Ted Kavanau is a veteran television news executive, was one of the founders of CNN and created CNN’s Headline News. He has served in news managerial capacities at TV stations in New York, Oakland, Calif., and San Diego. He discovered Katie Couric, and groomed several of the newscasters we see on news shows today.
Wild Thing comment…… I realize Katie Couric is a piece of crap and I can’t stand her but these are the facts and unlike the MSM I will not keep information from a post I make. I put it all out there for you to see and know. Heck I hired some real winners ( UGH) in my business too over the years…..OK BACK to the rest of my post.
Ted Kavanau left this comment on the Brent Bennett post the other day. Here it is.
Americans should understand the stake they have in helping free Jack, Brent and Ed and put back in action his team of terrorist hunting Afghans. Very recent history makes the case ever more sharply. Following the three bombings of American-owned Hotels in Jordan there was again a lot of chatter by pundits on TV here about how vulnerable we are in the US. Was that vulnerablity a surprise to anybody? Did it really take a horrific event to happen before we again fall back into enjoying our pleasant lifesyles? It is ironic that the attack in Jordan comes one day after the British Parliament voted down Tony Blair’s proposal to triple the number of days a suspected terrorist can be held in a British prison. I hear the British press is calling for Tony Blair to resign after his defeat. I think it is time for the British Parliament members who voted against him to resign. Here in the US the Democrats, after a few electoral victories in Governor races, are smelling Bush weakness and again getting aggressive about our not yet finding Bin Laden (as well their other complaints about the war in Iraq). The Republicans are playing into the hands not only of their political enemies, but of their terrorist enemies by not unleashing one of the best weapons they have against Al Qaeda and its followers, namely Jack Idema, Brent Bennett and the Afghans warriors of Saber7. If Idema and the others had not been arrested, there was good reason (you can read all about it on www.superpatriots.us) to believe Idema would have captured Bin Laden.
Let’s hope that with the new Afghan Parliament Idema and Saber7 will again have the opportunity to go hunt terrorists and keep us all a lot safer. That’s the stake we all have in what happens to Idema and his team and that is why his story is so worthy of our attention and our action.
Help us put pressure on our elected representatives and ask them why these men have not been released–since they were declared innocent at the end of March, 2005 and the only reason they’re still being held at Pulacharke is because the US Government has ordered it.
When all was said and done, these people admitted that no torture occurred, and 5 Afghan Supreme Court Justices decleared them innocent of all charges. Yet, the American government won’t allow them to be released. The question is…why?
What I don’t understand is why Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, the Red Cross and all those “watch groups” haven’t raised any hell in this case. I haven’t heard the human rights activists complaining about THESE injustices, why would that be? Could it be that the only people they are supporting in terms of human rights violations are the terrorists and not our soldiers and the men who are defending us in this war?
Idema was tortured with boiling water, starvation, threats of death, and assault with various implements (such as wire cables and rubber whips), resulting in broken ribs, a separated sternum, torn rotator cuffs, hemorrhaged eyes, multiple concussions, lacerations, contusions, and bruises. Although the U.S. Embassy later had medical reports indicating the extent of the torture, Sandra Ingram, Assistant U.S. Consul DOS Kabul, ordered the reports rewritten to tone down the extent of the injuries.
And let’s not forget how they were treated at Thanksgiving:
Thanksgiving for Jack Idema, Captain Bennett, Lt Banderas, and Journalist Carabello went like this: Ten US Special Operations Soldiers were threatened by the Dept of State with Article 15’s (low level court martials) if they brought Turkey to Pulacharke Prison on Thanksgiving.
If that’s not enough,
US Consul Addie Harchick visted them, refused them mail, and then tried to drive away with the water the Marines sent them, until an Afghan General had his bodyguards block the Embassy car and force them to deliver the water. One of the State Dept Security officers told the story at bar last night, and it made the boys sitting there listening f***ing sick. We treated Nazi POWs better than this.
Now denying them water might not seem to be a big deal, but it really is and this is part of the reason why.
Without water, they will be forced to drink local water which contains microorganisms and bacteria fatal to American citizens and forces in Central West Asia. Although ciprofloxacin can be administered to combat the severe dysentery, vomiting, and eventually death* that will occur as the result of the denial of drinking water, two problems make this solution untenable. First, ciprofloxacin is not readily available, the US Embassy has already refused to supply drugs to them, and the FBI confiscated the medical and surgical kits they possessed to avoid any link to the United States government.** Second, because Idema has operated in Afghanistan for more than three years, he has already used ciprofloxacin extensively and is not a suitable candidate for continued long-term use. The same situation would apply to Bennett and Caraballo if they were to be forced into long-term use of ciprofloxacin. Therefore, the denial of water is not only completely retaliatory and nefarious, but brutally vindictive and unwarranted.
Something’s terribly wrong here, and part if it has to do with the leftists who are supporting the rights of the enemy versus truly supporting our troops and the people who are fighting the WOT on our behalf.
We should make it clear that we know what has gone on here and that it’s an outrage and all men from TF Sabre/7 should be released, exonerated, their names cleared. And we should be also pushing for a Congressional investigation as to who was involved, the how and the why. Nobody fighting in Afghanistan or Iraq should EVER have to worry about being hung out to dry like this by a government that is employing stalinist tactics and turning its back on all the freedoms and rights that have been provided and guaranteed us by our founding documents and the blood of our forefathers, many of whom are laying at Arlington cemetary–as well as old standards which all men in uniform think they have as safeguards such as the Geneva Conventions. Are we to apply the Geneva Conventions to terrorists to whom these safeguards don’t apply and ignore them for our men in uniform for whom they were written???
If so, we’re setting ourselves up for FAILURE in this TERROR WAR.
This is the “Free Jack” campaign.
To join the campaign, email Cao of Cao’s Blog and tell her you want to join the Free Jack Idema blogburst. You will be added to the blogroll and she’ll send you the html code to put up for that week in case you’re pressed for time and can’t put something together…or you can write your own.
We will be blogging on this every Wednesday until he and his team are released, and when they are, we’ll be blogging about a congressional hearing.
Cao will maintain an email list, and will email you the post of the week along with a picture (if there is one for that week) to host at your blog.
Join the fight. No American should ever have to worry about ending up in this predicament ever again. But first, we must make sure they get home safely and in one piece.
These are the blogs so far who are participating:
For information on where to write and call please continue………………………..
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Also discussing this is Nickie Goomba
What’s in the News??
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