Ok children, here is what the media has not shown you for years, and you must ask WHY

[nadinbrzezinski]

Flashback to Nassaryah during the first weeks of the war.

A trooper on the ground, in pain, laying there while a medic tries to get him ready for transport to the rear. Camera pans down to the two mangled legs, shreds of uniform, pool of blood, red meat, and white bones sticking out, as well as dirt, dirt everywhere, and the two obvious bands of green material keeping him from bleeding out, we call them tourniquets, and probably saved his life. Camera pans up to the reporter, holding a mike, and an IV bag. You never saw this in the US Media, but if you tuned in to the Mexican Media you surely did. I was lucky to have access, in Hawaii of all places, to have access to it, through a cable channel. Oh the cameraman, my hat goes off to him also showed the face of this young kid, they are always kids, his face was that of an African American soldier, and his deep hazel eyes were full of tears. That is a face you never forget.

Then there is more.

A building that collapsed from an impact, whether there were insurgents in there or not did not matter. Camera man pans to a woman, older in age, pulling her hair and on her knees, wearing a black abaya and screaming to the sky WHY. ALLAH WHY (translator voice over), the camera pans over and you saw two legs sticking out from the rubble, two small legs.. in a blue, sky blue cloth. That was a child... You never saw that either, but if you had to CBC you would have.

Of course there was a photo that appeared on other media that many here have seen of a dad, perhaps, holding his dead child in a black and white blanket... bloody blanket.

And there is another that CBC showed, kind of the horrors of war. An M-1 tank running down the street... and a scream on the video, followed by a flattened body, only a mass of body mess, brains and blood... and a flat body, Yes the tank ran over this person. We never learn, from the reporters whether this dead Iraqi was a member of the resistance or not... otherwise known as a valid target or a civilian.

Now most US Citizens have never seen this... we have been sheltered from this reality... but this was just the beginning of the war, and people were still surrendering because they expected us to treat them right. After all we did in 1991, why would that change?

Then came abu ghraib... and in the US people were surprised... I mean we don't do that right? Well we have been doing this for a while

Let me introduce you to some of the horrors that were done in your name in CA... during that other secret war called Iran Contra.

During that war, we didn't use OUR people... we used advisors, to sons of bitches like Battalion 100, a Salvadoran elite unit. So what did these boy scouts do? Well one of their favorite things to do was to take people like Maria into the prison (not using real names). They brought her twleve year old daughter and raped the daughter in front of mom... sounds familiar? I am sure it does. After all Sly Hersh has told us this happened.

They brought people like Jose and stripped him bare naked, took cables to the genitals and used a little electricity. Sounds familiar? It should

One of their favorite tactics was the water torture, and another was to take people and keep them awake for days on end. Is this really starting to sound familiar?

They also took people into a cell, stripped them down, took handcuffs and cuffed them to the ceiling... for days on end, with toes barely touching the ground... not only was it painful, but many of its victims live to this day with nerve damage.

Now children, this is why we need to see these pictures. I'll be honest, I am no longer shocked when I see any of these photos or horrors. I got detached after hearing many a story but here is the progression. In the 80s it was done by others under our advise. Now it was done by our sons of bitches to the other. Next time it will be done to your children by us.

Oh and you may not like to see these photos, I can't blame you. Hell after hearing these stories from survivors, you get to the point where you start having nightmares about this. But at least you get to sleep after that... and to bear witness. For the torture victim this never ends... they live with those horrors for the rest of their lives. I know. I heard the stories from survivors who had PTSD years after the fact. You know what was the worst, Maria's daughter. When I met her she was seventeen. That kid could barely speak, from the trauma. Think about it.

And if we are to stop this from happening it is time to stop making excuses, just because OUR side is now sounding like good Imperial lords. This is not a partisan matter. Get this through your heads. This is not a partisan matter.

At least I count my blessings. This time around I don't speak the language or am in the right place or the right time to hear the stories... as inured and detached as I became I don't know if I could handle it again.

So I will post the poem that the partisanship inspired today, with this background

--------------

On Partisanship

For the millions who have died when good men have refused to speak...

For the millions more who have lost all when good men have refused to scream.

For the millions more that will die, because people still refuse to do what is right.

You go on.

Forgive me for not joining you in the cheering alley.

I will be at the corner, weeping...

we have not learned.

we never learn.

---------------------------------

Now forgive me DU... but for those of you who choose party over country, we do part company. I owe that to Maria and Jose, and the hundreds who told stories. I also owe that to my family, who went up in a place called Treblynka, because good people chose to remain silent, or took sides, like this.

[Suich]

1. I agree.

Recommended.

[mike_c]

2. thank you for standing up for what is right...

...rather than for political expedience. :patriot:

[nadinbrzezinski]

4. You know I was not surprised though to read the same arguments

here that I read in 2002 on AOL... after all we need to stand behind our leaders in time or war.

IT was Mr. Serling I am ready for my closeup

Cue Twilight Zone music.

And back then I was among the 10% who opposed the war.

Back at ya

:patriot:

[90-percent]

67. 10% opposed the war back in 2003?

I recall that the MAJORITY OF AMERICANS opposed the war back then.

It was only after a year or so of catapulting the propaganda that it may have gained support. And I recall support for the war grew after the fucking thing had been started!

America was sold that we were going after the villains responsible for 9-11. A year of that bull shit direct from the entire Bush Administration was enough to sell the war to the majority.

We seem to be forgetting the depth of the Orwellian everything-is-political, you-better-watch-what-you-say repression of the Bush years. It got pretty totalitarian back in those recent dark ages!

-90% jimmy

[knowbody0]

3. and the empire will fall

imploding upon itself when the truth be known.

I hooked up with some serious anarchists in the early eighties. once you see these truths you are never the same.

peace

[nadinbrzezinski]

5. I was a young Red Cross worker

in Mexico... when we started getting the refugee flow.

Some of the people we interviewed left me in tears.

But at this point, I am really inured to these horrors... you could say my .... price

[knowbody0]

8. good on ya

thank you for your humanity. I hear your silent scream, it is in harmony with mine.

[nadinbrzezinski]

11. I just did my duty, and it was truly wrong place right time

I was also a medic, and for ten years got to see other stuff

Why, as I said, show me a picture and at this point it really does nothing to me. The pictures are nothing compared to the reality.

But pictures are still things that need to be shown as Muricans still refuse to see what we have done.

We are treated like kids, who need to be protected... and boy we like it.

[truedelphi]

12. My father confided in me, when I was a very young child, to allow himself

To deal with the horrors of WWII.

This taught me compassion, and it taught me that the "heroics" of war are not the full story.

