Daily Kos: Updated: Gang-Rape Cover-Up by U.S., Halliburton / KBR

Daily Kos: Updated: Gang-Rape Cover-Up by U.S., Halliburton / KBR

Updated: Gang-Rape Cover-Up by U.S., Halliburton / KBR

by gooderservice

Mon Dec 10, 2007 at 12:23:15 PM PST

Jamie Leigh Jones, now 22, says that after she was raped by multiple men at a KBR camp in the Green Zone, the company put her under guard in a shipping container with a bed and warned her that if she left Iraq for medical treatment, she'd be out of a job.

I'm just going to add a few blockquotes with a link to the story. She was drugged, raped multiple times, and held captive. Will the perpetrators pay? Nope. More snippets below the fold.

• gooderservice's diary :: ::
• 
  

"It felt like prison," says Jones, (snip) "I was upset; I was curled up in a ball on the bed; I just could not believe what had happened."

Finally, Jones says, she convinced a sympathetic guard to loan her a cell phone so she could call her father in Texas.

"I said, 'Dad, I've been raped. I don't know what to do. I'm in this container, and I'm not able to leave,'" she said. Her father called their congressman, Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas.

She was 20 years old working as a civilian in Iraq. Oh, and when she did finally get to see the Army doctors (after the congressman called the State Department, who rescued her) the Army doctors confirmed she had been raped... in more than one fashion. Evidence. But not so much, since the rape kit was turned over to KBR security officers, where it subsequently disappeared. But then again, isn't that standard protocol when a crime takes place, the doctor at the hospital executes the rape kit to collect evidence, and then turns it over to an employee of the victim's company.

A United States citizen works for the American people, gets brutally assaulted, is held captive, and Gonzo looks the other way

UPDATE:
As suggested, and the link provided, by Dissento, YOU can tell KBR how you feel.

h/t to borkitekt for suggesting I update this diary to include that link.

UPDATE 2:

h/t to gatu

From Jamie Leigh Jones' Journal

In regards to the missing pictures and doctor's notes that were taken in Baghdad Lynn Falanga and I both called the doctor that performed the rape kit. The doctor stated to both of us that "I have no idea which rape victim you are because so many young contractor girls were raped after drinking with the guys" she also stated that "I performed so many rape kits in the six months that I was stationed there that there would be no way to recall whom yours was."

So what is the date that this doctor will testify under oath at a Congressional hearing?

Jamie's Foundation

White House preparing to stage new September 11 !!!

jbcard's Xanga Site

White House preparing to stage new September 11 - Reagan official

13:58 | 20/ 07/ 2007

WASHINGTON, July 20 (RIA Novosti) - A former Reagan official has issued a public warning that the Bush administration is preparing to orchestrate a staged terrorist attack in the United States, transform the country into a dictatorship and launch a war with Iran within a year.

Paul Craig Roberts, a former Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, blasted Thursday a new Executive Order, released July 17, allowing the White House to seize the assets of anyone who interferes with its Iraq policies and giving the government expanded police powers to exercise control in the country.

Roberts, who spoke on the Thom Hartmann radio program, said: "When Bush exercises this authority [under the new Executive Order], there's no check to it. So it really is a form of total, absolute, one-man rule."

"The American people don't really understand the danger that they face," Roberts said, adding that the so-called neoconservatives intended to use a renewal of the fight against terrorism to rally the American people around the fading Republican Party.

Old-line Republicans like Roberts have become increasingly disenchanted with the neoconservative politics of the Bush administration, which they see as a betrayal of fundamental conservative values.

According to a July 9-11 survey by Ipsos, an international public opinion research company, President Bush and the Republicans can claim a mere 31 percent approval rating for their handling of the Iraq war and 38 percent for their foreign policy in general, including terrorism.

"The administration figures themselves and prominent Republican propagandists ... are preparing us for another 9/11 event or series of events," he said. "You have to count on the fact that if al Qaeda is not going to do it, it is going to be orchestrated."

Roberts suggested that in the absence of a massive popular outcry, only the federal bureaucracy and perhaps the military could put constraints on Bush's current drive for a fully-fledged dictatorship.

