HRW: Investigate VP bodyguard's death

Human Rights Watch calls on "Iraq: Investigate Death of VP's Bodyguard in Custody:"

(Beirut) – Iraqi authorities should order a criminal investigation into allegations that security forces tortured to death a bodyguard of Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi, Human Rights Watch said today.

Iraqi authorities released Amir Sarbut Zaidan al-Batawi’s body to his family on March 20, 2012, about three months after arresting him for terrorism. His family told Human Rights Watch that his body displayed signs of torture, including in several sensitive areas. Photographs taken by the family and seen by Human Rights Watch show what appear to be a burn mark and wounds on various parts of his body.

“The statements we heard and photos we saw indicate that Iraqi security officers may have tortured Amir Sarbut Zaidan al-Batawi to death while he was in their custody,” said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “It’s essential for the Iraqi government to investigate his death and report publicly what they find.”

The family said that al-Batawi’s death certificate listed no cause of death. They said that before his arrest, the 33-year-old married father of three was in excellent health.

“I could barely recognize him,” a close relative told Human Rights Watch on March 22. “There were horrible marks and signs of torture all over his body. He had lost about 17 kilos [37.5 pounds] from the day they arrested him.”

Iraqi authorities have denied the torture allegations. On March 22, Lt. Gen. Hassan al-Baydhani, chief of staff of Baghdad’s security command center and a judicial spokesman, said al-Batawi died of kidney failure and other conditions after refusing treatment. When asked by reporters about the photographic evidence that al-Batawi had been tortured, Baydhani replied, “It is easy for Photoshop to show anything,” referring to a digital photo-editing software.

As the United States was pulling its last remaining troops from Iraq in December 2011, Iraqi authorities issued an arrest warrant for al-Hashemi on charges he was running death squads. Al-Hashemi has taken refuge in Iraqi Kurdistan and refused to return to Baghdad, saying he cannot receive a fair trial. Kurdistan Regional Government authorities have so far declined to hand him over.

An unknown number of other members of al- Hashemi’s security and office staff have been arrested since late December and are also in custody, including two women. On March 22, al-Hashemi told Human Rights Watch, “I have made repeated requests to the government to find out who else in my staff has been arrested and where they are being held, but they have not responded.”

Human Rights Watch called on the Iraqi government to release the names of all those detained and the charges against them, and to ensure that they have access to lawyers and medical care.

Highlights

This piece is written by Rebecca of Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude, Cedric of Cedric's Big Mix, Kat of Kat's Korner, Betty of Thomas Friedman is a Great Man, Mike of Mikey Likes It!, Elaine of Like Maria Said Paz, Ruth of Ruth's Report, Marcia of SICKOFITRADLZ, Stan of Oh Boy It Never Ends, Ann of Ann's Mega Dub, Isaiah of The World Today Just Nuts and Wally of The Daily Jot. Unless otherwise noted, we picked all highlights.

"'Cost-savings' on the backs of veterans, service members" -- most requested highlight by readers of this site.

Isaiah's The World Today Just Nuts Sporty Barack -- Isaiah charts the budding romance between David Cameron and Barry O.


"THIS JUST IN! MIDDLE AGED LOVE!" and "Pray God there's no black dress in the wings" -- and on that romance, Wally and Cedric react to the news that David Cameron was tucked in by Barry O.

"Iraq snapshot," "Iraq snapshot" and "Iraq snapshot" -- C.I. reports on Congress, specifically a joint-hearing of the House Veterans Affairs Commitee and the Senate Veterans Affairs Commitee and a joint-hearing by finance and oversight committees.


"Kat's Korner: Carole's back catalogue" and "Kat's Korner: Carole Touches the Sky and Soul" -- Kat provided two music pieces this week, be sure to check them both out. And for more of Kat on music, check out:

"Janis Ian"
"Madonna's Act of Contrition?"

"Egg plant casserole in the Kitchen" -- Trina offers a solid recipe and also explores the vegan/not vegan debate.

"Pedometer II" -- Betty on exercise.

