Reply #30: AbsoLUtely! Have never heard of their RESTRAINT CHAIRS, any [View All]

reference to recurrant killings in jail by prison guards, rapes by prison guards, state-assigned defense lawyers who actually sleep through their clients' trials, "quirky" state killings, like "Old Sparky," the Florida electric chair, which was finally retired after causing flames to shoot high above the head of the guest of honor and dance in the air, the recent 34 minute execution, the hangings we used to have in Kansas until a couple of decades ago, the long history of bogus arrests and subsequent bogus sentences, savage killings by cops in the streets, their homes, etc., etc.

You notice these right-wing clowns whirl right around and point at all these travesties and insist that the fault must be placed at the feet of the possible SUSPECTS, and then proceed to inform us they brought their murders upon themselves by not dropping their hands, turning around, lying down when told, stop talking, getting or not getting out of their cars, etc., etc., etc.

It's enough to make your head spin. On one hand, they worship THIS society for its savage treatment of anyone unlucky enough to attract its attention, except for the wealthy, and then point their jam and peanut butter encrusted grubby little porky fingers at countries they know NOTHING about, and gibber that those countries are harsh, while STILL having absolutely no information whatsoever to go on, other than the half-baked, sly lies fed into the public discourse by some very idle reactionaries.

It's a thing of beauty that Cuban idiot right-winger Jorge Mas Canosa died early, through cancer, in Miami, a man who kept his community tightly controlled by fear, a man who believed whole heartedly that he would be the next president of Cuba because his supporters in Miami would make sure it happened, a man whose organization sponsored terrorism all OVER this continent, South America, the Caribbean, Europe, and Africa, tracking down and murdering Cuban diplomats, the employees of Cuban embassies, figures in other governments who supported Cuba, and even other Cubans in the United States who supported dialogue with the Cuban government.

If he had NOT died, we'd be seeing an entire different atmosphere in Miami, where at one time people didn't DARE speak outside his own very limited field of reference concerning Cuba. As he or one of his underlings one remarked, concerning the suppression of all opinion in Miami outside the official anti-Cuban position, "It's not a first amendment issue, it's a Cuban issue."

And yet foreign-language journalists operate in a world where the First Amendment is often irrelevant. Many of these news outlets are part of tight-knit immigrant enclaves where deviation from certain political or religious orthodoxies can make journalists pariahs, or subject them to physical attack. "I can tell you that the United States Constitution does not exist in Miami," says Francisco Aruca, a left-leaning radio personality in Miami. "There is an unwritten law in Miami: If you are expressing views against the anti-Castro industry, you are going to pay a price."
Aruca has paid that price more than once. The Cuban immigrant has long been a thorn in the side of virulently anti-Communist exiles who make up the Cuban community's business and political elite in South Florida. He first aroused their ire in the late 1970s, when he founded Marazul Charters, a travel agency that arranges tours to Cuba. But what really made him a traitor in the eyes of the anti-Castro lobby was his creation of Radio Progreso, which features Spanish-language programs in which Aruca attacks both the economic embargo of Havana and what he describes as the political intolerance of the chief exile groups. His programs, which air weekdays on WOCN 1450-AM, also carry entertainment from Cuba's state-run radio.
Exile groups regularly brand Aruca an agent of Castro's government, a charge he laughs off. The 59-year-old immigrant points out that he spent time in a Cuban prison in the 1960s for anti-Castro activity. But he doesn't laugh off some of the other tactics used against him, like the noisy demonstrations outside the station's offices or the broken windows or frequent death threats.
In February 1992, a few weeks after the militant exile group Alpha 66 demonstrated outside the radio station, three men broke into the building late on a Sunday night, looking for Aruca. Informed he wasn't there, they beat and tied up the operations manager and ransacked the station. Terrorists have also firebombed Marazul Charters--in 1989 and again in 1996--attacks that Aruca says were directed at his radio program. No one was arrested in any of the incidents and police never accused Alpha 66 of a link to the beatings at the station. "We have constant pressure on us," says Aruca. "We are a well-listened-to program, but companies cannot advertise with us. They are afraid."
Aruca is not the only journalist who has been targeted in Miami. Emilio Milian, the general manager of another Miami radio station, WWFE 550-AM, has sharply criticized anti-Castro terrorism. He lost both legs when his car was blown up in 1976.
Human Rights Watch/Americas issued reports in 1992 and 1994 that condemned the perils to free expression in Miami and warned that right-wing radio stations were inciting groups to violence. "Only a narrow range of speech is acceptable, and views that go beyond these boundaries may be dangerous to the speaker," said the 1994 report, the last study the group made of the region.
(snip)

http://www.ajr.org/Article.asp?id=766

I hope more and more DU'ers will get infected with curiosity and start doing more and more research until they finally KNOW they have broken through to the truth. Once you've seen it you WON'T be fooled again!