So I am very aware of the photos you are speaking of, having sought them out over the internet. Some of the images were so repulsive, especially those of parents being killed in front of their children, that I will never ever get them out of my mind.

And a quiet salute to you for offering solace to the refugees that you helped. Gratitude for your compassion, and so sorry that you have had to pay the price.

[nadinbrzezinski]

13. Well, you at least looked

I still remember the amazing contrast

CBC building down, mother screaming

CNN took Tikrit... which has its own comedy attached as they drove through an army base, the APCs empty, with hatches open... that told the whole story at the end of the war.

Mexican news, shows US Troop injured, seriously... NBC has a picture of US troops moving on to Baghdad. We really never saw the casualties, well almost, Sanjay Guptha did save the life of a US troop... he is a neurosurgeon, but he also became part of the story.

And I am sorry they gave you nightmares. But more folks should see these photos. And when was the last time Imperial Citizens saw those photos? Not WW II... we were also very sheltered and some photos of US troops dead at the beaches didn't reach declassification for years... Vietnam

The famous photo of the kids bathed in Napalm had a very negative effect on morale back home. So you could say our leaders learned their lesson.

I know some stories from Grenada and Panama as well, but there were no photos.

[Uzybone]

6. Nice sentiment

but America will shrug its shoulders and move on like it always has. I think you are misleading yourself if you think America doesnt know what is done in its name. I don't think we (as a country) really care that much.

You are correct, it is not a partisan matter, and I dont see anyone on DU making torture, war crimes and illegal war a partisan matter.

[nadinbrzezinski]

9. Actually you would be shocked to know how many people don't know

in-fact most Americans really don't know what is done in their name... and as to care... it is not that they don't care, they don't know. The Empire will not file charges because empires don't do that, and you can tell yourself this is because the insular american doesn't care. Partly you are right, but partly the insular american does not know either.

And that my dear is done on purpose, that way the Empire can self-preserve. Does not matter if this is ROME, or Spain, or England or the US. Empires treat their Imperial Citizens like children.

And you have not been paying attention, it is already partisan.. part of the self preservation of the empire.

[Chulanowa]

14. That's utter bullshit

Americans shrug their shoulders at words.

Back in the 2008 campaign, I used Sarah Palin's position on wolf kills as an example of why she should not be VP.When I told the local conservatives about it, they shrug and say "So what, it's just an animal." When I showed them stories in the papers or literature, they would harrumph and say the wolves kill all the game, good riddance.

I found footage of a wolf hunt, filmed from one of the helicopters used. It pans around, and a wolf bolts out like a crazy thing, obviously terrified of the chopper's noise. The chopper gets low and tails the wolf. You hear the crack of a rifle, and the wolf flips and starts frantically biting at its own rear end like it's trying to eat itself. The camera's good enough you can see its eyes rolling around as it tries to deal with te fact that it has a horrible pain in its rear left leg that no longer works, while the snow around it starts turning red.

Suddenly it wasn't "just an animal." No argument about caribou competition really worked after I showed this video. It was no longer a wolf, it was a helpless creature in agony, something that had no idea why it was in excruciating pain, a creature that never had the remotest chance of defending itself or even escaping, a being that suffered and died only because some person decreed it was a crime to be a wolf. At least here on Vashon Island, that one wolf cost McCain / Palin twenty voters right off the bat. Several of them likely spread the word, and hopefully the video.

I imagine numerous other people did the same thing with the same results around the country. I certainly can't say that this had even a minuscule effect out of the millions of voters. But it DID have an effect.

People will react to what they can interact with or experience firsthand (or close to firsthand). Abu Ghraib; the stories of torture had been floating around for a while, but as you say, it got a shrug " So what, they're terrorists!" - then came the photos. Our big-smiling, heartland American service members, grilling over bloody iced corpses and hamming it up over a naked pile of men, a hooded man being terrorized by a dog, possibly leashed, himself. People reacted to the photos. They could not deny the evidence. They still don't have any excuses - "bad apples" is a diversion, a sign of an uncomfortable person changing the subject.

Now. We come back to the latest bundle of torture.

You say that people already know. That's right. They know because they've seen the stories in print, or heard the heads talking about it on the news or on the radio. They know, intellectually, that there is torture going on. But so long as they don't have the evidence, the visceral, gut-punching proof of what's going on, they can shrug it off - after all, the heads and the papers call it "controversial." But once people see with their own eyes, the corpses, the burned and beaten and scarred bodies, the hollow eyes and the ravings of men literally reduced to madness by what has been done to them... then people will really know.

The key to making people care about something is to make it personal. To bring it into their comfort zone and let it loose. To point them at something htey can see with their own eyes, and be made aware of what is going on. Some may try to dismiss it, of course, there are people who are just that ready to kiss ass for their "club" - but the vast majority of people, right or left, American or otherwise, white, black, male, female, young, old... You show them an animal in pain - or much more potently, a human being, their own kind of animal - And they will nearly universally want to do something about it. They might convince themselves of some reason not to help the person out, but every witness will have that pang of conscience... And a great many will step up to lend a hand.

THAT is why we need these things released.

[Forkboy]

15. Awesome post.

Thank you.

[voc]

16. IF only that were so.....

Showing Americans the pictures may effect some, but there are a great many who have seen worse and turned a blind eye to the misery and suffering of others right here on our shores.
"Not in Our Name" is a great premise, but "we the people"have rationalized atrocities in our own backyards for centuries.
Those who were affected by the pics of the wolf are they same ones who would say the wolf didn't deserve it while the "perceived enemies" did. Reality.

[Chulanowa]

17. There are always "some"

I'm maintaining that genuine sociopaths are very rare in the population, and most people will have an empathic reaction to these things. Some will no doubt find some reason to turn their noses up at it. Studies by sociologists reveal that 3% of people would rather let a child drown than risk getting their own pants wet. If that number holds, then there are 9,121,791 frighteningly selfish Americans. Nine million bastards is quite a number, sure, but it still leaves two hundred and ninety-one million of us who aren't complete douchnozzles to the bone.

I'm telling you that it's a lot harder to rationalize photos and video footage, than to rationalize text and second- or third-hand reports.

As for your argument, I refer you to the OP, who's line of work has apparently rendered him jaded on a level that I pray to any conveniant deity I will never personally experience. But he's obviously moved by what's going on - or, perhaps, by what isn't going on, that being an accurate accounting of what's being done.

If people want to rationalize it, if they want to turn a blind eye to it, well, I say let's give them lots of material to work with. Let htme rationalize themselves sick, let them turn their eyes so blind they run into fucking lampposts.

