Maher Arar, Bradley Manning and the Sad State of the U.S. Justice System

Guest post by Chase Madar, a lawyer in New York. His next book, The Passion of Bradley Manning, will be published by O/R Books in the fall.

What the US government did to Maher Arar is certainly atrocious. But is our government’s treatment of Arar so very different from what it routinely does to its own citizens, minus the air travel and exotic outsourcing? After all, many of the atrocities that we have committed in the course of our Global War on Terror find easy analogs in our everyday “normal” justice system.

Take Omar Khadr, captured at the age of 15 in Afghanistan, tortured during interrogation and, after years of pretrial detention, convicted of a wholly invented “war crime”. This is surely an appalling persecution of a child soldier. But here in the United States we have young men doing life without parole for crimes committed when they were 13, and who have been treated no less roughly every step of the way. Is the Khadr prosecution consistent with American values? You bet.

The nasty treatment of Bradley Manning has also provoked an international outcry, from the Bundestag to the United Nations.  A year of pretrial solitary confinement under the most punitive conditions must surely be an aberration in any wealthy developed country.  Alas, it turns out that the infliction of isolation even in pretrial detention is far from unknown in the United States.  And solitary confinement itself, properly viewed as a form of no-touch torture that drives people insane, is utterly routine here.  We have about 25,000 prisoners in long-term solitary in the federal prison system, and how many in the state prisons, nobody knows.  Our Supreme Court came within a whisker of finding solitary confinement to be a violation of the Eight Amendment against cruel and unusual punishment back in 1890.  Are we moderns just a whole lot tougher than our 19th century forebears?

The analogy between our treatment of terror suspects and homegrown defendants is of course imperfect: torture-driven interrogations are not as systematic in our local lock-ups as they were Bagram, Abu Ghraib or Guantanamo.  But domestic torture isn’t uncommon either.  Chicago police captain Jon Burge was recently convicted on perjury charges stemming from a long career of torturing suspects in interrogation rooms.  Many of his tricks he learned while serving in Vietnam, and we can only imagine what some of our returning soldiers today will take with them into law enforcement.

To be sure, the extraordinary rendition of Maher Arar is a particularly vivid case of American national security gone berserk.   But we are kidding ourselves if we see this as a one-of-a-kind freakout, an anomalous blot on an otherwise wonderful justice system.  The greater part of our disgrace at Abu Ghraib, Bagram and elsewhere is simply to have replicated and exposed to the world some of our rarely controversial practices from back home.  It is going to be difficult to roll back any of our brutal (not to mention counterproductive) national security practices without an Augean cleansing of our domestic justice and penal systems as well.

We certainly have our work cut out for us.

The views expressed are not necessarily those of Amnesty International.

This post is part of our 2011 Torture Awareness Month series

AIUSA welcomes a lively and courteous discussion that follow our Community Guidelines. Comments are not pre-screened before they post but AIUSA reserves the right to remove any comments violating our guidelines.

20 thoughts on “Maher Arar, Bradley Manning and the Sad State of the U.S. Justice System

  1. I disagree with the above blogs premise.

    Arar's case is totally different than Khadr or Manning.

    For one thing Arar is innocent while Khadr or Manning are incredibly guilty.
    I will repeat that; !!!!—i—n—n—o—c—e—n—t—!!!!

    Since most sleaze bag defense lawyers like yourself spend your entire legal careers happily trying what ever sneaky tricks you can to gain acquittals of those you know personally to be extremely guilty, no matter if they be child rapist murders, terrorists mass killers of civilians or traitors, the fact that Mayer Arar is actually innocent must come as a complete shock to you.

    Mayer Arar did not ever have anything what so ever to do with terrorism or extremism in any way. Arar was then and is still today a simple, honest, decent hard working, loyal Canadian citizen and father, raising his family in the Muslim faith followed by the vast majority of Muslims, i.e. a faith which does not condone terrorism.

    Omar Khadr's father was a senior Al Qeda terrorist who blew up the Egyptian Embassy in Islamabad in 1995 killing 17 Muslim civilians, Omar Khadr's mother, sister and brother appeared on Canadian television and PBS in 2004, and told how happy the were to hear about the 911 attacks and how proud they were to have sent Omar at age 11 from Canada to Al Qeda training camps in Afghanistan to train as a terrorist suicide bomber since if he were allowed to grow up in Canada would in danger of turning into a homosexual ?!?!?!?!.

    source: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/kha

    Even if it was Omar Khadr's horrific sub-human excuse for parents at fault for sending him as a child, but never the less, at time of capture Omar was a member of an illegal criminal organization and Omar plead guilty to illegally killing a solider on a mission fully authorized by the UN Security council. And Omar Khadr, now an adult, still to this day has never renounced the Al Qeda ideology of crimes against humanity mass killing of civilians.

