Democracies Worst Example

They say you lead by example. if thats true then i would have to say the middle east was already a near perfect democracy BEFORE we destroyed it. I mean after reading this article its sad to say that what we showed the world about how a "free" democracy works is appalling.

• the U.S. military has created a global network of overseas prisons, keeping 14,000 detainees beyond the reach of established law.
• Disclosures of torture and long-term arbitrary detentions have won rebuke from leading voices including the U.N. secretary-general and the U.S. Supreme Court
• Seventy to 90 percent of the Iraq detentions in 2003 were "mistakes," U.S. officers once told the international Red Cross.
• Captured on battlefields, pulled from beds at midnight, grabbed off streets, tens of thousands now have passed through U.S. detention, often interrogated around the clock, then released months or years later without apology, compensation or any word on why they were taken
• dozens of ex-detainees, government ministers, lawmakers, human rights activists, lawyers and scholars in Iraq, Afghanistan and the United States said the detention system often is unjust and hurts the war on terror by inflaming anti-Americanism in Iraq and elsewhere.
• Reports of extreme physical and mental abuse, symbolized by the notorious Abu Ghraib prison torture-like treatment of the inmates.
• Human rights groups count dozens of detainee deaths for which no one has been punished or that were never explained.
• The secret prisons — unknown in number and location — remain available for future detainees.
  
• The new manual banning torture doesn't cover CIA interrogators. And thousands of people still languish in a limbo, deprived of one of common law's oldest rights, habeas corpus, the right to know why you are imprisoned.

Bush -whacker planned military tribunals - BUT .............
Supreme Court ruled against military tribunals. The court held the tribunals were not authorized by the U.S. Congress and violated the Geneva Conventions.

Bush-whacker said we dont torture, BUT ........

• he certainly had no problem sending prisoner to countries where we know the possibility is good that they will torture these prisoners.
• the U.S. government's willingness to resort to "extraordinary rendition," transferring suspects to other nations where they might be tortured, appears unchanged.

Bush-whacker claimed we have no secret prisons, BUT ...........

• n his Sept. 6 speech, Bush acknowledged for the first time the existence of the CIA's secret prisons, believed established at military bases or safehouses in such places as Egypt, Indonesia and eastern Europe. That network, uncovered by journalists, had been condemned by U.N. authorities and investigated by the Council of Europe.

-- Herein lies the problem:
"If you, God forbid, are an innocent Afghan who gets sold down the river by some warlord rival, you can end up at Bagram and you have absolutely no way of clearing your name," said John Sifton of Human Rights Watch in New York. "You can't have a lawyer present evidence, or do anything organized to get yourself out of there."

Now I know politicians, all of them, including presidents lie, but did we have to have one Sooo stupid that he gets caught over and over again and then stands with a stupid look on his face? And did we have to have him TWICE??? Do we need more proof that there ought to be a test before being allowed to vote? Thank God it will be over soon and thank God we are running out of Bushes!!! And one final thought, after Clinton and Bush do you need more proof that the Commander in chief ought to be someone with extensive military background? Two draft dodgers in a row.
I'm rooting for John McCain. A thinking American with brains and a serious military background, something we havent had for the last 6 years.

article here