[voc]

20. You have a point...

I can't fathom what those photos could possibly contain that would shock me or the OP. I am jaded as well.
I am not privy to the OP's line of work nor do I care to be. Maybe there are only 9 mil. That would be a plus.

History shows people rationalize anything including man's inhumanity to man, or we wouldn't be here. I agree that pics do have an effect, my point, albeit a cynical one, is I don't think they will have the shock value intended unless the MSM shows them 24/7, which they won't do.
An empathic reaction? I do hope you are right, I fear you are mistaken. But it is definitely worth a go.

[Chulanowa]

21. Humans have some interesting psychological wiring

You may be "jaded" - but all that means is you've lost your "shock" reaction, either from training or trauma. I'll bet that you retain the sensation of outrage quite acutely. Pity, guilt? Of course. You and the OP may not find much shocking, but you (I would hope) lack the bad wiring that produces honest-to-goodness sociopaths. The two of you are not blase about this topic. Therefor it stands to reason that despite your initial "jaded" response, you still care.

The same is true for pretty much all of us.

Of course the whole point of our sentient state is to override "wrong" instincts - if our primitive ancestors saw a lion, their fist instinct might be to flee, but their sapience might instead remind them that lions hunt in pairs and this one is probably trying to flush us right into the mouth of its partner.

We can very obviously take this "instinct override" programming and do all sorts of things with it - convince ourselves that a fetus is human, that the Arab being tortured isn't, all sorts of things. Intellectually we're highly mutable, able to convince ourselves of all sorts of things, and also apparently quite willing to do so, too.

But the instinct will always be there, still running in the background processes, so to speak. And our natural instinct towards suffering is compassion. We're a communal species, and seeing one of our number in a bad situation immediately sends our instinctive brain into "protect the species" mode.

As you can see, "just shock" isn't enough. There's lots of shocking things that cause no lasting emotional response in the shocked person. The shock is a jolt stimuli, but the real effect is the dense bundle of automatic emotions that are awakened by that stimuli, Tapping into those is what I'm talking about.

An interesting side note of the wolf video I mentioned, is that I've shown people videos of what goes on in slaughterhouses, too, with a much lessened response. Now it could just be that we see pigs and cows as food, and wolves as not-food. Or, and this is my thought, we may have developed a psychological response to instinctively treat the dog as "human" (they certainly think of us as "dog" in this manner) and the wolf is enough like a dog to send people into that sort of aghast sympathy for it. (THis could be a rationale for why some people just randomly loathe little dogs - it's our canine version of the "uncanny alley")

[nadinbrzezinski]

44. Not jaded, I don't react to the photos

but that is because I have met the people that this has been done to

A whole different level of experience.. one that I do not wish upon people and WHY I know the photos need to be released. Most people will react to the photos.

I figured I'd better point that out.

Yes it is horrifying to see a prisoner cowering as a Military Working Dog snarls... a whole different thing to see that person, a few years later, break in front of you because of that dog.

[Torn_Scorned_Ignored]

74. yes, witnessing the aftermath

of a person like you, or I.

Most are humans are fortunate. We do not experience inhumanity and soul death as a rule.

Inflicting terror for kicks - or torture because you have time to kill, leaves victims of those it was done to and those who understand the cost.

Thank you for the thread and your humanity.

[DaLittle Kitty]

93. Mr. President, We Want To See Those Pictures!

:think: Thank you for your insights!

[Uzybone]

28. I disagree

those people who saw the Palin-wolf videos, had they already seen the Abu Ghraib photos from 2004? They probably had and still voted for Bush. I think people are way less interested in these issues than we generally believe. I wish it were not so...


I've seen others talk about how we made the Germans see the work the Nazis did to show them what was done in their name. Does anyone really believe they didn't know what was going on until we liberated the camps? People have an ability to block out the most evil crimes, as long as its affecting someone else.

[Ignis]

42. Thank you.

This is precisely why every American should be FORCED to see the photographs of what was done in our name. Not for prurient interest, not for cheap thrills--but because we're very, very good at pretending that we have absolutely NO idea why "They" hate us "for our freedoms." :eyes:

[PassingFair]

106. Like German citizens had to be FORCED to view concentration camps to have it "sink in"....

what had been done in their name, that they
had supported or turned a blind eye to:

[OwnedByFerrets]

80. Fantastic post that should be a post of its own.

[ThomCat]

102. I agree. Make it personal and people will care.

Make them feel it and they'll respond to it.

That's the principle behind effective advertising, effective advocacy, and effective politics. Make them feel it and they'll respond to it.

But nadinbrzezinski is right too. If we can't get those photos and find a way to make people look at them then people won't know, won't remember, won't care.

People don't know what's happening in their name. We are the ones that bring them this knowledge in some cases. And then if we are effective in bringing that knowledge then we also make them care. That is what bridges the gap from her position to yours.

[Arctic Dave]

7. When the concentration camps were discovered by the US military

during WWII they made the Germans who lived in the towns next to them walk through and see with their own eyes what had happened. Why? Did the Commanding Officer get a thrill from it? I would say no, I would say that some things will only be believed when seen with your own eyes.
We need to have the US population heads removed from the sand.

[nadinbrzezinski]

10. Exactly... why that was General Dwight Eisenhower General Order for the Army

I'd hazard he'd be shocked as to what we have done sixty years later.

[Chulanowa]

19. Exactly - and notice how contrite the people of Germany still are

I imagine the legacy of this, of men and women who waved their Nazi flags and cheered all while ignoring the cap down the road, suddenly being shown the horrors that they had allowed, that they had abetted, that they had in efect encouraged.

It must have been the most sobering, shameful moment of their lives to see what their herd mind and apathy had done to so many other people. I imagine even the most scathing, sick-minded person in that lot would have been struck by the sight of it all.

These men and women told their children - sometimes those children came with their parents. They told their friends, their relatives in other parts of the nation. it was a sort of inoculation. The Germans (and Austrians, and Poles, and French, and all those folks in what would soon be Yugoslavia)were collectively drenched in blood. Not just from the camp tours, but from the relentless exposure of what went in in the camps.

Now, I imagine Germany may be the last place where Fascism could erupt, much less that sort of atrocity arise in its wake. Maybe someday in the far future, I suppose,

Exposure is key.

[democracy1st]

18. great post K & R

[Ozymanithrax]

22. Vietnam is partly to blame.

They showed us a lot more back then. The sight of little girls with their cloths burned off by napalm apparantly running from American soldiers was a bit to stark for American tastes. It made people ask the wrong questions.

