Cockburn
/ St. Clair's Scorching New History of a Decade of War
Now Available!
Today's
Stories
May
15 / 16, 2004
Alexander
Cockburn
Green Lights for Torture
May
14, 2004
Dr.
Susan Block
Bush's POW Porn
Ron
Jacobs
Secret History of the War on Drugs
William
Blum
God, Country and Torture
Michael
Donnelly
The People v. Corporate Greed: A Victory on the North Coast
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
India Shines
Stephen
Gowans
Building Democracy in Iraq and Other
Absurdities
May
13, 2004
Dave
Lindorff
Where is Kerry?
Colm
O'Laithian
Torture and Degradation: Revenge American Style?
Saul
Landau and Farrah Hassan
Wal-Mart: Scrooge with Hi-Tech Accounting
Practices
Ralph
Nader
An Open Letter to Bush on the Inhumane Treatment of Iraqi Prisoners
Willliam
James Martin
Deir Yassin Massacre Recalled
Marc
Salomon
Reality TV Bites
Forrest
Hylton
Law 'n Order in La Paz: All Quiet
on the Southern Front?
May
12, 2004
Blanton
/ Kornbluh
Prisoner Abuse: Cheney Warned in
1992
Virginia
Tilley
So, Who's to Blame?
Bruce
Jackson
James Inhofe, the Dumbest Senator
of Them All
Thomas
P. Healy
No Enemies: Making Peace with Bert Sacks
Linda
S. Heard
Racism and Ignorance: a Lethal Cocktail in Iraq
Norman
Solomon
Spinning Torturegate
Lisa
Viscidi
The People's Voice: Community Radio in Guatemala
Jack
Heyman
View from the Bay Bridge: Longshoremen Plan Mass Workers March
on DC
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Rummy's Reprieve
CounterPunch
Wire
Teamsters Corruption Scandal: Hoffa Exec. Assistant Alleged to
Have Quashed Investigation into Mob Influence
Christopher
Brauchli
Detention Camp, USA
William
S. Lind
Bush's Waterloo?
May 11, 2004
Mark
Engler
On the "Necessity" of Torture
Ray
McGovern
More Troops? A March of Folly
Kurt
Nimmo
Dirty Nukes and Jefferson's Grand Experiment
Mickey
Z.
Less Than Hero
Christopher
Reed
Torture on the Homefront: America's Long History of Prison Abuse
Dennis
Hans
When John Negroponte was Mullah Omar
Bruce
Jackson
Pete Seeger at 85
Mike
Whitney
Killing al Sadr
Simon
Helweg-Larsen
Shrinking the Guatemalan Military
William
A. Cook
The Unconscious Country: Righteous Indignation,
Nakedly Displayed
May
10, 2004
Robert
Fisk
From Hollywood to Abu Ghraib: Racism
and Torture as Entertainment
Wayne
Madsen
The Israeli Torture Template: Rape,
Feces and Urine-Soaked Cloth Sacks
Col.
Dan Smith
The Shame of Abu Ghraib
Joe
Bageant
John Ashcroft, Keep Your Mouth Off My Wife!
Ron
Jacobs
Rummy's Prisongate Blues: Don't Leave Mad; Just Leave
Ben
Tripp
Getting in Touch with Your Inner Savage
Ray
Hanania
Why They Hate Us: Racism, Bigotry and Abuse
Reza
Fiyouzat
"Mishandled" Invasions
Diane
Christian
Images & Abstractions &
Genitals
Website
of the Day
Crushing Iraqi Skulls with Tanks for Sport?
May
8 / 9, 2004
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
Torture: as American as Apple Pie
Adam
Jones
America's Srebrenica: What About the Hundreds of POWs Suffocated
and Shot at Kunduz?
Douglas
Valentine
Who Let the Dogs Out?: Torture, the CIA and the Press
Kurt
Nimmo
Rush Limbaugh and the Babes of Abu Ghraib
Brian
Cloughley
Humpty Dumpty is Falling
Lucia
Dailey
Forbidden Games
Joanne
Mariner
* * * *: Redacting Moussaoui
Mickey
Z.