"They may have had enough. They may not go along with it," he said.

The radio interview was a follow-up to Robert's latest column, in which he warned that "unless Congress immediately impeaches Bush and Cheney, a year from now the U.S. could be a dictatorial police state at war with Iran."

Roberts, who has been dubbed the "Father of Reaganomics" and has recently gained popularity for his strong opposition to the Bush administration and the Iraq War, regularly contributes articles to Creators Syndicate, an independent distributor of comic strips and syndicated columns for daily newspapers.

"Good Riddance, Attention Whore" ...by Cindy Sheehan

MichaelMoore.com : "Good Riddance, Attention Whore" ...by Cindy Sheehan

Monday, May 28th, 2007
"Good Riddance, Attention Whore" ...by Cindy Sheehan

I have endured a lot of smear and hatred since Casey was killed and especially since I became the so-called "Face" of the American anti-war movement. Especially since I renounced any tie I have remaining with the Democratic Party, I have been further trashed on such "liberal blogs" as the Democratic Underground. Being called an "attention whore" and being told "good riddance" are some of the more milder rebukes.

I have come to some heartbreaking conclusions this Memorial Day Morning. These are not spur of the moment reflections, but things I have been meditating on for about a year now. The conclusions that I have slowly and very reluctantly come to are very heartbreaking to me.

The first conclusion is that I was the darling of the so-called left as long as I limited my protests to George Bush and the Republican Party. Of course, I was slandered and libeled by the right as a "tool" of the Democratic Party. This label was to marginalize me and my message. How could a woman have an original thought, or be working outside of our "two-party" system?

However, when I started to hold the Democratic Party to the same standards that I held the Republican Party, support for my cause started to erode and the "left" started labeling me with the same slurs that the right used. I guess no one paid attention to me when I said that the issue of peace and people dying for no reason is not a matter of "right or left", but "right and wrong."

I am deemed a radical because I believe that partisan politics should be left to the wayside when hundreds of thousands of people are dying for a war based on lies that is supported by Democrats and Republican alike. It amazes me that people who are sharp on the issues and can zero in like a laser beam on lies, misrepresentations, and political expediency when it comes to one party refuse to recognize it in their own party. Blind party loyalty is dangerous whatever side it occurs on. People of the world look on us Americans as jokes because we allow our political leaders so much murderous latitude and if we don't find alternatives to this corrupt "two" party system our Representative Republic will die and be replaced with what we are rapidly descending into with nary a check or balance: a fascist corporate wasteland. I am demonized because I don't see party affiliation or nationality when I look at a person, I see that person's heart. If someone looks, dresses, acts, talks and votes like a Republican, then why do they deserve support just because he/she calls him/herself a Democrat?

I have also reached the conclusion that if I am doing what I am doing because I am an "attention whore" then I really need to be committed. I have invested everything I have into trying to bring peace with justice to a country that wants neither. If an individual wants both, then normally he/she is not willing to do more than walk in a protest march or sit behind his/her computer criticizing others. I have spent every available cent I got from the money a "grateful" country gave me when they killed my son and every penny that I have received in speaking or book fees since then. I have sacrificed a 29 year marriage and have traveled for extended periods of time away from Casey's brother and sisters and my health has suffered and my hospital bills from last summer (when I almost died) are in collection because I have used all my energy trying to stop this country from slaughtering innocent human beings. I have been called every despicable name that small minds can think of and have had my life threatened many times.

The most devastating conclusion that I reached this morning, however, was that Casey did indeed die for nothing. His precious lifeblood drained out in a country far away from his family who loves him, killed by his own country which is beholden to and run by a war machine that even controls what we think. I have tried ever since he died to make his sacrifice meaningful. Casey died for a country which cares more about who will be the next American Idol than how many people will be killed in the next few months while Democrats and Republicans play politics with human lives. It is so painful to me to know that I bought into this system for so many years and Casey paid the price for that allegiance. I failed my boy and that hurts the most.

I have also tried to work within a peace movement that often puts personal egos above peace and human life. This group won't work with that group; he won't attend an event if she is going to be there; and why does Cindy Sheehan get all the attention anyway? It is hard to work for peace when the very movement that is named after it has so many divisions.