"Whitney,""Whitney," "why community sucks," "Whitney and the Iraq War," "Whitney,"
"Smash and other things," "Missing (ABC)," "Revenge," "revenge hypothesis," "Cougar Town -- Give Courtney Cox the Emmy," "Unforgettable," "Raising Hope," "revenge - is emily part of a larger group?," "Smash," "Racist ABC, Racist Marc Cherry, Racist Housewives," "Never again PBS," "bring back the soapy mini-series," "The Good Wife" and "Smash" -- Ann, Betty, Rebecca, Marcia, Elaine, Mike, Rebecca, Ruth and Stan cover TV.

"Movie Musicals through the years," "My Mother The Spy," "Netflix and the Dunce" and "Netflix" -- Kat and Stan on movies.

"Barack's Wipings" -- Isaiah dips into the archives.

"Media resources?" -- Ann on the resources the community uses.

"The awful ObamaCare and the awful Paul Krugman" -- Trina on ObamaCare.

"The John Edwards Sewer" -- Ruth continues to cover the latest on sewer dweller John Edwards.

"THIS JUST IN! CALL HIM HECKLES THE CLOWN!" and "Custard's last stand?" -- Wally and Cedric on how the sheltered Barry O can't handle the heckles.

Truest statement of the week

One woman who does activism to ban all nuclear weapons, including DU, said that now in Iraq, a woman’s first question after giving birth is not: "Is it a boy or a girl," but, "Is it normal?"

-- Cindy Sheehan, "Is It Normal?" (Cindy Sheehan's Soapbox).

Truest statement of the week II

Republicans would probably like to impeach Obama for any number of reactionary reasons. But, whatever their motives, Congressman Jones’ resolution is solidly grounded in both international law and the U.S. Constitution. The wording is impeccable, and should have emanated from the Congressional Progressive and Black Caucuses, rather than the Republican Right.
The resolution defines “the use of offensive military force by a president without prior and clear authorization of an act of Congress” as constituting “an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor,” a violation of Congress’s exclusive power to declare war.”
Jones says his action is a direct response to an exchange between Obama’s Secretary of Defense, Leon Panetta, and the far-right Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions. Regarding the use of military force against Syria, the Secretary said the “goal would be to seek “international permission” and then inform Congress – but not necessarily to ask permission from the other branch of government. In other words, congressional approval of U.S. wars is optional – not mandatory – for this president.

-- Glen Ford, "Obama Richly Deserves Impeachment for War Policies, But Only a Few Dare Say So -- and Most of Them are Republicans" (Black Agenda Radio -- link is text and audio).

A note to our readers

Hey --
Another Sunday.

First up, we thank all who participated this edition which includes Dallas and the following:

The Third Estate Sunday Review's Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess and Ava,
Rebecca of Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude,
Betty of Thomas Friedman Is a Great Man,
C.I. of The Common Ills and The Third Estate Sunday Review,
Kat of Kat's Korner (of The Common Ills),
Mike of Mikey Likes It!,
Elaine of Like Maria Said Paz),
Cedric of Cedric's Big Mix,
Ruth of Ruth's Report,
Wally of The Daily Jot,
Trina of Trina's Kitchen,
Marcia of SICKOFITRDLZ,
Stan of Oh Boy It Never Ends,
Isaiah of The World Today Just Nuts,
and Ann of Ann's Mega Dub.


What did we come up with?

• Truest statement of the week

Cindy Sheehan.

• Truest statement of the week II

Glen Ford.

• Editorial: It Takes A War Whore

We had another piece planned that would have gone great with this. But maybe next week. A number of people were under the weather (C.I., Mike, Wally and Ava) so we'll take what we got.

• TV: What people will watch and what they won't

Ashley Judd has a new TV show. It'll run for 10 episodes on ABC this season and hopefully be back next fall. Even I (Jim) love the show and I'm not big on TV these days. (More due to being a Daddy than to the quality of TV.) So if you missed last Thursday's debut, make a point to stream it online. And I really love this piece Ava and C.I. wrote. But I'll digress a bit to tell you a little story here. Ava and C.I. hated Prime Suspect. 'Duh,' you say, 'I read this and saw it.' No, they hated it before it aired. They got two episodes before the fall season started and were asked to push the show if they liked it. They called it Dirty Mary and found it disgusting. They called it many things. Week in and week out. They could have done the most hilarious take down of the show. And they refused to. They only mention it now because the show is dead. I am going to try to get them to revisit Prime Suspect because they have so much more to offer about why that show failed. We'll see if I have any luck.