    Compared to the unbelievably cruelty sustained over months, and very nearly fatal full extreme torture the innocent victim of mistaken identity Meyer Arar was subjected to in Syria, Omar was practically treated with kid gloves.

    And Bradley Manning, who you do not claim did not do what he is accused of, you say 6 months of solitary confinement, including having regular visits from his family, supporters and lawyers, that this condition of imprisonment is torture and that outrages you?

    In that case I assume you will immediately call on Hamas in Gaza to allow the poor Israeli conscript Corporal Gilad Shalit his right to Red Cross visits, since Gilad is accused of no crime by anyone, is held as a hostage for ransom ( a war crime), and Gilad has suffered in a far, far more isolated form of total complete solitary confinement, than Manning could not even imagine, not for 6 measly months including family visits Manning gets, but Gilad has suffered true total isolation for 5 YEARS !!!!.

  2. I disagree with the above blogs premise.

    Arar's case is totally different than Khadr or Manning.

    For one thing Arar is innocent while Khadr or Manning are incredibly guilty.
    I will repeat that; !!!!—i—n—n—o—c—e—n—t—!!!!

    Since most sleaze bag defense lawyers like yourself spend your entire legal careers happily trying what ever sneaky tricks you can to gain acquittals of those you know personally to be extremely guilty, no matter if they be child rapist murders, terrorists mass killers of civilians or traitors, the fact that Mayer Arar is actually innocent must come as a complete shock to you.

    Mayer Arar did not ever have anything what so ever to do with terrorism or extremism in any way. Arar was then and is still today a simple, honest, decent hard working, loyal Canadian citizen and father, raising his family in the Muslim faith followed by the vast majority of Muslims, i.e. a faith which does not condone terrorism.

    Omar Khadr's father was a senior Al Qeda terrorist who blew up the Egyptian Embassy in Islamabad in 1995 killing 17 Muslim civilians, Omar Khadr's mother, sister and brother appeared on Canadian television and PBS in 2004, and told how happy the were to hear about the 911 attacks and how proud they were to have sent Omar at age 11 from Canada to Al Qeda training camps in Afghanistan to train as a terrorist suicide bomber since if he were allowed to grow up in Canada would in danger of turning into a homosexual ?!?!?!?!.

    source: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/kha

    Even if it was Omar Khadr's horrific sub-human excuse for parents at fault for sending him as a child, but never the less, at time of capture Omar was a member of an illegal criminal organization and Omar plead guilty to illegally killing a solider on a mission fully authorized by the UN Security council. And Omar Khadr, now an adult, still to this day has never renounced the Al Qeda ideology of crimes against humanity mass killing of civilians.

    Compared to the unbelievably cruelty sustained over months, and very nearly fatal full extreme torture the innocent victim of mistaken identity Meyer Arar was subjected to in Syria, Omar was practically treated with kid gloves.

    And Bradley Manning, who you do not claim did not do what he is accused of, you say 6 months of solitary confinement, including having regular visits from his family, supporters and lawyers, that this condition of imprisonment is torture and that outrages you?

    In that case I assume you will immediately call on Hamas in Gaza to allow the poor Israeli conscript Corporal Gilad Shalit his right to Red Cross visits, since Gilad is accused of no crime by anyone, is held as a hostage for ransom ( a war crime), and Gilad has suffered in a far, far more isolated form of total complete solitary confinement, than Manning could not even imagine, not for 6 measly months including family visits Manning gets, but Gilad has suffered true total isolation for 5 YEARS !!!!.

  3. I disagree with the above blogs premise.

    Arar's case is totally different than Khadr or Manning.

    For one thing Arar is innocent while Khadr or Manning are incredibly guilty.
    I will repeat that; !!!!—i—n—n—o—c—e—n—t—!!!!

    Since most sleaze bag defense lawyers like yourself spend your entire legal careers happily trying what ever sneaky tricks you can to gain acquittals of those you know personally to be extremely guilty, no matter if they be child rapist murders, terrorists mass killers of civilians or traitors, the fact that Mayer Arar is actually innocent must come as a complete shock to you.

    Mayer Arar did not ever have anything what so ever to do with terrorism or extremism in any way. Arar was then and is still today a simple, honest, decent hard working, loyal Canadian citizen and father, raising his family in the Muslim faith followed by the vast majority of Muslims, i.e. a faith which does not condone terrorism.

