Watching the Shadows

Gitmo detainee fears "disappearance" to Libya

From the Center for Constitutional Rights, Sept. 24:

On September 24, 2007, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) submitted a petition to the Supreme Court asking it to intervene in the case of Libyan Guantánamo client Abdul Ra'ouf Al Qassim and prevent his transfer to Libya, where he would likely be tortured and possibly killed.

Ruling paves way for Gitmo tribunals

From the Los Angeles Times, Sept. 25 (links added):

WASHINGTON — A decision Monday night by a military court of review will pave the way for the Pentagon to restart its terrorism tribunals for detainees held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

9-11 survivors play into hands of police state?

From the New York Times, Sept. 19:

Settlements Do Not Deter 9/11 Plaintiffs Seeking Trials
Families of 14 of the people killed in the planes hijacked on Sept. 11, 2001, have settled their lawsuits, but relatives of other victims said yesterday that they would continue fighting in court to address their questions about how Islamic terrorists bypassed airport security, commandeered four jets and killed thousands of people.

State Department goes bloggo

From the front page of the New York Times, Sept. 22:

At State Deptartment, Blog Team Joins Muslim Debate
WASHINGTON — Walid Jawad was tired of all the chatter on Middle Eastern blogs and Internet forums in praise of gory attacks carried out by the "noble resistance" in Iraq.

Russian and Israeli neo-Nazis: media double standard?

The anarchist blog Three-Way Fight wants to know (despite leaving the question marks off their questions):

Why does the media - CNN, MSNBC, FOX, BBC, Harretz, etc - spend today going over and over again, with lots of video footage, of the bust of a supposed neo-Nazi group in Israel that beat up people and vandalized synagogues. [Sic] The group, made up of Russian emigres who had at least some direct relative who had been of Jewish religious/cultural descent, were videoed attacking people and sieg heiling in front of a German flag.

Robert Fisk joins 9-11 conspiracy vampires

Everyone is talking about Robert Fisk's Sept. 11 column in The Independent, but nobody is noting what a cynical, disingenuous piece of self-serving propaganda it is. The most sickening thing about it is that he feels obliged to start out with a ritual put-down of the conspiracy vampires—and then goes on to legitimize their transparent claptrap. Here it is—with our corrections and deconstructions of Fisk's bunk interjected:

Osama does it again

Osama bin Laden's last communique of January 2006 attempted to exploit the writings of leftist icon William Blum—but, as we noted, rather garbled it. Now The Guardian calls him out on similarly exploiting—and garbling—the work of one of their reporters in his latest missive. From the Sept. 11 edition:

Bin Laden takes liberties with contents of Guardian video
To the long list of crimes committed by Osama bin Laden a new one can now be added: manipulation of the media. In his latest video address, released last Friday, the al-Qaida leader refers to a film made by the Guardian in Iraq and misquotes the contents of the documentary to suit his own dramatic effect.

Patriot Act provision ruled unconstitutional

This Sept. 6 report from Computer World hails a victory for the privacy rights of cyberscenti, but as we have noted, this also concerns us old-school types who go to libraries and read books. (We know, how quaint.)

Judge: Court order needed before ISPs turn over user info without notification
A federal court today ruled that the FBI can't compel ISPs to turn over user records without notifying those users unless it has a court order or a grand jury subpoena. The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York struck down part of the amended Patriot Act's National Security Letter (NSL) provision, according to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which had filed a lawsuit challenging the provision.

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