• PBS, we don't want to see it in 2012

Ava and C.I. are the ones. Not NOW, not Feminist Majority, not any of the do-me feminists. Ava and C.I. call out what needs to be called out. No one else noted the way PBS decided only men could make judgments during their DNC and RNC coverage. Ava and C.I. called it out. Soon PBS will be covering conventions again. Will women be invited on to share opinions? It'll be interesting to see -- just as interesting as it was to see Ava and C.I. do all the heavy lifting on this topic in 2008.

• From the TESR Test Kitchen

We planned this one awhile back.

• The endless cost overruns

We're not John McCain fans. We are fans of accountability.

• The week in funny

We're not promising that we'll do this next week. But we are glad so many readers enjoyed this last week.

• Roundtable

A brief roundtable. Ava and C.I. don't speak. By choice. They felt like s**t and motioned to Dona half-way in that they weren't speaking. They did take all the notes for this transcript piece.

• Obama betrays labor again, guts union rights

Jill Stein is running for the Green Party's presidential nomination.

• Iraqi authorities should 'unequivocally condemn' e...

Amnesty International.

• On the picket line (Sue Davis)

Repost of Workers World.

• Highlights

Mike and the gang wrote this and we thank them for it.



Peace.

-- Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, Ava and C.I.

Editorial: It Takes A War Whore

The ridiculous Michele Flournoy tried to suck it up and write "Iraq is a testament to Obama leadership" (POLITICO). Flournoy recently left the Defense Dept. and now holds a ceremonial post in Barack's re-election campaign. She left the Defense Dept. because she was not promoted to Secretary of Defense. A truth teller would be addressing that publicly and noting how she felt there was a glass ceiling at play. Instead, Flournoy plays the good foot soldier for the man who betrayed her and thinks that gives her 'one of the boys' cred.

It doesn't. It just makes her a joke.

The same way her ridiculous column does.

Iraq is a testament to Barack's incompentence. Violence has increased. Iraqis live in fear. The religious minorities are fleeing at a faster rate than they were in all of 2010. Human Rights Watch notes that Iraq "is slipping back into authoritarianism." Most telling is the targeting of Iraqi youth.

Iraqi Emo youths are being targeted by the government. They're being killed with cement blocks and with the approval and endorsement of Nouri al-Maliki. Nouri al-Maliki never nominated anyone to head the Ministry of the Interior deciding he'd head it 'briefly' (which has now lasted 15 months). Last month, a statement attacking and demonizing the Emo youth went up on the Ministry of the Interior website. It was only taken down last week. That's on Nouri.

As are his efforts to demonize his political opponents, demanding Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi be arrested for terrorism, demanding Deputy Prime Minister Saleh al-Mutlaq be stripped of his post. As former Ambassador Feisal Istrabadi explained in December ["Does Maliki Want to Become Unchallenged Ruler of Iraq?" (PBS NewsHour; text, audio and video)]:


What has been happening in Iraq in the last 24 hours cannot be seen in isolation. For the past 12 months, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has refused to appoint a permanent minister of defense. That was supposed to be one of the portfolios that went to the Iraqiya coalition. They have nominated six people for that position. Each one of them has been rejected. He has appointed a member of his own coalition, the prime minister's own coalition, as acting minister of defense. He is acting as minister of the interior. And one of his cronies is acting minister of state for national security. He has cashiered career officers and appointed cronies to senior officer positions in the armed and security forces in Iraq. In other words, the prime minister has under his control as we speak all the instrumentalities of state security in Iraq. I'll remind your viewers that, in the early 1970s, this is precisely how Saddam Hussein came to power at the time. What we -- I think Iraqis, with our history, we have to be overly cautious when we see similar actions occur as have occurred in our relatively recent past. Strength in the new Iraq must be through constitutional democracy, and not through harassment and intimidation.


And Nouri? That's on Barack Obama.