    Omar Khadr's father was a senior Al Qeda terrorist who blew up the Egyptian Embassy in Islamabad in 1995 killing 17 Muslim civilians, Omar Khadr's mother, sister and brother appeared on Canadian television and PBS in 2004, and told how happy the were to hear about the 911 attacks and how proud they were to have sent Omar at age 11 from Canada to Al Qeda training camps in Afghanistan to train as a terrorist suicide bomber since if he were allowed to grow up in Canada would in danger of turning into a homosexual ?!?!?!?!.

    source: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/kha

    Even if it was Omar Khadr's horrific sub-human excuse for parents at fault for sending him as a child, but never the less, at time of capture Omar was a member of an illegal criminal organization and Omar plead guilty to illegally killing a solider on a mission fully authorized by the UN Security council. And Omar Khadr, now an adult, still to this day has never renounced the Al Qeda ideology of crimes against humanity mass killing of civilians.

    Compared to the unbelievably cruelty sustained over months, and very nearly fatal full extreme torture the innocent victim of mistaken identity Meyer Arar was subjected to in Syria, Omar was practically treated with kid gloves.

    And Bradley Manning, who you do not claim did not do what he is accused of, you say 6 months of solitary confinement, including having regular visits from his family, supporters and lawyers, that this condition of imprisonment is torture and that outrages you?

    In that case I assume you will immediately call on Hamas in Gaza to allow the poor Israeli conscript Corporal Gilad Shalit his right to Red Cross visits, since Gilad is accused of no crime by anyone, is held as a hostage for ransom ( a war crime), and Gilad has suffered in a far, far more isolated form of total complete solitary confinement, than Manning could not even imagine, not for 6 measly months including family visits Manning gets, but Gilad has suffered true total isolation for 5 YEARS !!!!.

  4. I disagree with the above blogs premise.

    Arar’s case is totally different than Khadr or Manning.

    For one thing Arar is innocent while Khadr or Manning are incredibly guilty.
    I will repeat that; !!!!—i—n—n—o—c—e—n—t—!!!!

    Since most sleaze bag defense lawyers like yourself spend your entire legal careers happily trying what ever sneaky tricks you can to gain acquittals of those you know personally to be extremely guilty, no matter if they be child rapist murders, terrorists mass killers of civilians or traitors, the fact that Mayer Arar is actually innocent must come as a complete shock to you.

    Mayer Arar did not ever have anything what so ever to do with terrorism or extremism in any way. Arar was then and is still today a simple, honest, decent hard working, loyal Canadian citizen and father, raising his family in the Muslim faith followed by the vast majority of Muslims, i.e. a faith which does not condone terrorism.

    Omar Khadr’s father was a senior Al Qeda terrorist who blew up the Egyptian Embassy in Islamabad in 1995 killing 17 Muslim civilians, Omar Khadr’s mother, sister and brother appeared on Canadian television and PBS in 2004, and told how happy the were to hear about the 911 attacks and how proud they were to have sent Omar at age 11 from Canada to Al Qeda training camps in Afghanistan to train as a terrorist suicide bomber since if he were allowed to grow up in Canada would in danger of turning into a homosexual ?!?!?!?!.

    source: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/khadr/etc/script.html

    Even if it was Omar Khadr’s horrific sub-human excuse for parents at fault for sending him as a child, but never the less, at time of capture Omar was a member of an illegal criminal organization and Omar plead guilty to illegally killing a solider on a mission fully authorized by the UN Security council. And Omar Khadr, now an adult, still to this day has never renounced the Al Qeda ideology of crimes against humanity mass killing of civilians.

    Compared to the unbelievably cruelty sustained over months, and very nearly fatal full extreme torture the innocent victim of mistaken identity Meyer Arar was subjected to in Syria, Omar was practically treated with kid gloves.

    And Bradley Manning, who you do not claim did not do what he is accused of, you say 6 months of solitary confinement, including having regular visits from his family, supporters and lawyers, that this condition of imprisonment is torture and that outrages you?

    In that case I assume you will immediately call on Hamas in Gaza to allow the poor Israeli conscript Corporal Gilad Shalit his right to Red Cross visits, since Gilad is accused of no crime by anyone, is held as a hostage for ransom ( a war crime), and Gilad has suffered in a far, far more isolated form of total complete solitary confinement, than Manning could not even imagine, not for 6 measly months including family visits Manning gets, but Gilad has suffered true total isolation for 5 YEARS !!!!.

  5. to judonimh
    How dare you presume to prejudge the innocence or "guilt" of anyone detained for months in subhuman conditions before even being brought to trial. What are you- God or clairvoyant?
    Not being allowed to sleep for Months on end is in fact TORTURE.
    They should do it to you and see how you feel.
    Bradley Manning was NOT having visits from his family. In fact his mother traveled all the way from Wales and was denied seeing her son.
    For some devious reason neither Amnesty International nor Juan Mendez UN rapporteur on torture were never allowed to see him. Oh, but you know more than everyone else because you are all-seeing and all-knowing.

