By Odd Man Out
From The Telegraph:
A judge in Washington DC has allowed the CIA, FBI and National Security Agency to use a loophole to keep information from MPs that might include information about the complicity of UK authorities in extraordinary rendition.
Under US freedom of information laws, the release of documents to anyone representing a foreign government can be blocked.
According to the Independent [newspaper], the CIA won the ruling after the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Extraordinary Rendition made a number of requests for information while members investigated the UK’s knowledge of torture against terror suspects.
Tony Lloyd, vice-chairman of the cross-party group, told the newspaper the judgment was “disappointing” and had been sought to avoid embarrassment.
“It suggests this material is not really something that affects national security or intelligence, but is being withheld to prevent the embarrassment of officials,” he said.
Imagine the arrogance — Britain, the closest ally of the United States, requests information from the U.S. about the activities of British officials and is essentially told to piss off. Is the court guarding information that’s merely embarrassing, or is the information potentially incriminating? So much for the pursuit of justice.
The news story is reminiscent of Roman Polanski’s The Ghost Writer, which is party about U.S.-British cooperation on extraordinary rendition and torture, with Pierce Brosnan as a thinly veiled version of Tony Blair. Except that in this case you can’t say, “It’s only a movie.”
“A judge in Washington DC,” a “judge” prevented justice. Who’da thunk it? Now here’s a Zimmerman/Martin equivalency, or how justice is more about propaganda than it is about what’s right and what’s wrong. When the US of A sticks something on top of a big old rocket and shoots it up into space, why that’s just ducky. But when North Korea does the very same thing—no way Jose. Does that make any sense to anyone? It’s like the US of A is George Zimmerman and North Korea is Trayvon Martin. Even worse is how Israel (Zimmerman with nuclear bombs) treats Iran (Martin without nuclear bombs). But, you be the judge.
While the denial of access to the British Parliament should be embarrassing, it was not the point of sending the Justice Department to federal court. Keeping us from finding out what our government is doing kidnapping foreigners is why the motion was filed. “Obamaparency”