In March 2010, Iraqis turned out to vote. This followed weeks of Nouri insisting that this Iraqiya candidate was a terrorist or that one was and having them pulled from the list of candidates, Iraqiya candidates were even killed -- killings that never resulted any arrests by Nouri's government (you do the math), they were demonized and Nouri was supposedly going to overwhelming beat all opponents with his State of Law political slate. Quil Lawrence (NPR) was so convinced of that he went on air and declared Nouri the winner of the election. But you gotta wait for the votes to be counted, Quil.

First place went to Iraqiya. That was the people's choice. Iraqis used the ballot box to ask for a change. They made their feelings known.

And yet they're still stuck with Nouri.

That's Barack Obama's fault.

War Whores like Michele and Samantha Power made the decision that the US could get the oil draft passed and other things they wanted via Nouri and that it would be too much work to start over with someone new.

So piss on Iraqis, so f**k democracy, none of it mattered. All that mattered was what Barack Obama wanted.

Again to Iraq's former Ambassador Istrabadi, discussing Iraq with host Warren Oleny on KCRW's To the Point in December.

The critical mistake the Obama administration made occurred last year when it threw its entire diplomatic weight behind supporting Nouri al-Maliki notwithstanding these very worrisome signs which were already in place in 2009 and 2010. The administration lobbied hard both internally in Iraq and throughout the region to have Nouri al-Maliki get a second term -- which he has done. Right now, the betting there's some question among Iraq experts whether we'll ever have a set of elections in Iraq worthy of the name. I mean, you can almost get odds, a la Las Vegas, on that among Iraq experts. It's a very worrisome thing. What can they do in the future? Well I suppose it would be helpful, it would be useful, if we stopped hearing this sort of Happy Talk coming from the administration -- whether its Jim Jeffreys in Baghdad, the US Ambassador or whether it's the president himself or other cabinet officers. We're getting a lot of Happy Talk, we're getting a lot of Happy Talk from the Pentagon about how professional the Iraqi Army is when, in fact, the Iraqi Army Chief of Staff himself has said it's going to take another ten years before the Iraqi Army can secure the borders. So it would help, at least, if we would stop hearing this sort of Pollyanna-ish -- if that's a word -- exclamations from the administration about how swimmingly things are going in Iraq and had a little more truth told in public, that would be a very big help to begin with.


Iraq is a testament to Barack Obama's craven lies and desperation. It's not a shiny example but deceit and only a War Whore would claim otherwise.

"Why? I want to know why?" Michele cried months ago to Robert Gates when she learned she wouldn't be his replacement. While we don't celebrate the sexism of the Obama administration we take great joy in knowing that the War Whore whose actions have destroyed so many was reduced to tears by someone and that War Whores don't always get what they want.

TV: What people will watch and what they won't

ABC's Missing does a number of things right off the bat, including establishing the character and the series immediately. Those aren't minor points as any who suffered through NBC's Prime Suspect can attest.



That show was saddled with a one-note actress (Maria Bello) who appeared to have graduated from the Ali MacGraw Fine Acting Institute which she, no doubt, attended on the Candice Bergen Flared Nostril Scholarship. Prime Suspect was an attempt to remake a British series starring Helen Mirren and that could have made for an entertaining show were it not for the fact that Maria Bello was bound and determined to play her one-note tantrum in scene after scene and the writers had nothing to add.


In the UK version, Mirren was a victim of sexism in the first season. In the US version, they wanted you to feel for Bello while never really letting her be a victim of sexism. Her biggest problem when it came to getting along with her colleagues had to do (a) with her rude attitude and (b) with the fact that she may have slept her way up to the position of detective. Supposedly Jane was a talented detective but if she did sleep her way in (the sex wasn't in dispute, whether or not it got her promoted was), you're not really going to feel too sorry for her if co-workers aren't dying to go on assignment with her.

Apparently to explain the fact that Bello wasn't able to shade or subtext, we were told in the first episode that Jane was attempting to stop smoking, as if that would explain the angry cyborg on the screen before us. With her live-in lover, she was just as exasperated and angry. Near the end, this rating hemophilliac paired Bello with a small child -- an orphan who was being targeted for death -- and you still didn't get another side of the emotional iceberg.

Some wondered if the problem was that there was nothing feminine about Bello in Prime Suspect? The bigger problem was there was nothing human about Bello's character.



