Rumsfeld owns "Mount Misery" plantation (where Frederick Douglass was sent to be tortured)

[philosophie_en_rose]

surprised?

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/293201_amy22.html?source=mypi

Frederick Douglass, the renowned abolitionist, began life as a slave on Maryland's Eastern Shore. When his owner had trouble with the young, unruly slave, Douglass was sent to Edward Covey, a notorious "slave breaker." Covey's plantation, where physical and psychological torture were standard, was called Mount Misery. Douglass eventually fought back, escaped to the North and went on to change the world. Today Mount Misery is owned by Donald Rumsfeld, the outgoing secretary of defense.

It is ironic that this notorious plantation run by a practiced torturer would now be owned by Rumsfeld, himself accused as the man principally responsible for the U.S. military's program of torture and detention. Rumsfeld was recently named along with 11 other high-ranking U.S. officials in a criminal complaint filed in Germany by the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights. The center is requesting that the German government conduct an investigation and ultimately a criminal prosecution of Rumsfeld and company. CCR President Michael Ratner says U.S. policy authorizing "harsh interrogation techniques" is in fact a torture program that Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld authorized himself, passed down through the chain of command and was implemented by one of the other defendants, Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller.

Torture is a noxious, heinous practice and should not be tolerated. Slavery was once legal and tolerated in the U.S. (it is still practiced in some parts of the world). But people fought back, organized and formed the abolition movement. Pioneering legal and human-rights organizations, such as CCR, aggressively and creatively are working to stop torture, and to hold the torturers and their superiors accountable. Ultimately, it will be the U.S. populace -- not the German courts, not the U.S. Congress -- that stops the U.S. torture program. Frederick Douglass summed it up most eloquently -- in 1849:

"If there is no struggle there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will."

The owner of Mount Misery should take heed.

[Jacobin]

1. Note to the Onion

You are now free to close down. Your services are no longer required

[Pierre.Suave]

2. No Shit...

Even the Onion could not have made that up.

[Divine Discontent]

4. ah..

I get it (lil slow today), you're saying the irony..

this is a very disturbing story, and if he owns it, he should be asked to sell it. the appearance of a sick torture approving son of a bitch having that property is sickening... along with a million other things that are disturbing about them, but this would be a start...

[bobbolink]

3. I don't believe in karma, but this is really eerie....

Surely he wasn't ignorant of it's history when he bought it..?

[volstork]

5. Of course he does

Now maybe he will go the way of slavery-- to be remembered as a a tragic episode in America's history.

[earth mom]

6. Why am I not surprised?

:puke:

[mentalsolstice]

7. I bet he had that eat-shit smile on his face when he bought it. eom

[Divine Discontent]

8. I don't hate people

but I can HATE that shitty ass eatin smirk of his... the man makes me more nauseous than cheney...

only because I don't see cheney that much...

[mentalsolstice]

12. Almost as bad as *'s arrogant smirk

You know the one...where his lips get tight and he looks down his pointy nose, as if he's saying "how dare you cross me"? He had that look during the debates in 2000 & 2004, like he couldn't believe that anyone would have the audacity to run against him. And you can tell when a presser is going badly for him (usually about the time David Gregory asks a question), he gets that look. They all make me ill!

[Gatchaman]

9. Wow. Reality and Karma collide in an explosion of irony

One the one hand, this property is of significant historical value, and such properties are often owned (when in private hands) by the more powerful members of society. At least it's not owned by some developer who will tear it down.

One the other hand, I wonder if Rummy goes out to the former slave quarters late at night and masturbates?

[PassingFair]

10. Sounds like a "Twilight Zone" episode.

Hope it ENDS like one for him.

[grasswire]

11. I'd like to see historical drawings of this place

I wonder if any exist.

[blogslut]

26. Here's some pics

Before Rummy, when it was a Bed and Breakfast:



After Rummy moved in:



Douglass' great-great granddaughter, Nettie Washington Douglass, looking at the place from the gate:

[SlavesandBulldozers]

13. you should see his vacation home in Treblinka

beautiful this time of year.

[hsher]

14. A cry in the delivery room: and another Daily Show cartoon is born

I get no rest with these kinds of stories popping up.

[Bad Penny]

15. Rumsfeld is a true nutjob

Every trait an SS Commandant needed to possess Rumsfeld has in spades. Nixon thought he was creepy for chrissakes! Can't remember which channel ran it about three years back but some newsie did a one on one interview with him at the ranch he co-owns/owned with Dan Rather (!) among other people. Seems Rummy enjoys walking his long gravel driveway in his coveralls and picking every manner of foreign object from pieces of string to bird crap and taking them back to his workshop where he sorts them into jars. No shit. I saw him do it

[SlavesandBulldozers]

17. love your signature btw!

lol

[SlavesandBulldozers]

19. are you serious?

he picks up stuff in his driveway and organizes it into jars?

[Bad Penny]

21. rummy is a lunatic

[AspenRose]

16. Wow

If he's proud of that land purchase, then he's one sick son of a bitch. :wow: :scared:

[Pachamama]

18. Coincidink?

I think not.... :eyes:

[Cleita]

20. Speculating in the Astrology Forum is that Rummy could he be a

reincarnation of Edward Covey. Are there any pictures out there of him?

[daninthemoon]

22. Is this place anywhere near Amityville?

[annabanana]

23. May the souls of the tormented haunt his every waking moment....

and jerk him up from slumber, pale, shaking, shivering and sweating, every night.

[philosophie_en_rose]

25. for some reason I don't think tormented souls would bother him

[hunter]

24. Story arisen from the New York Times Travel Section, no less.

http://www.utne.com/webwatch/2006_272/news/12303-1.html

http://travel2.nytimes.com/2006/06/30/travel/escapes/30michaels.html

6/30/2006 If you need a date they played the crazy Rumsfeld card.