They Hate Our Freedom

Our freedoms are threatened by this war on terror. The President can designate you as an "enemy combatant" and violate every single right you were once garanteed by the U.S. Constitution. We are now afraid to speak, to write, to publish, to practice our religion, to assemble, to keep and bear arms and to even petition. We are no longer safe from unreasonable search and seizure, from cruel and unusual punishment nor safe from being threaten with torture and death if we do not incriminate ourselves. Yes, Americans have been tortured:

John Walker Lindh, captured in Afghanistan by Northern Alliance warlord Rashid Dostum and handed over to US forces. He spent weeks on the USS Bataan, a Navy warship in the North Arabian Sea, being interrogated by U.S. investigators before he was transferred to U.S. military post at Kandahar International Airport in Afghanistan. Lindh’s lawyers claim that Lindh was systematically brutalised and threatened with 'torture and death' after US troops seized him. He was denied all rights to due process as an American citizen. Lindh pleaded guilty to some of the charges against him as part of a deal to avoid a life sentence and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Lindh could have testify about his torture at a court scheduled evidence suppression hearing and the government's evidence against him may have been dissmissed having been forced under duress, but prosecuters offered him a plea bargain. Lindh would consent to a official gag order and not make any public statement about his torture, plead guilty to two of the charges and all other charges dropped.

Michael Chertoff, who was head of the Criminal Division of the Department of Justice at the time, in fact directed the prosecution to offer the plea bargain fearing that the government's weak case for war and terrorism would be lost. Other Americans tortured by our government include Jose Padilla and Yasser Hamdi.

But it is not only the fear of torture that threatens our freedom, the lies and disinformation coming from our government and the media as well as the undue control that corporations and foreign entities have over these institutions.