  6. Dear Pat …

    Excellent point !!

    Brad has been held over a year without being tried !!

    Dear Mr Madar,

    The title of your book speaks my own tongue, my own heart !!

    i can't wait to read it !!

    You are the kind of lawyer who reminds us what lawyers are really supposed to do, to be.

    i'm INDEBTED to your Truth that 25,000 prisoners in the US languish in isolation cells in the fed system alone !!!

    Even PREtrial prisoners !!

    & your Truth that Omar Khadr isn't an exception, that OTHER children, AMERICAN to boot, are undergoing LIFE WITHOUT PAROLE !!

    Judonimh talks of Omar's pleading "guilty" to killing a soldier… when the whole world is outraged at the fact of Omar being even TRIED AT ALL ….AS AN ADULT !!

    Judonimh, an apolgist for Apartheid Israel, avoids any mention of what every observer of America's criminal system knows … that accused parties SO OFTEN plead "guilty" out of fear induced by coercion & threat …

    They plead "guilty" on being offered bargains they feel are safer to accept, knowing they are in the grip of an immoral system which will stop at nothing, including getting false testimonies from other convicts in exchange for better bargains for the perjured convicts ….

    In Omar's case, the testimony of a US SOLDIER PARTICIPATING IN the battle in which he was captured shows the DISTINCT PROBABILITY that the soldier who was killed DIED AS A RESULT OF A GRENADE THROWN BY US FORCES FROM OUTSIDE THE COMPOUND, NOT FROM A GRENADE USED INSIDE THE COMPOUND by ANY member of the Afghan Resistance, which included Omar but NOT JUST HIM ALONE.

    Judonimh, who also supports torture of prisoners, always glibly says Omar was never tortured, he has been lying, when witnesses of Omar's condition, including Omar's lawyer & a US guard inside the prison, attest to the torture & the conditions in which he was kept, which conditions amount to conditions of torture in themselves, to say nothing of Omar being kept with adults .. an illegal form of confinement in his case, under international law the US is signatory to.

  7. to judonimh
    How dare you presume to prejudge the innocence or “guilt” of anyone detained for months in subhuman conditions before even being brought to trial. What are you- God or clairvoyant?
    Not being allowed to sleep for Months on end is in fact TORTURE.
    They should do it to you and see how you feel.
    Bradley Manning was NOT having visits from his family. In fact his mother traveled all the way from Wales and was denied seeing her son.
    For some devious reason neither Amnesty International nor Juan Mendez UN rapporteur on torture were never allowed to see him. Oh, but you know more than everyone else because you are all-seeing and all-knowing.

  8. I obviously have no personal knowledge of Manning's guilt or innocence and never said I did.

    As I understand it, it is in fact the author of the above article, radical lawyer Chase Madar, who does not claim Manning is innocent, but rather justifies acts which include the public outing of the names of pro democracy activists living under brutal dictatorships, thereby exposing them to possible arrest, torture and execution as some sort of justifiable whistle blowing.

  9. Dear Pat …

    Excellent point !!

    Brad has been held over a year without being tried !!

    Dear Mr Madar,

    The title of your book speaks my own tongue, my own heart !!

    i can’t wait to read it !!

    You are the kind of lawyer who reminds us what lawyers are really supposed to do, to be.

    i’m INDEBTED to your Truth that 25,000 prisoners in the US languish in isolation cells in the fed system alone !!!

    Even PREtrial prisoners !!

    & your Truth that Omar Khadr isn’t an exception, that OTHER children, AMERICAN to boot, are undergoing LIFE WITHOUT PAROLE !!

    Judonimh talks of Omar’s pleading “guilty” to killing a soldier… when the whole world is outraged at the fact of Omar being even TRIED AT ALL ….AS AN ADULT !!

    Judonimh, an apolgist for Apartheid Israel, avoids any mention of what every observer of America’s criminal system knows … that accused parties SO OFTEN plead “guilty” out of fear induced by coercion & threat …

    They plead “guilty” on being offered bargains they feel are safer to accept, knowing they are in the grip of an immoral system which will stop at nothing, including getting false testimonies from other convicts in exchange for better bargains for the perjured convicts ….

    In Omar’s case, the testimony of a US SOLDIER PARTICIPATING IN the battle in which he was captured shows the DISTINCT PROBABILITY that the soldier who was killed DIED AS A RESULT OF A GRENADE THROWN BY US FORCES FROM OUTSIDE THE COMPOUND, NOT FROM A GRENADE USED INSIDE THE COMPOUND by ANY member of the Afghan Resistance, which included Omar but NOT JUST HIM ALONE.

