Weekly Review

By Roger D. Hodge

Lost Souls in Hell, 1875.

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld apologized for the torture of Iraqi prisoners and said that there are "many more photographs and indeed some videos" of American soldiers engaging in "blatantly sadistic, cruel, and inhuman" behavior; Rumsfeld took "full responsibility" for the abuse but still refused to resign. "It's going to get a good deal more terrible, I'm afraid." Specialist Sabrina Harman, who faces court martial because of her role in the torture, said in an email that she never even saw a copy of the Geneva Conventions until recently. "I read the entire thing," she said, "highlighting everything the prison is in violation of. There's a lot." Harman said her job was to "soften up" prisoners for interrogation.¹ American soldiers allegedly put a harness on an elderly Iraqi woman and rode her like a donkey.² New charges included rape, murder, and child molestation.³ "The system works," Rumsfeld told the Senate.⁴ President Bush, who authorized his staff to leak the fact that he had privately rebuked Donald Rumsfeld for failing to tell him about the torture photographs, apologized on Arab television; British Prime Minister Tony Blair also apologized, though there were questions about the authenticity of the British images.⁵ President Bush continued to maintain that the Abu Ghraib torturers were un-American, but human-rights advocates pointed out that similar abuse takes place in U.S. prisons all the time, especially in Texas.⁶ The Council on American-Islamic Relations reported that anti-Muslim bias incidents are up 70 percent, and a⁷ new Justice Department report warned that Al Qaeda is recruiting supporters in American prisons.⁸ Someone desecrated the grave of James Byrd Jr., the black man who was dragged to death behind a pickup in Texas, for the second time.⁹ It was reported that CACI International, the company that employs one of the accused Abu Ghraib torturers, also sells the Bush Administration ethics training tapes.¹⁰ "Don Rumsfeld is the best secretary of defense the United States has ever had," said Vice President Dick Cheney. "People ought to let him do his job."¹¹

The Bush Administration was trying to persuade European and other leaders to support Ariel Sharon's plan to withdraw from the Gaza Strip, even though Sharon's own Likud Party rejected it.¹² Sudan, where government-sponsored Arab militias called Janjaweed have been slaughtering black farmers, was elected to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights over the objections of the United States. One Sudanese diplomat scoffed at the U.S. objection and pointed to the American atrocities in Iraq.¹³ U.S. officials postponed the release of this year's international human-rights report because the timing was somewhat embarrassing.¹⁴ Ethnic violence continued in Nigeria between the Taroks and Fulanis.¹⁵ The prime minister of Nepal resigned after weeks of violent street protests against the king.¹⁶ President Akhmad Kadyrov of Chechnya was killed along with a dozen more officials in a bomb attack at Dynamo stadium in Grozny, where a celebration of the defeat of Nazi Germany was under way.¹⁷ Russian legislators hired a Siberian shaman to purge the parliament building of "negative energy."¹⁸ Sheikh Abdul-Sattar al-Bahadli, an aide to Moktada al-Sadr, offered rewards for the capture or killing of British soldiers; he said that female soldiers could be kept as slaves.¹⁹ Alabama police were chasing a gang of cross-dressing car thieves, and²⁰ Al Gore and a group of investors bought a cable television news channel they plan to market to young people.²¹ Chile legalized divorce.²²

A German ornithologist discovered that urban nightingales, forced to compete with noise pollution, can sing so loud they break the law. The loudest recorded was 95 decibels, which is as loud as a chainsaw.²³ Brazilians were worried that President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva drinks too much.²⁴ The Congressional Research Service said that Bush Administration officials broke the law when they ordered the Medicare actuary to withhold information on the true cost of the new Medicare law from Congress.²⁵ A new federal building was dedicated in Oklahoma City.²⁶ Osama bin Laden offered a reward of 10,000 grams of gold for the head of L. Paul Bremer, and at²⁷ least ten people died in a suicide bombing at a Shiite mosque in Karachi, Pakistan.²⁸ Brooklyn police arrested a forty-three-year-old armless man for raping and beating one of his fellow nursing-home inmates.²⁹ Haitian farmers have been reduced to eating the seed that they should be planting, a German aid agency said; other³⁰ Haitians were eating biscuits made out of butter, salt, water, and dirt.³¹ Fifteen Chinese warehouse workers were crushed to death by an avalanche of garlic.³² World grain carryover stocks were at a 30-year low, it was reported, well below the 70-day consumption level that is considered the minimum for basic food security.³³ The Pentagon was thinking about setting up a new office to plan postwar operations for future wars, and the³⁴ Selective Service System proposed requiring women to register for the draft.³⁵ The Walt Disney Company refused to distribute a new Miramax documentary by Michael Moore called Fahrenheit 911, which is highly critical of President Bush.³⁶ African clawed frogs were invading San Francisco.³⁷ It was discovered that Paroxetine, an antidepressant, helps relieve irritable-bowel syndrome, and a ³⁸ new study found that Americans get substandard medical care most of the time, despite the fact that they spend about $1.4 trillion a year for it.³⁹ Marijuana use was up in the United States.⁴⁰ Chinese researchers found evidence that SARS is spread by sweat, and⁴¹ scientists announced that women with large breasts and narrow waists are especially fertile.⁴²