The New York Times reports US hospitals are increasingly deporting seriously injured or ill immigrants who cannot find nursing homes willing to accept them without insurance. The hospitals often conduct the deportations on their own, without assistance from US immigration authorities. Some immigrant rights advocates describe the procedure as a kind of international patient dumping. Dr. Steven Larson of the University of Pennsylvania said, “Repatriation is pretty much a death sentence in some of these cases. I’ve seen patients bundled onto the plane and out of the country, and once that person is out of sight, he’s out of mind.” At least one private company, MexCare, can be hired to handle deportations for hospitals.
A major study prepared for the Pentagon has criticized how the Bush administration has focused on using military might to defeat al-Qaeda in the so-called war on terror. The RAND Corporation study concludes that the current strategy for defeating al-Qaeda has failed in diminishing the group’s capabilities. The study recommends a “fundamental rethinking of US strategy” to focus on minimizing overt military action while increasing intelligence collection and partnerships with law enforcement agencies around the world. The co-author of the study, Seth Jones, said, “Terrorists should be perceived and described as criminals, not holy warriors, and our analysis suggests there is no battlefield solution to terrorism.”
Police in the city of Winnfield, Louisiana are being accused of covering up the death of twenty-one-year-old Baron Pikes. He died in police custody on January 21 after being shot nine times with a taser gun while in handcuffs. The city police chief initially claimed that Pikes was high on crack cocaine and PCP at the time of his death. But the coroner recently ruled Pikes’ death to be a homicide, after an autopsy determined there were no drugs in his system. The coroner also determined that the police shot Pikes twice after he lost consciousness.
Couric: Senator McCain, Sen. Obama says, while the increased number of U.S. troops contributed to increased security in Iraq, he also credits the Sunni awakening and the Shiite government going after militias. And says that there might have been improved security even without the surge. What’s your response to that?
McCain: I don’t know how you respond to something that is such a false depiction of what actually happened. Colonel McFarlane (phonetic) was contacted by one of the major Sunni sheiks. Because of the surge we were able to go out and protect that sheik and others. And it began the Anbar awakening. I mean, that’s just a matter of history. Thanks to General Petraeus, our leadership, and the sacrifice of brave young Americans. I mean, to deny that their sacrifice didn’t make possible the success of the surge in Iraq, I think, does a great disservice to young men and women who are serving and have sacrificed.
They were out there. They were protecting these sheiks. We had the Anbar awakening. We now have a government that’s effective. We have a legal system that’s working, although poorly. And we have progress on all fronts, including an incredible measure of security for the people of Iraq. There will still be attacks. Al Qaeda’s not defeated. But the progress has been immense. And to not recognize that, and why it happened, and how it happened, I think is really quite a commentary.
WOW, talk about covering up another blunder by McCain!
A new congressional report has determined Vice President Cheney’s office and the oil industry blocked efforts by the Environmental Protection Agency to rule that greenhouse gases should be regulated under clear air laws. The report says that there was wide senior-level support at the EPA for concluding that greenhouse gases are a danger to the public and that the EPA should regulate emissions. But the EPA ignored its own senior-level staff after concerns were raised by Cheney’s energy adviser, F. Chase Hutto, along with unidentified individuals from ExxonMobil and the American Petroleum Institute.
A secret report by the International Red Cross warned the Bush administration last year that the CIA’s treatment of prisoners categorically constituted torture and could make Bush administration officials who approved the torture methods guilty of war crimes. One prisoner—Abu Zubaydah—told the Red Cross he had been waterboarded at least ten times in a single week. He was confined in a box so small that he had to double up his limbs in the fetal position. The details about the secret Red Cross report appear in a new book by investigative journalist Jane Mayer called The Dark Side.
I really don’t call this a joke because a joke is something you don’t mean. But I really believe this guy would love to kill all of them. John McCain is a disaster waiting to happen!
PITTSBURGH — Cindy McCain’s jab to her husband’s back came a second too late Tuesday to keep him from making a wisecrack about the health impact of Iran’s main import from the United States: cigarettes.
Republican presidential candidate John McCain was asked about an Associated Press report that $158 million in cigarettes have been shipped to Iran during George W. Bush’s presidency despite restrictions on U.S. exports to that country.
“Maybe that’s a way of killing them,” McCain told reporters, smiling as he waited for a cheesesteak sandwich at the Primanti Brothers restaurant. His wife, sitting next to him at the counter, poked his back without looking up.
“I meant that as a joke,” McCain quickly explained. “As a person who hasn’t had a cigarette in 28 years,” he began to say, when his wife corrected him: 29 years.
Visit the Bugliosi website
In The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder, Bugliosi presents a tight, meticulously researched legal case that puts George W. Bush on trial in an American courtroom for the murder of nearly 4,000 American soldiers fighting the war in Iraq. Bugliosi sets forth the legal architecture and incontrovertible evidence that President Bush took this nation to war in Iraq under false pretenses—a war that has not only caused the deaths of American soldiers but also over 100,000 innocent Iraqi men, women, and children; cost the United States over one trillion dollars thus far with no end in sight; and alienated many American allies in the Western world.
As a prosecutor who is dedicated to seeking justice, Bugliosi, in his inimitable style, delivers a non-partisan argument, free from party lines and instead based upon hard facts and pure objectivity.
A searing indictment of the President and his administration, The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder also outlines a legally credible pathway to holding our highest government officials accountable for their actions, thereby creating a framework for future occupants of the oval office.
Vincent Bugliosi calls for the United States of America to return to the great nation it once was and can be again. He believes the first step to achieving this goal is to bring those responsible for the war in Iraq to justice.
