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International News Title: Do You Feel Safe Now? Now that military officers selected by the Bush Pentagon have reached a split verdict convicting Salim Hamdan, a onetime driver for Osama bin Laden, of supporting terrorism, but innocent of terrorist conspiracy, do you feel safe? Or are we superpower Americans still at risk until we capture bin Ladens dentist, barber, and the person who installed the carpet in his living room? The Bush Regime with its comic huffings and puffings is unaware that it has made itself the laughing stock of the world, a comedy version of the Third Reich. Hamdan was not defended by the slick lawyers that got O.J. Simpson off, and he most certainly did not have a jury of his peers. Hamdan was defended by a Pentagon appointed US Navy officer, and his jurors were all Pentagon appointed US military officers with an eye on their careers. Even in this Kangaroo Court, Hamdan was cleared of the main charge. The US Navy officer who was Hamdans appointed attorney is certainly no terrorist sympathizer. Yet even this United States officer said that the rules Bush designed for the military tribunals were designed to achieve convictions. He also said that the judge allowed evidence that would not have been admitted by any civilian or military US court. He said that the interrogations of Hamdan, which comprised the basis of the Bush Regimes case, were tainted by coercive tactics, including sleep deprivation and solitary confinement. Does this make you a proud American? Do you think you are made more safe when you stand there while your government implements its own version of Joseph Stalins show trials? The trial and conviction of Hamdan has made every American very unsafe. The one certain fact about US law is that it is expanded until it applies to everyone. Consider RICO, for example, the asset freeze law that was intended only in criminal cases involving the Mafia; it wasnt long before RICO found its way into civil divorce proceedings. Bushs multi-year, multi-billion dollar war on terror has been reduced to railroading a low level employee, a driver, for terrorism. One would hope that the Hamdan verdict would be enough shame and ridicule for the US in one day. But no, Bush didnt stop there. On his way to the Beijing Olympics, President Bush expressed deep concerns for the state of human rights in China. But not in Guantanamo, nor in Abu Ghraib, nor in the CIAs torture dungeons used for renditions, nor in Iraq and Afghanistan where the US is expert at bombing weddings, funerals, childrens soccer games, and every assortment of civilians imaginable. As the good book says, clean the beam from your own eye before pointing to the mote in your brothers eye. But Americans, the salt of the earth, have neither beams nor motes. We are the virtuous few, ordained by God to impose our hegemony on the world. It is written, or so say the neocons. What would President Bush say if, heaven forbid, the Chinese were as rude as he is and asked Mr. Superpower why the land of freedom and democracy has one million names on a watch list. China with a population four times as large doesnt have a watch list with one million names. What would President Bush say if China asked him why the US, with a population one-fourth the size of Chinas has hundreds of thousands more of its citizens in prison? The percentage of Americans in prison is far higher than in China and is a larger absolute number. What would President Bush say if China asked him why he used lies and deception to justify his invasion of Iraq. China, unlike Bush, is not responsible for 1.2 million dead Iraqis and 4 million displaced Iraqis. Chinas human rights policy is not perfect. Chinas greatest human rights failing is that China is the Bush Regimes prime enabler of its war crimes and human rights abuses in Iraq and Afghanistan. By financing Bushs budget deficit, China is financing Bushs gratuitous wars. Indeed, China can be said to finance the weaponry that the US gives Israel to enable the suppression of the Palestinians and with which to bomb the civilian population of Lebanon. China is a serious human rights abuser, because China is complicit in Bushs human rights abuses. If we are honest about who is actually murdering and abusing people, it is the US, Israel, and the UK. Theres your axis of evil.
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