'US violates human rights'

[bemildred]

Beijing - China on Thursday accused the United States of serious human rights violations and told Washington to clean up its own act before "wantonly trampling on the sovereignty of other countries".

In its annual Human Rights Record of the United States, China hit out at the "atrocity" of United States troops in Iraq and criticised the Bush administration for failing to deal with poverty, racial discrimination and crime at home.

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"Despite tons of problems in its own human rights, the United States continues to stick to its belligerent stance, wantonly trampling on the sovereignty of other countries," said the report, the sixth China has issued.

"The United States should reflect on its erroneous behaviour on human rights and take its own human rights problems seriously instead of indulging itself in publishing the 'human rights country report' to censure other countries unreasonably."

News24

[mermaid]

1. As A Transgender Woman...

I do not find this to be "Latest Breaking News" WE have known for AGES that the United States violates basic human rights!! :nuke: :nuke: :nuke:

[bemildred]

6. Yeah, it's a "No Shit, Sherlock" moment.

We don't have the highest incarceration rate in the World for nothing.

[Mahatma]

7. Unmorality of the US

That´s right!

But it´s good to remember these facts day by day.
By not reacting to these atrocities, we have grown accustomed to unhuman behavior and seem to agree to it.

I am just waiting for American citizens standing up one day to denounce their own country´s (un)moral stance in so many issues!



"All the world needs are examples of people capable of living out their dreams and fighting for their ideas."
by author Paulo Coelho
http://www.warriorofthelight.com

[Seabiscuit]

26. Hi, mermaid! I hope you're feeling better today. I know it's been rough

for you lately.

[beyurslf]

2. How low have we sunk that CHINA tells us we violate human rights?

[bvar22]

4. and Germany calling us Nazis...

*

[Igel]

9. They started this when Clinton was in office.

Define "rights", then attack somebody else to deflect attention. Execute 200 people sentenced in secret trials over the course of a couple weeks ... Hey, what's that over there? Insufficient medical care? Human rights abuse!!

Back in the '60s and '70s Izvestiya was full of articles about riots, illiteracy, kids dying because of bad health care, suicide ... convincing Russians that they truly lived in a paradise.

We Americans really have no clue how to effectively dish out negative face (at least at the diplomatic level).

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

11. Hypocritical, certainly, but

if you place two people side by side, one of which stole $1000, and the other stole $5000, is the latter one forbidden from saying "this guy here stole $1000"?

[Igel]

17. It's true, but usually what actually happens is that instead of

saying X is horrible to the xth degree, and Y is guilty to the yth degree, all you have is one group focusing on the one that they dispise the most. Granted people can only give their attention to one thing at a time, but it's not like we're required to forget about all the other things while we're doing so.

Note that I didn't say that the US wasn't guilty of rights violations; if I had wanted to say that, I could have. I said that China was using US flaws to either justify or draw attention from their own. These are two entirely different propositions, and have nothing to do with each logically.

And from what I've read, what I perceive to be China's intent is working.

[Sandpiper]

13. Well, if we're going to release Human Rights reports on other countries

We shouldn't complain if they turn around and do the same to us, sour grapes not withstanding.


The part though, is that we've incurred some rather large black marks on our human rights record under George W. Bush, with Guantanomo, Abu Ghraib, etc.

[Igel]

18. I don't think I did, and I didn't complain

that they had.

I pointed out what I perceive to be their motive in releasing the report. No more, no less.

[0007]

23. Not only in Guantanomo or Abu Graib but here in the United States

"The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons: Fyodor Dostoyevsky: Russian novelist, 1821-1881

[Zhade]

14. So we weren't violating human rights under Clinton, too?

Something tells me AI and other groups would disagree...

[Igel]

19. Yes, we were violating them under China;

but somebody above implied that the only reason China was releasing such a report was *.

Post hoc fallacies are only deceiving when the hoc is post.

And while I try to sometimes have clever allusions and double entendres in my posts, I'm far, far to tired and grumpy for any of them today.

[Say_What]

15. Axis of Executioners--China, Iran and the United State according to AI

<clips>

Organization Releases 2003 Survey of Human Rights in 151 Countries

...The report presents data on key human rights indicators, including the death penalty, a category in which the US is a leading violator. China, Iran and the United States - a so-called "axis of executioners" - accounted for 81 percent of all known executions in 2002, with recorded executions in each country numbering 1,060, 113 and 71, respectively. Amnesty International research shows that over the last decade, an average of three countries annually have abolished the death penalty in law or practice.

http://www.unityfirst.com/amnestywariniraq.htm

---

<clips>

US becomes last country to end death penalty for under-18s

The US bowed to international and domestic pressure yesterday, becoming the last country in the world officially to abolish the death penalty for offenders who were under 18 when they committed murder.

The supreme court ruling will spare up to 70 inmates who are on death row for committing murders while aged 16 or 17, and it removes a source of friction between the US and Europe. The EU welcomed the decision, but said it "opposes capital punishment under all circumstances".

The former American president Jimmy Carter said that with the ruling the US had joined "the community of nations".

"The supreme court decision confirms recent, compelling scientific research findings, that the capacity for curbing impulsiveness, using sound judgment, and exercising self-control is much less developed in adolescents than in adults," Mr Carter said in a statement.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1428377,00.html

[KyndCulture]

3. OMG - China telling us to clean up our act. We're doomed. nt

[Daphne08]

5. Yep, and I never thought I'd live to see the day...

[BRLIB]

8. China need to make its "aid" (investment in the US)

contingent upon the US cleaning up its human right record and democratic reforms.

[LynnTheDem]

10. ROTFLMAO!!!!!!

OMG that would be HILARIOUS!!!

bush & Cartel & the rethugs would be red in the face from shrieking, LOL!!!