    Judonimh, who also supports torture of prisoners, always glibly says Omar was never tortured, he has been lying, when witnesses of Omar’s condition, including Omar’s lawyer & a US guard inside the prison, attest to the torture & the conditions in which he was kept, which conditions amount to conditions of torture in themselves, to say nothing of Omar being kept with adults .. an illegal form of confinement in his case, under international law the US is signatory to.

  10. I obviously have no personal knowledge of Manning’s guilt or innocence and never said I did.

    As I understand it, it is in fact the author of the above article, radical lawyer Chase Madar, who does not claim Manning is innocent, but rather justifies acts which include the public outing of the names of pro democracy activists living under brutal dictatorships, thereby exposing them to possible arrest, torture and execution as some sort of justifiable whistle blowing.

  11. Without the exaggerations, hype and lies, exactly what conditions Manning was held under for 8 months were described by Manning in his own words in his Article 138 complaint he filed under the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) in January 2011.

    During his imprisonment he was held under a Prevention Of Injury order. He had access to television, books and magazines, one hour outside exercise a day, and frequent visits from his lawyer and medical personal. He was allowed to sleep when ever he wanted and was not disturbed during his sleep unless he tried to hide under his blankets. In April 2011 his Article 138 complaint was successful. He was moved about 3 months ago to medium security.

    It is a complete outrage and travesty to compare the infantile whining of this big cry baby Manning to real torture , that so many millions around the world have suffered, for example the real torture the totally innocent Meyer Arar suffered and nearly died from in Syria.

    For one example, Manning moaned like a little spoiled child in his Article 138 about how he thought he was so terribly mistreated by having his eye glasses taken away so as consequence he had to sit a little closer than normal to his television.

    That Madar has the unmitigated nerve to compare Manning's series unbelievably trivial complaints about such things as watching his television to the Syrian dungeons of torture the innocent Mayer Arar lived through….

    It actually makes me physically ill.

  12. Without the exaggerations, hype and lies, exactly what conditions Manning was held under for 8 months were described by Manning in his own words in his Article 138 complaint he filed under the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) in January 2011.

    During his imprisonment he was held under a Prevention Of Injury order. He had access to television, books and magazines, one hour outside exercise a day, and frequent visits from his lawyer and medical personal. He was allowed to sleep when ever he wanted and was not disturbed during his sleep unless he tried to hide under his blankets. In April 2011 his Article 138 complaint was successful. He was moved about 3 months ago to medium security.

    It is a complete outrage and travesty to compare the infantile whining of this big cry baby Manning to real torture , that so many millions around the world have suffered, for example the real torture the totally innocent Meyer Arar suffered and nearly died from in Syria.

    For one example, Manning moaned like a little spoiled child in his Article 138 about how he thought he was so terribly mistreated by having his eye glasses taken away so as consequence he had to sit a little closer than normal to his television.

    That Madar has the unmitigated nerve to compare Manning’s series unbelievably trivial complaints about such things as watching his television to the Syrian dungeons of torture the innocent Mayer Arar lived through….

    It actually makes me physically ill.

  13. Judonimh the advocate of Israel comes here … out of concern for rights ?

    His project instead is to destroy them.

    His is the Zionist / neocon 2 – pincer strategy.

    On the one hand, the plan is to cultivate BLACK SITES, BLACK ZONES where targetted people or groups will not only NOT be entitled to any legal protections, but where NO LAW WILL APPLY AT ALL.

    Judonimh first strips "terrorists" of all rights Americans are eligible to.

    Then he exends this exception to include Bradley Manning ( &, by extension, to all Americans like him ).

    Judonimh diverts the dialog from Mr Madar's crucial premise, that alleged "terrorists" & US / Canadian citizens alike are facing a highly similar barrage of inhuman illegalities.

    Why ? What does the neocon / Zionist project gain from this ?

    The strategy here is to create more & more BLACK ZONES to cover the future forthcoming imperial / colonial projects, which will necessitate a greater & increasing suspension of rights across widening sectors of foreign regions & Empire's domestic populations as well.

    Israel has a vested interest in the creation of BLACK ZONES, EXTRALEGAL ZONES, for this Jewish state is a BLACK ZONE STATE dysfunctional even in the face of pacifist interventions & experiments that seek harmony in place of conflict.

    The ISRAELI BLACK HOLE,like all others, is sucking America into her void.

    Judonimh now extends his BLACK ZONE, which he had formerly reserved for nonAmerican "terrorists", to Bradley Manning.

    He does this by indirectly way, by belittling, ridiculing & infantilizing Brad Manning.

    By this means Judonimh belittles, ridicules & infantilizes Bradley Manning's rights, as well as the greater rights Manning is fighting for, the people's sovereign rights to know & thus to be informed decisionmakers in thir own rule.

    The attack on Manning by the neoconZionist mindset signals the open INTERNALIZATION of the hitherto GLOBALIZED US / ISRAELI EXTRALEGALITY.

