Pages tagged bush:

Mirror, Mirror on the Wall - Errol Morris Blog - NYTimes.com
http://morris.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/mirror-mirror-on-the-wall/?hp

Final Presidential photos of Bush. HAGKYD
Errol Morris spricht mit Agenturjournalisten über Bush-Fotos
The traveling pool of press photographers that follows presidents includes representatives from three wire services — AP (The Associated Press), AFP (Agence France-Presse) and Thomson Reuters. During the last week of the Bush administration, I asked the head photo editors of these news services — Vincent Amalvy (AFP), Santiago Lyon (AP) and Jim Bourg (Reuters) — to pick the photographs of the president that they believe captured the character of the man and of his administration. There are overlapping pictures — of the president with a bullhorn at Ground Zero, of the president looking out the window of Air Force One over New Orleans, of the president receiving the news on the morning of 9/11. It is interesting that these pictures are different. They may be of the same scene, but they have different content. They speak in a different way. (The photos are reproduced here with their original captions, unedited.)
Errol Morris writes, "The traveling pool of press photographers that follows presidents includes representatives from three wire services -- AP (The Associated Press), AFP (Agence France-Presse) and Thomson Reuters. During the last week of the Bush administration, I asked the head photo editors of these news services -- Vincent Amalvy (AFP), Santiago Lyon (AP) and Jim Bourg (Reuters) -- to pick the photographs of the president that they believe captured the character of the man and of his administration. There are overlapping pictures -- of the president with a bullhorn at Ground Zero, of the president looking out the window of Air Force One over New Orleans, of the president receiving the news on the morning of 9/11. It is interesting that these pictures are different. They may be of the same scene, but they have different content. They speak in a different way."
Mirror, Mirror on the Wall - Errol Morris Blog - NYTimes.com
http://morris.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/mirror-mirror-on-the-wall/
Photographs of George W. Bush and what their meaning to Errol Morris and other photojournalists.
photos of George Bush
Iconic pictures of Bush from various photographers framed differently
11tqy52.jpg (JPEG Image, 1007x242 pixels)
http://i40.tinypic.com/11tqy52.jpg
de Bush a Obama xd
The resemblance between Bush and Obama is uncanny... The middle picture, which is coincidentally the average between the two, happens to be the best-looking IMO.
George W. Bush -> Barack H. Obama
I'm Still Tortured by What I Saw in Iraq - washingtonpost.com
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/28/AR2008112802242.html?hpid=opinionsbox1
via rodcorp
On the problems of torture and benefits of simple detective investigation: "We got to know our enemies, we learned to negotiate with them, and we adapted criminal investigative techniques to our work [...] 'I decided that everything I was told about Americans was wrong. That's why I decided to cooperate.' [...] I learned in Iraq that the No. 1 reason foreign fighters flocked there to fight were the abuses carried out at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo"
I learned in Iraq that the No. 1 reason foreign fighters flocked there to fight were the abuses carried out at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. Our policy of torture was directly and swiftly recruiting fighters for al-Qaeda in Iraq. The large majority of suicide bombings in Iraq are still carried out by these foreigners. They are also involved in most of the attacks on U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq. It's no exaggeration to say that at least half of our losses and casualties in that country have come at the hands of foreigners who joined the fray because of our program of detainee abuse. The number of U.S. soldiers who have died because of our torture policy will never be definitively known, but it is fair to say that it is close to the number of lives lost on Sept. 11, 2001. How anyone can say that torture keeps Americans safe is beyond me -- unless you don't count American soldiers as Americans.
"I learned in Iraq that the No. 1 reason foreign fighters flocked there to fight were the abuses carried out at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. Our policy of torture was directly and swiftly recruiting fighters for al-Qaeda in Iraq.The large majority of suicide bombings in Iraq are still carried out by these foreigners. "
How could anyone deny the opinions of someone one the ground ... especially someone on the ground who was successful.
Until we renounce the sorts of abuses that have stained our national honor, al-Qaeda will be winning.
Interrogator reveals practical reasons why torture was not just wrong in principle, but counterproductive in practice.
bush-map.gif (GIF Image, 1500x818 pixels)
http://www.theatlantic.com/images/issues/200901/bush-map.gif
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US Torture: Voices from the Black Sites - The New York Review of Books
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/22530
An article by Mark Danner from The New York Review of Books, April 9, 2009
We think time and elections will cleanse our fallen world but they will not.
