In a new book based primarily on government documents released under FOIA law, two American Civil Liberties Union attorneys reveal many disgusting facts not known before by the public. The Book " Administration of Torture" comes from over 100,000 documents. The documents disclose not only torture but many deaths never publically reported.

"The documents show unambiguously that the administration has adopted some of the methods of the most tyrannical regimes," write Jameel Jaffer and Amrit Singh. "Documents from Guantanamo describe prisoners shackled in excruciating 'stress positions,' held in freezing-cold cells, forcibly stripped, hooded, terrorized with military dogs, and deprived of human contact for months."

Please notice this says Guantanamo, not Abu Ghraib. We have ALWAYS been told this was never done at Gitmo.

I'm not sure how I am going to spent this bonus of income. The nnews is now public so I except all the people I know calling hoping to get a piece. How big a increase will I be getting to offset the rising prices of gas, energy, food, medicines, medical costs, and every freaking thing else that has gone up by 30 or 40% in the last yr? Would you believe I'm going to the get whopping amount of $24.00 ?

The typical retiree will face the challenge of using the extra $24 to cover higher costs for everything from gasoline and food to medical care.

What will that $24.00 pay for ? 1/3 of a tank of gas allowing me to go appox 100 miles. It could be used to pay for a 1/7 of my month prescriptions, or 8lbs of hamburger. It will pay 1/33 of my monthly rent, but only for one month. Such extravagance is unheard of in this day and age of supporting the entire country 0f Iraq. I sure hope they can share it.http://hosted.ap.org/...

I had just read this story when I switched over to the NYTimes and it was there also. It appears that rather than lose our top soldiers to Blackwater and their ilk, we have been paying out some damn hefty bonus.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Pentagon has paid more than $100 million in bonuses to veteran Green Berets and Navy SEALs, reversing the flow of top commandos to the corporate world where security companies such as Blackwater USA are offering big salaries...

Overall, more than 1,200 of the military's most specialized personnel near or already eligible for retirement have opted for payments of up to $150,000 in return for staying in uniform several more years.  Military offers millions in bonuses to retain elite commandos

I have the breakdown on the flip.

Rep. Henry Waxman is hot on the trail of more fraud surrounding the US Embassy in Iraq. He has obtained documents showing not only fraud, but bribery and some of the shoddiest building practices I have never seen and I was in the construction field for over 20 yrs. While Waxman didn't come right out and say it, he seems to feel members of the State Dept. also may have committed perjury before his committee. That is a hell of a lot to cram in my first paragraph, and you will need to read the entire letter he sent to Rice to understand it all.

I could post the entire letter but it would take up way too much space. I will quote a few important points and send you over to read all the nasty details. I will only post one quote before the break because it says so much, then if you are interested follow after the break.

● "[T]he entire installation is not acceptable."

Anyone who listens to CSpan, Fox, or any number of talk shows that allow call-ins know by now what a hot button Sandy Berger is for those on the right. For years now the Right has used Berger as a propaganda issue against the Clintons and the Left.

The News that Hillary taken on Berger to do what he used to do for the Kerry campaign before he was fired over the scandal is going to do more to outrage the Rights base than any other thing she could of done.(The facts about if Sandy if has been hired or is working unpaid and informally are in question, fyi)

WASHINGTON (Map, News) - Sandy Berger, who stole highly classified terrorism documents from the National Archives, destroyed them and lied to investigators, is now an adviser to presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton. Berger, who was fired from John Kerry’s presidential campaign when the scandal broke in 2004, has assumed a similar role in Clinton’s campaign, even though his security clearance has been suspended until September 2008. This is raising eyebrows even among Clinton’s admirers

While some of those from our Progressive Caucus in the House have plans to try and stop Immunity, it appears Dems in the Senate have other plans. 4 plans to be exact. They are floating 4 different ideas, but the problem is the Telecoms walk away scot-free in every one of them.

Four possibilities are being discussed, said a Senate aide familiar with the discussions. The broadest would be blanket immunity, which would immunize anyone, including government officials, who had anything to do with any surveillance program. That is the approach the government favors and is strongly opposed by civil liberties advocates.

The second is targeted immunity, in which companies that can prove they were acting in good faith would be granted immunity from prosecution. The third is substitution, in which the government would replace the defendant in the lawsuit. Finally, there is indemnification. The cases would proceed through the court system, and if there were financial penalties, the government would assume them, the aide said.

