Shorter Donald Rumsfeld.. Courtesy Patrick Farley.

Dear Citizens of the Earth:

Please judge America by our ideals rather than our actions; and likewise, judge our enemies by their actions rather than their ideals.

Otherwise, we'll fuck your shit up.

[Electrolite]"QB

So true (the ideals and actions stuff).  comment []12:49:03 PM    

"Just a Few Bad Apples" Watch.. Remember, as George W. Bush insists, "the actions of those folks in Iraq do not represent the values of the United States of America."

The man who directed the reopening of the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq last year and trained the guards there resigned under pressure as director of the Utah Department of Corrections in 1997 after an inmate died while shackled to a restraining chair for 16 hours. The inmate, who suffered from schizophrenia, was kept naked the whole time.

The Utah official, Lane McCotter, later became an executive of a private prison company, one of whose jails was under investigation by the Justice Department when he was sent to Iraq as part of a team of prison officials, judges, prosecutors and police chiefs picked by Attorney General John Ashcroft to rebuild the country's criminal justice system.

(Via the New York Times.) [Electrolite]

Let's see. They DON'T send someone with actual war experience on interrogation (see below) but they do send someone who seems to run a pretty awful system of prisons. So, instead of having someone who knows what they are doing with regards to human rights, they send someone who KNOWS what they are doing. And we end up with Abu Ghraib!  comment []12:47:58 PM    

Chain of Command. Chain of Command - CNN reports WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A congressman with experience in military detention said Saturday that the... [Unqualified Offerings]

Last year, the Army wanted to send someone who had experience in the Gulf War in 1991 with detentions and the legal aspects of running them. The Office of the Secretary of Defense said no. Why?  comment []12:36:48 PM    

Mother's hips.

Here's something to help you appreciate Mom a little better:

This is a simple diagram illustrating the size of a neonate's head (the black oval) to the size of the pelvic outlet (the outer oval) in several species of monkeys... [Pharyngula]

All our cousins seem to have a reasonable time but humans. Wow. Luckily the baby's head is fungible.  comment []12:31:44 PM