Orbits of a deluded mind

This was posted in cakmpls LJ and OMG, I had to repost it on my LJ along with my response. Carol please forgive me for copying this and expanding the forum a step or two further, but this is really bad and needs to be pounded into the public consciousness. The public must awaken and learn that they were once free men and women. To say nothing would be nearly criminal.

Commit war crimes, then pass laws to protect yourself
"White House officials are drafting legislation to protect U.S. personnel from certain war crimes prosecutions, The Washington Post reported.

...

"Senior officials are working on legislation that would provide protection for U.S. personnel involved in the terrorism fight, against prosecution for past violations of the War Crimes Act ..."

"After the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Geneva Conventions apply to the detainees suspected of terrorism, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales spoke privately with Republican lawmakers about the need for protections, the newspaper reported, citing someone who heard his remarks. ..."

http://tinyurl.com/p2bbs

in reply, I wrote...

Ah yes, I can see the double-speak clearly.

"We're asking (directing) this legislation to protect our soldiers (President) from frivolous (appropriate) legal action by foreign powers (former allies) who would use this for political gain (sometimes referred to as justice). Our men and women in uniform are held accountable to very high standards (like Haditha and Abu Graib) and they deserve this protection (so they don't end up in places like GITMO)..."

As a former major in the Air Force, I can say that this is a bad idea. The UCMJ and the Geneva Conventions (which this Administration has stepped all over) provides more than outstanding coverage for our troops. Offering or demanding this kind of protection, makes them above the law we are all supposed to be bound by. In some of the worst cases I mentioned above, this would make the troops immune from prosecution in the United States. Extended a step farther (which is the standard operating procedure of the Administration thus far), it would protect the President, Vice President, SecDef and military officials right down the chain of command. The implication is that ANY action taken in the name of the "War on Terror" would be immune to war crimes charges in this country.

Think very carefully on where and what that could lead to...

This is the kind of law recently overturned in Mexico, Argentina and Paraguay. It had been enacted there to protect the soldiers and politicos of the various dictatorships in those countries from human rights abuses, failures of due process and so forth. It's not a far leap to consider that more could happen. Who would have thought we find our democracy and "guarantees of freedoms" in the condition it's in now?

Write your papers, write your Congressional representatives, make your voices heard above the buzz and the lies. To paraphrasing a former adversary, Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, who recognized the power of the American people – "I fear we have must awaken the sleeping giant."

With my home computer down (probable hard drive failure), I’m not going to be able to work on these for a while. Not to worry, the photos were all stored on my secondary hard drive. That being said, I’d already uploaded a substantial number of images on-line. With a little luck, I should have my computer back in a couple days, and can upload photos from Investiture Court and Queen’s Champion.

I’ll note a couple of important things here. First, it’s taken me two months of hard work to get multiple filter settings developed to actually get these images to look half-way presentable. Being something of a perfectionist, I simply refuse to post things that don’t look good enough. The lighting conditions were horrendous, so I was surprised I was to save as many photos as I could.

The following photos are from the early parts of court to just before the first break.


Awards and Recognitions

( Final Court highlights (20 images behind the cut) )