One of the snipers charged with placing "bait" out to draw Iraqis into their killzone is quoted as saying

"If you've never been outside the wire, you really have no basis -- you don't have a basis to judge what I do or what I don't do. You've never been in a life-or-death situation, where you've had to count on the guy to your left and right,"Hand said.

"People who stay back here, in my opinion, are not mentally in the game. They've never been out there."

The problem is what happens "outside the wire" has become a freezone. Free from accountability for anything a Soldier does. We have seen over and over when brought up on charges for things like murder and rape, the punishment is a slap on the wrist if that. There is too pat a pattern not to believe the same thing that is happening in Washington, is happening in Iraq.

After Comey, after Goldsmith rescinded the Bybee Memo on Torture, after Congress passed laws barring torture, and many more denials by Bush, yet another secret opinion was written saying torture was ok, even when done to the extreme.

But soon after Alberto R. Gonzales’s arrival as attorney general in February 2005, the Justice Department issued another opinion, this one in secret. It was a very different document, according to officials briefed on it, an expansive endorsement of the harshest interrogation techniques ever used by the Central Intelligence Agency.

The new opinion, the officials said, for the first time provided explicit authorization to barrage terror suspects with a combination of painful physical and psychological tactics, including head-slapping, simulated drowning and frigid temperatures.

http://www.nytimes.com/...

David Ignatius has a OpEd in the Washington Post about finding the middle ground when it comes to giving up our civil rights for safety from Terrorists. I found it deeply disturbing in tone. The reasoning alone that we should give up any Civil Rights is wrong to me. We have given up too much over the last 50 yrs or so already. This is what is being done way too often in the name of fear. When you read the numbers released over the last couple days that 100,000 Americans are killed a yr, and not a one by a foreign terrorist, it make me wonder why we are even having this debate. That is the basics of where I look at this from.

David starts the piece with a simple statement we can all agree with, it is also the setup. The sentence is, "When a nation can't solve the problems that concern its citizens, it's in trouble." We all know this country is in some deep trouble and GW Bush is responsible for most of it.
The interesting part of this piece is what David lets out that I had never heard before, but maybe you have. It's about the deal being made by the DC Elites behind closed doors. More on the flip.

Before anyone goes off on me for posting some CT crap, please read the whole story. While it is true some other sites have been following this story and have made claims, I waited until McClatchy and Yahoo News ran the story to write about it. Two reputable News Sites. First the basics.

MEXICO CITY — U.S. authorities are assisting the Mexican government in the investigation of an American business jet that crashed near Cancun this week with four tons of cocaine on board, officials said Thursday....

Some news reports have linked the plane to the transport of terrorist suspects to the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, but those reports cite logs that indicate only that the plane flew twice between Washington, D.C., and Guantanamo and once between Oxford, Conn., and Guantanamo. No terrorist suspects are known to have been transferred to Guantanamo directly from the United States.

The jet, carrying the tail number N987SA, changed hands twice in recent weeks. But how it ended up in the hands of suspected drug traffickers remains a mystery. Who owned drug plane that crashed in Mexico?

Does this get your attention ?

 The AP is reporting they have been told that it took 9 hours to set up a tap on those insurgents they think kidnapped 3 of our Soldiers last Spring. A Unnamed source. It's a good spin as they go, but watch how many people buy this one. If you think the Patraeous Report kept us in Iraq, then you will see this save the Telcos and the Warrantless Wiretaps.Call me cynical.

Last spring, with insurgents apparently holding three American soldiers in Iraq, it took the U.S. government more than nine hours to begin emergency surveillance of some of the kidnappers' electronic communications.

The bulk of that time was spent on internal legal deliberations by Bush administration lawyers and intelligence officials,

Can you feel it coming ? Bendover anyone who thought we might of stopped the madness, here it comes.

It appears the Sunni's in Iraq have decided they like Gen. Petreaous's tactic. So much so they have adopted it. Just to make sure no one misses their change they have what Tahseen al-Sheikhly, from the Minister of Interior says is a message.

"The main reason behind all these attacks are the signs of improvement of the security situation mentioned in the Crocker-Petraeus report," said Tahseen al-Sheikhly, the Iraqi spokesman for the security plan, in a reference to the recent Congressional testimony of General Petraeus and the American ambassador to Iraq, Ryan C. Crocker. "The terrorist groups are just trying to say to the world that the (Petreaous) report did not reflect the reality of the security situation in Iraq."

