Sherry Chandler

Sherry Chandler » Black Border

Black Border

A correspondent sent me this link:

Let us hope this is a bit premature.

But the detainee/torture bill that is now making its way to George W. Bush’s desk is reason enough to mourn.

[Update: I updated the link and can now point you to a bit of explanation.]

— from Maia Szalavitz at The Huffington Post:

First, they came for the addicts. And because the word “drug” was so frightening to otherwise sane Americans, they countenanced treatment involving beatings, the wearing of humiliating outfits (drag for men, whorish make-up and revealing clothes for women), sexually degrading language, stress positions, forced exercise, food deprivation, sleep deprivation and unrelenting emotional attacks.

…

So should we be at all surprised that Americans accept food deprivation, sleep deprivation and hypothermia for suspected terrorists? We think it’s OK to force “bad” kids into the wilderness to live on lizards in freezing temperatures; we think, in fact, that this will cure their depression or addiction or defiance. We think, stranger still, that “defiance” is something that should be “cured.”

— from Unhappy Camper:

In my 61 years on this planet, I thought I had seen most things.

I have been married and divorced. I have children and have seen a child die. I have grandchildren and have seen a grandchild die. I watched my Mother suffer with Multiple Sclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease and dementia for years before passing away in 2005.

I have spent 16 miserable days on a troopship from Oakland, California to Da Nang, Viet Nam.

I witnessed Tet of 1968 up close and personal.

In April 1970, I was in a forward base camp 100 meters inside the Cambodian border.

I have learned to fly a helicopter, shoot a 4.2 mortar, repair teletype machines, high frequency and tactical radios, land mine detectors and pretty much everything in between.

I have teed off a round of golf at midnight in Tronheim, Norway.

I was at the 1972 Olympics in Munich when the unthinkable happened.

Today I have been listening to the Senate debate about redefining Common Article Three of the Geneva Convention and revocation of habeas corpus. I have watched Senators argue that secret trials and secret evidence is good.

Today our values may be time warped to pre-1215 values.

I just can’t get my brain around what is being done to our dignity today. I can truthfully say I think I have seen everything.

Something is really, really wrong here.