Our brave young men and women in Iraq have been abandoned there indefinitely by their cowardly leaders who move them around like pawns on a chessboard of destruction and the people of Iraq have been doomed to death and fates worse than death by people worried more about elections than people. However, in five, ten, or fifteen years, our troops will come limping home in another abject defeat and ten or twenty years from then, our children's children will be seeing their loved ones die for no reason, because their grandparents also bought into this corrupt system. George Bush will never be impeached because if the Democrats dig too deeply, they may unearth a few skeletons in their own graves and the system will perpetuate itself in perpetuity.

I am going to take whatever I have left and go home. I am going to go home and be a mother to my surviving children and try to regain some of what I have lost. I will try to maintain and nurture some very positive relationships that I have found in the journey that I was forced into when Casey died and try to repair some of the ones that have fallen apart since I began this single-minded crusade to try and change a paradigm that is now, I am afraid, carved in immovable, unbendable and rigidly mendacious marble.

Camp Casey has served its purpose. It's for sale. Anyone want to buy five beautiful acres in Crawford, Texas? I will consider any reasonable offer. I hear George Bush will be moving out soon, too…which makes the property even more valuable.

This is my resignation letter as the "face" of the American anti-war movement. This is not my "Checkers" moment, because I will never give up trying to help people in the world who are harmed by the empire of the good old US of A, but I am finished working in, or outside of this system. This system forcefully resists being helped and eats up the people who try to help it. I am getting out before it totally consumes me or anymore people that I love and the rest of my resources.

Good-bye America…you are not the country that I love and I finally realized no matter how much I sacrifice, I can't make you be that country unless you want it.

It's up to you now.

Iraq Action Camp

Iraq Action Camp

Ever feel like no one's listening?

With more than 3300 troops dead and the majority of Americans in opposition to the war, it's time for a realistic plan to bring our troops home safely.

Apply here to attend the Iraq Action Camp June 10-14.

Do you want to...

• tell your legislators face to face that it’s time to end the war?
• prepare for an exciting semester of action on your campus?
• meet students from all across the country who are working to end the war?

At the Iraq Action Camp, you can.

Join us June 10-14 for an intense week of training, campfires, lobbying, s'mores, and connections. Get trained by experienced organizers from MoveOn, Democracy Matters, the United States Student Association, Campus Progress Action, and elsewhere. Learn what a good campaign looks like and how to work with the media to get your message out. Then qualify for grant money to turn your vision into reality. Together, we can bring our troops home.

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54 Representatives that cave for Bush

Primary 2008 List

Submitted by Bob Fertik on May 30, 2007 - 12:52pm.

• Democratic Primary Challenges

Here is the list of 59 Representatives who voted against the McGovern Amendment on 5/10/2007. We are recruiting anti-war candidates to challenge them in Democratic primaries in 2008. If they change their position to oppose the endless occupation of Iraq, we will cross them off our list.

