"Build That Afghan Prison Now! ..."

Boy, to take a little liberty with the song, what a difference a week makes ...


There, we had President Obama, on the heels of unveiling his "Jobs for America" package, hitting the stump and exhorting Congress to "Pass that bill now!" 


 


Funny, in what I read about the proposal, and Obama's stumping, I don't recall seeing anything about a massive, Fortress-of-Solitude-like Afghan Prison, there were no impassioned cries of "Build that Afghan prison now! ..."


Glenn Greenwald has the dirt;

As the Obama administration announced plans for hundreds of billions of dollars more in domestic budget cuts, it late last week solicited bids for the construction of a massive new prison in Bagram, Afghanistan.  Posted on the aptly named FedBizOps.Gov website which it uses to announce new privatized spending projects, the administration unveiled plans for "the construction of Detention Facility in Parwan (DFIP), Bagram, Afghanistan" which includes "detainee housing capability for approximately 2000 detainees."

Yikes!


McClatchy Newspapers'  Saeed Shah, back in February;

The U.S. plans to hand over the new Bagram to the Afghan military next January, a demanding target that some think it will be unable or unwilling to meet. Afghan guards are due to start arriving this spring to be trained. This appears to be the reason, officially at least, for expanding the capacity so dramatically, from 600 prisoners at the old site to 1,000 currently and up to 2,300 when the new building is completed.


"This will be the enduring detention facility for the next 50, 60 years. It's world class," said Navy Vice Adm. Robert Harward, who's in charge of U.S. detention programs in Afghanistan and who was visiting Bagram. "For the Afghans, this means that they will immediately be able to separate the insurgents from the criminal population."

"For the next 50, 60 years?"


You mean we'll be housing, and feeding and, otherwise taking care of Afghan prisoners (some who may, or may not, be terrorists - they being held with that "Do Not Pass Go" justice system - secret evidence, no charges, no trial - from the previous war criminal administration, which means Obama has looked in the rearview mirror, at least, once), for decades to come, so, like, who's going to pay for this?

One obstacle is funding, though. It costs $5 million a year to maintain the new facility, plus an additional cost per detainee, Garrity said. That's way beyond the budget of the Afghan authorities for a single jail, so it remains unclear how the new prison will be financed.

Oh, let us count the ways ...


More, from Greenwald;

One last point: recall how many people insisted that the killing of Osama bin Laden would lead to a drawdown in the War on Terror generally and the war in Afghanistan specifically.  Since then -- in just four months since bin Laden's corpse was dumped into the ocean -- the U.S. has done the following:  renewed the Patriot Act for four years with no reforms; significantly escalated drone attacks in Yemen, Somalia and Pakistan; tried to assassinate U.S. citizen Anwar al-Awlaki with no due process; indicted a 24-year-old Muslim for "material support for Terrorism" for uploading an anti-American YouTube clip after he talked to the son of a Terrorist leader; pressured Iraq to keep U.S. troops in that country; argued that it has the virtually unlimited right to kill anyone it wants anywhere in the world; and now finalized plans to build a sprawling new prison in Afghanistan.

And, he finishes most wryly;

If that's winding things down, I sure would hate to see what a redoubling of the American commitment to Endless War looks like.

Help Me Mr. Wizard! ....


 


Bonus Riffs


Tom Engelhardt: Scamming Washington - Exclusive Letters from the ScamiLeaks Archives


Ambassador Crocker Meets Eddie Izzard


Krugman: Reclaiming America’s Soul


Does He Get To Keep The Bag Man?


Top Ten Cloves: Other Things The CIA Tried To Use With The Afghan Warlords


PNAC Going All Xe On Us


Again, Why Are We In Afghanistan?

Rumsfeld Goes With The Lies He Wish He Had

Who knew!

Lenny Bruce used to do a bit where he offered this advice;

"Whatever happens, deny it. Flat-out deny it! If you really love your wife, deny it. If they walk in on you, deny it. Even if they got pictures, deny it. Even if she catches you with a chicken, deny it."