    The other pincer of this strategy is the use of precedential & parallel forms of black zones as countering chess pieces of blackmail in the "normalization" of the abnormal within public dialog.

    Judonimh already uses such blackmail to silence opposition & criticism.

    It doesn't work, for world opinion is largely able to tell truth from its fabrications.

    But when this strategy's used to exert gravity's pull to overthrow targets within the power structures of nations, it can work, for these structures are soft with corruption.

    This pincer strategy is enabling the US Empire to pull down the American Republic, & it's helping the Zionist albatross of Israel to pull down both in turn.

  14. No.

    It doesn't work this way.

    Judonimh's smearing of Brad Manning speaks more about Judonimh than Brad Manning.

    Judonimh jeers at Brad as a "big cry baby" , & it is Judonimh's language that is "infantile", not Brad.

    Judonimh's language is that of a schoolyard bully, jeering from an anonymous height.

    Brad has proved himself.

    His inner strength BELIES his boyish, pudgyfaced softness.

    For months they tried to break him down.

    The US Government.

    The American military.

    The Marines of Quantico.

    The base commander.

    They tried to make him turn against Assange.

    They tried to make him help them make a "case".

    So they could "get" at Julian.

    No way.

    Brad turned out to be no snitch, the kind the system uses.

    Brad singlehandedly did what Ellsberg did in a time that feels so long ago today.

    Brad exposed the US wars for terror as crimes of war themselves.

    He exposed the American Occupations.

    He exposed Guantanamo.

    He exposed the US attempt to dominate & control other countries through diplomacy.

    He did all of the media's job for it.

    Judonimh talks about the suffering of milions.

    Brad didn't talk.

    He gave those millons flesh & faces.

    He revealed their actual suffering, their agonies.

    & he exposed their real Oppressors.

  15. Judonimh the advocate of Israel comes here … out of concern for rights ?

    His project instead is to destroy them.

    His is the Zionist / neocon 2 – pincer strategy.

    On the one hand, the plan is to cultivate BLACK SITES, BLACK ZONES where targetted people or groups will not only NOT be entitled to any legal protections, but where NO LAW WILL APPLY AT ALL.

    Judonimh first strips “terrorists” of all rights Americans are eligible to.

    Then he exends this exception to include Bradley Manning ( &, by extension, to all Americans like him ).

    Judonimh diverts the dialog from Mr Madar’s crucial premise, that alleged “terrorists” & US / Canadian citizens alike are facing a highly similar barrage of inhuman illegalities.

    Why ? What does the neocon / Zionist project gain from this ?

    The strategy here is to create more & more BLACK ZONES to cover the future forthcoming imperial / colonial projects, which will necessitate a greater & increasing suspension of rights across widening sectors of foreign regions & Empire’s domestic populations as well.

    Israel has a vested interest in the creation of BLACK ZONES, EXTRALEGAL ZONES, for this Jewish state is a BLACK ZONE STATE dysfunctional even in the face of pacifist interventions & experiments that seek harmony in place of conflict.

    The ISRAELI BLACK HOLE,like all others, is sucking America into her void.

    Judonimh now extends his BLACK ZONE, which he had formerly reserved for nonAmerican “terrorists”, to Bradley Manning.

    He does this by indirectly way, by belittling, ridiculing & infantilizing Brad Manning.

    By this means Judonimh belittles, ridicules & infantilizes Bradley Manning’s rights, as well as the greater rights Manning is fighting for, the people’s sovereign rights to know & thus to be informed decisionmakers in thir own rule.

    The attack on Manning by the neoconZionist mindset signals the open INTERNALIZATION of the hitherto GLOBALIZED US / ISRAELI EXTRALEGALITY.

    The other pincer of this strategy is the use of precedential & parallel forms of black zones as countering chess pieces of blackmail in the “normalization” of the abnormal within public dialog.

    Judonimh already uses such blackmail to silence opposition & criticism.

    It doesn’t work, for world opinion is largely able to tell truth from its fabrications.

    But when this strategy’s used to exert gravity’s pull to overthrow targets within the power structures of nations, it can work, for these structures are soft with corruption.

    This pincer strategy is enabling the US Empire to pull down the American Republic, & it’s helping the Zionist albatross of Israel to pull down both in turn.

  16. No.

    It doesn’t work this way.

    Judonimh’s smearing of Brad Manning speaks more about Judonimh than Brad Manning.

    Judonimh jeers at Brad as a “big cry baby” , & it is Judonimh’s language that is “infantile”, not Brad.

    Judonimh’s language is that of a schoolyard bully, jeering from an anonymous height.

    Brad has proved himself.

    His inner strength BELIES his boyish, pudgyfaced softness.

