“Extraordinary rendition” is White House-speak for kidnapping. Just ask Maher Arar. He’s a Canadian citizen who was “rendered” by the U.S. to Syria, where he was tortured for almost a year.
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U.S. Army Reserve Spc. Chancellor Keesling died in Iraq on June 19, 2009, from “a non-combat related incident,” according to the Pentagon. Keesling had killed himself.
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Climate-change activists, from pranksters to presidents, are stepping up the pressure by staging elaborate stunts.
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Lt. Dan Choi doesn’t want to lie. Choi, an Iraq war veteran and a graduate of West Point, declared last March 19 on “The Rachel Maddow Show,” “I am gay.” Under the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” regulations, those three words are enough to get Choi kicked out of the military.
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A social worker from New York City was arrested last week while in Pittsburgh for the G-20 protests, then subjected to an FBI raid this week at home—all for using Twitter.
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Journalist Christian Parenti responds to our interview with Kevin Bales, founder of Free The Slaves
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The now-defunct Holy Land Foundation was once the largest Muslim charity in the United States. It collected donations for local committees providing humanitarian aid in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The government had accused it of providing “material support” to a foreign terrorist organization. But jurors failed to reach a unanimous verdict and the US district judge declared a mistrial on most of the charges. We speak to David Cole, Professor of Law at Georgetown University and Khalil Meek, President of the Muslim Legal Fund of America. [includes rush transcript]
A bipartisan group of Congress members have personally apologized to Maher Arar, the Canadian citizen seized by U.S. officials, secretly flown to Syria, where he was tortured. Arar testified last week before a House panel, the first time he has had a chance to tell his story to U.S. lawmakers. But he couldn’t testify in person. Even though the Canadian government has cleared his name, Arar remains barred from the U.S. because the Bush administration says he poses a national security threat. [includes rush transcript]
Democratic Rep. Jerrold Nadler of New York joins us from Capitol Hill to talk about why he thinks the Bush administration should compensate and apologize to Maher Arar. Rep. Nadler also addresses recent controversies around John Tanner of the Voting Rights section and birth control foe Susan Orr, the newly appointed Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary for Population Affairs. And Nadler talks about congressional efforts to intervene in the case of the Jena 6. [includes rush transcript]
Turkish warplanes and ground troops have attacked Kurdish militant positions inside northern Iraq, killing 34 members of the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK. The strikes follow a cross-border raid from Kurdish militants that killed 17 Turkish troops. We speak with Kurdish human rights activist Kerim Yildiz, executive director and co-founder of the London-based Kurdish Human Rights Project. He was a former Amnesty Prisoner of Conscience and fled Turkey in 1986. [includes rush transcript]