The vogue now is to hide us from the consequences of empire. That is why the first Bush, Clinton, and Bush redux allowed laws against showing the coffins coming home. (Bush I and Clinton both violated that law in some instances.) If Americans see a line of hearses carrying dead kids they might want to know "What are we fighting for?" It should be mandatory for every school child in America to tour the amputee ward at Balboa Hospital where you see young men and women with their legs,arms, and important reporduction organs missing.

The media followed the dictates of the government like a jackass on a leash. But the media (I don't call them news) went along because money talks and truth walks. Give me underwear and male potency commercials while telling me about the most recent naked white dead blond teenage girl, and they are all over that. There is real money in naked dead blonds and potency pills.

But, for Media's sake, don't show us anything that informs us. Americans need bread and circuses not truth and consequences.

[newspeak]

24. I'm with you

the chickenhawks took their lessons from Vietnam. That's why this bogus war-only embedded journalists were allowed to be with the troops-only certain propaganda photos were allowed and why the bodies of the fallen soldiers were not to be filmed. They sterilized the war--made it so those Americans not directly involved would not see the horrors of the war in Iraq-the bombings, civilian and soldiers suffering. Nah, we were told by * that it was our patriotic duty to go shop.

[FloriTexan]

27. And seeing all the photos of the horrors in Vietnam...

did exactly what to stop the recent white phosphorus and other chemical attacks? Did it stop us from dropping cluster bombs and other of our weapons of mass destruction? In reality, you can look at all the photos you want, but it doesn't stop anything.

[newspeak]

29. actually in Vietnam

it did help stop the war. More and more of the general public (I'm talking older, conservative Americans) finally decided enough was enough. I remember Vietnam, we had stories nightly about Vietnam and I remember the damn body count. I have a friend who was on the front lines (was a military journalist), to this day he refuses to salute the flag. He told me abut the body count and how they'd stack human bodies, men, women and children, like cords of wood. Visuals do seep into the human conscience, after awhile it becomes an overload until it becomes intolerable for most--Of course, I'd say the protests did help, but having mainstream populace go against it is really what got us out.

[FloriTexan]

31. And in recent times?

It would seem that showing the photos has limited effect. I've posed this question before with no viable response. What has seeing any of these photos from the past stopped. The only one I can think of is the ones form when we dropped the bomb on Japan.

[newspeak]

37. tell me where you have seen photos

of all these dead people? I stated that Vietnam was on the news nightly-they barely show us anything coming from Iraq-Falluja they showed a few dead bodies but not that many where people, especially children were hurt--they've shown people weeping over their dead--but not really people grievously wounded or suffering. I watch the news every night and they barely cover what's happening in Iraq. Now, I bet they probably showed a lot of photos of our phosphoresce show in Europe. Remember the Italian reporter who was shot? But, our media is not really showing the consequences of our invasion to the general public. Like they didn't mention our slaughter of Iraqi soldiers who were retreating during Desert Storm.

[FloriTexan]

43. Generally, all photos..

whether of vietnam, civil war, POW camps, etc. etc. etc. They have stopped nothing. If you are seeking to stop the U.S. from torturer, hasn't that alrady happened?

[nadinbrzezinski]

49. No it hasn't and you are a fool if you believe

that the torture has stopped.

By the way, many a historian will disagree with you about the photos

The most graphic from WW II, like troops, dead troops, at landing beaches were so sensitive that they were deep sixed for decades. The photos from Antietam didn't really make it to the papers until the war was over. The Spanish American War didn't have much photos...

The only war where we freely had access to the raw footage from war was Nam. Think about it next time you make that statement.

[FloriTexan]

53. No need to get personal

because someone disagrees with you. Perhaps these photos should also be "deep sixed for decades" as they would seem to be just as sensitive. Perhaps til we are out of there. Perhaps you should think about what you write before you defeat you own argument.

So you think the United States is still torturing? You think this administration is authorizing it? I'd sure like you to back that up with some facts.

[nadinbrzezinski]

54. I am sure it is still going on

read a little history.

You think we didn't waterboard in the Nam? Are you that naive? We did... to the credit of the military folks who were caught red handed were court martialed

You truly believe we didn't torture in CA? It was against the law too, read the OP

As to the photos, they should be released so people like you get to see what was done in your name. I know what has been done... no need to tell me. And I am not naive. I know it is still going on.

Official orders notwithsanding.

[FloriTexan]

55. So, your argument is now...

history repeats itself. Photos haven't stopped a thing. So what is the point.

[nadinbrzezinski]

57. PROSECUTION, that is why they are keeping off the table

they are also keeping them OFF THE TABLE to protect YOU. They fear that YOU and I, and the rest will be horrified enough to take to the streets and DEMAND troops come home like it happened in the 1960s... got it now? This is what this is about. And those of us demanding they be released are on the right side of history, by the by... even if the empire might suffer.



And they helped greatly to stop the Vietnam Conflict. That is the ONLY war in US history where the photos from the front lines were published by the US press. And they still kept some of it away from you... like US Troops playing with the reproductive organs of killed VC.

And I will say this again, if you think torture has stopped... it just moved to darker places. It is the nature of war. And war is not a nice thing... where only the white hats win and the black hats loose. They are ugly, they are dark, and they are all but morally clean.

[FloriTexan]

65. So you think that they don't want the photos seen

because we might take to the streets and demand our troops come home? Perhaps that might happen, but they've already released a few and now they want to release a few more, and it will likely continue that way until they are all released, including the videos of the children being sodomized included, and before we can take to the streets in anger the retaliation to our troops will have already begun. I think prosecuting the war criminals will send a better message to the world AND keep our troops safe until we can bring them home. I would not like to think that the photos would stir others to violence against our troops which would increase the fighting and their risk and possibly draw us in further. Also, retailiation may not just be directed to our troops. It might just bring another attack on our soil against civilians. No one really knows what would happen so I think taking the side of caution is the better course of action.

[nadinbrzezinski]

86. Yes, that is ONE reason why they will not release them

why nobody will be charged when all is said and done

And why we will continue to "look forwards"

The Empire requires that

[nadinbrzezinski]

45. Read the OP, what I described that appeared in foreign media

and tell me exactly where that injured trooper, tended by a medic, and a reporter ironically, appeared in US Media.

Show me the photo of the woman screaming in US media

It did appear, but not in the evening news... of the United States

[bagrman]

72. Bring back the draft and the wars will end quickly. "But they are volunteers" is the basic line...

of shit they utter, as if we're not exposed to care.


sp edit

[NNN0LHI]

94. If I am not mistaken we had a draft during Vietnam and that didn't end quickly

[bagrman]

103. The fact that everyones sons and daughters were in harms way

it kept the war on everyone mind and yes it was a factor in the anti war movement.