Mark Danner obtains Red Cross report on CIA Black Sites - US behavior toward detainees = "torture"
Mark Danner obtains confidential ICRC report on CIA torture.
the toread tag is becoming more aspirational all the time
American Civil Liberties Union : Office of Legal Counsel Memos : Bush Administration Torture Memos : Bradbury Memos, Bybee Memo
http://www.aclu.org/safefree/general/olc_memos.html
read the actual torture memos
Torture memos 1
Top secret documents released by ACLU proving the US torutred
AND HE SHALL BE JUDGED: GQ Features on men.style.com
http://men.style.com/gq/features/landing?id=content_9217
on the morning of Thursday, April 10, 2003, Donald Rumsfeld’s Pentagon prepared a top-secret briefing for George W. Bush. This document, known as the Worldwide Intelligence Update, was a daily digest of critical military intelligence so classified that it circulated among only a handful of Pentagon leaders and the president; Rumsfeld himself often delivered it, by hand, to the White House. The briefing’s cover sheet generally featured triumphant, color images from the previous days’ war efforts: On this particular morning, it showed the statue of Saddam Hussein being pulled down in Firdos Square, a grateful Iraqi child kissing an American soldier, and jubilant crowds thronging the streets of newly liberated Baghdad. And above these images, and just below the headline secretary of defense, was a quote that may have raised some eyebrows. It came from the Bible, from the book of Psalms: “Behold, the eye of the Lord is on those who fear Him…To deliver their soul from death.” This mixing o
Nice overview of Donald Rumsfeld.
donald rumsfeld
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"Former defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld has always answered his detractors by claiming that history will one day judge him kindly. But as he waits for that day, a new group of critics—his administration peers—are suddenly speaking out for the first time. What they’re saying? It isn’t pretty"
Excellent profile of Donald Rumsfeld, who, it turns out, pandered to Bush's religiosity by including old testament citations on his defense intelligence reports from Iraq. Yikes.
Former defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld has always answered his detractors by claiming that history will one day judge him kindly. But as he waits for that day, a new group of critics—his administration peers—are suddenly speaking out for the first time. What they’re saying? It isn’t pretty
GQ Articles, Pics, and More on men.style.com
http://www.men.style.com/gq/features/topsecret
Crusading cover sheets from March & April, 2003
The Official George W. Bush Presidential Librarium
http://www.goodnightbush.com/librarium/
Hilarious!!!
Worth a look
MinnPost - Investigative reporter Seymour Hersh describes 'executive assassination ring'
http://www.minnpost.com/ericblackblog/2009/03/11/7310/investigative_reporter_seymour_hersh_describes_executive_assassination_ring
Council for Secular Humanism
http://www.secularhumanism.org/index.php?section=library&page=haught_29_5
Incredibly, President George W. Bush told French President Jacques Chirac in early 2003 that Iraq must be invaded to thwart Gog and Magog, the Bible’s satanic agents of the Apocalypse. Honest. This isn’t a joke. The president of the United States, in a top-secret phone call to a major European ally, asked for French troops to join American soldiers in attacking Iraq as a mission from God.
Incredibly, President George W. Bush told French President Jacques Chirac in early 2003 that Iraq must be invaded to thwart Gog and Magog, the Bible’s satanic agents of the Apocalypse.
A French Revelation, or The Burning Bush
"Honest. This isn’t a joke. The president of the United States, in a top-secret phone call to a major European ally, asked for French troops to join American soldiers in attacking Iraq as a mission from God."
Now out of office, Chirac recounts that the American leader appealed to their “common faith” (Christianity) and told him: “Gog and Magog are at work in the Middle East…. The biblical prophecies are being fulfilled…. This confrontation is willed by God, who wants to use this conflict to erase his people’s enemies before a New Age begins.
Si Vous le Répétez, Je Démentirai
What every American should be made to learn about the IG Torture Report - Glenn Greenwald - Salon.com
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/08/24/ig_report/
I wrote earlier today about Holder's decision to "review" whether criminal prosecutions are warranted in connection with the torture of Terrorism suspects -- that can be read here -- but I want to write separately about the release today of the 2004 CIA's Inspector General Report (.pdf), both because it's extraordinary in its own right and because it underscores how unjust it would be to prosecute only low-level interrogators rather than the high-level officials who implemented the torture regime. Initially, it should be emphasized that yet again, it is not the Congress or the establishment media which is uncovering these abuses and forcing disclosure of government misconduct. Rather, it is the ACLU (with which I consult) that, along with other human rights organizations, has had to fill the void left by those failed institutions, using their own funds to pursue litigation to compel disclosure. Without their efforts, we would know vastly less than we know now about the crimes
The Report highlights how depraved were the interrogation practices - and how unjust it is to immunize U.S. leaders.