Please Forgive U.S.? (There Are No Innocent Bystanders)
John
Chuckman
The Thing with No Brain
Doug
Giebel
Someone Knew: There Were No WMDs
Norm
Dixon
How the Bush Gang Exploited 9/11
Sam
Bahour
A Guiding Light Falls on Ramallah
Susan
Davis
Disorderly Conduct as Fine Art
Dave
Marsh
In a Pig's Eye: Alan Lomax, Dead But Still Stealing
Laura
Flanders
Life with Dick and Lynne
Dave
Zirin
Fans Push Spiderman Off Base
Carolyn
Baker
Why I Won't Vote in 2004
Prince
"Ain't No Sense in Voting"
Dr.
Susan Block
Onan for Two: Liberating Masturbation
Poets'
Basement
Smith, Sleeth, Ford, Albert and Saska
May
7, 2004
Human
Rights Watch
10 Prisons; 9,000 Prisoners: US Detention
Facilities in Iraq
Ron
Jacobs
UnAmerican? I Wish It Were So
Robert
Fisk
An Illegal and Immoral War
Ahmad
Faruqui
The 50th Anniversary of Dien Bien
Phu
Alexander
Zaitchik
From Terrell Unit in Texas to Abu Ghraib: Doesn't It Ring a (Prison)
Bell?
Mike
Whitney
The Price of Victory
Norman
Solomon
This War, Racism and Media Denial
M.
Shahid Alam
A Comic Apology
May
6, 2004
Jeffrey
St. Clair
They Did It for Jessica: Smeared with
Shit; Kicked to Death
Kathy
Kelly
May Day in Pekin Prison: Prison Labor
for the War Machine
Werther
The Sunk Cost Fallacy: War as Vegas
Casino Game
Lawrence
Ferlinghetti
Totalitarian Democracy
Robert
Fisk
"Smoke Him": Video Shows Wounded
Men Being Shot by US Helicopter
John
Janney
Torturing the Way to Freedom?
Christopher
Ketcham
Outlaw Heterosexual Marriage Now!
Alan
Farago
Dead Oceans: So Long, Thanks for the Fish
Sam
Hamod
Bush on Arab TV: Worthless and Demeaning
James
Brooks
Sullen Spring
William
S. Lind
On the Brink of Defeat in Iraq
May
5, 2004
Maj.
Gen. Antonio M. Taguba
Complete US Army Report on Abuse of
Iraqi Prisoners
Kathleen
and Bill Christison
Kerry: a Lost Cause for Progressives?
Will
Youmans
Deal with the Devil: a Palestinian
Zionist and the End of the World
Patrick
B. Barr
Terrorists R Us: the Powerful are Exempt from the Label
Lawrence
Magnuson
Nightline's All-American Morgue
Greg
Moses
Pocketbook of Denuded Ideals
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Tormenting Prisoners, Torturing
Truth
Lee
Ballinger
Cinco de Mayo and Unity
Gilbert
Achcar
Bush's Cakewalk into the Iraq Quaqmire
Website
of the Day
Operation Phoenix & Iraq
May
4, 2004
Human
Rights Watch
A Timeline of Torture and Abuse Allegations
and Responses
Kurt
Nimmo
The CIA Privatized Torture
David
Peterson
CBS, Self-Censorship & Iraq
Barry
Lando
CACI's Private Torture Chambers
Patrick
Cockburn
Torture: Iraqis Disgusted, But Not Surprised
Dr.
Susan Block
Indecent Insurgents: Watch What You Say
Fidel
Castro
A Mindless, Unnecessary War
Mike
Whitney
Empire of Torture
Sonali
Kolhatkar
How to Stop the War: Demonstrate Against
John Kerry
Josh
Frank
The Lost Sierra Club
Stan
Goff
The Role: Another Open Letter to US Troops in Iraq
Agustin
Velloso
Spare Us Your Disgusting Ethics
Stew
Albert
American Know-How
Website
of the Day
Scenes from a Cover-Up
May
3, 2004
Virginia
Tilley
Let the Wall of Silence Fall
May
1 / 2, 2004
Patrick
Cockburn
An Army in Disgrace, a Policy
in Tatters, the Real Prospect of Defeat
Robert
Fisk
"Good Guys" Who Can Do No
Wrong
Alexander
Cockburn
Watching Niagara: Stupid Leaders,
Useless Spies, Angry World
Heather
Williams
Gringo, We're Going Home: Latin
American Troops Flee Iraq
Diane
Rejman
An Army Vet on Torture in Iraq:
Abu Ghraib as My Lai?