[NNN0LHI]

105. The fact that everyones sons and daughters were in harms way? LOL

All the guys I knew with any wealth or connections who didn't want to go all received deferments for one thing or another during that time period.

And no ones daughter was ever drafted. They didn't even have to register for the Selective Service. They still don't.

Don

[Echo In Light]

23. Kudos. I'm an indie, so there's no company to part with, per se

Frankly I'm surprised I haven't been banned here yet ...although my avatar rights were recently revoked w/o explanation lol

K&R

[FloriTexan]

25. I'm seeing a couple of interesting points...

That we need to so the photos so we learn from them and this kind of thing stops; but seeing them makes us immune to them overtime. :shrug:

[nadinbrzezinski]

46. Only if you work in the field of refugee work

and only because then you get to meet the victims face to face. That has it's own horror.

[snake in the grass]

26. I agree with you.

The entire ugliness must come out; all of it. This has nothing to do with voyeurism. It's time to choose between what's right and what's expedient.

[Prospero1]

30. Another point

The fact that the Reagan/Bush 1 administrations got away with murder, torture, and genocide (and the other crimes of Iran/Contra) emboldened them to perpetrate the crimes of the Bush 2 administration. After all, there are many of the same people involved. This is why this rhetoric about "moving on" is so dangerous. I don't want to contemplate what they would feel free to do if we let this one pass. BTW a "Truth Commission" is not the answer - they'll all get immunity for the sake of a "complete investigation" (think Ollie North). We need a special prosecutor.

[Bluenorthwest]

32. I'm with you on all of this.

Some things, there is no fence to sit on. It is in fact an atrocity to politicize atrocity, to play for advantage with facts so damning of our culture.
The truth will out. And many will be sitting on what they thought was a fence, only to find it was a pile of corpses.

[DU GrovelBot]

33. ## PLEASE DONATE TO DEMOCRATIC UNDERGROUND! ##

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[Lydia Leftcoast]

34. The powers that be know EXACTLY what they're doing by keeping the pictures from us

Like some of the people above, I remember the Vietnam era, when TV reporters had complete freedom to report on what they saw.

The cumulative effect of seeing the horrors on the nightly news day after day (dead civilians of every age and both genders, summary executions, American G.I.'s gleefully applying cigarette lighters to the thatched roofs of peasant huts, young Americans mangled and screaming in agony) gradually turned the public against the war.

Nixon got elected because he "had a plan" to end the war, while Humphrey made the mistake of identifying with Johnson's policies.

That's why war reports have been censored ever since. That's why so many Americans were able to treat the Gulf War as if it was just one big video game.

You know, the people of the former Soviet Union KNEW that they were being lied to and that their "news" was only what the government wanted them to see and hear. They knew that they had to listen to the BBC and Voice of America to find out what was really happening in their own country.

We THINK we have this wonderful free and inquiring press, but the corporate media are hand in glove with the rich and powerful who own the government, unbeknownst to most Americans, many of whom actually believe that the media have a "liberal bias."

Few of us realize that we're being lied to and that we need to look to non-mainstream and foreign reports to learn what is really going on in the world. (Living in Japan was a real eye-opener for me.)

[Blue_Tires]

35. k+r

[malaise]

36. Excellent post

K & R

[pmorlan1]

38. Bravo!

For those who choose Party over country I have NO respect for you. You are nothing but toadies who would gladly give up principle for political expediency. In my mind you're no better than Bush supporters who make excuses for torture.

[nadinbrzezinski]

47. They hold the exact same makeup

and it is a football game

[Mabus]

39. Thank you for expressing many of the thoughts that I have had

I cannot stand by and be silent either. I cannot choose a political party or a person over my own conscience.

I'm sorry I can only recommend this once.

[valerief]

40. Ah, the glorious Iran Contra Raygun years. No wonder he's a saint. Just like GWB.

:sarcasm:

Sarcasm aside, as you point out, who's to know otherwise?
:grr:

[ChiciB1]

41. I'm With Ya... All The Way!! To Those Who Want to Apologize OR

rationalize by saying our soldiers will be put in harm's way, or say it will just inflame a situation, to ALL those, remember TRUTH is what it's all about!!

I'm old enough to remember Viet Nam and some very horrible scenes on the nightly news, and it made the people of this country mad and outraged! Now, the CIA, Pentagon and whoever else have "decided" we WILL NOT be shown the TRUTH!

I see the threads here at DU and all the "EXCUSES" by so many as to why the pictures or the TRUTH shouldn't be put out there and I wonder why the comments are made! Is it because of Obama?? POOR SAD EXCUSE, and unforgivable IMHO! We are told that "only" 4000 plus of "our" soldiers have died, I wonder if even that is true... but is it a million people WE have killed in the name of DEMOCRACY just in Iraq? How many other countries can YOU count over the years???

A DEMOCRACY I don't even see here in this country!! I see MONEY thrown around to keep others silent, I see our representatives shutting up because of it, but what I don't see is THE TRUTH!!

You think Democrats are doing the work for "we the people" anymore? If you don't, then HOW LONG are YOU willing to wait to get what "we the people" are paying for!

I freely admit I'm a Liberal Pacifist, but that shouldn't be a reason to know and feel the PAIN this country has inflicted on far too many other countries in the NAME OF DEMOCRACY!!

Thanks for posting, it needed to be said, and even though you had no pictures along with it, one can only IMAGINE!! I saw horrible pictures way back when, on the front pages of magazines that stared at you and didn't go away like the TV screen. So STOP apologizing for what America has done, please!!!

[Raksha]

48. K & R - Thank you for bearing witness, Nadin.

[jeff30997]

50. "Well we have been doing this for a while"

I totally agree with your OP but just want to add that it was happening even further back

in time (I'm sure that you know about this nadinbrzezinski but it need to be told IMHO):


Torture Is News But It’s Not New

by John Pilger (May 8, 2004 article)


"When I first went to report the American war against Vietnam, in the 1960s, I visited the Saigon offices of the great American newspapers and TV companies, and the international news agencies.

I was struck by the similarity of displays on many of their office pinboards. "That’s where we hang our conscience," said an agency photographer.

There were photographs of dismembered bodies, of soldiers holding up severed ears and testicles and of the actual moments of torture. There were men and women being beaten to death, and drowned, and humiliated in stomach-turning ways. On one photograph was a stick-on balloon above the torturer’s head, which said: "That’ll teach you to talk to the press."

The question came up whenever visitors caught sight of these pictures: why had they not been published? A standard response was that newspapers would not publish them, because their readers would not accept them. And to publish them, without an explanation of the wider circumstances of the war, was to "sensationalise."

