Thursday, November 16, 2006
Here Come the World Court Hearings for USA Abuse
On November 14, 2006 in Germany, twelve detainees, who were abused in military jails in Iraq and Cuba, filed a law suit against former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, including American officials who might have either approved or "allowed" such abuse and sexual humiliation to happen under USA watch as was the case at Abu Ghraib.
Certainly Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales and others who have been part of the process of making such abuse and torture seem reasonable and not illegal will have to defend their position, notwithstanding that Congress (before the recent Democratic take over) passed an act allowing President Bush the leeway he said he needed to face any violation of the Geneva Convention with regard to dealing with prisoners of war.
Also of late the Supreme Court might have to get involved in a Texas case in which the International Court of Justice in The Hague has ruled that the USA violated the rights of 51 Mexican citizens who were not told they could speak with a consular official after their arrest. The fact that these 51 are on death row is no laughing matter, nor should Americans over react that the World Court is telling the USA what to do when we as a free democracy appear to have violated the very rights we are so eager to establish across the globe. In other words what is good for the goose is also good for the gander, and, to belabor it even more, what goes around comes around.
To make the realization of the bad image the USA has recently created under the Bush regime even more clear, in today's papers there is an article that Australia is about to create a Center of U.S. Studies because our reputation in Australia has fallen to the lowest point, some 10 points below that reputation Australians hold for China, France, the United Nations and the county of Papua New Guinea. How much lower could the USA fall?
Now, we Americans must make Congress step up to the plate to salvage our reputation throughout the world, for as a democracy that insists on spreading democracy, one cannot be hypocritical about what a democracy can or should not do. If anything, we must go the extra mile to convince others that we are not cut from the same cloth as are the nations which we do not respect because they abuse the rights of its citizens, illegal aliens within their borders, or prisoners captured during a period of war.
Certainly Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales and others who have been part of the process of making such abuse and torture seem reasonable and not illegal will have to defend their position, notwithstanding that Congress (before the recent Democratic take over) passed an act allowing President Bush the leeway he said he needed to face any violation of the Geneva Convention with regard to dealing with prisoners of war.
Also of late the Supreme Court might have to get involved in a Texas case in which the International Court of Justice in The Hague has ruled that the USA violated the rights of 51 Mexican citizens who were not told they could speak with a consular official after their arrest. The fact that these 51 are on death row is no laughing matter, nor should Americans over react that the World Court is telling the USA what to do when we as a free democracy appear to have violated the very rights we are so eager to establish across the globe. In other words what is good for the goose is also good for the gander, and, to belabor it even more, what goes around comes around.
To make the realization of the bad image the USA has recently created under the Bush regime even more clear, in today's papers there is an article that Australia is about to create a Center of U.S. Studies because our reputation in Australia has fallen to the lowest point, some 10 points below that reputation Australians hold for China, France, the United Nations and the county of Papua New Guinea. How much lower could the USA fall?
Now, we Americans must make Congress step up to the plate to salvage our reputation throughout the world, for as a democracy that insists on spreading democracy, one cannot be hypocritical about what a democracy can or should not do. If anything, we must go the extra mile to convince others that we are not cut from the same cloth as are the nations which we do not respect because they abuse the rights of its citizens, illegal aliens within their borders, or prisoners captured during a period of war.
