying that there is criticism to be given?

“The first thing you do is ask, what’s legal?” he said. “What do the lawyers say is possible? I made the decision, within the law, to get information so I can say to myself, ‘I’ve done what it takes to do my duty to protect the American people.’ I can tell you that the information we got saved lives.”

You forgot something didn’t you Mr Bush?  Didn’t you forget the words, “What can we MAKE legal?“

Bush repeated his disclaimer about not passing judgment Obama later in the speech when asked about North Korea’s test of a nuclear weapon. Before answering, the 43rd president said that he is “in no way trying to shape my successor’s decisions or criticize them.”…

On the topic of how to respond to North Korea, Bush said diplomacy is impossible without leverage.

“A lot of times people want to give out the carrots,” he said. “My attitude is, you give out the carrots when the behavior changes.”

So with Mr Bush saying he isn’t trying to ’shape’ Obama’s decisions or criticize them but…”you give out the carrots when the behavior changes…”.  Isn’t that giving advice?

And if it’s advice, should Obama listen to the former President?  The same man that ended up GIVING CARROTS to North Korea in 2007 after trying for 7 years to get them to GIVE IN by having 6 nation talks? He gave the carrots one year before election day.

First it was former Vice President Cheney, then Condi Rice and now the ‘man’ himself, George W. Bush.  They must really be worried that the TORTURE stories are pinching a ‘nerve’ with the American people, otherwise why bother talking about what was LEGAL?

These millionaires are living it up after ruining America’s self respect — they need to be brought up for War Crimes and immediately!

U.S. General Says Bush Admin Committed –War Crimes

You don’t see this story in the headlines.  It’s being listed as a ’side’ or ‘back page’ story.

LONDON -- A former U.S. general said graphic images of rape and torture are among the photos of Iraqi prisoner abuse that President Barack Obama’s administration does not want released.

Retired Major Gen. Antonio Taguba, who oversaw the U.S. investigation into the abuses at Baghdad’s Abu Ghraib prison, was quoted as telling Britain’s Daily Telegraph in an article Wednesday that he agreed with Obama’s decision not to release the pictures…

According to the Telegraph, the new photos depicted much more serious abuses than previously documented. One photo reportedly showed an American soldier apparently raping a female prisoner and another was said to show a male translator raping a male detainee, the paper reported.

The Telegraph said the photos related to 400 cases of alleged abuse between 2001 and 2005 at Abu Ghraib and six other prisons.

That was FOX NEWS report.  The following report on ChattahBox.com is a bit more specific with details of abuse:

Although Taguba’s 2004 report detailed incidents of rape of detainees, it was not revealed that photos existed of the shocking abuses, until now. Some of the unreleased photographs show detainees being raped and sexually abused with objects, such as a truncheon, wire, a phosphorescent tube and a policeman’s baton.

One photo also shows a female prisoner with exposed breasts after her clothing was forcibly removed.

Maj. Gen Taguba saw the horrors first hand during his Abu Ghraib investigation and he believes the Bush administration is guilty of war crimes.

In a preface to a report by Physicians for Human Rights on prisoner abuse and torture in U.S. military prisons Taguba wrote: “There is no longer any doubt that the current administration committed war crimes. The only question is whether those who ordered torture will be held to account.”

Note the SIX OTHER PRISONS statement and the years of 2001 through 2005.  The famous Abu ghraib story came out in 2004.  This means torturing and abuse was happening way past that time that we were told it was just “A Few Bad Apples” that committed the crimes.

If the General that investigated the abuse thinks it’s a war crime — shouldn’t the rest of us?

More comments from another source about abuse:

Among the graphic statements…is that of Kasim Mehaddi Hilas in which he says: “I saw [name of a translator] ******* a kid, his age would be about 15 to 18 years. The kid was hurting very bad and they covered all the doors with sheets. Then when I heard screaming I climbed the door because on top it wasn’t covered and I saw [name] who was wearing the military uniform, putting his **** in the little kid’s ***…. and the female soldier was taking pictures.” [...]

Three detainees, including the alleged victim, refer to the use of a phosphorescent tube in the sexual abuse and another to the use of wire, while the victim also refers to part of a policeman’s “stick” all of which were apparently photographed.

GOP Has Amnesia Again – North Korea Said Same things During Bush Years

This week’s actions by North Korea, setting off nuclear tests and missiles have many in the media talking how President Obama is being tested.  Many are already calling Obama’s ‘talking down North Korea’s threats’ as being a sign of weakness.

I think maybe it’s time to remind folks what North Korea did during President George W. Bush’s eight years in office.

When President Bush declared that Iraq, Iran and North Korea were the “axis of evil”,

a North Korean foreign ministry spokesman described Mr Bush’s State of the Union address as “little short of a declaration of war“.

In a statement from the foreign ministry, Pyongyang said Washington’s recent problems were “entirely attributable to the unilateral and self-opinionated foreign policy, political immaturity and moral leprosy of the Bush administration”.

The US Central Intelligence Agency has released a report saying that North Korea sold numerous missiles to the Middle East and other areas of tension last year (2001 a Bush year).

*****************************************************************************************

In February of 2003, North Korea threatened to abandon the 1953 armistice that ended the Korean war, accusing the United States of plotting a pre-emptive attack on the communist state.

North Korea’s rhetoric has been escalating since the crisis flared up late last year, and warnings of an impending US attack are broadcast almost daily in Pyongyang’s official media. It was not clear whether last night’s statement broke that pattern or represented more of the same.

North Korea conducted their first nuclear test in 2006 - during the Bush so-called “get tough” years.