Dist	Incumbent	Primary
AR-2	Vic Snyder
AR-4	Mike Ross
AZ-5	Harry Mitchell
AZ-8	Gabrielle Giffords
CA-11	Jerry McNerney	voted anti-war on 5/24
CA-18	Dennis Cardoza
CA-20	Jim Costa
CA-28	Howard Berman	Rep. Cindy Montanez Rep. Lloyd Levine Mike Stettler
CO-2	Mark Udall	[running for US Senate]
CO-3	John Salazar
FL-2	Allen Boyd	Rep. Al Lawson
FL-16	Tim Mahoney
GA-2	Sanford Bishop
GA-8	Jim Marshall	George Carswell
GA-12	John Barrow
GA-13	David Scott
IA-3	Leonard Boswell	Rep. Jo Oldson Rep. Bruce Hunter Rep. Rick Olson Sen. Dick Dearden
IL-3	Daniel Lipinski	Mark Pera
IL-8	Melissa Bean
IN-2	Joe Donnelly
IN-8	Brad Ellsworth
IN-9	Baron Hill
KS-2	Nancy Boyda
KS-3	Dennis Moore
KY-6	Ben Chandler	Sen. Ernesto Scorsone
LA-3	Charlie Melancon
MD-2	Dutch Ruppersberger
MD-5	*Steny Hoyer	Paul Prinsky
MN-7	Collin Peterson
MO-4	Ike Skelton
MS-4	Gene Taylor
NC-2	Bob Etheridge
NC-7	Mike McIntyre
NC-11	Heath Shuler	Sen. Martin Luther Nesbitt Rep. Susan C Fisher Rep. Ray Rapp
ND-0	Earl Pomeroy
NV-1	Shelley Berkley
OH-6	Charles Wilson
OH-18	Zachary Space
OK-2	Dan Boren
PA-4	Jason Altmire
PA-10	Christopher Carney
PA-13	Allyson Schwartz	Chuck Pennachio
PA-17	Tim Holden	Sen. Michael O'Pake
SD-0	Stephanie Herseth
TN-1	David Davis
TN-4	Lincoln Davis
TN-5	Jim Cooper
TN-6	Bart Gordon
TN-8	John Tanner
TX-9	Al Green	Rep. Alma Allen Rep. Hubert Vo
TX-17	Chet Edwards
TX-22	Nick Lampson
TX-23	Ciro Rodriguez
TX-27	Solomon Ortiz	Juan Garcia
TX-28	Henry Cuellar
TX-29	Gene Green	Sen. Mario V. Gallegos
UT-2	Jim Matheson	Mayor Rocky Anderson
VA-9	Rick Boucher
WI-3	Ron Kind

911 Mysteries

Watch the best 911 video sofar:

http://www.informationliberation.com/?id=15716

Why I leave the Democratic Party

An Open Letter to the Democratic Congress
By Cindy Sheehan

Dublin, Ireland

Dear Democratic Congress,

Hello, my name is Cindy Sheehan and my son Casey Sheehan was killed on April 04, 2004 in Sadr City , Baghdad , Iraq . He was killed when the Republicans still were in control of Congress. Naively, I set off on my tireless campaign calling on Congress to rescind George's authority to wage his war of terror while asking him "for what noble cause" did Casey and thousands of other have to die. Now, with Democrats in control of Congress, I have lost my optimistic naiveté and have become cynically pessimistic as I see you all caving into "Mr. 28%"

There is absolutely no sane or defensible reason for you to hand Bloody King George more money to condemn more of our brave, tired, and damaged soldiers and the people of Iraq to more death and carnage. You think giving him more money is politically expedient, but it is a moral abomination and every second the occupation of Iraq endures, you all have more blood on your hands.

Ms. Pelosi, Speaker of the House, said after George signed the new weak as a newborn baby funding authorization bill: "Now, I think the president's policy will begin to unravel." Begin to unravel? How many more of our children will have to be killed and how much more of Iraq will have to be demolished before you all think enough unraveling has occurred? How many more crimes will BushCo be allowed to commit while their poll numbers are crumbling before you all gain the political "courage" to hold them accountable. If Iraq hasn't unraveled in Ms. Pelosi's mind, what will it take? With almost 700,000 Iraqis dead and four million refugees (which the US refuses to admit) how could it get worse? Well, it is getting worse and it can get much worse thanks to your complicity.

Being cynically pessimistic, it seems to me that this new vote to extend the war until the end of September, (and let's face it, on October 1st, you will give him more money after some more theatrics, which you think are fooling the anti-war faction of your party) will feed right into the presidential primary season and you believe that if you just hang on until then, the Democrats will be able to re-take the White House. Didn't you see how "well" that worked for John Kerry in 2004 when he played the politics of careful fence sitting and pandering? The American electorate are getting disgusted with weaklings who blow where the wind takes them while frittering away our precious lifeblood and borrowing money from our new owners, the Chinese.

