US Senate debates resolution on Iraqi abuses

[Eye and Monkey]

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N10568339.htm

10 May 2004 20:18:26 GMT

WASHINGTON, May 10 (Reuters) - The U.S. Congress awaited arrival of new images of mistreatment of Iraqi detainees at a U.S.-run prison on Monday and the Senate prepared to pass a resolution meant to assure the world such abuses will not happen again.

"We cannot undo the abuse those Iraqi prisoners suffered, but we can through our actions now show the Iraqi people that the transgressions of a few do not represent America," Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said.
<snip>

But Sen. Edward Kennedy, a Massachusetts Democrat, blamed the scandal on Rumsfeld and other top Pentagon officials he said shrugged off repeated warnings on the prison. "We all agree that the guards and interrogators who committed these abuses at Abu Ghraib prison should be held accountable," Kennedy said. "But the responsibility for these abuses does not lie with them alone."

Kennedy also accused Republican U.S. President George W. Bush of presiding "over America's steepest and deepest fall from grace in the history of our country." He called "the tragedy unfolding in Iraq ... the direct result of a colossal failure of leadership."

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[displacedtexan]

1. "Transgressions of the few," the not so proud, only the MPs?

What a crock, Frist!

[Jacobin]

2. gee, shouldn't they wait for the investigations to be complete?

Oh I forgot, they'll simply "declare" it all to be a few bad apples and it'll all go away.

What a bunch of chumps

[lovedems]

3. They honestly think if you tell a lie 5 times, it becomes the truth.

Perception is reality and so far it appears many believe this is just a few bad apples.

:shrug:

[teryang]

4. With an unaccountable executive run amok

...any resolution from this ineffectual group of enabling porkers doesn't mean anything. It's a joke.

They should cut all appropriations for civilian mercenaries and interogators immediately and appropriate the same funds for recruitment of a like number of troops subject to the UCMJ. They should prohibit the use of federal funds to use civilians of any kind inside detention facilities operated by the Armed Forces.