    For months they tried to break him down.

    The US Government.

    The American military.

    The Marines of Quantico.

    The base commander.

    They tried to make him turn against Assange.

    They tried to make him help them make a “case”.

    So they could “get” at Julian.

    No way.

    Brad turned out to be no snitch, the kind the system uses.

    Brad singlehandedly did what Ellsberg did in a time that feels so long ago today.

    Brad exposed the US wars for terror as crimes of war themselves.

    He exposed the American Occupations.

    He exposed Guantanamo.

    He exposed the US attempt to dominate & control other countries through diplomacy.

    He did all of the media’s job for it.

    Judonimh talks about the suffering of milions.

    Brad didn’t talk.

    He gave those millons flesh & faces.

    He revealed their actual suffering, their agonies.

    & he exposed their real Oppressors.

  17. The blog asked the question "Was the treatment given to Manning and Khadr equivalent to torture as was done on innocent victim Meir Arar?"

    On this, the actual question the blog posed question I answered, "No, In my opinion Manning's spoiled brat complaints that for example having his eyeglasses confiscated while in solitary made it somewhat difficult for him to watch his in-cell television was not at all equivalent maltreatment to Meir Arar being placed in a hole in the ground in Syria and savagely tortured to near death and in fact the attempt to draw an analogy between Manning and Arar is just ridiculous and an outrage."

    Please note: The subject was not "Can A. Savage completely ignore the actual subject of the blog and instead just make one more in a long line of long winded personal attacks on someone else daring to comment on the blog ?"

    Savage: could you please please next time try to make even a token attempt to stick to the subject of the blog?

    By the way I did notice you, along with the blog author Madar have decided this young kid to be without a shadow of a doubt guilty as charged even before his trial. Can not you have the minimal decency to even wait till Manning's trial at least before convicting him in your own mind?

  18. The blog asked the question “Was the treatment given to Manning and Khadr equivalent to torture as was done on innocent victim Meir Arar?”

    On this, the actual question the blog posed question I answered, “No, In my opinion Manning’s spoiled brat complaints that for example having his eyeglasses confiscated while in solitary made it somewhat difficult for him to watch his in-cell television was not at all equivalent maltreatment to Meir Arar being placed in a hole in the ground in Syria and savagely tortured to near death and in fact the attempt to draw an analogy between Manning and Arar is just ridiculous and an outrage.”

    Please note: The subject was not “Can A. Savage completely ignore the actual subject of the blog and instead just make one more in a long line of long winded personal attacks on someone else daring to comment on the blog ?”

    Savage: could you please please next time try to make even a token attempt to stick to the subject of the blog?

    By the way I did notice you, along with the blog author Madar have decided this young kid to be without a shadow of a doubt guilty as charged even before his trial. Can not you have the minimal decency to even wait till Manning’s trial at least before convicting him in your own mind?

  19. Stick to the point ?

    Then let me start by demonstrating how Judonimh DISTORTS it here.

    Mr Madar did not EQUATE Arar's case with Khadr's or Manning's, as Judonimh alleges he did.That is NOT the issue here.

    Mr Madar didn't assert that Khadr's & Manning's "treatment" is "EQUIVALENT" ( Judonimh's term ) to Arar's torture.

    Nor did Mr Madar distinguish Arar alone as "innocent", implying the others are not, as Judonimh tries to allege. The distinction of "innocence" is Judonimh's , NOT Mr Madar's.

    Were we in court, Mr Madar would make mincemeat of such word juggling, such verbal sleights of hand, by Judonimh !

    Judonimh DISTORTS the actual theme of this blog, which is that a CONNNECTING illegality & inhumanity mark the treatment of prisoners in the US's War of Terror. Which is NOT to say the treatment is unvarying or comparatively the same.

    In order to ridicule & belittle Bradley Manning, Judonimh deliberately & spuriously connects ( that is, compares ) the treatment of Manning with the torture of Arar, equating them on the same level so that he ( Judonimh ) could then ridicule Manning's complaints about the treatment Manning received in very different contexts, & differing conditions, from those suffered by Arar.

    Mr Madar did NOT posit such a comparison as his theme here, in other words.

    Judonimh tries to assert that he did, for such a ridiculous comparison would serve his purpose of ( mis )using Maher Arar to belittle Bradley Manning.

    Also, Mr Madar did not allege Manning was "guilty" of anything, including the alleged charges against him.

    Nothing in his blog shows or indicates he even touched this subject.

    But the world at large ( by common knowledge ) knows Bradley Manning was thrown into prison by the US for the "Collateral Murder" video.

    He was imprisoned for allegedly releasing documented evidence of US war crimes & US practices aimed at the domination of other countries.