I knew having a Democratic Congress would make no difference in grassroots action. That's why we went to DC when you all were sworn in to tell you that we wanted the troops back from Iraq and BushCo held accountable while you pushed for ethics reform which is quite a hoot...don't' you think? We all know that it is affordable for you all to play this game of political mayhem because you have no children in harm's way...let me tell you what it is like:

You watch your reluctant soldier march off to a war that neither you nor he agrees with. Once your soldier leaves the country all you can do is worry. You lie awake at night staring at the moon wondering if today will be the day that you get that dreaded knock on your door. You can't concentrate, you can't eat, and your entire life becomes consumed with apprehension while you are waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Then, when your worst fears are realized, you begin a life of constant pain, regret, and longing. Everyday is hard, but then you come up on "special" days...like upcoming Memorial Day. Memorial Day holds double pain for me because, not only are we supposed to honor our fallen troops, but Casey was born on Memorial Day in 1979. It used to be a day of celebration for us and now it is a day of despair. Our needlessly killed soldiers of this war and the past conflict in Vietnam have all left an unnecessary trail of sorrow and deep holes of absence that will never be filled.

So, Democratic Congress, with the current daily death toll of 3.72 troops per day, you have condemned 473 more to these early graves. 473 more lives wasted for your political greed: Thousands of broken hearts because of your cowardice and avarice. How can you even go to sleep at night or look at yourselves in a mirror? How do you put behind you the screaming mothers on both sides of the conflict? How does the agony you have created escape you? It will never escape me...I can't run far enough or hide well enough to get away from it.

By the end of September, we will be about 80 troops short of another bloody milestone: 4000, and MoveOn.org will hold nationwide candlelight vigils and you all will be busy passing legislation that will snuff the lights out of thousands more human beings.

Congratulations Congress, you have bought yourself a few more months of an illegal and immoral bloodbath. And you know you mean to continue it indefinitely so "other presidents" can solve the horrid problem BushCo forced our world into.

It used to be George Bush's war. You could have ended it honorably. Now it is yours and you all will descend into calumnious history with BushCo.

The Camp Casey Peace Institute is calling all citizens who are as disgusted as we are with you all to join us in Philadelphia on July 4th to try and figure a way out of this "two" party system that is bought and paid for by the war machine which has a stranglehold on every aspect of our lives. As for myself, I am leaving the Democratic Party. You have completely failed those who put you in power to change the direction our country is heading. We did not elect you to help sink our ship of state but to guide it to safe harbor.

We do not condone our government's violent meddling in sovereign countries and we condemn the continued murderous occupation of Iraq .

We gave you a chance, you betrayed us.

Sincerely,
Cindy Sheehan
Founder and President of
Gold Star Families for Peace.

Founder and Director of
The Camp Casey Peace Institute

Eternally grieving mother of Casey Sheehan

Impeach Now!

MichaelMoore.com : Impeach Now! ...by Jodin Morey

hursday, January 11th, 2007
Impeach Now! ...by Jodin Morey

Well, our chance to convince Nancy Pelosi to Impeach Bush/Cheney is this Monday Jan. 15th.

Pelosi most likely said impeachment was "off the table" to remove any appearance of conflict-of-interest that would arise if she were thrust into the presidency as a result of the coming impeachment.

What we need to do is to pressure Pelosi not to interfere with impeachment maneuverings within her party. Sending her Do-It-Yourself impeachments legitimizes her when she is forced to join the impeachment movement in the future.

Sacks and sacks of mail are about to arrive in Nancy Pelosi's office initiating impeachment via the House of Representative's own rules this Monday January 15th. This legal document is as binding as if a State or if the House itself passed the impeachment resolution (H.R. 635).

There's a little known and rarely used clause of the "Jefferson Manual" in the rules for the House of Representatives which sets forth the various ways in which a president can be impeached. Only the House Judiciary Committee puts together the Articles of Impeachment, but before that happens, someone has to initiate the process.That's where we come in. In addition to a House Resolution (635), or the State-by-State method, one of the ways to get impeachment going is for individual citizens like you and me to submit a memorial. ImpeachforPeace.org has created a new memorial based on one which was successful in impeaching a federal official in the past. You can find it on their website as a PDF.

You can initiate the impeachment process and simultaneously help to convince Pelosi to follow through with the process. Do-It-Yourself by downloading the memorial, filling in the relevant information (your name, state, etc.), and sending it in. Be a part of history.

Impeach for Peace -- Impeach Now!