Psyche, Science, and Society

Bradley Manning song interupts Obama fundraiser

The Bradley Manning issue will dog Obama until the end of his Presidency or else until he does the right thing. CBS News reports that an Obama fundraiser was interrupted by protesters singing a song for Obama, and for Bradley Manning’s freedom:

Obama fundraiser interrupted by protesters seeking release of Bradley Manning

By Brian Montopoli

President Obama was interrupted by a group of protesters at a fundraiser at the St. Regis Hotel in San Francisco on Thursday who called on him to release from jail alleged Wikileaks leaker Bradley Manning.

Mr. Obama was in the middle of his speech when he was interrupted by a woman in the back of the room, who stood up and started singing, according to a pool report. The room was small – there were only about 200 people – and Mr. Obama could not ignore the woman, who said she had prepared a song for the president.

She began singing and humming as the other people at her table held up 8.5×11 yellow signs reading “Free Bradley Manning.” Her song, which the other eight people at the table also began singing, included the lyric “we paid our dues, where’s our change.”

The song also included the lyric: “We’ll vote for you in 2012, yes that’s true, Look at the Republicans, what else can we do.”

The woman eventually took off a White blazer to reveal a black t-shirt with Manning’s picture. White House aides approached the table to try to end the song, and the woman was eventually escorted out by the aides. After the song ended, Mr. Obama said, “That was a nice song, much better voiced that I.”

As she was escorted out, the woman said: “Free Bradley Manning. I’m leaving. I hope I don’t get tortured in jail.”

The lead protester was later identified as Oakland-based activist Naomi Pitcairn. In a forthcoming interview after the event with CBS station KPIX, Pitcairn reprized her performance and started singing the song again to the camera.

Turning back to his speech after the disruption, Mr. Obama said “Where was I? That didn’t break my flow.” The fundraiser then continued with the rest of the protesters still in the room.

Added the president: “As was indicated by that song, Over the last two and a half years, change turned out to be tougher than we expected.”

It was one of six fundraisers Mr. Obama is holding on his three-day West coast swing, which also includes two town hall events. Tickets for the event ranged up to $35,800, with money going to the Obama Victory Fund.

Manning was moved to a Kansas jail this week after spending nine months in a Marine brig, where critics say he was held in unnecessarily harsh conditions.

One of the protesters gave a reporter a copy of the song lyrics, which were written on the back of a menu for the fundraiser. Also there was the url for the website for “Fresh Juice Party,” which pays people small amounts to sing about Manning in public forums.

Briefing reporters on Air Force One after the event, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said Mr. Obama said he thought the protest was “kind of funny.”

Carney said the president took it in stride and suggested that it “certainly perked up the morning.”

The song lyrics:

Dear Mr. President we honor you today sir
Each of us brought you $5,000
It takes a lot of Benjamins to run a campaign
I paid my dues, where’s our change?
We’ll vote for you in 2012, yes that’s true
Look at the Republicans – what else can we do
Even though we don’t know if we’ll retain our liberties
In what you seem content to call a free society
Yes it’s true that Terry Jones is legally free
To burn a people’s holy book in shameful effigy
But at another location in this country
Alone in a 6×12 cell sits Bradley
23 hours a day is night
The 5th and 8th Amendments say this kind of thing ain’t right
We paid our dues, where’s our change?

April 21st, 2011

Bradley Manning to be moved

The Associated Press reports that Bradley Manning is to be moved out of Quantico to Fort Leavenworth

in the wake of international criticism about his treatment during his detention at the Marine Corps base at Quantico, Va.

It is unclear at this moment if this is a victory for decency and human rights or simply another maneuver.

1 comment April 19th, 2011

Update on Larry James trial

Courthouse News provides an update on latest developments in the attempt to force the Ohio psychology licensing board to take seriously complaints against former Guantanamo BSCT psychologist Larry James:

Doctors Demand State Board Take Action Against Gitmo Psychologist

By Kyle Anne Uniss

COLUMBUS, Ohio (CN) – Two doctors, a minister and a disabled veteran sued the Ohio Board of Psychology, claiming it failed to act on their detailed complaint against a psychologist, an Army colonel who “was responsible for the abuse and exploitation of detainees as a senior psychologist at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, in violation of Ohio law and Board ethics rules.”

The plaintiffs seek writ of mandamus to compel the State Board to take “formal action” against Dr. Larry C. James, a board-licensed psychologist and Dean of Wright State University’s School of Professional Psychology.

James is not listed as a defendant.

The plaintiffs say he worked at the Guantanamo prison in 2003 and in 2007-2008. At Guantanamo, James was an Army colonel who led the Behavioral Science Consultation Team, which included psychiatrists and psychologists who “played a role in the exploitation, abuse, and torture of detainees at Guantanamo Bay, subsequently misrepresented that experience, and improperly disclosed confidential patient information,” according to the complaint.

James led the team from January to May 2003, and against from June 2007 through May or June 2008, according to the complaint in Franklin County Court.

The plaintiffs are Dr. Trudy Bond, a practicing psychologist from Toledo; Michael Reese, an Army veteran, member of Disable American Veterans, and a former counselor for people with disabilities; the Rev. Colin Bossen, a Unitarian minister from Cleveland Heights; and Dr. Josephine Setzler, director of an Ohio chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness.

The plaintiffs say they filed a 50-page complaint against James with the Board on July 7, 2010. They ask that if the board does not take “formal action” against james, that it be compelled “to provide clearly articulated reasons grounded in fact or law for any decision, and to show that it investigated meaningfully and/or carried out a formal proceeding in good faith.”

The plaintiffs say the July 7, 2010 “Board Complaint” alleges violations of 18 Ohio laws and Board ethics rules.

They accuse James of “publishing confidential patient history in his 2008 memoir and … misleading the public and the Board about his role.”

They claim that after James left Guantanamo, he continued to commit “grave breeches of confidentiality through statements he made in his book,” “Fixing Hell: An Army Psychologist Confronts Abu Ghraib.” They say that James published this book in 2008, “while his application for an Ohio license was pending before the Board.”

According to the lawsuit: “The Board Complaint documents that while Dr. James was chief psychologist and alleged commanding officer of the BSCT [Behavioral Science Consultation Team], men and boys detained in the prison were threatened with rape and death for themselves and their family members; sexually, culturally, and religiously humiliated; forced naked; deprived of sleep; subjected to sensory deprivation, over-stimulation, and extreme isolation; short-shackled into stress positions for hours; and physically assaulted.

“The Board Complaint alleges that Dr. James participated in, ordered, supervised, ratified, facilitated, acquiesced in, and/or failed to prevent, stop, report or punish this and other types of abuse at the prison.

The Board Complaint provides specific exampled of this misconduct, including an incident drawn from Dr. James’s own admission in which he watched behind a one-way mirror and drank coffee as an interrogator and three guards wrestled a man to the floor forcing him to wear lipstick, a wig, and women’s underwear. The Board Complaint alleges that Dr. James did not report the incident and documents Dr. James’s admission that he did not reprimand or disciplines the interrogator and guards.”

The plaintiffs say that their Board Complaint alleged, inter alia, that James and members “under his command and control … advised and trained interrogators, meeting with them to review interrogation plans designed to isolate detainees and foster dependence on their interrogators so as to enhance and exploit their disorientation, shock and fear;

“observed, monitored and retained at least de facto authority to end many, if not all, interrogations, many of which involved treatment rising to the level of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment;

“assessed and evaluated detainee behavior and suggested abusive interrogation techniques …

“The U.S. government had previously recognized such techniques as illegal, and U.S. government officials have since reaffirmed that some of these techniques constitute torture.” (Citations omitted.)

“The Board Complaint is further supported by a report submitted by psychologist and attorney Dr. Bryant Welch, an expert in psychological ethics,” the legal complaint adds. “Dr. Welch concludes that if the allegations contained in the Board Complaint are factually true, the conduct described constitutes the most serious and far-reaching ethical breaches he has ever encountered in his career as a psychologist.”

The plaintiffs say the Ohio Board of Psychology responded to their complaint with a “cursory letter” of Jan. 31, stating that “It has been determined that we are unable to proceed to formal action on this matter.”

The plaintiff’s say that’s an abuse of the Board’s discretion of “a 50-page complaint with over 1,000 pages of credible documentation, including government reports and Dr. James’s own admissions,” and that the Board “must proceed pursuant to its duty to protect the public from psychologists who abuse their professional knowledge and skills to cause harm.” The plaintiffs are represented by Terry Lodge of Toledo and Deborah Popowski and Tyler Giannini of Harvard Law School’s International Human Rights Clinic.

April 19th, 2011

Lawrence Tribe, Obama Constitutional law teacher, joins critics of Manning’s treatment

President Obama was apparently asleep during his Harvard Law classes on Constitutional law. In any case he seems to have missed that pesky ban on cruel and unusual punishment. Now his Constitutional law teacher Lawrence Tribe has joined hundreds of other legal scholars in criticizing the Obama administration’s abusive treatment of alleged Wikileaks source Bradley Manning.

Obama’s constitutional law professor joins group calling Manning’s treatment illegal

By Stephen C. Webster

Nearly 300 experts, scholars and authors demand an end to Manning’s rough treatment

The Harvard professor who taught President Barack Obama about America’s founding document has added his name to a letter damning the treatment of U.S. Army Private Bradley Manning, the lone soldier accused of leaking a vast number of government secrets to anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks.

Harvard Constitutional law professor Laurence Tribe, who quit his post as an adviser to the Obama administration about three months ago, is just one of nearly 300 of the nation’s top legal minds and other experts to sign an open letter calling on the government to treat Bradley Manning as it does other prisoners.

Manning has been held in solitary confinement in the Quantico military brig since July. He gets one hour of exercise per-day, must be checked by guards every five minutes and is forced to sleep naked and undergo a nude inspection every morning. Critics of this treatment say it amounts to torture and an illegal punishment for an American who has not been convicted of a crime.

Tribe wrote that Manning’s treatment “violates his person and his liberty without due process of law and in the way it administers cruel and unusual punishment of a sort that cannot be constitutionally inflicted even upon someone convicted of terrible offenses, not to mention someone merely accused of such offenses”.

“Private Manning has been designated as an appropriate subject for both Maximum Security and Prevention of Injury (POI) detention,” the open letter explained. “But he asserts that his administrative reports consistently describe him as a well-behaved prisoner who does not fit the requirements for Maximum Security detention. The brig psychiatrist began recommending his removal from Prevention of Injury months ago. These claims have not been publicly contested. In an Orwellian twist, the spokesman for the brig commander refused to explain the forced nudity “because to discuss the details would be a violation of Manning’s privacy.”

The letter also cites former U.S. State Dept. spokesman P.J. Crowley, who called the treatment of Manning “counterproductive and stupid,” suggesting it may make prosecuting the soldier even more difficult. Crowley resigned his post after criticizing the administration’s handling of the case

“If Manning is guilty of a crime, let him be tried, convicted, and punished according to law,” the open letter continues. “But his treatment must be consistent with the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. There is no excuse for his degrading and inhumane pretrial punishment.”

The document was authored by Bruce Ackerman, of Yale Law School, and Yochai Benkler, of Harvard Law School. It had 295 co-signers at the time of this story’s publication.

The full letter and list of distinguished signatories appears below. It was first published by The New York Review of Books.

####

Private Manning’s Humiliation

Bradley Manning is the soldier charged with leaking US government documents to Wikileaks. He is currently detained under degrading and inhumane conditions that are illegal and immoral.

For nine months, Manning has been confined to his cell for twenty-three hours a day. During his one remaining hour, he can walk in circles in another room, with no other prisoners present. He is not allowed to doze off or relax during the day, but must answer the question “Are you OK?” verbally and in the affirmative every five minutes. At night, he is awakened to be asked again “Are you OK?” every time he turns his back to the cell door or covers his head with a blanket so that the guards cannot see his face. During the past week he was forced to sleep naked and stand naked for inspection in front of his cell, and for the indefinite future must remove his clothes and wear a “smock” under claims of risk to himself that he disputes.

The sum of the treatment that has been widely reported is a violation of the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment and the Fifth Amendment’s guarantee against punishment without trial. If continued, it may well amount to a violation of the criminal statute against torture, defined as, among other things, “the administration or application…of… procedures calculated to disrupt profoundly the senses or the personality.”

Private Manning has been designated as an appropriate subject for both Maximum Security and Prevention of Injury (POI) detention. But he asserts that his administrative reports consistently describe him as a well-behaved prisoner who does not fit the requirements for Maximum Security detention. The brig psychiatrist began recommending his removal from Prevention of Injury months ago. These claims have not been publicly contested. In an Orwellian twist, the spokesman for the brig commander refused to explain the forced nudity “because to discuss the details would be a violation of Manning’s privacy.”

The administration has provided no evidence that Manning’s treatment reflects a concern for his own safety or that of other inmates. Unless and until it does so, there is only one reasonable inference: this pattern of degrading treatment aims either to deter future whistleblowers, or to force Manning to implicate Wikileaks founder Julian Assange in a conspiracy, or both.

If Manning is guilty of a crime, let him be tried, convicted, and punished according to law. But his treatment must be consistent with the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. There is no excuse for his degrading and inhumane pretrial punishment. As the State Department’s P.J. Crowley put it recently, they are “counterproductive and stupid.” And yet Crowley has now been forced to resign for speaking the plain truth.

The Wikileaks disclosures have touched every corner of the world. Now the whole world watches America and observes what it does, not what it says.

President Obama was once a professor of constitutional law, and entered the national stage as an eloquent moral leader. The question now, however, is whether his conduct as commander in chief meets fundamental standards of decency. He should not merely assert that Manning’s confinement is “appropriate and meet[s] our basic standards,” as he did recently. He should require the Pentagon publicly to document the grounds for its extraordinary actions—and immediately end those that cannot withstand the light of day.

Signed:

Bruce Ackerman, Yale Law School
Yochai Benkler, Harvard Law School

Additional Signatories (institutional affiliation, for identification purposes only):

Jack Balkin, Yale Law School
Richard L. Abel, UCLA Law
David Abrams, Harvard Law School
Martha Ackelsberg, Smith College
Julia Adams, Sociology, Yale University
Kirsten Ainley, London School of Economics
Jeffrey Alexander, Yale University
Philip Alston, NYU School of Law
Anne Alstott, Harvard Law School
Elizabeth Anderson, Philosophy and Women’s Studies, University of Michigan
Kevin Anderson, University of California
Scott Anderson, Philosophy, University of British Columbia
Claudia Angelos, NYU School of Law
Donald K. Anton. Australian National University College of Law
Joyce Appleby, History, UCLA
Kwame Anthony Appiah, Princeton University
Stanley Aronowitz, Sociology, CUNY Graduate Center
Jean Maria Arrigo, PhD, social psychologist, Project on Ethics and Art in Testimony
Reuven Avi-Yonah, University of Michigan Law
H. Robert Baker, Georgia State University
Katherine Beckett, University of Washington
Duncan Bell, Politics and International Studies, University of Cambridge
Steve Berenson, Thomas Jefferson School of Law
Michael Bertrand, UNC Chapel Hill
Christoph Bezemek, Public Law, Vienna University of Economics and Business
Michael J. Bosia, Political Science, Saint Michael’s College
Bret Boyce, University of Detroit Mercy School of Law
Rebecca M. Bratspies, CUNY School of Law
Jason Brennan, Philosophy, Brown University
Talbot Brewer, Philosophy, University of Virginia
John Bronsteen, Loyola University Chicago
Peter Brooks, Princeton University
James Robert Brown, University of Toronto
Sande L. Buhai,Loyola Law School, Los Angeles
Ahmed I Bulbulia, Seton Hall Law School
Susannah Camic, University of Wisconsin Law School
Lauren Carasik, Western New England College School of Law
Teri L. Caraway, University of Minnesota
Alexander M. Capron, University of Southern California, Gould School of Law
Michael W. Carroll, Law American University
Marshall Carter-Tripp, Ph.D, Foreign Service Officer, retired
Jonathan Chausovsky, Political Science, SUNY-Fredonia
Carol Chomsky, University of Minnesota Law School
John Clippinger, Berkman Center for Internet and Society
Andrew Jason Cohen, Georgia State University
Lizabeth Cohen, Harvard University
Marjorie Cohn, Thomas Jefferson School of Law
Doug Colbert, Maryland School of Law
Sheila Collins, William Paterson University
Nancy Combs, William& Mary Law School
Stephen A. Conrad, Indiana University Mauer School of Law
Steve Cook, Philosophy, Utica College
Robert Crawford,Arts and Sciences, University of Washington
Thomas P. Crocker, University of South Carolina
Jennifer Curtin, UCI School of Medicine
Deryl D. Dantzler, Walter F. Gorge School of Law of Mercer University
Benjamin G. Davis, University of Toledo College of Law
Rochelle Davis, School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University
Wolfgang Deckers, Richmond University, London
Michelle M. Dempsey, Villanova University School of Law
Wai Chee Dimock, English, Yale University
Sinan Dogramaci, Philosophy, University of Texas at Austin
Zayd Dohrn, Northwestern University
Jason P. Dominguez, Texas Southern University
Judith Donath, Fellow, Berkman Center for Internet and Society
Norman Dorsen, New York University School of Law
Michael W. Doyle, International Affairs, Law and Political Science, Columbia
Bruce T. Draine, Astrophysics, Princeton University
Jay Driskell,History, Hood College
Michael C. Duff, University of Wyoming College of Law
Lisa Duggan, Social and Cultural Analysis, NYU
Cynthia Fuchs Epstein, Graduate Center,CUNY
Stephen M. Engel, PhD, Political Science, Marquette University
Simon Evnine, Philosophy, University of Miami
Mark Fenster, Levin College of Law, University of Florida
Martha Field, Harvard Law School
Justin Fisher, Philosophy, Southern Methodist University
William Fisher, Harvard Law School
Joseph Fishkin, University of Texas School of Law
Mark Fishman, Sociology, Brooklyn College
Martin S. Flaherty, Fordham Law School
George P. Fletcher, Columbia University, School of Law
John Flood, Law and Sociology, University of Westminster
Michael Forman, University of Washington Tacoma
Bryan Frances, Philosophy, Fordham University
Katherine Franke, Columbia Law School
Nancy Fraser, Philosophy and Politics, New School for Social Research
Eric M. Freedman, Hofstra Law School
Monroe H. Freedman, Hofstra University Law School
Kennan Ferguson, University of Wisconsin, MilWaukee
John R. Fitzpatrick, Philosophy, University of Tennessee/Chattanooga
A. Michael Froomkin, University of Miami School of Law
Gerald Frug, Harvard Law School
Louis Furmanski, University of Central Oklahoma
James K. Galbraith, LBJ School of Public Affairs, University of Texas at Austin
Herbert J Gans, Columbia University
William Gardner, Pediatrics, Psychology,& Psychiatry, The Ohio State University
Urs Gasser, Harvard Law School, Berkman Center for Internet and Society
Julius G. Getman, University of Texas Law School
Todd Gitlin, Columbia University
Bob Goodin, Australian National University
Angelina Snodgrass Godoy, Human Rights, University of Washington
David Golove, NYU School of Law
James R. Goetsch Jr., Philosophy, Eckerd College
Thomas Gokey, Art and Information Studies, Syracuse University
Robert W. Gordon, Yale Law School
Stephen E. Gottlieb, Albany Law School
Mark A. Graber, University of Maryland School of Law
Jorie Graham, Harvard University
Roger Green, Pol. Sci. and Pub. Admin., Florida Gulf Coast
Daniel JH Greenwood, Hofstra University School of Law
Christopher L. Griffin, Visiting, Duke Law School
James Grimmelmann, New York Law School
James Gronquist,Charlotte School of Law
Jean Grossholtz, Politics, Mount Holyoke College
Lisa Guenther, Philosophy, Vanderbilt University
Christopher Guzelian, Thomas Jefferson School of Law
Gillian K. Hadfield, Law, Economics, University of Southern California
Jonathan Hafetz, Seton Hall University School of Law
Lisa Hajjar, University of California – Santa Barbara
Susan Hazeldean, Robert M. Cover Fellow, Yale Law School
Dirk t. D. Held, Classics, Connecticut College
Kevin Jon Heller, Melbourne Law School
Lynne Henderson, UNLV–Boyd School of Law (emerita)
Stephen Hetherington, Philosophy, University of New South Wales
Kurt Hochenauer, University of Central Oklahoma
Lonny Hoffman, Univ of Houston Law Center
Michael Hopkins, MHC International Ltd
Nathan Robert Howard, St. Andrews
Marc Morjé Howard, Government, Georgetown University
Kyron Huigens, Cardozo School of Law
Alexandra Huneeus, University of Wisconsin Law School
David Ingram, Philosophy, Loyola University Chicago
David Isenberg, Isen.com
Sheila Jasanoff, Harvard Kennedy School
Christopher Jencks, Harvard Kennedy School
Paula Johnson, Alliant International University
Robert N. Johnson, Philosophy, University of Missouri
Albyn C. Jones, Statistics, Reed College
Lynne Joyrich, Modern Culture and Media, Brown University
David Kairys, Beasley Law School
Eileen Kaufman, Touro Law Center
Kevin B. Kelly, Seton Hall University School of Law
Antti Kauppinen, Philosophy, Trinity College Dublin
Randall Kennedy, Harvard Law School
Daniel Kevles, Yale University
Heidi Kitrosser, University of Minnesota Law School
Gillian R. Knapp, Princeton University
Seth F. Kreimer University of Pennsylvania Law School
Alex Kreit, Thomas Jefferson School of Law
Stefan H. Krieger, Hofstra University School of Law
Mitchell Lasser, Cornell Law School
Mark LeBar, Philosophy, Ohio University
Brian Leiter, University of Chicago
Mary Clare Lennon, Sociology, The Graduate Center, CUNY
George Levine,Rutgers University
Sanford Levinson, University of Texas Law School
Margaret Levi, Pol. Sci., University of Washington and University of Sydney
Tracy Lightcap, Political Science, LaGrange College
Daniel Lipson, Political Science, SUNY New Paltz
Stacy Litz, Drexel University
Fiona de Londras, University College Dublin, Ireland
John Lunstroth, University of Houston Law Center
David Luban, Georgetown University Law Center
Peter Ludlow, Philosophy, Northwestern University
Cecelia Lynch, University of California
David Lyons, Boston University
Colin Maclay, Harvard University, Berkman Center
Joan Mahoney, Emeritus, Wayne State University Law School
Chibli Mallat, Visiting Professor, Harvard Law School
Phil Malone, Harvard Law School
Jane Mansbridge, Harvard Kennedy School
Jeff Manza, Sociology, New York University
Dan Markel, Florida State University
Daniel Markovits, Yale Law School
Richard Markovits, University of Texas Law School
Michael R. Masinter, Nova Southeastern University
Ruth Mason, University of Connecticut School of Law
Rachel A. May, University of South Florida
Jamie Mayerfeld, Political Science, University of Washington
Diane H. Mazur, University of Florida Levin College of Law
Jason Mazzone, Brooklyn Law School
Jeff McMahan, Philosophy, Rutgers University
Richard J. Meagher Jr., Randolph-Macon College
Agustín José Menéndez, Universidad de León and University of Oslo
Hope Metcalf, Yale Law School
Frank I. Michelman, Harvard University
Gary Minda, Brooklyn Law School
John Mikhail, Georgetown University Law Center
Gregg Miller, Political Science, University of Washington
Eben Moglen, Columbia Law School and Software Freedom Law Center
Immanuel Ness, Brooklyn College, City University of New York
Charles Nesson, Harvard University
Joel Ngugi, Law, African Studies, University of Washington
Ralitza Nikolaeva, ISCTE Business School, Lisbon University Institute
John Palfrey, Harvard Law School
James Paradis, Comparative Media Studies, MIT
Emma Perry, London School of Economics and Political Science
Charles Pigden, University of Otago
Adrian du Plessis, Wolfson College, Cambridge University
Patrick S. O’Donnell, Philosophy, Santa Barbara City College
Hans Oberdiek, Philosophy, Swarthmore College
Duane Oldfield, Political Science, Knox College
Michael Paris, Political Science, The College of Staten Island (CUNY)
Philip Pettit, University Professor of Politics and Human Values, Princeton
Frank A. Pasquale, Seton Hall Law School
Matthew Pierce, University of North Carolina
Charles Pigden, Philosophy, University of Otago
Leslie Plachta, MD MPH, Albert Einstein College of Medicine
Thomas Pogge, Yale University
Giovanna Pompele, University of Miami
Joel Pust, Philosophy, University of Delaware
Ulrich K. Preuss, Law& Politics, Hertie School of Governance, Berlin
Margaret Jane Radin, University of Michigan and emerita, Stanford University
Aziz Rana, Cornell University Law School
Gustav Ranis, Yale University
Rahul Rao, School of Oriental& African Studies, University of London
Calair Rasmussen, Affiliation: Political Science, University of Delaware
Daniel Ray, Thomas M. Cooley Law School
Jeff A. Redding, Saint Louis University School of Law
C. D. C. Reeve, Philosophy, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Bryan Register, Philosophy, Texas State University
Robert B. Reich, University of California, Berkeley
Cassandra Burke Robertson, Case Western Reserve University School of Law
John A. Robertson, University of Texas Law School
Corey Robin, Brooklyn College and the CUNY Graduate Center
Clarissa Rojas, CSU Long Beach
Kermit Roosevelt, University of Pennsylvania Law School
Susan Rose-Ackerman, Law, Political Science, Yale University
Norm Rosenberg, History, Macalester College
Clifford Rosky, University of Utah
Brad R. Roth, Poli. Sci. and Law, Wayne State University
Barbara Katz Rothman, Sociology, City University of New York
Bo Rothstein Political Science, University of Gothenburg
Laura L. Rovner,University of Denver College of Law
Donald Rutherford,Philosophy, University of California, San Diego
Leonard Rubenstein, JD, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
Chester M. Rzadkiewicz, History, University of Louisiana at Lafayette
DeWitt Sage, Flimmaker
Cindy Skach, Comparative Government and Law, Oxford
William J. Talbott, Philosophy, University of Washington
Natsu Taylor Saito, Georgia State University College of Law
Dean Savage, Queens College, Sociology, CUNY
Kent D. Schenkel, New England Law
Kim Scheppele, Princeton Univeristy
Ben Schoenbachler, Psychiatry, University of Louisville
Jeffrey Schnapp, Harvard University
Kenneth Sherrill, Political Science, Hunter College
Claire Snyder-Hall, George Mason University
Jeffrey Selbin, Yale Law School
Wendy Seltzer, Fellow, Princeton Center for Information Technology Policy
Jose M. Sentmanat, Philosophy, Moreno Valley College, California
Omnia El Shakry, History, University of California
Scott Shapiro, Yale University
Stephen Sheehi, Languages, Lit. and Cultures, University of South Carolina
James Silk, Yale Law School
Robert D. Sloane, Boston University School of Law
Ronald C. Slye, Law, Seattle University
Matthew Noah Smith, Philosophy, Yale University
Stephen Samuel Smith, Political Science, Winthrop University
John M. Stewart, Emeritus, Psychology, Northland College
Peter G. Stillman, Vassar College
Alec Stone Sweet, Yale Law School
Robert N. Strassfeld, Case Western Reserve University School of Law
Mateo Taussig-Rubbo, SUNY-Buffalo Law School
Jeanne Theoharis, Brooklyn College of CUNY
Frank Thompson, University of Michigan
Matthew Titolo, West Virginia University College of Law
Massimo de la Torre, University of Hull Law School
John Torpey, CUNY Graduate Center
Vilna Bashi Treitler, Black& Hispanic Studies, Baruch College, City
Laurence H. Tribe, Harvard University
David M. Trubek, University of Wisconsin (emeritus)
Robert L. Tsai, American University, Washington College of Law
Peter Vallentyne, Philosophy, University of Missouri
Joan Vogel, Vermont Law School
Paul Voice, Philosophy, Bennington College
Victor Wallis,Berklee College of Music
David Watkins, Political Science, University of Dayton
Jonathan Weinberg, Wayne State University
Henry Weinstein, Law, Literary Journalism, University of California
Margaret Weir, Political Science,University of California, Berkeley
Christina E. Wells, University of Missouri School of Law
Danielle Wenner, Rice University
Bryan H. Wildenthal, Thomas Jefferson School of Law
Langdon Winner,Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Naomi Wolf, author
Lauris Wren, Hofstra Law School
Elizabeth Wurtzel, Attorney and author
Betty Yorburg, Emerita, City University of New York
Benjamin S. Yost, Philosophy, Providence College
Jonathan Zasloff, UCLA School of Law
Michael J. Zimmer, Professor of Law, Loyola University Chicago
Lee Zimmerman, English, Hofstra University
Mary Marsh Zulack, Columbia Law School

2 comments April 11th, 2011

Secret US prisons in Afghanistan admitted after year of lies

The Associated Press reports that, after a long period of denial (i.e., lies) the Obama Defense Department has finally admitted the existence of an extensive network of secret prisons in Afghanistan, including the infamous “black jail” at Bagram.

[S]uspected terrorists in Afghanistan are being held and interrogated for weeks at temporary sites, including one run by the elite special operations forces at Bagram Air Base, according to U.S. officials who revealed details of the detention network to The Associated Press.

The Pentagon has previously denied operating secret jails in Afghanistan, although human rights groups and former detainees have described the facilities. U.S. military and other government officials confirmed that the detention centers exist but described them as temporary holding pens whose primary purpose is to gather intelligence.

The Pentagon also has said that detainees only stay in temporary detention sites for 14 days, unless they are extended under extraordinary circumstances. But U.S. officials told the AP that detainees can be held at the temporary jails for up to nine weeks, depending on the value of information they produce. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the program is classified.

The most secretive of roughly 20 temporary sites is run by the military’s elite counterterrorism unit, the Joint Special Operations Command, at Bagram Air Base. Working together with CIA and other intelligence officers at the site, JSOC questions high-value targets, the detainees suspected of top roles in the Taliban, al-Qaida or other militant groups.

The site’s location, a short drive from a well-known public detention center, has been alleged for more than a year.

It should be remembered that there have been persistent reports of abusive treatment at the black jail.

The detainees reported being forced into nudity and humiliated upon arrival, malnourishment resulting from inadequate and foul-smelling food, sensory deprivation and sleep deprivation resulting from cold temperatures and inadequate bedding. They reported being blindfolded and shackled when leaving their cells and losing complete track of the time and date. The International Committee of the Red Cross was also reportedly denied access to the detainees and the secret facility.

There have also been suggestions by Marc Ambinder that the black jail may be a site of secret research into the infamous Army Field Manual Appendix M coercive interrogation techniques:

From what information I’ve been able to gather, the interrogation environment is much like a social science laboratory, with psychologists and experts in human behavior looking for clues to see who might know more than they do, alternating with interrogators trained to ferret out actionable intelligence information.

April 10th, 2011

Speaking on Bradley Manning’s treatment next Wednesday

I will speak at a forum on the treatment of Bradley Manning at Boston University next Wednesday. Also speaking is Manning friend David House:

Event Description: Boston University’s Amnesty International Chapter will be hosting an event about the US soldier, Bradley Manning, who allegedly leaked classified documents to Wikileaks. Manning is currently being held under conditions many have deemed solitary confinement. He has been required to stay in his cell for 23 hours a day with no blanket or pillow and is not allowed to exercise in the confines of his cell. Recently, Manning has been forced to strip naked and give up his clothes for the duration of the night. The soldier Pfc. Bradley Manning’s close friend and regular visitor, David House, and psychologist and activist Dr. Stephen Soldz will discuss the current conditions of Manning’s detainment. Dr. Stephen Soldz, a professor at the Boston Graduate School of Psychoanalysis and the founder of Psychoanalysts for Peace and Justice, will be speaking. Dr. Soldz has been featured on Democracy Now! and other news media as an outspoken critic of torture.
Date: Wednesday, March 23
Time: 6:00pm – 8:00pm
Location: Boston University College of General Studies Room 505, 871 Comm Ave

There are many other events, including 20+ rallies this weekend, to support Manning. Check them out here.

March 16th, 2011

Reaction to Crowley firing

Glenn Greenwald summarizes the reaction among Obama supporters to P. J. Crowley’s firing for the crime of objecting to prisoner abuse:

Denunciations of the President from his own supporters are as intensive and pervasive here as they have been for any other prior incident, if not more so.  Matt Yglesias wrote that “to hold a person without trial in solitary confinement under degrading conditions is a perversion of justice” and thatit’s a ”sad statement about America that P.J. Crowley is the one being forced to resign over Bradley Manning.”  Andrew Sullivan — writing under the headline ”Obama Owns the Treatment of Manning Now” — said that Crowley was forced out “for the offense of protesting against the sadistic military treatment of Bradley Manning,” that “the president has now put his personal weight behind prisoner abuse,” and that “Obama is directly responsible for the inhumane treatment of an American citizen.”  Meanwhile,Ezra Klein previews his denunciation of the President’s treatment of Manning and Crowley by announcing that it’s his first ever lede “that isn’t about economic or domestic policy” but rather is ”about right and wrong,” and then questions “whether the Obama administration is keeping sight of its values now that it holds power.”  Those strong words are all from supporters of the President.

Elsewhere, The Philadelphia Daily News‘ progressive columnist Will Bunch accuses Obama of “lying” during the campaign by firing Crowley and endorsing “the bizarre and immoral treatment of the alleged Wikileaks leaker.”  In The Guardian, Obama voter Daniel Ellsberg condemns “this shameful abuse of Bradley Manning,” arguing that it “amounts to torture” and “makes me feel ashamed for the [Marine] Corps,” in which Ellsberg served three years, including nine months at Quantico.  Baltimore Sun columnist Ron Smith asks:  ”Why is the U.S. torturing Private Manning?,” while UCLA Professor Mark Kleiman — who only last yearhailed Obama as “the greatest moral leader of our lifetime” and eagerly suggested on Friday (before Obama’s Press Conference) that Crowley was speaking for Obama – mocked Obama’s defense of the Manning treatmentas “clueless on the Bush level” and now says of Crowley’s firing:  ”The Torturers Win One,” while lamenting Obama’s overt support for a policy that he calls “unconscionable and un-American and borderline criminal.”

Greenwald then points to the support Obama’s policies are now getting from those who supported the Bush torture policies. Alas, Obama has chosen his side and it is firmly with human rights abusers.

March 14th, 2011

White House pressures PJ Crowley to resign over Manning comments

The Obama administration today made commitment to prisoner abuse a central pillar of its policies. State Department spokesperson P. J. Crowley has abruptly resigned after intense pressure from a White House furious that he criticized the Defense Department’s abuse of Bradley Manning. With this action the Obama administration has signaled its continuity with the Bush administration program of abuse.

Alas, there are fewer and fewer people of conscience, like Crowley, left in this administration. As Crowley said in a statement today:

The exercise of power in today’s challenging times and relentless media environment must be prudent and consistent with our laws and values.

These are not the sentiments of someone who can survive in the current lawless administration, just as such a person couldn’t survive in the lawless Bush administration. Those who believe in human rights have been driven out by Obama’s flunkies who think that the only reason to be in power are to get reelected while handing the country over to Wall Street and the military-intelligence establishment.

Crowley resigns as State Department spokesman

By CNN Senior White House Correspondent Ed Henry

WASHINGTON (CNN) – P.J. Crowley abruptly resigned Sunday as State Department spokesman over controversial comments he made about the Bradley Manning case.

Sources close to the matter the resignation, first reported by CNN, came under pressure from the White House, where officials were furious about his suggestion that the Obama administration is mistreating Manning, the Army private who is being held in solitary confinement in Quantico, Virginia, under suspicion that he leaked highly classified State Department cables to the website Wikileaks.

Speaking to a small group at MIT last week, Crowley was asked about allegations that Manning is being tortured and kicked up a firestorm by answering that what is being done to Manning by Defense Department officials “is ridiculous and counterproductive and stupid.”

Crowley did add that “nonetheless, Bradley Manning is in the right place” because of his alleged crimes, according to a blog post by BBC reporter Philippa Thomas, who was present at Crowley’s talk.

“The unauthorized disclosure of classified information is a serious crime under U.S. law,” Crowley said in a statement Sunday. “My recent comments regarding the conditions of the pre-trial detention of Private First Class Bradley Manning were intended to highlight the broader, even strategic impact of discreet actions undertaken by national security agencies every day and their impact on our global standing and leadership.

“The exercise of power in today’s challenging times and relentless media environment must be prudent and consistent with our laws and values,” Crowley said. “Given the impact of my remarks, for which I take full responsibility, I have submitted my resignation.”

Crowley has told friends that he is deeply concerned that mistreatment of Manning could undermine the legitimate prosecution of the young private. Crowley has also made clear he has the Obama administration’s best interests at heart because he thinks any mistreatment of Manning could be damaging around the world to President Obama, who has tried to end the perception that the U.S. tortures prisoners.

Nevertheless, Crowley’s political fate was sealed on Friday when Obama was asked at a White House news conference about his comments regarding Manning.

Obama revealed that he had asked Pentagon officials “whether or not the procedures that have been taken in terms of (Manning’s) confinement are appropriate and are meeting our basic standards.”

In a comment that drew howls of protest from liberals, Obama added that Pentagon officials “assure me that they are. I can’t go into details about some of their concerns, but some of this has to do with Private Manning’s safety as well.”

Manning’s treatment has become a flashpoint for liberals, with Amnesty International noting he has been confined to a windowless cell for 23 hours a day, is stripped down to his boxers at night and is not given pillows or blankets.

Manning’s lawyer also says the young private recently had to sleep in the nude because defense officials thought there was a suicide threat and decided to take away his boxer shorts.

Crowley is highly respected on foreign policy matters, dating back to his time as National Security Council spokesman under then-President Bill Clinton. He has been the Obama administration’s public face on many international stories as the daily briefer at the State Department for Secretary Hillary Clinton.

But he has not had a completely smooth relationship with officials in the Obama White House, and eyebrows were raised several months ago when White House aide Mike Hammer was sent over to the State Department to serve as Crowley’s deputy.

Hammer will replace Crowley as the assistant secretary for public affairs, Hillary Clinton said in a statement Sunday.

She said she accepted Crowley’s resignation “with regret.”

“P.J. has served our nation with distinction for more than three decades, in uniform and as a civilian,” she said. “His service to country is motivated by a deep devotion to public policy and public diplomacy, and I wish him the very best.”

A little-known factor in Crowley’s comments about Manning was revealed Saturday by April Ryan, a White House correspondent for American Urban Radio who covered Crowley in the Clinton White House.

Ryan wrote on Twitter that Crowley “dislikes treatment of prisoners as his father was a Prisoner of War.”

While it’s true that Crowley’s father was imprisoned during World War II, people close him downplay that as a major factor in his comments about Manning, saying the biggest factor is simply that Crowley believes what he said.

Asked to comment on Crowley stepping down, Tommy Vietor, spokesman for the National Security Council, referred questions to the State Department.

In the statement, Crowley said he leaves with “great admiration and affection” for his colleagues and “deep respect for the journalists who report on foreign policy and global developments every day, in many cases under dangerous conditions and subject to serious threats. Their efforts help make governments more responsible, accountable and transparent.”

March 13th, 2011

Alexander: Rumsfeld’s memoir, “selective memory”

Former Iraq interrogator, and torture opponent, Matthew Alexander discusses Donald Rumsfeld’s recent “memoir”:

Known and Forgotten: Rumsfeld’s Memoir

By Matthew Alexander, Former Senior Military Interrogator and Amnesty Volunteer

It would have been a better title for former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s recently released memoir. There are things Rumsfeld remembers and things he has conveniently forgotten. What we called in the interrogation room “selective memory.” What’s most striking about the memoir, however, is the blatant hypocrisy.

Take for instance, his assertion in Chapter 39 (page 582) that “None of the authorized interrogation methods…involved physical or mental pain. None were inhumane.” What planet are we on? The Category I techniques he approved include stress positions for up to four hours. Anyone who’s been through basic training knows that maintaining a stress position for four hours would be the very definition of pain. But apparently, for Mr Rumsfeld, there’s no difference between standing at your work podium in your cushy Pentagon office and squatting for four hours straight. No pain, indeed.

Rumsfeld also doesn’t consider it painful to be confronted with one’s phobias, for instance to have aggressive dogs placed inches from one’s face. To Rumsfeld, that’s probably just a fun way to spend a Saturday. Of course, this is from a guy who’s made a career out of Washington’s steak rooms.

He also approved, in Category II, forced grooming and forced nudity. Rumsfeld would like us all to forget that the prohibition per military regulations is not against torture. It’s against Cruel, Inhumane, and Degrading treatment. So Mr Rumsfeld, how about strolling once around the halls of the Pentagon in your birthday suit? Then you can explain to us how forced nudity is not humiliating. Not all of us share your selective memory.

But the most appalling part of Rumsfeld’s memoir is the twisted logic and McNamara-like pompousness that led to the tragedy of Abu Ghraib. The logic goes like this. He says he rejected waterboarding for military use because the technique might be appropriate if used by a few, highly trained CIA agents, but “Tight limits on interrogation, such as those contained in the Army Field Manual, are appropriate for the U.S. military. Tens of thousands of detainees passed through U.S. military custody in Afghanistan and Iraq.”

So according to the former SecDef, if he had allowed waterboarding, it would have corrupted the forces and led to the widespread torture and abuse of detainees. But the same logic doesn’t apply to the torture and abuse techniques that he approved.

Worse, in the same chapter (again page 582) he admits that the interrogation of Muhammed al-Qahtani did go beyond the interrogation techniques he approved. Why? Precisely because he set the precedent that breaking the rules once in a while is okay, as long as it keeps us safe. It’s a point he makes over and over again. So if the Secretary of Defense, the highest ranking official in the Department of Defense, approves rule-breaking in limited cases and people then exceed those limits, it’s not the same logic that he used to reject waterboarding. It’s insanity. And then it gets more insane.

Indulge me for a moment. Do a search for in this chapter on interrogations for the word “future” or the words “long-term.” You won’t find them because not once does Donald Rumsfeld, with his many years of experience in strategic decision-making, ever consider the long-term future ramifications of approving the torture and abuse of prisoners in U.S. custody. You won’t find any discussion of the fact that it became Al Qaeda’s number one recruiting tool (a fact I witnessed, and my Task Force tracked, while I oversaw interrogation of foreign fighters in Iraq).

You won’t hear Rumsfeld discuss how future adversaries will think twice about surrendering to U.S. troops as they have in past conflicts like World War II and the first Gulf War. That will have a real cost in U.S. lives. And you want read any discussion about how some of our allies have hesitated to work with us because they don’t want to be involved in U.S. policies on detention. You certainly won’t hear what I heard in Iraq. That is, detainees saying from the very start of the interrogation that we were all torturers, an obstacle that made all of our jobs much more difficult. Who knows how much intelligence information we never received because of Rumsfeld’s decision to make torture and abuse official policy? That certainly had a cost in lives too.

What you also won’t read in Chapter 39 is the term “World War II.” Because what Rumsfeld and the other torture supporters consistently fail to acknowledge is that we made it through that war, facing much graver threats to our national security, without using Category I or II techniques.

Rumsfeld’s final grave sin, however, is to cite retired General Michael Hayden, the former Director of the CIA, in saying that the waterboarding of Khalid Sheikh Mohammad was justified because he provided half of all we know about Al Qaeda, a claim that has been thoroughly debunked. Ninety percent of what Hayden and Rumsfeld claim KSM gave us was the same information he gave to an Al Jazeera reporter two years earlier in Pakistan. What an amazing revelation. And absent from this discussion is the glaring failure of 183 waterboarding sessions. KSM never gave up the one thing that any good interrogator would have said was the key objective of those interrogations – the location of Osama bin Laden.

There are actions that former Secretary Rumsfeld accomplished that have had significant positive impact on the U.S. military’s ability to fight future conflicts, such as ridding us of obsolete weapon systems and preparing us for future small scale wars. But along with this kudos, we must place the blame for one of the worst stains in the history of the United States Military – the torture and abuse of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of prisoners, precisely where it belongs. This was a complete selling out of the very principles so many Americans have died defending. And the blame belongs squarely on the former Secretary’s shoulders.

Amnesty International continues to campaign for Donald Rumsfeld and other members of the Bush administration who authorized the use of torture to be held to account for their actions and to gain justice for those wrongly detained and abused. Take action and add your voice to those demanding that President Obama follow through on his campaign commitment to make this the anti-torture Presidency.

March 9th, 2011

Open Letter on the Humiliating Treatment, Including Forced Nudity, of PFC Bradley Manning

Psychologists for Social Responsibility (PsySR) has issued the following letter regarding the treatment of alleged Wikileaks source Bradley Manning. This letter is a follow-up to our January 3 letter, also to Secretary Gates, which can be read here: http://www.psysr.org/about/programs/humanrights/gates-manning-letter.php. Please help it obtain wide distribution.

Open Letter on the Humiliating Treatment, Including Forced Nudity, of PFC Bradley Manning

March 9, 2011

The Honorable Robert M. Gates
Secretary
100 Defense Pentagon
Washington, DC 20301

Dear Mr. Secretary:

Psychologists for Social Responsibility (PsySR) remains deeply concerned about the solitary confinement conditions under which PFC Bradley Manning is being held at the Quantico Marine Corps Base in Virginia. When we wrote you on January 3, 2011, we warned of the severely deleterious effects on the psychological wellbeing of those subjected to solitary confinement. We also expressed alarm over PFC Manning’s subjection to cruel and potentially harmful treatment during this lengthy pre-trial period when he has not been convicted of any crime and is presumed innocent by our Constitution and justice system.

We write you again today because news reports, including those in the New York Times, indicate that PFC Manning’s conditions of confinement have recently become even more severe. According to these reports, which quote officials in charge of PFC Manning’s care, PFC Manning is now being deprived of his clothes at night and is forced to stand naked for inspection in the morning. This is apparently being justified as a “precautionary measure” to prevent PFC Manning from injuring himself.

As an organization of psychologists and other mental health practitioners – many of whose members have worked in mental hospitals, the criminal justice system, and with veterans – PsySR can state unequivocally that removal of clothing is not an accepted or reasonable procedure for avoiding self-injury.

There is no publicly available information suggesting that PFC Manning is at heightened risk of self-harm. However, if this is a real concern of the military officials, it is imperative to recognize that forced nakedness (and solitary confinement) is designed to induce helplessness, humiliation, and shame – all of which are potential risk factors that increase the possibility of self-harm. We note that forced nakedness is so disturbing that it is banned for use by military interrogators in the 2006 Army Field Manual.

We are also concerned that the confinement conditions and treatment experienced by PFC Manning may interfere with the right to a fair trial.  Literature on the harmful psychological consequences associated with the abuse to which PFC Manning is being subjected suggests that his ability to assist in his own defense may be compromised.

Our country and the entire world were shocked by the pictures of Iraqi detainees being kept naked at Abu Ghraib. PFC Manning’s treatment, because of its needless and destructive cruelty, also shocks the conscience. Mr. Secretary, Psychologists for Social Responsibility calls upon you to rectify the inhumane and harmful treatment of PFC Bradley Manning immediately. Given your purported concern regarding PFC Manning’s suicidality, we also urge you to release him from solitary confinement as soon as possible as a first step in addressing his mental health needs.

We are also providing a copy of this letter to President Obama, as he and his administration bear the ultimate responsibility for PFC Manning’s treatment.

Sincerely,

Stephen Soldz, Ph.D., President, Psychologists for Social Responsibility

Trudy Bond, Ph.D., Psychologists for Social Responsibility Steering Committee

3 comments March 9th, 2011