I just can't picture Old Snowflakes being into Bruce, so he must have just taken his own advice and said "You go to write a book with the lies you have---not the lies you might want or wish to have at a later time."

Yes, yet another of the Bush Grindhouse, one of their most prolific warmongers, has penned a "Not Me, Not My Fault" book, hitting the streets this week.

UGH!

From the NYT;

“Two weeks after the worst terrorist attack in our nation’s history, those of us in the Department of Defense were fully occupied,” Mr. Rumsfeld recalls. But the president insisted on new military plans for Iraq, Mr. Rumsfeld writes. “He wanted the options to be ‘creative.’ ”

[snip]

His biggest mistake, Mr. Rumsfeld writes, was in not forcing Mr. Bush to accept his offers to resign after the abuse of Iraqi detainees by American military jailers came to light in early 2004. Mr. Rumsfeld insists that the abuses were the actions of rogue soldiers and that they did not reflect any approved policies, but nevertheless he offered to step down.

[snip]

While generally defending the Bush administration’s counterterrorism legal policies, Mr. Rumsfeld expresses some regrets. He suggests several times that some criticism and setbacks could have been avoided if the administration had gone to Congress for legislation authorizing the policies instead of relying on the president’s war powers.

"Oh, if we only didn't didn't have contempt and scorn for our critics (you know, the "Appeaserrs ... the morally and intellectually confused" ), and only if we didn't piss on the Constitution and make up our own laws, maybe things would have turned out better."

Will Bunch, over on his Attytood doesn't mince words;

Heh, that's funny. Of course, since there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and in fact there apparentrly had not been any for a number of years, the reason that Rumsfeld would like to take "that one" back is because he was lying. Maybe someday someone will free the Washington Post from the tyranny of the inverted pyramid and they can actually say that.

Donald Rumsfeld lied.

Jack Stuef, over on Wonkette weighed in as well;

America’s Grandpa of Death Donald Rumsfeld is having his memoir published on Tuesday, serving as an addendum to George W. Bush’s book in that it has actual, alleged facts, opinions, and memories in it. So: Abu Ghraib? Not his fault, but he really wanted to resign over it and feels very emo that big meanie Bush wouldn’t let him. Initial troop levels? Not his fault, nobody in the military ever asked him for more troops. Guantanamo? Not his fault the jail existed, and actually he made sure there was less torture and fewer prisoners. Hmm, anything we’re forgetting here? Oh, that one war. What was it called again? Anyway, not his fault, Bush came to him about Iraq before the U.S. even invaded Afghanistan, but at the same meeting, he also talked about Rummy’s son’s drug addiction, so all Rummy could do was cry about that. Whoops!

And this;

Ah, there you have it. Rumsfeld could have said, “What the fuck are you talking about going to war with Iraq for? Our country was just attacked by a foreign terrorist organization we need to go try to destroy. Iraq has nothing to do with this. Aren’t you more concerned with winning this war we haven’t even begun yet?” But instead, his son had done some drugs. Sure thing, Rumsfeld. Perfectly good excuse. You should drop some leaflets on the families of people, American and Iraqi, whose children have died in that war. “Sorry, my son was doing drugs. I was emotional at the time. Not my fault.”

Stuef also had a suggestion for those plans to invade and occupy Iraq to be "creative" that "Rummy says Defense was preparing for offense on Afghanistan at the time, but Bush asked him to be “creative.” Creative! Perhaps the military could stage a production of Grease for the people of Iraq before taking a bow and dropping a bomb on them?

No instead we just got greasy lies, at the time, and more polished greasy lies now, with the book.

I wonder if his Lie Tour will interfere with his, and his former Shadow President's Armageddon weekends?

Like we said above, Ugh!

Bonus Rummy Riffs

Top Ten Cloves: What Would Be Different If Rumsfeld Was A Dog, But Still Secretary of Defense

Leave It to Rumsfeld ... There's Not Enough Lying Going On!

