Humane

The Palestinian government revives, and implements, the death penalty. Terrific.

In the last Iranian elections, the young (and the voting age in Iran is 15) turned out to vote for change, and didn’t get it. So this time candidates need to offer them something else:

Rafsanjani has reinvented himself, attracting the high-society set of north Tehran with beautiful girls on rollerblades handing out posters wearing short tight Islamic gear

The Times failed to include a picture, but here’s one from AFP:



Cheney says that Guantanamo won’t be closed: “The important thing here to understand is that the people that are at Guantanamo are bad people.” And that’s just the guards (rimshot). More Gitmo leaks today, in Time magazine (link, but only for subscribers, so go here instead). Mohammed al-Qahtani, a suspected Al Qaida guy, one of the many people tied for 20th hijacker, was tortured with Christina Aguilera music, “sissy slaps,” and being ordered to “bark to elevate his social status up to that of a dog.” So it’s not the gulag of our times, it’s the dog obedience school of our times. But as Cheney said, the people that are at Guantanamo have been very bad! Bad! Bad boy!

The Pentagon has issued a response to the Time article, which you should read. It says basically: 1) yeah, we tortured him, but it worked, 2) hey, remember how afraid you were back then, remember anthrax and the shoe bomber, huh, huh? 3) This was all done according to a detailed interrogation plan. I’m unsure in what way that is supposed to be reassuring. It adds, “The Department of Defense remains committed to the unequivocal standard of humane treatment for all detainees.” Of course by humane, what it’s referring to is the Humane Society.