The Report highlights how depraved were the interrogation practices - and how unjust it is to immunize U.S. leaders
The GOP's Misplaced Rage - The Daily Beast
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-08-12/the-gops-misplaced-rage/full/
Conservative protesters should remember that the recession, which led to so many of the policies they oppose, is almost entirely the result of Bush’s policies. According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, the recession began in December 2007—long before Obama was even nominated. And the previous recession ended in November 2001, so the current recession cannot be blamed on cyclical forces that Bush inherited.
HOORAY!
The Guantánamo “Suicides”: A Camp Delta sergeant blows the whistle—By Scott Horton (Harper's Magazine)
http://www.harpers.org/archive/2010/01/hbc-90006368
Scott Horton (Harper's Magazine)
1. “Asymmetrical Warfare”-- When President Barack Obama took office last year, he promised to “restore the standards of due process and the core constitutional values that have made this country great.” Toward that end, the president issued an executive order declaring that the extra-constitutional prison camp at Guantánamo Naval Base “shall be closed as soon as practicable, and no later than one year from the date of this order.” Obama has failed to fulfill his promise.
On June 9th, 2006, [Aamer] was beaten for two and a half hours straight. Seven naval military police participated in his beating. Mr. Aamer stated he had refused to provide a retina scan and fingerprints. He reported to me that he was strapped to a chair, fully restrained at the head, arms and legs. The MPs inflicted so much pain, Mr. Aamer said he thought he was going to die. The MPs pressed on pressure points all over his body: his temples, just under his jawline, in the hollow beneath his ears. They choked him. They bent his nose repeatedly so hard to the side he thought it would break. They pinched his thighs and feet constantly. They gouged his eyes. They held his eyes open and shined a mag-lite in them for minutes on end, generating intense heat. They bent his fingers until he screamed. When he screamed, they cut off his airway, then put a mask on him so he could not cry out.
Sock and Awe!
http://play.sockandawe.com/
Throw the shoe at George Bush - see how many times you can hit him!
Sent by Cousin Bill after the Iraq journalist sheo throwing incident in 12/08
The Raw Story | Whistleblower: NSA spied on everyone, targeted journalists
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Whistleblower_Bushs_NSA_targeted_reporters_0121.html
Former National Security Agency analyst Russell Tice, who helped expose the NSA's warrantless wiretapping in December 2005, has now come forward with even more startling allegations. Tice told MSNBC's Keith Olbermann on Wednesday that the programs that spied on Americans were not only much broader than previously acknowledged but specifically targeted journalists.
Article was updated. One time there were military helicopters that were hovering directly over me and Kenneth's apartments in Bowling Green. I went to tell Francis Gardler what had just happened to me and he just dismissed me as paranoid and crazy. Of course, military helicopters really did hover directly over our apartments. That's about the time that I started losing respect for Gardler.
Whether you were in Kansas and you never made foreign communications at all. They monitored all communications: says Whistleblower Russell Tice
Making Light: The true history of the Bush years
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/010952.html#010952
in hyperlinks
all articles from "the onion" relating to bush & bush administration.
In a Herculean feat of linkage, Teresa Nielsen Hayden offers us the Bush years through the watering eyes of Onion readers. As she says "Other histories of the Bush years will doubtless be more factual, but none will ever be truer."
The 13 people who made torture possible | Salon News
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2009/05/18/torture/
The Bush administration's Torture 13. They authorized it, they decided how to implement it, and they crafted the legal fig leaf to justify it. (...) Some of the 13 manipulated the federal bureaucracy and the legal process to "preauthorize" torture in the days after 9/11. Others helped implement torture, and still others helped write the memos that provided the Bush administration with a legal fig leaf after torture had already begun.
"The Bush administration's Torture 13. They authorized it, they decided how to implement it, and they crafted the legal fig leaf to justify it."
