Free Republic

As distrust of the press grows, news articles are relentlessly scrutinized for bias, but almost no one is focusing on stories that are simply ignored. For instance, a May 18 report in the Afghan newspaper Kabul Weekly said the riots that killed 17 people were not about disrespect for the Koran in American detainment camps--they were a show of force by the Taliban and another fundamentalist group, Hezb-e Eslami. "These demonstrations were organized by the Taliban and their supporters, and only some naive people joined the protesters," the newspaper said. The BBC picked up the story on May 22, but...

In the late 1970s I was working for Crocker National Bank in California, which at the time was the eleventh-largest bank in the country. A friend of mine worked for one of its offices along the U.S.-Mexico border in California's Imperial Valley. At the time, the president of Mexico announced to the public that his country was considering a monetary devaluation of its currency. He told his fellow countrymen that it was imperative that Mexicans everywhere not move their currency out of Mexico (and into the U.S.). As an operations supervisor at the time, I was keenly aware of the...

On a weekend when we praise those who serve in our military, you might want to know how that military is being criticized. Last week, Amnesty International issued its annual report. In it, the United States was criticized for: Thumbing "its nose at the rule of law and human rights." Abuse and mistreatment of prisoners. Not acting quickly enough on legal challenges from detainees. Attempting to "redefine" torture. Making a "mockery of justice." And, in the wallop sentence that Amnesty Secretary General Irene Khan knew would make headlines, Guantanamo Bay was called "the gulag of our times." We don't see...

"Gulag" is the Russian acronym made famous by Alexander Solzhenitsyn to describe the vast network of Soviet slave labor camps in which millions died. It is thus one more sign of the moral degradation of Amnesty International that the pressure group is now calling the U.S. detention facility for Taliban and al Qaeda suspects at Guantanamo Bay "the gulag of our time." At a press conference Wednesday releasing its annual human rights report, William Schultz, the executive director of Amnesty's U.S. branch, called the U.S. a "leading purveyor and practitioner" of torture. He urged foreign governments to investigate and arrest...

SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) - The head of the secret police under Gen. Augusto Pinochet said in a court document that the former dictator was responsible for the abuses committed by the feared security service, his lawyer said Friday. Retired Gen. Manuel Contreras also submitted a document to the Supreme Court disclosing the fate of more than 500 dissidents who disappeared after being arrested by his force, said Juan Carlos Manns, Contreras' lawyer. The report confirmed that many of the victims were thrown into the sea after being killed - a disclosure that had already been made last year by a...

The United Nations has chosen a group of nations which will decide the agenda for its next Human Rights Commission meeting. The only problem is that three of those nations are human rights abusers themselves. The U.N. has chosen Cuba, Zimbabwe and Saudi Arabia to join the “Working Group on Situations,” which will plan the course for effectively dealing with human rights violations. The panel also includes Hungary and the Netherlands. The U.S. State Department has denounced the choices of Cuba and Zimbabwe, which Secretary Condoleeza Rice called “outposts of tyranny” in her confirmation hearings. “The United States believes that...

Tilting at Liturgical Abuses by Peter W. Miller Statue of Don Quixote "Our liturgies are completely faithful to the reforms of Vatican II," was one of the more concise responses from my pastor years ago. It was only some time later that I would realize how right he was. Initially, his brevity was somewhat disappointing given the work put into the case I presented to him. For I had become a self-taught scholar of "liturgical abuse" and arming myself with Inaestimabile Donum, other documents from the Congregation for Divine Worship (CDW) and selected Q&A responses from some of the more...

In yet another example of why journalists are held in such low esteem by most Americans, the Associated Press finds itself under legal challenge from six Navy SEALs and two of their wives over a series of photographs that the news agency published this month. The pictures, taken from a public Web site that was located by an AP reporter using a Google search, seemed to show the SEALs mistreating prisoners. Because the photos carried a date stamp of May 2003, the AP story said, they might have constituted the earliest photographic evidence of prisoner abuse in Iraq. The problem,...

How did the abuses get started? Selected quotes from the past on specific problems raised in Redemptionis Sacramentum Redemptionis Sacramentum §25 exhorts bishops to look into the working and membership of diocesan worship commissions, who should "be chosen from among those whose soundness in the Catholic faith and knowledge of theological and cultural matters are evident". A survey of books and articles on the Liturgy reveals that many practices condemned as abuses began as recommendations from influential liturgical experts. (Most experts quoted are members of liturgical organizations and/or are academics who have shaped liturgical practice since the Second Vatican Council.)

Now is not the time for the United States to withdraw from Iraq. Stung by the damage done by revelations that American personnel abused detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan, President Bush spoke on Arab television and was unequivocal: "People in Iraq must understand that I view those practices as abhorrent." He pledged to punish the soldiers involved. Across the Middle East, officials condemned the United States. Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi, for example, said the incident was proof that the United States had a "systematic plan to torture Iraqis, to kill them, to rape them." Syria's official daily, Ath-Thawra, called...

