The Lies Of Terror

When we hear from the piss sodden professional weepers on the right, the bawling bigots like Raphael Alexander, on matters of "terror" we get second hand lies, polished and sticky with group mucus. When it comes to the illegal detention, torture and fate of individuals in places like Guantanamo we are told to hush. These are terrorists, donchaknow, bad men from bad places that have done bad things. And how do we know this? Because someone in an outfit says so. Because we've allowed our own moral standards to be abandoned and displaced. We have thrown out the rule of law, taken a steaming, wet shit on the legal traditions that are the very basis of our notions of justice and we've kidnapped these individuals from various countries. We've held them without charge, stripped them of dignity and hope and subjected them to systematic debasement and torture. We wouldn't do that to innocents now would we? Without fair and open trial, we'll never know.

These same damp trousered fools are among the "free speech" champions that are only too eager to secure the right to preach hatred with their endless wailing about "star chambers". These are the same breathless chicken hearts that clutch their holy books and dab at their tear swollen eyes, burbling about "slippery slopes" when the issue of non-hetero nuptials arise. These are the self declared patriots, the shameless pricks that have the gall to ask why we hate our country when we stand against the willful abrogation of habeas corpus, the knowing violation of basic human rights, when we argue against war crimes and the base violence done in our name under the lie that it somehow keeps us safe.

These are the creatures who sit upon their high horses sneering in their conservative contempt when the call is made to release Omar Khadr from his illegal, unjust and immoral detainment and for him to be turned over to Canadian custody. Somehow, we are supposed to believe that this child soldier represents such an enormous threat to our way of life that it is acceptable to abet a foreign government in crimes against him. Our Prime Minister Harper refuses to act on the behalf of human rights, the Geneva Conventions, international law and Canadian laws and rights because young Mr Khadr "faces serious charges". Charges to be heard in an actual star chamber proceeding, a trumped up military commission that has defiled every western notion of jurisprudence. Denied proper legal council, without habeas rights and facing manufactured evidence, somehow we are supposed to just believe that the moral consequence of allowing and supporting these state sanctioned evils is better than risking the pursuit of justice, constitutional protection and obeying the rule of law.

The rationale for becoming that which we fear and despise is simple, simple in the least flattering use of that term. The simpletons desperately want us to believe that to obey our own laws is to risk actually setting one or more of these individuals free. We are all familiar with the basic legal constructs that underpin our system of justice, innocent until proven guilty, the right not to incriminate one's self, the right to effective advocacy and legal council, access to evidence and to question witnesses, the right to a timely trial and the right not to be incarcerated without charge. We are being asked by our government to ignore these rights. We are being asked to ignore international laws and treaties to which we are signatories. When we dare question these slippery slopes and star chamber proceedings (when the the pretense of proceedings occur) it is portrayed as necessary because to do otherwise risks these individuals returning to their alleged but unproven ways of terror. Boo.

And after hearing this endless mantra of the bad guys returning to their evil ways, we learn that even that petty pretense is a bald faced lie. From Crooks & Liars comes news of a legitimate look at the recidivism canard. Seton Hall has released a report that debunks the wild claims of the Pentagon and other officials and propagandists. The Seton Hall press release is as follows...

The Seton Hall Center for Policy and Research has issued a report which rebuts and debunks the most recent claim by the Department of Defense (DOD) that “61, in all, former Guantánamo detainees are confirmed or suspected of returning to the fight.”



Professor Denbeaux of the Center for Policy & Research has said that the Center has determined that “DOD has issued 'recidivism' numbers 43 times, and each time they have been wrong—this last time the most egregiously so.”

Denbeaux stated: “Once again, they’ve failed to identify names, numbers, dates, times, places, or acts upon which their report relies. Every time they have been required to identify the parties, the DOD has been forced to retract their false IDs and their numbers. They have included people who have never even set foot in Guantánamo—much less were they released from there. They have counted people as 'returning to the fight' for their having written an Op-ed piece in the New York Times and for their having appeared in a documentary exhibited at the Cannes Film Festival. The DOD has revised and retracted their internally conflicting definitions, criteria, and their numbers so often that they have ceased to have any meaning—except as an effort to sway public opinion by painting a false portrait of the supposed dangers of these men.



"Forty-three times they have given numbers—which conflict with each other—all of which are seriously undercut by the DOD statement that 'they do not track' former detainees. Rather than making up numbers “willy-nilly” about post release conduct, America might be better served if our government actually kept track of them.”

Let's have no more of these lies to protect us from false threats. America is preparing to bid farewell to their most crooked and disastrous presidency and to inaugurate a man in whom enormous hope has been invested. Let that hope not be displaced. I call on Mr Obama to repatriate Omar Khadr to face whatever justice is founded on the rule of law, here in Canada where he is a citizen. I call on Mr Obama to close the illegal prisons established by his predecessors and to begin to rehabilitate his nation's reputation and reclaim some of the moral standing that has been squandered on the bloody altar of terror. More important, I call on Stephen Harper to quit the path of injustice and to call for the repatriation of Omar Khadr. To do less is to act as a co-conspirator in the crimes against him. As a child soldier he is protected by the Geneva Conventions and international law. Failing in the duty to uphold and honour those legal standards and commitments is a stain upon our nation and acts against our good standing in the community of nations. We can not, in good faith, stand up and decry the bad acts of an Iran, Hamas or North Korea when we condone similar actions taken in our name, against our own citizens.