How they delivered this message is being seen out front as the title of the WaPo makes clear. Sunni Insurgents in New Campaign to Kill Officials

Imagine for second going into any poor neighborhood with high unemployment in the USA and placing a Twenty Dollar Bill on the ground for all to see. Next imagine it's legal to shoot anyone that bends over to pick up that Twenty. Does that idea shock your civilized mind like it did mine ? That is basicly what goes on in Iraq every day. This behavior even has it's own name, it's known as "Baiting", similar to chumming the water when fishing.

A Pentagon group has encouraged some U.S. military snipers in Iraq to target suspected insurgents by scattering pieces of "bait," such as detonation cords, plastic explosives and ammunition, and then killing Iraqis who pick up the items, according to military court documents.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/...

I am beginning to believe to we have been had again. Mukasey, when his name was announced and all the hype about how independent he would be had that sound of " Too good to be true", and brought to mind that saying of "Buyer Beware".

Slowly the truths about him are seeping out and we should take heed to what is being said. Michael Isikoff has a very short article out about some of this info.

According to three sources, who asked not to be named discussing the private meetings, Mukasey said that he saw "significant problems" with shutting down Guantánamo Bay and that he understood the need for the CIA to use some "enhanced" interrogation techniques against Qaeda suspects

 I am a chronic pain sufferer and I sit with tears of joy over this news. No one, absolutely no one should have to be in constant, overwhelmning, debilitating pain in our country when there are ways to grant relief to them. Finding a Dr. who is not scared of losing their license is damn near impossible in the political climate we live in. One of the most damning cases in recent history is the case of Richard Paey. This pardon is a major victory for chronic sufferers across our nation.

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - A disabled former attorney who said he needed large amounts of drugs to numb his pain was released from prison Thursday after the governor and the rest of the state clemency board pardoned his drug trafficking charges.

Richard Paey, 48, learned Thursday he’d be released after four years. He expected to die in jail, and credited Gov. Charlie Crist and national advocacy groups with helping free him.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/...

Live Blogging

Hearing Notification
Hearing on Warrantless Surveillance and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act: The Role of Checks and Balances in Protecting Americans’ Privacy Rights (Part II)

Witnesses
The Honorable Mike McConnell
Director of National Intelligence
The Honorable Kenneth Wainstein
Assistant Attorney General for National Security United States Department of Justice
Hearing can be viewed by live streaming at Cspan3 http://www.c-span.org/...
Please DO NOT Recommend  Diary - Please Recommend the Mothership

 House link is current Cspan is on delay http://judiciary.house.gov/...  

A few weeks ago Paul Bremer, weaselly Neocon, wrote a OpEd/Excuse piece in regards to Iraq Armys demise. Gen. Pace said they just faded into the background, the word he used was "Dissolved" when I saw him on CSpan today and it hit me, Bremer had used the same word. Now we have this.

Charles Ferguson, a filmmaker ( No End In Sight ), presents a rebuttal to claims made by L. Paul Bremer III that top American officials approved the decision to disband the Iraqi army. ( rebuttal is a bit mild )

 Paul Bremer says that he spoke with everyone in the chain of command including General Abizaid, Rumsfeld, Feith, Walter Slocombe, Waterbroad Willie Haynes, Gen. Tommy Franks and Jay Garner, the coalition’s top civil administrator at the time. Bremer also said "I then alerted the president that "I will parallel this step with an even more robust measure dissolving Saddam’s military and intelligence structures." There are a few problems about all this as the Video will show you.

 I just found out the General Petraeus is a ambitious man that wants to be president. If the story is true he cannot afford to lose in Iraq. Not even the Right would vote for the General that will be blamed for losing his War in Iraq. ( Or would they ?)

The US commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, expressed long-term interest in running for the US presidency when he was stationed in Baghdad, according to a senior Iraqi official who knew him at that time.

Sabah Khadim, then a senior adviser at Iraq's Interior Ministry, says General Petraeus discussed with him his ambition when the general was head of training and recruitment of the Iraqi army in 2004-05.

"I asked him if he was planning to run in 2008 and he said, 'No, that would be too soon'," Mr Khadim, who now lives in London, said. Independent