[Massacure]

12. But But But... China can't pull a Merika! Only Merikans can pull a Merika!

[Say_What]

16. If the USSA gave a flying F*CK about human rights anywhere, they'd

have been promoting peace and the end to hunger and poverty around the globe as soon as the Berlin wall fell and they became the only superpower. Human rights my ass.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
$60 billion a year cuts global poverty in half by 2015.
$165 billion a years goes to U.S. military contractors
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

http://borgenproject.org/

[Dark]

20. Where does China get off being able to lecture us about human rights?

Seriously. China has no right to chastise us for human rights violations. We've done some terrible stuff, granted. But they have done just as bad, and in some cases, much worse.

[NNN0LHI]

22. Yea, yea. We are slightly better than China in the realm of human rights

Does that make you feel better?

Don

[Dark]

24. What would make me feel better is to wake up, and find out that Kerry won.

But we are more than 'just a little' better than China.

[sonicx]

25. You must have missed the earlier news...

China's doing this in retaliation to the State Department's human rights report on China.

[NNN0LHI]

21. Full text of Human Rights Record of the US in 2004

http://english.people.com.cn/200503/03/eng20050303_175406.html

By the Information Office of the State Council of the People's Republic of China

March 3, 2005

In 2004 the atrocity of US troops abusing Iraqi POWs exposed the dark side of human rights performance of the United States. The scandal shocked the humanity and was condemned by the international community. It is quite ironic that on Feb. 28 of this year, the State Department of the United States once again posed as the "the world human rights police" and released its Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2004. As in previous years, the reports pointed fingers at human rights situation in more than 190 countries and regions (including China) but kept silent on the US misdeeds in this field. Therefore, the world people have to probe the human rights record behind the Statue of Liberty in the United States. snip

Jails have become one of the huge and most lucrative industries, with a combined staff of more than 530,000 and being the second largest employer in the United States only after the General Motors. Private prisons are more and more common. The country now has over 100 private prisons in 27 states and 18 private prison companies. The value of goods and services created by inmates surged from 400 million US dollars in 1980 to 1.1 billion US dollars in 1994. Abuse of prisoners and violence occur frequently in US jails and prisons, which are under disorderly management. The Los Angeles Times reported on Aug. 15 last year that over 40 state prison systems were once under some form of court order, for brutality, crowding, poor food and lack of medical care. snip

Over 80,000 women prisoners in the United States are mothers, and the overall number of the minor children of the American women prisoners is estimated at some 200,000. The country had more than 3,000 pregnant women in jails from 2000 to 2003 and 3,000 babies were born to the prisoners during this period (see Mexico's Milenio on Feb. 21, 2004). It is estimated that at least more than 40,000 prisoners are locked up in the so-called "super jails", where the prisoner is confined to a very tiny cell, cannot see other people throughout the year, and has only one hour out for exercise every day.

Sexual harassment and encroachment are common in jails in the Unite States. The New York Times reported last October that at least 13 percent of inmates in the country are sexually assaulted in prison (Ex-Inmate's Suit Offers View Into Sexual Slavery in Prisons, The New York Times, Oct. 12, 2004). In jails of seven central and western US states, 21 percent of the inmates suffer sexual abuse at least once after being put in prison. The ratio is higher among women inmates, with nearly one fourth of them sexually assaulted by jail guards. snip

The United States is the only country in the world that rules out ex-inmates' right to vote, which disenfranchises 5 million ex-inmates and 13 percent male black people (see Milenio, Mexico, Oct. 22 2004).

more

[dummy-du1]

27. China, mankind's last hope

I stumbled over this Noam Chomsky article recently. We really live in interesting times...

Without forgetting the very significant progress towards more civilized societies in past years, and the reasons for it, let’s focus nevertheless on the present, and on the notions of imperial sovereignty now being crafted. It is not surprising that as the population becomes more civilized, power systems become more extreme in their efforts to control the “great beast” (as the Founding Fathers called the people). And the great beast is indeed frightening: I’ll return to majority views on major issues, which are so far to the left of the spectrum of elite commentary and the electoral arena that they cannot even be reported – another fact that teaches important lessons to those who do not like what is being done in their names.

The conception of presidential sovereignty crafted by the radical statist reactionaries of the Bush administration is so extreme that it has drawn unprecedented criticism in the most sober and respected establishment circles. These ideas were transmitted to the President by the newly appointed Attorney-General, Alberto Gonzales – who is depicted as a moderate in the press. They are discussed by the respected constitutional law professor Sanford Levinson in the current issue of the journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Levinson writes that the conception is based on the principle that "There exists no norm that is applicable to chaos." The quote, Levinson comments, is from Carl Schmitt, the leading German philosopher of law during the Nazi period, who Levinson describes as “the true éminence grise of the Bush administration.” The administration, advised by Gonzales, has articulated “a view of presidential authority that is all too close to the power that Schmitt was willing to accord his own Führer,” Levinson writes.

One rarely hears such words from the heart of the establishment.

The same issue of the journal carries an article by two prominent strategic analysts on the “transformation of the military,” a central component of the new doctrines of imperial sovereignty: the rapid expansion of offensive weaponry, including militarization of space – joined apparently by Canada -- and other measures designed to place the entire world at risk of instant annihilation. These have already elicited the anticipated reactions by Russia and recently China. The analysts conclude that these US programs may lead to “ultimate doom.” They express their hope that a coalition of peace-loving states will coalesce as a counter to US militarism and aggressiveness, led by – China. We’ve come to a pretty pass when such sentiments are voiced in sober respectable circles not given to hyperbole. And when faith in American democracy is so slight that they look to China to save us from marching towards ultimate doom. It’s up to the second superpower to decide whether that contempt for the great beast is warranted.