As you know, I’m a secularist and believe religion is best kept to the private sphere. But this kind of suppression of religious belief is truly noxious, and merely gives the religious right more grist for paranoia.
LIBERTY BEFORE DEMOCRACY? A tweaking of the Bush doctrine.
CAVUTO: Not only knee-pads but several contributions to the Bush campaign, up to $2000 in 2002. Here, here, and here. Hey: fair and balanced.
LOWER OFFICER STANDARDS: The military, facing a recruitment crisis, is lowering standards for officers, allowing people who have committed minor crimes. Obvious commentary from a retired army officer here.
THE ANSWER, MY FRIEND: Thanks for all your theories about the military pee blowing in the wind. Just to recap, here’s the official description of what happened:
The guard had left his observation area post and went outside to urinate. He urinated near an air vent and the wind blew his urine through the vent into the block. The Sergeant of the Guard (SOG) responded and immediately relieved the guard. The SOG ensured the detainee received a fresh uniform and a new Koran. The Joint Detention Operations Group (JDOG) 2 commander reprimanded the guard and assigned him to gate guard duty where he had no contact with detainees for the remainder of his assignment at JTF-GTMO.
Here’s a useful picture of what we might be dealing with. A little pee splatter is not uncommon. But there are many places to take leaks. I’ve taken advantage of trees, bushes, dark urban corners, alleys, and all sorts of places in my time. But I tend not to pee near an air-vent that leads directly into a someone’s living quarters. I don’t scout around for a basement apartment, look for an airvent and pee just nearby. Even if I did, and some pee drifted in the wind into an open air-vent, what are the chances that even a small amount would make it on to an individual inside? If I were a soldier and this was an absurd mistake, I can see being disciplined. But I don’t see why I’d be forbidden access to any detainees for the rest of my time in Gitmo. The obvious truth is that a guard decided to humiliate a Muslim prisoner by pissing on him through an airvent. The military cannot say that because the story would then read: Koran not flushed, but pissed on. So they came up with the magic pee, whose ability to swerve left then right into the designated wind vent rivals the smartest of smart bombs. Our military sure is high-tech these days. And no, this isn’t a huge deal. It’s just a petty lie that makes us suspect bigger ones.
The Dish 