RT @HoneyBearKelly The 13 people who made torture possible. http://tinyurl.com/pxqurs Marcy Wheeler is doing such a great job. [from http://twitter.com/thejoshuablog/statuses/1860684718]
Testimony of Spc. Brandon Neely — The Center for the Study of Human Rights in the Americas (CSHRA)
http://humanrights.ucdavis.edu/projects/the-guantanamo-testimonials-project/testimonies/testimonies-of-military-guards/testimony-of-brandon-neely
A couple days later I found out from a detainee who was on that block that the older detainee was just scared and that when we placed him on his knees he thought he was going to be executed. He then went on to tell me that this man had seen some of his friends and family members executed on their knees. I can remember guys coming up to me after it was over that night and said "Man, that was a good job; you got you some". .......... Former President George Bush and Former Vice President Dick Cheney will never be held accountable for the decisions they made. It's the detainees and the guards like myself that will have to live every day with what they went through, saw, and did while there.
On December 4, 2008, Specialist Brandon Neely approached CSHRA with testimony he wished to contribute to the Guantánamo Testimonials Project. He believed that insufficient attention had been paid to "the hell that went on at Camp X-Ray." He would be in a position to know, as he arrived in Guantánamo while the cages of Camp X-Ray were still being welded, and escorted the second detainee to hit the prison grounds. In this interview, Specialist Neely provides testimony of the arrival of the detainees in full sensory-deprivation garb, sexual abuse by medical personnel, torture by other medical personnel, brutal beatings out of frustration, fear, and retribution, the first hunger strike and its causes, torturous shackling, positional torture, interference with religious practices and beliefs, verbal abuse, restriction of recreation, the behavior of mentally ill detainees, possible isolation regime of the first six children in GTMO, utter lack of preparation for guarding individuals detained
testimony of guard at GTMO
The bus doors opened, the escort teams were lined up right next to the bus to take the detainees off the bus and put them in the holding area. You could hear the Marines screaming at them "Shut the fuck up! You're property of the United States of America now."
And what about minimal force? SOPs say IRFings have to use the minimal amount of force necessary. And guards' reports that have been released say they were conducted in this way as well. On the other hand, you say that the Number 1 Man of the IRF team had to "hit the detainee as hard as he could with the shield". That does not seem consistent with minimal force… All I can say to this question is I am sure a lot really has changed in the way the day-to-day activities take place. Especially with regards to IRFing. But at Camp X-Ray, especially before ICRC (or International Committee of the Red Cross%2
Former Gitmo Guard Tells All—By Scott Horton (Harper's Magazine)
http://www.harpers.org/archive/2009/02/hbc-90004409
He describes body searches undertaken for no legitimate security purpose, simply to sexually invade and humiliate the prisoners. This was a standardized Bush Administration tactic–the importance of which became apparent to me when I participated in some Capitol Hill negotiations with White House representatives relating to legislation creating criminal law accountability for contractors. The Bush White House vehemently objected to provisions of the law dealing with rape by instrumentality. When House negotiators pressed to know why, they were met first with silence and then an embarrassed acknowledgement that a key part of the Bush program included invasion of the bodies of prisoners in a way that might be deemed rape by instrumentality under existing federal and state criminal statutes. While these techniques have long been known, the role of health care professionals in implementing them is shocking.
Harper's Magazine
Army Private Brandon Neely
Daily Kos: State of the Nation
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/2/9/234340/6189/142/695504
Mon Feb 09, 2009 at 08:58:22 PM PDT According to Rep. Paul Kanjorski (D) (PA-11), in mid-September of 2008, the United States of America came just three hours away from the collapse of the entire economy. In a span of 2 hours, $550 billion was drawn out of money market accounts in an electronic run on the banks.
Nevermind, this is apparently false. http://www.portfolio.com/views/blogs/market-movers/2009/02/11/kanjorski-and-the-money-market-funds-the-facts
Rep. Paul Kanjorski (D PA-11)
According to Rep. Paul Kanjorski (D) (PA-11), in mid-September of 2008, the United States of America came just three hours away from the collapse of the entire economy. In a span of 2 hours, $550 billion was drawn out of money market accounts in an electronic run on the banks. Rep. Kanjorski: "It would have been the end of our economic system and our political system as we know it."
Why is a U.S. Army brigade being assigned to the "Homeland"? - Glenn Greenwald - Salon.com
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/09/24/army/index.html
It only took a few paragraphs in a $500 billion, 591-page bill to raze one of the most important limits on federal power. Congress passed the Insurrection Act in 1807 to severely restrict the president's ability to deploy the military within the United States. The Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 tightened these restrictions, imposing a two-year prison sentence on anyone who used the military within the U.S. without the express permission of Congress. But there is a loophole: Posse Comitatus is waived if the president invokes the Insurrection Act.
For the first time in 100 years, and contrary to a long-standing legal prohibition, an active duty military unit is permanently assigned inside the U.S.
2008/09/24