    It's coming out the US put him in positions of psychological & physical torture as punishment for this crime & in order to force him to become a snitch the way the USraeli system encourages individuals it holds in its power to become such creatures.

    & i know it's these reasons behind Manning's incarceration & torture by the US system, & his continued moral resistance throughout his ordeal, that are the REAL reasons why Judonimh spits out his ridicule & belittling of Manning the way he does.

    At the same time Judonimh tries to show he is impartial & neutral towards Manning by never touching on the REAL REASONS he has for ridiculing Manning with such special & vindictive fury.

    This helps Judonimh MASK his own motives for his very obvious loathing of Manning, while pretending to be morally decent, indeed delicate, himself towards Manning.

    Judonimh hides the real reasons for his loathing of Manning under this cloak of ethical decency, while using his apparent distance from those reasons to lash Manning with as much "disinterested"scorn ( & impunity ) as he can.

    Judonimmh pretends a concern for "this young kid" while doing his utmost to strip him of his ACTUAL, PUBLIC dignity here on this site in exactly the same way the US tried to strip him of it psychologically & physically inside its prison.

    It's the psychological stripping of a human subject for "his own good", in "his own interest", inflicted by a "morally neutral" & even "disinterested" spectator.

    & i find such behavior repulsive & contemptible.

    If my reaction is taken as a personal attack, i will still say the same thing.

    It's COWARDLY behavior, it's REPULSIVE, & it's CONTEMPTIBLE.

  20. Stick to the point ?

    Then let me start by demonstrating how Judonimh DISTORTS it here.

    Mr Madar did not EQUATE Arar’s case with Khadr’s or Manning’s, as Judonimh alleges he did.That is NOT the issue here.

    Mr Madar didn’t assert that Khadr’s & Manning’s “treatment” is “EQUIVALENT” ( Judonimh’s term ) to Arar’s torture.

    Nor did Mr Madar distinguish Arar alone as “innocent”, implying the others are not, as Judonimh tries to allege. The distinction of “innocence” is Judonimh’s , NOT Mr Madar’s.

    Were we in court, Mr Madar would make mincemeat of such word juggling, such verbal sleights of hand, by Judonimh !

    Judonimh DISTORTS the actual theme of this blog, which is that a CONNNECTING illegality & inhumanity mark the treatment of prisoners in the US’s War of Terror. Which is NOT to say the treatment is unvarying or comparatively the same.

    In order to ridicule & belittle Bradley Manning, Judonimh deliberately & spuriously connects ( that is, compares ) the treatment of Manning with the torture of Arar, equating them on the same level so that he ( Judonimh ) could then ridicule Manning’s complaints about the treatment Manning received in very different contexts, & differing conditions, from those suffered by Arar.

    Mr Madar did NOT posit such a comparison as his theme here, in other words.

    Judonimh tries to assert that he did, for such a ridiculous comparison would serve his purpose of ( mis )using Maher Arar to belittle Bradley Manning.

    Also, Mr Madar did not allege Manning was “guilty” of anything, including the alleged charges against him.

    Nothing in his blog shows or indicates he even touched this subject.

    But the world at large ( by common knowledge ) knows Bradley Manning was thrown into prison by the US for the “Collateral Murder” video.

    He was imprisoned for allegedly releasing documented evidence of US war crimes & US practices aimed at the domination of other countries.

    It’s coming out the US put him in positions of psychological & physical torture as punishment for this crime & in order to force him to become a snitch the way the USraeli system encourages individuals it holds in its power to become such creatures.

    & i know it’s these reasons behind Manning’s incarceration & torture by the US system, & his continued moral resistance throughout his ordeal, that are the REAL reasons why Judonimh spits out his ridicule & belittling of Manning the way he does.

    At the same time Judonimh tries to show he is impartial & neutral towards Manning by never touching on the REAL REASONS he has for ridiculing Manning with such special & vindictive fury.

    This helps Judonimh MASK his own motives for his very obvious loathing of Manning, while pretending to be morally decent, indeed delicate, himself towards Manning.

    Judonimh hides the real reasons for his loathing of Manning under this cloak of ethical decency, while using his apparent distance from those reasons to lash Manning with as much “disinterested”scorn ( & impunity ) as he can.

    Judonimmh pretends a concern for “this young kid” while doing his utmost to strip him of his ACTUAL, PUBLIC dignity here on this site in exactly the same way the US tried to strip him of it psychologically & physically inside its prison.

    It’s the psychological stripping of a human subject for “his own good”, in “his own interest”, inflicted by a “morally neutral” & even “disinterested” spectator.

    & i find such behavior repulsive & contemptible.

    If my reaction is taken as a personal attack, i will still say the same thing.

    It’s COWARDLY behavior, it’s REPULSIVE, & it’s CONTEMPTIBLE.

Comments are closed.