The past few weeks we were all very astounded and disgusted by the pictures and tales of abuse coming out of Iraq with regard to our U.S. forces and the treatment of Iraqi prisoners. On Friday, May 7th, the Secretary of Defense and Commander of the Joint Chiefs of Staff were hauled before two congressional committees to answer questions of accountability in this sordid scandal. On Tuesday, May 11th, General Antonio Taguba was testifying before congress regarding his report – the “15-6 Report” – and his findings. Now for the real bombshell; SFTT's website provided the conduit for the key...

WASHINGTON: India needs to rein in its troops responsible for widespread human rights violations in occupied Kashmir if it wants to improve its image in the world, a senior State Department official said on Wednesday. "This is the kind of message that needs to be sent (to India) ... that this type of abuses are not acceptable," said Michael G. Kozak, who heads the department's Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labour. Mr Kozak, while responding to an observation at a congressional hearing in Washington, said India "ought to clean that stuff up ... if it wants to improve its...

"The horrors experienced by many young inmates, particularly those who are convicted of nonviolent offenses, border on the unimaginable. Prison rape not only threatens the lives of those who fall prey to their aggressors, but it is potentially devastating to the human spirit. Shame, depression, and a shattering loss of self-esteem accompany the perpetual terror the victim thereafter must endure." This statement does not, as some might expect, refer to Iraqi detainees, but is commentary by Supreme Court Justice Harry A. Blackmun, in Farmer v. Brennan, about the U.S. prison system. Those who draw a straight line of responsibility between...

Ion Mihai Pacepa: Vietnam-Era Anti-War Movement Got Its Spin From the Kremlin Richmond Times-Dispatch May 3, 2004 Part of Senator John Kerry's appeal to a certain segment of Americans is his Vietnam-veteran status coupled with his anti-war activism during that period. On April 12, 1971, Kerry told the U.S. Congress that American soldiers claimed to him that they had "raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned on the power, cut off limbs, blew up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in a fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan." The exact...

Homestead racked up thousands in travel 2-5-04 By Lex Alexander, Staff Writer News & Record Posted 7:30 a.m. GREENSBORO — More than a dozen cruises, with expenses topping $112,000, were paid for with credit cards belonging to nonprofit home builder Project Homestead between 1997 and 2001, city records show. The records, compiled during the city’s recent audit of Homestead and released this week, also document other non-cruise travel purchases for places such as St. Thomas and the Bahamas with corporate credit cards issued to senior employees of the nonprofit. Some of the travel paid for by Homestead involved people who...

Officials at a federal prison in New York hindered an investigation that determined that as many as 20 guards abused detainees who were picked up shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks, the Justice Department reported Thursday. Investigators found hundreds of videotapes that officials at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn had said were destroyed or erased, according to a report by the department's internal watchdog, Inspector General Glenn A. Fine. The tapes confirmed the detainees' allegations of abuses that were outlined in a June report by Fine, the follow-up inquiry said. Investigators said many of the 84 detainees were mistreated....

Why is President Bush continuing policies that were initiated by President Clinton? The voters elected Bush to change obnoxious Clinton policies, and the voters don't understand why Bush is keeping the following seven in force. 1. One example is the Clinton administration's abolition of the U.S. Army's Risk Rule, which had exempted women in support units from areas that involve "inherent risk of capture." That policy change, ordered by the Clinton feminists, is the reason why a single mother of two young children was killed in the Iraq war and another single mother of a 2-year-old was taken prisoner. When...

Pope Issues Encyclical on Eucharist: It’s Deja vu all over again Thomas A. Droleskey PhD REMNANT COLUMNIST, New York One of the great sages of the past eight decades is a man who was born in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1924. Christened Lawrence Peter Berra, his childhood friend, Joseph Garagiola, nicknamed him “Yogi” because his squat demeanor called to mind a Buddhist engaged in meditation. Yogi Berra became famous not only for his exploits as a Hall of Fame catcher with the New York Yankees (who would later manage both the Yankees and the New York Mets, taking both teams...

Why he’s writing on the Eucharist today In Ecclesia de Eucharistia, released on Holy Thursday, Pope John Paul II says he seeks to ‘help to banish the dark clouds of unacceptable doctrine and practice’ By Russell Shaw 5/4/2003 Before the publication of Pope John Paul II’s encyclical Ecclesia de Eucharistia (on the Eucharist in its relationship to the Church), there was concern in Vatican circles whether it would be strong enough. As it turns out, it is a warm, faith-filled, sometimes moving document — and more than slightly tough. In undertaking to "help to banish the dark clouds of unacceptable...

Here is the list The year after the name is when membership is up. 1. Algeria 2003 2. Argentina 2005 3. Armenia 2004 4. Australia 2005 5. Austria 2004 6. Bahrain 2004 7. Belgium 2003 8. Brazil 2005 9. Burkina Faso 200510. Cameroon 2003 11. Canada 2003 12. Chile 2004 13. China 2005 14. Costa Rica 2003 15. Croatia 2004 16. Cuba 200317. Democratic Republic of the Congo 2003 18. France 2004 19. Gabon 2005 20. Germany 2005 21. Guatemala 2003 22. India 2003 23. Ireland 2005 24. Japan 2005 25. Kenya 2003 26. Libyan Arab Jamahiriya 2003 27. Malaysia...