At first, I accepted the apparent logic of this; atrocities and torture by "us" were surely aberrations by definition. My education thereafter was rapid; for this rationale did not explain the growing evidence of civilians killed, maimed, made homeless and sent mad by "anti-personnel" bombs dropped on villages, schools and hospitals.

Nor did it explain the children burned to a bubbling pulp by something called napalm, or farmers hunted in helicopter "turkey shoots," or a "suspect" tortured to death with a rope around his neck, dragged behind a jeep filled with doped and laughing American soldiers."

...

Beheading, Hooding, and Water Boarding:
CIA Torture in Vietnam, Latin America, and Iraq

by Nick Gier (7-15-06)

"In 1966 the CIA launched the Phoenix Project, a program designed to destroy the South Vietnamese Communists, better known as the Viet Cong. Specially designed torture chambers were constructed in all 44 provinces and rape of women suspects, electric shock, water torture, and hanging from ceilings were standard methods during interrogations.

Of the tens of thousands of South Vietnamese detained, at least 20,000 were summarily executed. Copying a Viet Cong practice, the severed heads of those executed were frequently displayed in the villages. Even more common was collecting the ears of dead Communist troops.

The principal incentive the CIA used for arresting suspects was money, and it was said that paid informants "often lied and set-up innocent people." Many detainees at Guantanamo were turned in by Afghan bounty hunters who were paid off by coalition officers. In night raids on Iraqi homes all males were routinely detained, but only 10-15 percent, admits intelligence officer Jose Garcia, are of any intelligence value."

http://www.newwest.net/index.php/main/article/9930/


Man is a wolf to man.Sometimes I'm truly disgusted to be a human.:(

[nadinbrzezinski]

52. And why I say that to those who beleive the torture is over,

are naive in the extreme

[madmom]

51. Thank You!!!!

K&R

[QueenOfCalifornia]

56. I had to recommend your OP

Brilliantly written and sadly correct.

I believe we voted for a man who promised us transparency but when it became inconvenient and ugly he changed course and we get fed media pablum.

I believe that every, single American should see what is being done in our name no matter what kind of pain this causes because the price of what we do is too great to slap a coat of sugar on it and sell it as enhanced interrogation.

I thank you for your service and if I could, I would hug you through the internets tubes.

(edit to correct typo.)

[nadinbrzezinski]

59. I will only issue one small correction

he has done this brilliant flip flop because the national security state requires this. Read Dean's take on this. He is absolutely right... he is pacifying the national security professionals in DC... who are still suffering from white house battered wife syndrome... but Dean also pointed out, keep banging on them drums, because we are on the right side of history... and Obama knows it.

Of course when Dean published that yesterday all that came to me was Dallas 1963... I wonder why... and Clinton who also made a 180 over Iran Contra

[QueenOfCalifornia]

60. Thank you for the correction.

It makes me feel less appalled -

I still want that hug. :pals:

[nadinbrzezinski]

61. HUGS

In fact, in the fiction I am producing I will have to incorporate some of this... humans never change

[QueenOfCalifornia]

62. Is this fiction in your

games? I have seen your blog and am quite fascinated. As someone who loves computer and video gaming my hat (if I was wearing one) is off to you.

edit to include.... The books aren't bad either :)

[nadinbrzezinski]

64. Yep, Tashkent is a mild imitation of the US

well right now they are going through a pretend revolution... but the nobility is our top tier... and just as self absorbed mostly and self important.

But the national security state is real... so I guess the new rulers will need a lesson in their true power

[alfredo]

58. A kick for you

[fascisthunter]

63. powerful and honest

[democrank]

66. Thank you, nadinbrzezinski.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart. ~PEACE~

[juno jones]

68. I learned about the events in CA while reading Noam Chomsky

in the late 80's-early 90's.

Stories of children as young as two being tortured in front of their parents.

Fingernails pulled out of their hands, rapes and other things just as ghastly, just to make their parents confess to...whatever?.

Children. Babies.

Empire is a perverted sickness that will ruin us. Whether we see it or not, watch, look away, or will ourselves blind, we still wear the blood, and, like Lady Macbeth, all the perfumes of Araby aren't enough to sweeten our little hands. If America is to survive as a country and an ideal, this shit must end. Now.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

69. war is evil and we need to get out of Iraq NOW

but oddly we are still there, thanks to President Bush er I mean President Obama.

Shit, I worked for him to get elected during the primary.
Now he's doing the same stuff as Bush but just more polite.

[flying_wahini]

70. my wrenched guts thank you for your article

really.

[MasonJar]

71. There is no option. Obama wil not act on his own so it is up to us to demand.

We are the front line troops and I expect us to act accordingly.

[DemReadingDU]

73. evening kick

[Liberation Angel]

75. Remember Treblynka! Remember Abu Ghraib! Witness!

You make such an excellent point Nadin!

If the photos of Auschwitz and Dachau and the stacks of bodies piled high like cord wood and being bulldozed into ditvhes did not exist, would we really remember and UNDERSTAND the crimes of those fascists?

Witnessing means to expose the truth in all its horror so that the words

NEVER AGAIN

actually have some meaning.

Obama is FAILING to get this fully. His Bushbot leftovers have twisted his thinking, (like the stay behind Corporal Hitler in 1918 Germany who pretended to be a part of the revolution and then handed the execution lists to the fascists).

I knew we were in trouble when Obama kept Gates

I know we are in worse trouble when Cheney picks Limbaugh over Powell as the voice of the republicans (and hence the true voice of the fascists we are up against with NO pretense whatsoever)

Obama CANNOT protect the fascist status quo and claim that he is the harbinger of hope and change. Not really.

But his failure to understand the fact that JUSTICE requires fully facing the truth of our past and our history (and NOT covering it up and "move on" nuthin' to see....)

We CAN'T NOT witness.

Obama must trust us and the world to know the difference

but that can only be if he really MEANS to bring about change

and I am not convinced he really does.

Just holding my breath at this point...

[annm4peace]

76. Dish Network; Free Speech and Link TV channels

Kept us informed leading up to invasion of Iraq. Americans could be informed if they wanted to.

I have seen so many pictures, videos and audios of the horrors of war, of occupation,. So many children, so many beautiful children, elderly, mothers, fathers. sick, horrific pictures.


so many protests, so many marches, so many letters written to the editors never to be published. so many petitions, so many calls to congress people, candidates, sitting in offices. So many times laughed at, yelled at, threatened, arrested. Shunned, lost friendships. Missed time with friends and family, vacation time given to get out the vote, to protest downtown, to join protests in DC.
Missing precious time w/beloved elderly relatives, new babies in the family because preparing and participating for the next rally or protest. missing funerals with guilt of not being there for the last days.