“They’re coming here for the American experience” ...Rumsfeld Weighs In On Immigration Battle; Won’t Tie It To War With Iran ...Suggests Army Recruiting Woes Could Be Solved With Mandatory Service By Illegal Aliens

Rummy On The Run? ... Let's Give Him Some Chase Music!

Top Ten Cloves: Reasons Dick Cheney Was Visiting Saudi Arabia

News Item: Why Was Cheney in Saudi Arabia?

10. Moonlighting for Fox News - Trying to get Saudis to say Oil Spill is Obama's fault

9. Picking up royalty check, for invading Iraq

8. Trying to give The Politico a scoop

7. Made a pit stop, after visiting Prince Sheikh Issa bin Zayed al-Nahyan, in the UAE, who lined up someone for Cheney to beat and run over

6. Looking for a buyer - Wants to put his old Secret Bunker on the market, for big bucks

5. No here will go hunting with him any longer

  4. Saudis wanted to hear, first hand, the telling of the Leahy "Go-fuck-yourself" story

3. Felt he had to, personally, go over and explain his rabid, nitwit daughter Liz

2. Moonlighting as "Bag Man" for the Carlyle Group

1. Working out a "No Extradition" deal, in the event he gets prosecuted

Must Read: Why I threw the shoe

Remember when The Commander Guy was over in Iraq, giving some kind of press conference, and the Iraqi journalist who stood up, likely knowing his fate for the act he was going to commit, threw his shoes at the War Criminal Court-Appointed President?



Muntazer al-Zaidi is his name, and he has a post up on the Guardian UK, a tremendous read, from the heart, from the perspective we have had too little of, from our own, warmongering, cheerleading Corporate media.

Why I threw the shoe - I am no hero. I just acted as an Iraqi who witnessed the pain and bloodshed of too many innocents

I say to those who reproach me: do you know how many broken homes that shoe which I threw had entered? How many times it had trodden over the blood of innocent victims? Maybe that shoe was the appropriate response when all values were violated.

When I threw the shoe in the face of the criminal, George Bush, I wanted to express my rejection of his lies, his occupation of my country, my rejection of his killing my people. My rejection of his plundering the wealth of my country, and destroying its infrastructure. And casting out its sons into a diaspora.

If I have wronged journalism without intention, because of the professional embarrassment I caused the establishment, I apologise. All that I meant to do was express with a living conscience the feelings of a citizen who sees his homeland desecrated every day. The professionalism mourned by some under the auspices of the occupation should not have a voice louder than the voice of patriotism. And if patriotism needs to speak out, then professionalism should be allied with it.

I didn't do this so my name would enter history or for material gains. All I wanted was to defend my country.

Muntazer al-Zaidi is an Iraqi reporter who was freed this week after serving nine months in prison for throwing his shoe at former US president George Bush at a press conference. This edited statement was translated by McClatchy Newspapers correspondent Sahar Issa www.mcclatchydc.com

We covered it here, on The Garlic;

"Son of A Dog!"

Leave it to The Commander Guy, to go off on a "Mission Accomplished" victory lap and be greeted, as The Bush Grindhouse long propagandized, like a "liberator".

It would be fitting, especially with the Court-Appointed-President's party attempting to kill off unions, to stand by and watch Detroit sink (reprising their positions of Katrina-battered New Orleans), if the UAW workers, as well as all American, sent their old shoes to Dubya, in a symbolic gesture of supporting the sentiments of the Iraqi journalist, Muntathar al Zaidi

[snip]

I'll be waiting, watching, to see how soon The Worst President Ever makes another one of those mocking videos, ducking shoes, much like he pretended to look for WMDs under his desk.

For all the lies, the deception, the careless disregard for all things good, the White House should have turned into a veritable shoe warehouse.

Instead, our media all but got on their hands-and-knees, and fit them with velvet slippers.

With all the troops still stationed in Iraq, and the call for more troops to be rushed into Flintstonesville (aka Afghanistan), perhaps we should emulate Muntazer al-Zaidi, or, at least, in spirit, start practice whipping off the shoes and flinging them.

(H/T to Jeremy Scahill, for his Twitter post on this)