My point is —- Bush was TESTED too and got the same words used against him as Obama is currently getting.  Bush finally gave in and ‘bribed’ North Korea into shutting down their nukes in 2007.  The only reason Bush gave in was, the 2008 election was coming up and he didn’t want the NK issue to be used against the GOP.

So the next time you hear a Republican or right winger accuse Obama of being WEAK or not tough enough – remind them of the Bush ‘get tough’ years and how that worked — NOT!

It’s Almost Over, YaHOO!

WASHINGTON — More than 90% of economists predict the recession will end this year, although the recovery is likely to be bumpy.

That assessment came from leading forecasters in a survey by the National Association for Business Economics released Wednesday. It is generally in line with the outlook from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and his colleagues.

About 74% of the forecasters expect the recession — which started in December 2007 and is the longest since World War II — to end in the third quarter. Another 19% predict the turning point will come in the final three months of this year, and the remaining 7% believe the recession will end in the first quarter of 2010.

This is great news.  Course, we must also consider the source.  These experts are probably the same ones that denied there ever being a recession in the first place.

There’s Also This Story out there:

WASHINGTON – Sales of previously occupied homes rose modestly from March to April as buyers who were brave enough to dive into the market took advantage of prices that were 15.4 percent below year-ago levels.

The National Association of Realtors said Wednesday that home sales rose 2.9 percent to an annual rate of 4.68 million last month, from a downwardly revised pace of 4.55 million in March.

The results slightly beat economists’ forecasts.

Another good sign that things are turning around.  Just imagine where we’d be if Bush were still in charge?

North Korea: Different Conclusions On How Admin’s Handled Them

CNN’s State Department Producer Elise Labott has an article on CNN’s website today, Analysis: Has North Korea reached a ‘tipping point’?

She has covered four secretaries of state and reported from more than 50 countries. Before joining CNN, she covered the United Nations.

Fifteen years after the Clinton administration signed the Agreed Framework, essentially bribing North Korea to give up its weapons program with a nuclear power plant, the U.S. has been riding a merry-go-round of deal-making, provocation and punishment with the North.

The Bush administration also tried unsuccessfully to get North Korea to abandon its nuclear ambitions — first by trying to squeeze the regime and then by reaching a deal with Pyongyang to dismantle its main nuclear reactor...

Economic sanctions, U.N. Security Council resolutions and even the Obama administration’s policy of engagement with rogue states all have failed so far…

So, President Bill Clinton ‘bribed‘ North Korea to give up its weapons; but President George W. Bush ‘reached a deal‘ with Pyongyang to dismantle its nuclear reactor.

Did you know that in just a little over 100 days President Obama’s foreign policy with respects to North Korea has failed?  President Bush had 8 years and he still failed; but you see no mention of that fact in that statement about sactions and resolutions not working.

The role of China and Russia, typically reluctant to impose sanctions against North Korea, will be crucial. Last month the U.S. could barely get Beijing and Moscow to sign onto to a watered-down statement criticizing North Korea. But administration officials involved in North Korea policy say the one silver lining in the latest antics is that they were so outrageous they crossed a line, which could galvanize Russia and China to act.

Don’t you just love knowing the political views of so called experts that are writing their opinions about a political situation?

With decades of diplomacy unable to produce a denuclearized Korean Peninsula, it begs the question of whether it is time for a fundamental overhaul of U.S. policy toward North Korea. There are serious conversations in Washington and among capitals about whether North Korea has reached a “tipping point,” offering the world final proof it is intent on developing what it calls a “nuclear deterrent.”

This is one statement I agree with.  As I mentioned in an earlier post, perhaps it’s time to use reverse psychology — show them a little mutual respect (because they too had weapons), just as we did China and the Soviet Union many decades ago.  It may be our only chance to stop them from passing along their capabilities to other nations like Iran.

Birds Have Rhythm Too

NEW YORK —  They wouldn’t blow away the competition on “Dancing with the Stars,” but it turns out that some birds got rhythm.

After studying a cockatoo that grooves to the Backstreet Boys and about 1,000 YouTube videos, scientists say they’ve documented for the first time that some animals “dance” to a musical beat.

This is rather long but he moves around several times dancing – it’s cute.  He dances better than some humans I’ve danced with…LOL

Snowball (TM) is a Medium Sulphur Crested Eleanora Cockatoo that dances to the Back Street Boys and other songs that he rates as having a “very good beat.”

Iraqi a U.S. Soldier?

BAGHDAD — In the fall of 2007, Forat Aldawoodi fled Iraq through a special visa program for Iraqis who worked with the U.S. government. He landed in Pawtucket, R.I., where he soon became a New England Patriots fan, traveled to the Atlantic Ocean and enlisted in the U.S. Army Reserves.

Today, after a year’s absence, Aldawoodi is in Iraq again — this time as an American soldier….

On July 4, Aldawoodi is scheduled to take his oath to become a U.S. citizen at a naturalization ceremony in Baghdad. He plans to return to Pawtucket in the fall to resume his life as an American — and U.S. soldier.

I’m sorry but I find it a little hard to believe that we allow Iraqi’s to serve in our military forces while we are at war in their nation.  If they want to serve in the military why not within their own country’s military, why ours?

He could have very well joined his country’s military and still worked as an interpreter.

We tax payers are paying this Iraqi citizen U.S. money to join our military while we conduct a war in HIS country — why? Don’t we have enough Americans that want to serve?

If we were not at war in Iraq I would probably accept this idea, but not while we are.  If he wants to fight the enemy, let him join his own people’s military.