And so to Bradley Manning.
As the weaponry and technology of war came home, so did a new, increasingly Guantanamo-ized definition of justice. This is one thing the Manning case has made clear.
As a start, Manning was treated no differently than America’s war-on-terror prisoners at Guantanamo and the black sites that the Bush administration set up around the world. Picked up on the “battlefield,” Manning was first kept incommunicado in a cage in Kuwait for two months with no access to a lawyer. Then, despite being an active duty member of the Army, he was handed over to the Marines, who also guard Guantanamo, to be held in a military prison in Quantico, Virginia.
What followed were three years of cruel detainment, where, as might well have happened at Gitmo, Manning, kept in isolation, was deprived of clothing, communications, legal advice, and sleep. The sleep deprivation regime imposed on him certainly met any standard, other than Washington’s and possibly Pyongyang’s, for torture. In return for such abuse, even after a judge had formally ruled that he was subjected to excessively harsh treatment, Manning will only get a 112-day reduction in his eventual sentence.
Eventually the Obama administration decided Manning was to be tried as a soldier before a military court. In the courtroom, itself inside a military facility that also houses NSA headquarters, there was a strikingly gulag-like atmosphere. His trial was built around secret witnesses and secret evidence; severe restrictions were put on the press -- the Army denied press passes to 270 of the 350 media organizations that applied; and there was a clear appearance of injustice. Among other things, the judge ruled against nearly every defense motion.
Interesting update on Obama. His Occidental College Registration records are on file with the State of California. They reveal that he is indeed ineligible to President of the US. The registration form shows that he is an Indonesian national (citizen), and his religion is Islam. There is no record of a Barack Obama or Barry Soetoro having applied for US Citizenship, or even attempting to renew/re file his citizenship claim of having been born in Hawaii. Either way though, Obama fails the Constitutional "natural born Citizen" test, as his father was a British colonial citizen of Kenya. The term "natural born Citizen" requires that both parent be US Citizens. The Occidental College Registration also shows that Obama, aka Barry Soetoro, applied for financial aid and was awarded a fellowship for foreign students from Fulbright Foundation Scholarship program. "Occidental Registration transcript states ~ Name: Barry Soetoro - Religion: Islam - Nationality: Indonesian The smoking gun evidence that annuls Obama's presidency is Obama's college transcripts regarding his application for and receiving of foreign student aid. Obama's college transcripts from Occidental College indicates that Obama, under the name Barry Soetoro, received financial aid as a foreign student from Indonesia as an undergraduate at the school. The transcript from Occidental College shows that Obama (Barry Soetoro) applied for financial aid and was awarded a fellowship (scholarship) for foreign students from the Fulbright Foundation Scholarship program - an international educational exchange program sponsored by the U.S. government. Grants are available for U.S. citizens to go abroad and for non-U.S. citizens with no U.S. permanent residence to come to the U.S. To qualify, for the non-US citizen scholarship to study in the U.S., a student applicant must claim and provide proof of foreign citizenship. This document would seem to provide the smoking gun that many of Obama