Second Verse
From Charles Dodson, by way of Avedon Carol, Boston.com / News / World / Indians say they were held against their will in Iraq by U.S. Army to do menial labor:
''We have seen the reports and are looking into them. We take all reports of abuse seriously and all allegations of mistreatment are investigated,'' Kennedy said. ''We are committed to treating all persons under coalition authority with dignity, respect and humanity.''
That's David Kennedy, spokesman for the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi, addressing allegations from four Indian citizens that they were. . . "shanghaied" both seems completely appropriate and totally inappropriate a word. . . into performing menial tasks at a US base in Iraq.
Of course, they don't have photos.
Video would be better.
Sorry, been thinking about the Rodney King beating, and how our concerns about police brutality were pretty much ignored up until that video came out.
Didn't see it until long after the fact myself, as I was in Saudi Arabia at the time. See, Iraq had invaded Kuwait and their troops were pulling babies out of incubators. . . no, wait, that last one, while untrue and not backed up by video or photo evidence, was accepted immediately.
That's the joke, see. Let's face it, if a bunch of Iraqis came forward and alleged the things we've all seen entirely too many photos of recently -- with more to come, it seems -- is there anyone out there who would have believed a word of it?
Especially if our government either gave a neutral comment like Kennedy's quoted above, or better yet issued a complete denial?
Luckily, there's reports of a lockdown on access to email by service personnel. This should have the effects of decreasing morale and making it look like we have something to hide. And probably won't actually succeed in hiding whatever that is; checking for discs is all well and good, if the Sony Mavica is the digital camera of choice over there, but CompactFlash and Smart Media cards are just wee things to smuggle or send out by snail mail. . .
But that's getting far afield.
Some Indians have made (thus far) unsubstantiated allegations regarding mistreatment by our forces in Iraq.
Innocent until proven guilty, the burden of proof lies with the accuser, yadda yadda yadda.I know that's how white folks like to think our justice system works, and normally I don't have the patience to even try arguing otherwise. Just another quick question: after seeing and hearing about what went on in Abu Gharib, are you just a wee bit less inclined to immediately dismiss the allegations?
I don't think there's a right answer to that one either.