The banality of death squads then and now – by Billmon.
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January 19, 2005
Billmon: The Evil of Banality
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Let us hope that the trick of banning the support for the death squads from the public sphere is no longer possible in the age of information. They must not get away with this any longer.
Posted by: teuton | Jan 19 2005 11:56 utc | 3
A couple of years ago, a German official — quite accurately — compared the techniques of the Bush administration with those of the Nazis. For this, the media (especially but not exclusively the right-wing echo chamber) opportunistically portrayed her as having directly compared Bush with Hitler. For this, I believe, she was pressured to step down. That’s how I recall it, anyway.
In the spirit of Why don’t we hear more from people who’ve turned out to be right?, I wonder what this perceptive individual has to say about the Bush administration today.
The other person I’d like to hear from is the Canadian official who lost her job for calling Bush a “moron.”
Posted by: ralphbon | Jan 19 2005 12:15 utc | 4
from edward herman’s study, the real terror network
Important characteristics of death squad activities in Latin America, which bear on the nature and purposes of the National Security State, have been their sadism and their tie-in with ordinary illegal activities like theft, kidnappings for ransom, and the drug trade. They are serviced by thugs. The thugs have a role to play in the National Security State – they eliminate “subversives” and intimidate and create anxiety in the rest of the population, all potential subversives.
Posted by: b real | Jan 19 2005 15:47 utc | 6
What are they working so hard to clean up?
He told me he has watched the military use bulldozers to push the soil into piles and load it onto trucks to carry away. This was done in the Julan and Jimouriya quarters of the city, which is of course where the heaviest fighting occurred during the siege, as this was where resistance was the fiercest. . .
“At least two kilometers of soil were removed,” he explained, “Exactly as they did at Baghdad Airport after the heavy battles there during the invasion and the Americans used their special weapons.” . . .
special weapons … “Special Treatment”?
Bush is now thinking of building jails abroad to hold suspects for life
…the administration sees the US not just as a self-appointed global policeman, but also as the world’s prison warder. It is thinking of building jails in foreign countries, mainly ones with grim human rights records, to which it can secretly transfer detainees (unconvicted by any court) for the rest of their lives – a kind of global gulag beyond the scrutiny of the International Committee of the Red Cross, or any other independent observers or lawyers
you can guage how “civilized” a society is by the number of jails it has and how many people can be talked into becoming policemen. – vine deloria, jr. ‘custer died for your sins’
Posted by: b real | Jan 19 2005 22:47 utc | 10