Missing kicks off with Ashley Judd's Becca on a morning run, passing friends to whom she explains her son and husband are out of the country. We cut to Vienna where her son Michael and her husband Paul (Sean Bean) are getting ready to return to the United States and Michael's trying to fit too much into a backpack. Paul agrees to carry the soccer ball. Then Paul dials Becca and they have what appears to be an interesting conversation (she's willing to try for a second child) when he hands the phone to their son and remembers or 'remembers' that he left the soccer ball behind. On the phone with his mother, Michael gets out of the car to get the ball and the car explodes apparently killing Paul.

Flash forward ten years later and Michael's off to Rome to study. A series of quick scenes with Becca and Mary (Aunjanue Ellis) as Becca receives text and calls from Michael follow and then nothing until she's informed he's been dropped from the program in Rome because he's missed three lectures and he moved out of his dorm two weeks ago. Becca realizes something's wrong and heads to Rome and we're ten minutes into the show.


It's at that point that we learn Becca was a formidable CIA agent. We discover that, thankfully, not from one long talky scene after another, but by what Becca does -- investigating, going head-to-head with what appears to have been an assassin, etc. A throw-away-line speaks volumes as the current CIA attempts to figure out Becca and what she's up to, "Those are the ones we've got to look out for, the thinner the file, the better the agent." It's in that scene that we're first primed for Keith Carradine who will surface in later episodes, he was her mentor Martin Newman.


Whether it's Richard Gere, Meryl Streep, Jack Lemmon, Sally Field or Harrison Ford, Americans are long conditioned to seeing the star go to great lengths to find a child. So there's no believability gulf. Equally true, the show's tailored for Ashley. No other American actress could pull this role off because no other American actress has starred in Kiss the Girls, Double Jeopardy, High Crimes and Twisted.

With Ashley, there's no need to play the Jodie Foster card -- the character had a father who . . . -- or to throw on a ton of backstory or, worse, explaining why a 'girl' would be interested in or know this or that 'manly' action. We accept Ashley as a woman of action because she's played that part successfully.

And part of the reason for her success is her own immense talent (never underestimate her, Ashley Judd's a powerhouse actress) but it's also because a long line of women came before including Monica Vitti, Diana Rigg, Pam Grier, Sigourney Weaver, Jamie Lee Curtis, Kathleen Turner, Geena Davis, Bridget Fonda and Angelina Jolie are among the actresses of the last decades who've successfully tackled the notions of what a woman can do.


When Prime Suspect crashed and burned, there was talk that the country just didn't want to see a woman in strong role but as Missing demonstrates, the issue was the actress not the notion. In other words, Prime Suspect trapped you in an elevator with a crank snarling loudly into a cell phone while Missing takes you on an escape.

PBS, we don't want to see it in 2012

PBS fails when it comes to diversity. If you ever doubted that, you missed the 2008 convention coverage and Ava and C.I.'s "TV: The endless non-news" and "TV: More sexism, more self-promotion." It was in the latter that they really noted the sexism going out over the airwaves.


That point was driven home best on Thursday when the boys decided to again explore women. It was interesting to see so many speaking about women and notice that not one person speaking was, in fact, a woman. You had the three male 'historians' (will get back to them), you had Jim Lehrer, David Brooks and Mark Shields as 'analysts' and you had a man from PEW research plus Ray Suarez. Eight voices discussing women -- eight voices and all of the male. Don't count on the increasingly inept watchdogs to call it out. They didn't do a damn thing when women were sidelined by PBS in Denver and they're not going to do a damn thing now.


They were referring to September 4th but it applies to Septemeber 3rd as well. And since, as usual, Ava and C.I. were alone in calling out the sexism, we want to underscore what took place before PBS prepares to cover the 2012 conventions.



















There were the eight men always weighing in and offering opinions.

These were the eight men who discussed topics like women's role in history. Eight men.

Always eight men.

Sometimes, there might be a toss to Judy Woodruff or Gwen Ifill but those two had to stick to facts and report. Opinions -- judgments -- came from the men.

PBS shouldn't have needed Ava and C.I. pointing out the problem in 2008. And they damn sure better have addressed before the 2012 convention coverage rolls around.