Diane
Christian
Blood Spilling: Osama, Bush and
Sharon Speak the Same Language
Patrick
Cockburn
Seems Like Old Times in Fallujah
Dave
Lindorff
Bush's Torturous Logic: Shocked,
Shocked, Shocked
Chris
Floyd
Suicide Bomber: Neocons, Nihilists
and Annihilation
April
29 / 30, 2004
Dave
Zirin
A Pawn in Their Game: the Unlonesome
Death of Pat Tillman
Kathy
Kelly
The Warden's Tour
Greg
Weiher
Fallujah and the Warsaw Ghetto: the
Banality of Evil
Michael
S. Ladah
Terrorism and Assassination: the
Ultimate Depception
Patrick
Cockburn
The Fallujah Mutinies
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
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Weekend
Edition
May 15/16, 2004
Dickensian Horrors
in Baltimore
Inside the City
Detention Center
By JOE SURKIEWICZ
The litany of horrors at the Baltimore
City Detention Center reads like something out of Dickens. The
short list:
Officials who routinely take
life-sustaining prescription drugs away from new detainees -
who then go weeks or even months without proper medical attention.
A woman who slipped and fell
in the shower, breaking her arm, waited two weeks before she
got her arm X-rayed and a cast put on. Inmates who must wash
their clothes in toilets, complaining that if they use the prison
laundry service, their clothes aren't returned. Detainees subjected
to severe overcrowding, putting them in close proximity to others
with serious medical and mental health needs that largely go
unmet.
While those problems have a
distinctly 19th-century ring, there's a 21st-century twist. The
U.S. Department of Justice recognized the deplorable conditions
in a 2002 report citing 107 different violations of health and
safety and found that the Baltimore City Detention Center violated
the constitutional rights of detainees. Inmates, the report stated,
"suffer harm or the risk of serious harm from deficiencies
in the facility's fire safety protections, medical care, mental
health care, sanitation, opportunity to exercise and protection
of juveniles."
And last but not least: About
90 percent of the population at the center is detainees who have
not been convicted of a crime.
The Baltimore City Detention
Center is the 18th-largest correctional institution in the country,
admitting more than 43,000 people a year. To look after their
rights in the face of the Dickensian conditions, the Public Justice
Center created the Prisoners' Rights Project in 2002. Wendy Hess,
one of the project's two coordinating attorneys, explained the
reasoning behind the new effort by the Baltimore nonprofit legal
service organization.
"Because the Legal Aid
Bureau can't represent prisoners [due to federal restrictions
put in place in the mid-1990s], until this project began there
was no one to give civil legal advice to detainees about conditions
of confinement," Hess said. "We've found deficiencies
in every area - people with diabetes who can't get insulin, inmates
with HIV who can't get their medications."
One legal expert called the
work done by the Prisoners' Rights Project "vitally important."
"The PJC focuses on the
failure of detainees to get treatment and a whole range of problems
for a population that's largely cast-off," said Ellen M.
Weber, a University of Maryland law professor in charge of the
school's drug policy law clinic. "It's especially inappropriate
for people who haven't been convicted of a crime. The PJC's efforts
are crucial for everybody. They're very effective advocates for
people with no voice."
Instead of adopting an aggressive
litigation strategy, the project has pursued individual inmate
advocacy with the prison administration, both formally and informally.
"We learn a lot through
interviewing clients," said Levern Blackmon, a paralegal
and client advocate with the project. "It was shocking to
find out what's happening - the lack of medical care, that if
you come in with prescription drugs, they take them away from
you."
It's especially shocking, Blackmon
said, because "the jail has an obligation to give adequate
medical care. They can't not give you medication. It's just human
decency and I believe the jail really drops the ball."
Compounding the problem is
the isolation of detainees.