Every friday after work on a corner with a sign, every Wednesday after work on a bridge with a sign, every Sunday morning on a freeway overpass with a banner to catch the people going to church or breakfast. standing in the 100 + heat, marching in the 3 ft of snow, standing w/sleet hitting my face.

WE TOLD THEM, WE TOLD THEM, WE TOLD THEM, WE TOLD THEM, WE TOLD THEM.

but they wouldn't listen, or didn't care.

[flyarm]

77. ahhh Nadin..thank you dearest for writing this , i know it came from your heart and soul!

how right you are..this is about who we all are, to hide the truth is to lose our moral compass...I fear many of my fellow countrymen already have..and it makes me sick to my stomach.

But there are so many who fight for truth, no matter where the fault lays.

We are supposed to have values and principles that are American ..not partisan.

I want truth..no matter how painful that may be..I want each and every person that committed torture and renditions to foreign countries for torture..held accountable..to the fullest extent of the law..they did it with my money and in my employ..and in my name..that is unacceptable to me.

No more laws broken, no more crimes in my name, no more torture, no more illegal wars of lies, no more renditions..no more hiding the lies and secret crimes..and i want the criminals held accountable!!

This nation is not dependant on win or lose..it is dependant on what is right and what is wrong.

No more party over what is right or wrong.

We all know what is right, why is it so hard to demand what is right?????????

Thank you dear Nadin..i could not agree with you more!!..we havde shared many days and night fighting for what is right..i will never stop demanding what is right and for truth..the whole truth and nothing but the truth!!

Hugs..
fly:hug: :hug:

[nadinbrzezinski]

89. hugs back

[OwnedByFerrets]

78. One of those rare post that should (but wont) get 1000 recs

[Swamp Rat]

79. k&r

[stoll]

81. I could not agree more

I just got done watching political pundits from both parties, and I have never wanted to punch the T.V. more. I find people that are stubbornly partisan from both parties, either brain dead or wind up dolls. I mean seriously, what the F@*K? Doesn't anybody debate rationally anymore. I am currently watching Bill Mahr and this chick Amy Hayes is making me want to put my head through a plate of glass. Or the other day some so called liberal political expert found 101 ways to duck the fact that the Senate Democrats voted against the American people and for Wall Street. Common sense has left the building.

[Ozymanithrax]

82. Life Magazine was once an incredible resource.

Many of the most horendous picutres published appeared in its pages. When Life magazine reaported real stories with wrenching images, other magazines also pushed the envelope. We no longer have a resource like that, except for the internet. The world changed, and not for the better.

[mia]

87. I couldn't agree more.

I grew up looking at Life Magazine.

[bertman]

83. Excellent post, Nadin. Recommend. We have been shielded from the photographic

evidence of our complicity. By design.

[mod mom]

84. I hear you 100%. Principles over Party! rec'd

[TBF]

85. Outstanding post.

I have a father who came back disabled from VietNam, but was in the Navy so it was handling hazardous chemicals. It's all in his records, of course. He's been on a military pension for over 25 yrs now as they use him as a guinea pig for various health-related experiments at the VA hospital. Two of my uncles were also in at the same time - early 1960's. One uncle had bouts with malaria but did survive. The other was in better physical condition but couldn't handle what he had been forced to do in the name of our country. Both were MP's, both were on orders to shoot women & children - and did. The second uncle eventually drank himself to death and died under a bridge in his 40's. I think of him often. My dad always said he was a really good guy in high school, just couldn't take what the military did to him. I am in touch with my cousins who are his sons. Both have had a rocky path, in and out of prison on drug charges.

My dad and these uncles were all small town guys just doing what they thought they were supposed to do for their country. My dad begged his parents to let him enlist at 17, just as he finished high school, because he wanted to go in the Navy rather than risk being drafted by the Army or Marines.

I know what they encountered way back in the 60's and I would hazard a guess that not much has changed since that time - except our government's willingness to cover it up even more.

[nadinbrzezinski]

88. Thank you folks I had the feeling that posting this

would not be too popular... though this is not about being popular

On the bright side, we see more drip, drip, drip

So perhaps I will be forced to eat my words and we will see some prosecution, though not holding my breath on that.

[Liberation Angel]

91. Hi Nadin

I am relatively new here

and just wanted to express my interest and gratitude for your writings and perspective.

I wanted to send you a private message but don't have enough posts yet.

Very few have the kind of background that you do to provide such a valuable perspective.

I have experience in both Holocaust research issues and a background in research on fascism in Latin America so your input is especially valuable to me.

[nadinbrzezinski]

92. Fellow historian here

I even considered doing holocaust studies for my MA... but chickened out as it was too close to the vein as it were.

I ended up doing Mexican History of the Enlightenment...

Of course nobody is hiring, so these days I write fiction. Once you got enough posts, send a PM and I will send you an PM sure no problem.

No problem helping to get some of the research that needs doing done. Suffice it to say I heard some stories from the medics who went to that wonderful place called Tlatelolco in 1968, of course when you are 18 young and dumb they are just ahem stories.

And for the record I wish I could get dad to speak... but he won't beyond a few details...

[Liberation Angel]

96. Was your Dad in a camp?

I know from working with many survivors that it is VERY difficult for many to talk about.

But it sometimes helps to get those details to reinforce the idea that never again will humanity be so dehumanized

and so that we can learn how to prevent such things in the future (but you know that already).

Many of the refugees went to Mexico btw

I have close connections to folks who worked in the resistance and in rescue and refugee smuggling ops in Europe.

I have looked at your blog and game/rpg sites and have a lot of interest (my son's an avid gamer at age 14).

But I am also working on a screenplay and found your reference to free software (CELTX) in the writing group here very helpful.

I do not know how many posts I need to PM and even tried to sign on the blog site you have, but to no avail (I got a blog but no access to post at your blog for some reason)

and I am so broke I can't donate right now to get access to the writer's group here. Oh well. One day soon hopefully.

More later.

LA

[nadinbrzezinski]

97. No, he was hidden by a polish family

recently his friend was entered to the list of the righteous at Yad Vashem.

As to the resistance, yep interesting things, and I know many went to mexico partly because the US did close her borders.

[Liberation Angel]

98. Amazing story

many amazing stories.

I actually worked on an exhibit at Yad Vashem involving rescuers and visited there.

I got to meet Jan Karski and a number of heroes of that period.

We have much to share, I think.

Thanks for getting back to me.

In many ways the parallels to the perps and their methods are too numerous to count.

