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Politics : Stockman Scott's Political Debate Porch -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: lurqer who wrote (34354)	1/6/2004 2:34:36 PM
From: lurqer	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 89467

In May, the rules were different. Now with Iron Hammer... Three U.S. Soldiers Discharged for Abusing Iraq POWs The U.S. Army has discharged three soldiers for abusing Iraqi prisoners of war in southern Iraq, a U.S. military spokesman said Monday. The three were found guilty of beating and harassing prisoners at Camp Bucca during the U.S.-led war against Iraq, spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Vic Harris told Reuters. The three soldiers, all from Pennsylvania, have been sent back to the United States after months of investigations led to their administrative discharge by Brigadier-General Ennis Whitehead III, the acting commander of the 143rd Transportation Command, Harris said. Whitehead indicted the soldiers under non-judicial punishment. This means a jury does not try the case and the defendants do not have to serve time in jail, Harris said. "The biggest consequence is that the soldiers have been separated from service and can no longer represent America in uniform," he said. He named the three as Master Sergeant Lisa Girman, 35, Staff Sergeant Scott McKenzie, 38, and Specialist Timothy Canjar, 21. "The charges stem from an incident last year when prisoners were being moved. Master Sergeant Girman, who was the senior person and in charge, was charged with physical abuse of Iraqi detainees," Harris said. In Atlanta, U.S. Army spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Gregory Julian said Girman was found guilty of knocking a prisoner to the ground, repeatedly kicking him in the groin, abdomen and head and encouraging her subordinate soldiers to do the same. He said McKenzie was found guilty of dragging a prisoner by his armpits across the ground, holding his legs apart and encouraging others to kick him in the groin while other U.S. soldiers kicked him in the abdomen and head, and throwing the prisoner to the ground and stepping on his injured arm. Canjar was found guilty of maltreatment of a prisoner by holding his legs apart while others kicked him in the groin and violently twisting his already injured arm, Julian said. McKenzie and Canjar also were convicted of making false sworn statements to army investigators. The U.S. Army had said last year the three faced up to 25 years in jail if convicted on charges of cruelty and maltreatment of POWs, dereliction of duty, filing false statements, obstruction of justice, and conspiracy to obstruct justice. The soldiers said they acted in self-defense. reuters.com JMO lurqer

To: lurqer who wrote (34354)	1/7/2004 12:37:20 AM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 89467

Dean: Dominator or Detonator? ______________________ By David S. Broder Columnist The Washington Post Wednesday, January 7, 2004 washingtonpost.com DES MOINES -- Howard Dean is now racing the clock to see what comes first -- nomination or detonation. The former Vermont governor is closing in on the honor of leading the Democratic ticket at the same time that his critics and rivals are busily converting his own utterances into controversies that could blow his chances to smithereens. The nightmare possibility for the Democrats is that the two might happen at once -- that Dean will polish off his opponents just as he commits the gaffe of all gaffes, the one for which no repairs are possible. It is hard to recall another challenger who has simultaneously outdistanced, out-organized and outmaneuvered the other candidates as thoroughly and swiftly as Dean has done, and at the same time has so thoroughly demonstrated a penchant for embarrassing himself. Whatever happens the rest of the way, it is clear that the doctor has an instinct for the political jugular -- other people's and his own. Dean has been scoring despite himself -- and because of himself. It was near genius for him to grasp as early as he did -- well before the Democratic fiasco in the midterm election of 2002 -- that grass-roots party activists were disgusted by the congressional party leaders' futile efforts to finesse both the tax issue and the war with Iraq and were wide open to being recruited by a dogmatic, even demagogic critic of President Bush and the Washington establishment. It was brilliant of Dean and his aides to make the Internet the most effective organizing and fundraising mechanism the Democrats have seen since John Kennedy's sisters used tea parties with Mama Rose to recruit willing workers. Those insights have put Dean into an exceptionally favorable position in the opening contests, here in Iowa on Jan. 19 and in New Hampshire on Jan. 27. With nine candidates contesting for votes, he doesn't have to persuade a majority to support him. He just has to turn out the true believers. Even modest plurality wins in those races would translate into a wealth of favorable publicity, and with more money to spend than any of his opponents, Dean could well run the table of the early February contests before anyone else effectively mobilizes a counterattack. Because this possibility is now so evident, the efforts to detonate a political bombshell under his express-train candidacy have become steadily more frantic. The nationally televised debate here on Sunday, sponsored by the Des Moines Register and Iowa Public Television, was essentially a series of attempts to make Dean explain -- or recant -- some of the remarkable things he has said in the past few weeks. In the area of foreign policy, his rivals say Dean has demonstrated his inexperience and naiveté. To argue, as Dean did, on the day after Saddam Hussein's capture by American troops, that jailing the Iraqi dictator left America "no safer" was a classically ill-timed remark. Whatever the ultimate judgment of history, that was a day for celebrating the success of the manhunt for this thoroughly malignant character. His remark to the Concord Monitor that he did not want to prejudge the guilt or innocence of Osama bin Laden left Dean arguing a legalistic point that once again set him apart from public opinion. As he later acknowledged, no real doubt attaches to the al Qaeda leader's role in masterminding the attacks that took nearly 3,000 lives at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Dean himself later said that a death sentence would be just punishment when bin Laden is found. His effort to rationalize his earlier remark on the grounds that he might be president when bin Laden is brought to trial and that a government official "must uphold the rule of law" put a hypothetical barrier in the way of identifying himself with a near-universal sentiment among the American people. When rival candidates criticized Dean's utterances in the debate, he did not erupt nor did he bother to extricate himself. He simply put the same words back on the record in a more benign context -- hoping to damp down the explosive potential. Were these isolated incidents, the damage might be minimal. But Dean has found so many ways in a short time to set people's teeth on edge -- with his comments about the Confederate flag, about his struggle to bring himself to talk religion in the South, about his variant positions on Medicare and trade and other issues -- that this is clearly a pattern. The voting can't come too soon for this accident-prone star. davidbroder@washpost.com © 2004 The Washington Post Company

To: lurqer who wrote (34354)	1/7/2004 12:40:22 AM
From: Karen Lawrence	Respond to of 89467

lurqer: I have read that stroke victims, brain surgery victims do much better when they are on an oxygen supply. What a tragedy for that family to go through. I think Charlene's case shows that doctors know very little about MDC in humans. I met a woman at a party about eight, nine years ago. She seemed just fine. Four years later - she was only 45, she was pretty incoherent - a victim of "early onset of Alzheimer's" Well, if doctors don't know until autopsy if a person has Alzheimer's - how do they know this wasn't that MCD in human's disease. Answer: they don't know.