"Jail walls not only keep
people in, they keep people out," Blackmon said. "If
you're not exposed to the problems, you won't know about them.
But occasionally a John Q. Public goes in and gets the shock
of his life." Hess told of one such "John Q. Public,"
a Loyola College graduate student. "He was diabetic, he
didn't have any insulin, and the water fountain was broken,"
she said. "So he was offered juice - the worst thing for
a diabetic. He almost went blind. It was definitely a life-threatening
situation."
Other health problems uncovered
include denial of expensive HIV medications, boils and open sores
exacerbated by washing clothes in toilets, infections from spider
bites, and dangerously high summer temperatures in the BCDC's
Women's Detention Center resulting in two lawsuits two summers
in a row. "We work with the ACLU National Prison Project,
which said this is one of the worst facilities they've ever seen,"
Hess noted.
Much of the jail's problems
stem from overcrowding in a jail that includes buildings over
100 years old.
"Far too many people arrested
for nonviolent petty crimes are denied their liberty because
they can't afford low bails or the bondsman's mandatory fee,"
explained Douglas L. Colbert, a law professor at University of
Maryland School of Law and an expert on criminal law. "The
PJC project should be congratulated for bringing needed attention
to the jail conditions, including overcrowding, that people face
while awaiting trial." Reducing the jail's population would
have a cascading effect.
"With fewer people, the
staff at BCDC could do a better job," said Brea Robinson,
a client advocate at the project. "When problems are identified,
there's no follow up and no oversight of the staff."
That includes failures in providing
even a minimum of health care. The community suffers when sick
inmates are released, Robinson said. "They've been off their
HIV meds, their mental health meds, they're often addicted, and
they're released without a plan," she said. "What do
you expect an addict without treatment to do when he's released
at 2 a.m.?" In addition to working with individual clients,
the project joined with the ACLU late last year to revive the
portions of a 1993 consent decree in Duvall v. Glendening that
require adequate medical care and proper maintenance of the jail.
A hearing is scheduled in June.
Other hopeful signs are on
the horizon. Hess pointed to HB 971 <http://mlis.state.md.us/2004rs/bills/hb/hb0971f.rtf>,
legislation passed by the General Assembly that gives more tools
to make sure jails comply with basic standards. "No one
tool will fix it, but it should help," she said. To put
a human face on the plight of detainees at the jail, the project
recently initiated a speakers bureau of former inmates.
"Their stories really
are compelling and it lets the public know 'this could be you,'"
Blackmon said. "If the public knew about the conditions
in the jail, they'd know we could do better than this. Denying
people life-sustaining drugs is inhumane."
For more information on the
Prisoners' Rights Project and the speakers bureau, call (410)
625-9409, ext. 222.
Joe Surkiewicz is the director of communications
at the Legal Aid Bureau.
Weekend
Edition Features for May 8 / 9, 2004
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
Torture: as American as Apple Pie
Adam
Jones
America's Srebrenica: What About the Hundreds of POWs Suffocated
and Shot at Kunduz?
Douglas
Valentine
Who Let the Dogs Out?: Torture, the CIA and the Press
Kurt
Nimmo
Rush Limbaugh and the Babes of Abu Ghraib
Brian
Cloughley
Humpty Dumpty is Falling
Lucia
Dailey
Forbidden Games
Joanne
Mariner
* * * *: Redacting Moussaoui
Mickey
Z.
Please Forgive U.S.? (There Are No Innocent Bystanders)
John
Chuckman
The Thing with No Brain
Doug
Giebel
Someone Knew: There Were No WMDs
Norm
Dixon
How the Bush Gang Exploited 9/11
Sam
Bahour
A Guiding Light Falls on Ramallah
Susan
Davis
Disorderly Conduct as Fine Art
Dave
Marsh
In a Pig's Eye: Alan Lomax, Dead But Still Stealing
Laura
Flanders
Life with Dick and Lynne
Dave
Zirin
Fans Push Spiderman Off Base
Carolyn
Baker
Why I Won't Vote in 2004
Prince
"Ain't No Sense in Voting"
Dr.
Susan Block
Onan for Two: Liberating Masturbation
Poets'
Basement
Smith, Sleeth, Ford, Albert and Saska
|