In an opinion piece sure to make a Bushie's head explode, Terry Jones speaks to issues of prisoner treatment. The piece ran in The Guardian. Oh, and that would be Terry Jones, Python.
"For God's sake, what's wrong with putting a bag over her head? That's what we do with the Muslims we capture: we put bags over their heads, so it's hard to breathe. Then it's perfectly acceptable to take photographs of them and circulate them to the press because the captives can't be recognised and humiliated in the way these unfortunate British service people are.
It is also unacceptable that these British captives should be made to talk on television and say things that they may regret later. If the Iranians put duct tape over their mouths, like we do to our captives, they wouldn't be able to talk at all. Of course they'd probably find it even harder to breathe - especially with a bag over their head - but at least they wouldn't be humiliated."
The entire article is definitely worth a read. Go on, we'll wait. That is, unless you're Bill O'Reilly. If you're Bill O'Reilly, you are far too busy screaming at a distinguished veteran of the armed forces. Retired Colonel Ann Wright has a conscience and she speaks her mind. She served 16 years in active service and 13 more years in the reserves.
She went on to serve her country working in the State Department from 1987 to 2003. In March of 2003, she resigned her position with the State Department on the eve of the invasion of Iraq. She retired in protest for four reasons:
"I disagree with the Administration's policies on Iraq
I disagree with the Administration's lack of effort in resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
I disagree with the Administration's lack of policy on North Korea
I disagree with the Administration's policies on Unnecessary Curtailment of Rights in America"
Since retiring, she has become a peace activist. O'Reilly gave her a lukewarm introduction and then tried to lead her along a rhetorical garden path toward the evils of Iran. Bill was on his high hobby horse, humping the horrible* treatment of the British captives being held in Tehran. She spoke her mind, that all sides of conflict, including America, should treat all prisoners justly and with dignity. That's when the O'Reilly leapt onto the hood of the station wagon, tore off the aerial and disabled the windshield wipers. Bellowing and gesticulating, the O'Reilly climbed off the hood of the car onto a branch, from which he pelted the vehicle with feces. Then he cut off her mic.
It is a performance of fair and balancedness for the ages, starring Bill O'Reilly as a scurrilous baboon. Ann Wright has served her country for nearly three decades. Bill O'Reilly has only ever served himself. I can only imagine the heights of outrage, the blandishments and agonies the right would have celebrated had a liberal teevee host behaved in such a manner with a hawkish retired officer. This was a clear case of a conservative hawking up a phlegm ball and spitting at a veteran.
As our good friend Snoop Dogg says, "Fuck Bill O'Reilly."
* that be aliteration.
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6 comments:
Heh. I would have done that. Just talk right through Bill O'Reilly. Good for her.
God, he's evil.
Yeah. I can see what he was trying to set up.
He was wrong in one of his first attempts to "walk her through it," that is, to get her to condemn Iran's action as "clearly illegal."
She said that she didn't know about that. And, really, that's where he first lost it.
But dig, you also gotta check it out: He's one of those assholes who refuses to admit that the US's invasion of Iraq was illegal. Now he has the gall to piss and moan about Iran?
"Somewhere along the line you decided that you hated your country" he has the nerve to say to a 29-year veteran.
No, somewhere along the line she decided that her country institutionalizing torture was what she didn't like.
Bill O'Reilly's America = torture.
The whole culture has become paranoid. It's been delusional for quite some time, so this is to be expected.
Gah...can we move Canada somewhere else?
Ti-Guy...if you move Canada somewhere else, would you mind making a stop along the east coast of the US and picking me up? You wouldn't even have to make that hard a right turn.
O'Reilly has got to be one of the most sancitmonious, disgusting, dishonest pieces of republican shit ever to pollute our collective environments with his rancid verbal refuse.
Unfortunately, abuse of veterans who have gone on to become peace activists is rather widespread not only among conservative journalists but in the conservative blogosphere also. Your service means nothing unless you're one of the Bushies; willing to mindlessly support everything he does (even if it's illegal and violates the rights of American citizens).
Why is it that anyone who advocates for peace is un-american, actually considered an enemy of the US?
To me it's just the opposite. The real enemy is he who forces an unnecessary war, violates every aspect of the Geneva Convention by allowing the abuse of political prisoners (and holding them without charges for years), and cares nothing for the lives of the people he's sent to Iraq to die. Bush has conducted himself so undiplomatically he has created animostiy toward us from countries who prior to his disastrous administration had none. Then he and the conservatives who are in active brain-swap mode with dear leader mock the grieving families of dead soldiers publicly with their policies and rhetoric and spew venom at peace demonstrators/demonstrations.
The cause of peace un-american?
Seems someone's got that backwards.
Protesting US violations of the GC as strictly the move of a person who loathes her own country?
O'Reilly has that backwards too.
But then, I suppose it is difficult to see things clearly when you're suffering from such a severe (possibly terminal) case of recto-cranial inversion.
shannon, by the power vested in me by the, um, blog, i hereby declare you an honorary canadian. how about that, eh?
PSA,
I gladly accept sir, and I thank you.
The Labatts are on me. :o)
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