[nadinbrzezinski]

99. Why I cannot cheer on with the partisans

it was partisans, aka those who remained silent, that allowed that horror to happen. And it is happening again.

[Liberation Angel]

100. It never stopped

That is the gravely serious tragedy of all this...

I understand that Obama is a very smart human being

and that he may in fact have an agenda which is honestly about change

However, the appearances on the surface from the vantage point of THIS long term activist (in an intergenerational struggle against fascism) are that Obama is ultimately enabling the continuation of fascist empire by failing to aggressively purge the criminals from the government and the military and the intelligenc services and the financial system (the corporofascist system).

Whether in fact he is trying to make steps to seriously dismantle this system as he promised during his campaign (or at least SEEMED to promise - and I heard him speak live and was convinced that he was NOT an enabler and an insider in the Bush criminal empire--- Obama is NOT taking down the machinery and operations of fascism, racism, genocide and crimes against humanity set up in the past by serious forces for evil.

This horror never really stopped. It has been accelerating.

It was only slowed down with the "defeat" of Germany in 1946 (yet the Nazi apparatus had already for years been translocated to latin America and was barely impaired by the "loss" of Germany.

If Obama fails to grasp that then we are all in serious danger of the continuation of a fascist enterprise which will only continue to accelerate the deterioration of the global quality of life, liberty and happiness.

Obama needs to dismantle it, not protect it.

[nadinbrzezinski]

101. Well this is not fascism in the german sense

it is EMPIRE pure and simple

And both my BIL and I said as we cast our votes, does not matter WHO takes over the white house... it will go on until the Empire goes away

It is showing sings, that it may just fall apart on us, and like the USSR I don't expect the country to survive, for the same exact reasons, actually.

But what is, though it does share elements with that ideology, is purely Empire, and the chain for this goes all the way to Rome, not Germany, but ROME.

That is why when he promised I went, that's a funny. Yes, I am overtly cynical I think. Or perhaps a realist. And it has little to do with him as a person. Dean actually explained it very well the other day at Find Law... Well you see he needs to pacify the National Security State, which goes back to 1945.. (and all that came to mind was November of 1963)... but that we need to keep pounding on them drums because we are right, and he knows it. Of course the latter was... ok you got more faith than I do Mr. Dean, but sure I will keep drumming on.

[Liberation Angel]

104. I look at it somewhat differently

Not much differently though really

The fact that the German Third Reich was designed on Wall Street and in the ivory towers of Harvard and Yale and Princeton and that Hitler was propped up and his antiSemitic fascist policies supported whole hog by the likes of the Bushes and Rockefellers et al leads me to conclude that the "national Security State" is really just a euphemism for the Fourth Reich, which is the direct successor in interest to the Third Reich.

The fascist policies of Rome and of empires is indeed a methodology going back millenia, but its current incarnation is, to my mind, personally linked to entities and individuals who have been able to gain control BECAUSE they were not prosecuted and disabled at the end of WWII. And, yes, 1963 was their doing as well: it eliminated the most effective opposition to it through assassination policies and programs which have continued up to the present day under Bush, Cheney et al..

While empire is itself fascistic in its normal incarnations, there is a distinction between truly evil fascist idealogies of Aryan supremacy and antiSemitism and the general rules of empire (which is simply might makes right as opposed to "we have the right because we are "racially' superior to you and you are subhuman").

In Latin America as in Germany (and Africa and Asia), the doctrine of a "master race" justifying the mass murder of inferior "subhumans" for Empire and enslavement and exploitation is the operating principle. That is something, I believe, to be distinct and far worse than the simple conquest of empires (which often allowed and incorporated peoples and territories and cultures into their empire rather than utilizing mass extermination of whole peoples and cultures - though mass murder and genocide were often employed - especially in modern colonial eras which were the forerunners to Nazi Germany and its idealogy pertaining to Jews and Slavs and Roma)

That is why it is so disturbing to me that Obama could NOT see these trends and principles operating all around him and that he could simply justify his "practicality" in not dismantling it (the current incarnation of empire as a fascist and supremacist reich) because he is an avowed capitalist "just trying to make the markets work" and protecting us from the evil of terrorists who want to destroy us and our way of life.

Was it Curtis Mayfield who called these elites "educated fools from uneducated schools".

The ivy league imprimatur on Obama and that elitism in the service of true fascist and supremacist empire is what worries me.

I am not holding my breath either, but I do think it is critically important to understand the playing field if we are to PUSH Obama to rid the world of fascist empire whose architects are rotting out the foundations of American democracy and who remain near Obama in the halls of power..

[kath]

90. Another excellent post, Nadin.

Highly rec.

[timtom]

95. What a magnificent post.

Thank you, nadinbrzezinski.

[gtar100]

107. Leaders count on short memories and the desire *not* to know the truth

My hope for this world is the flip side of how much money we spend on war. Who could possibly do these things except psychopaths? And they continue to get away with it. Makes me sick.

[Global Concerns]

108. Media Manipulation, Mass Amnesia, or Both?

Great post, Nadin! It was dead on target. I couldn't have said it better myself. It is truly amazing how short-lived most people's memories are in this country. Perhaps, it's because they have had so little, if anything, to remember themselves when it comes to the matter of atrocities, especially those who have never ventured beyond our borders nor have experienced or witnessed the atrocities carried out in our name.

Regarding that one incident you mentioned, the one involving the tank that ran over an Iraq civilian and continued on its way, I do distinctly remember seeing that footage and was horrified by it, as I was by many other videos and photos that I have viewed via the internet. But it seems that those images have already been wiped from the minds of those who saw them and have disappeared from view insofar as the media and our administration is concerned.

How well I also remember the murder of those nuns in Latin America by the very people who were being trained and supported by our own government, one of whom was a young novice who was only nineteen and, like the others, was there to help the poor. I also recall other specific acts of torture that were carried out by military dictatorships under the guidance of US "advisors."

What are these pictures of torture that Obama is not allowing us to see? Pictures that he claims are not sensational. If they are not sensational, then why should they upset people any more than the others that were flashed all over television and the internet in the earliest days of the war on Iraq?

As you so well indicate in your post, the torture which only now shocks so many people in this country and which our government denies it ever engaged in is nothing new. The only difference is that we no longer solely count on other governments to do our dirty work for us. Instead, we send our troops and operatives into other countries with a new mission; namely, to carry it out themselves. If a stop is not put to these atrocities, it is merely a matter of time before we ourselves become victims. And, like Nadin said, this is not a matter of partisanship. Torture is a matter that threatens us all.

[nadinbrzezinski]

109. Welcome to DU by the way

and the nuns were the tip of the damn iceberg

:hi: