Guantánamo, Evil and Zany in Pop Culture

This article, by William Glaberson of the New York Times, has given me some insight to the increasingly popular subject of Guantanamo Bay. The article begins by briefly discussing the upcoming film "Harold and Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay," which story revolves around a stoner-duo who try to out run U.S authorities who believe they are terrorist, after they try to sneak a bong on board their flight to Amsterdam. This is movie only furthers notions that Americans, as well as the rest of the world have on the infamous military base. Glaberson believes our pop culture has made up its mind about Guantanamo, due in part to the recent growing number of literary and film pieces on the base. Dan Fesperman, writer of the 2006 mystery novel "The Prisoner of Guantanamo believes, “Whether it’s America’s Devil’s Island or not, that’s how people are going to keep thinking about it." After reading this statement I could not help but agree with it. I find Guantanamo Bay uniquely fascinating. Our generations Alcatraz. The thought of it provokes mystery, secrets, and the bizarre. There is a wide array of different portrayals from both the inmates, and people who oversee the prison. Some of these accounts such as, “documented interrogation techniques including having a detainee perform dog tricks," disgust and shock the majority of the American public. However, the Bush administration insists the camp is, "a clean and modern detention camp, where humane treatment of terror suspects is the rule."Yet with allegations from former prisoners, such as Murat Kurnaz, who suggests that, “Nothing is the way the U.S. Army says it is and as it has been reported, filmed and photographed by journalists.”Kurnaz has stated that, “reporters were shown fake cells and playgrounds were littered with soccer balls that guards collected as soon as journalists departed.” With that being said, and the history of the Bush Administration I find these statements to be completely possible. It is very interesting that the majority of the public believes our government is being unconstitutional in Guantanamo, and that the prisoners should either be subject to a fair trial, or released back to their countries. I would love to find out more about Guantanamo Bay, but it remains obscured by our government, and information is kept tightly sealed. In my personal opinion from what I know about the base, I believe it is a symbol of all that it is Un-American.

U.S. Accused of Overlooking Rights Violations

This recent article in "The New York Times", by Helene Cooper discusses some interesting and disturbing allegations made by the advocacy group Human Rights Watch, in regards to the Bush administration. The organizations report states that our current government has been promoting democracy by endorsing elections in countries such as, Kenya, Nigeria, and Pakistan, yet at the same time neglecting human rights violations. In the case of Pakistan, President Pervez Musharraf, a major Bush ally, removed members of the independent judiciary, and placed them under arrest. He then proceeded to place his own allies on the Pakistani Supreme Court to assure his presidency. This also raises questions about the assassination of Benazir Bhutto who was expected to be his rival in the coming election. There is also speculation about the Bush administration allowing the Kenyan government to believe they could "rig" the December elections, as a result of Nigeria's 2007 election. Head of the Human Rights Watch Kenneth Roth believes it is all too easy for these autocratic governments to fake democracy, while denying their citizens basic democratic human freedoms (free speech, assembly, freedom of press, etc). Roth says, “Western governments insist on elections and [simply] leave it at." I believe this article is hugely relevant to our study of national government. These are important issues of foreign policy. News from Africa and the Middle East is almost entirely filtered and extremely overlooked. I believe that our government at times is not entirely legitimate, and articles like this one can shed some light on how our government interacts with foreign nations, and what democracy truly means to our government.