Saturday, April 12, 2008

I am not going to stop beating this drum


From bewert's diary at Daily Kos today. What happened to one of our prisoners. I'm only giving you the medical summary, not the details.
OPINION

This 47-year-old White male, [redacted], died of blunt force injuries and asphyxia. The autopsy disclosed multiple blunt force injuries,including deep contusions of the chest wall, numerous displaced rib fractures, lung contusions, and hemorrhage into the mesentery of the small and large intestine. An examination of the neck structures revealed hemorrhage into the strap muscles and fractures of the thyroid cartilage and hyoid bone. According to the investigative report provided by U.S. Army CID, the decedent was shackled to the top of a doorframe with a gag in his mouth at the time he lost consciousness and became pulseless.

The severe blunt force injuries, the hanging position, and the obstruction of the oral cavity with a gag contributed to this individual's death. The manner of death is homicide.

This is the reality of current US interrogation techniques. Hung by your wrists for an extended period, gagged, and beaten so harshly that you have almost 30 rib fractures and a broken sternum.

Receiving zero medical care. Actually losing consiousness and "becoming pulseless" while still hanging, feeling your broken ribs slice into your lungs, the skin falling off your wrists where the handcuffs are supporting your weight.

Repeatedly shitting yourself. As there is simply no other choice.
This is what the Bush Administration has led us into.

I don't give a flying fig whether we have enough time or enough votes for conviction,* if we aren't impeaching the lot of them then we cannot say we give a good goddamn about democracy OR decency.

*I do believe that if we had the investigation and the facts came out, we may well find we had the votes for conviction. The American people, if they knew the truth, would be so horrified and outraged that a Senator would be a damned fool to say, "No big deal."


UPDATE:
Want to do something about it? Check out Troutfishings diary today titled "How You Can Fight, Help Expose US Gov. Torture Programs"

--the BB

2 comments:

BooCat said...

Dear God. We are all guilty if we let our government get away with this. How many individuals stood in the courtroom in Nuremberg and said, "I didn't know." or "I was following orders." What did we do to them and their leaders? How can we say the American people don't know the truth? This is the kind of thing my mother used to tell me (in my youth) went on in Stalinist Russia, but she would then tell me not to worry because I lived in America and nothing like that would be tolerated by my government. Lord have mercy.

Paul said...

Boocat, it is simply mind-boggling to witness this happening in our day through the agency of the United States government.

I want to step back and say "how on earth did we get here?" except I cannot pretend to be so naive as not to know how we got here -through steady orchestrated manipulation on the part of those consumed with lust for power (and wealth) and lazy apathy on the part of the populace. Too lazy to question what we are fed and too apathetic to do anything about it. It is to weep.

If this were any country in Europe a general strike against the government would have been called some time ago (I like to think).

God help us all.