Caught this item on Fox News website just now. It says that since former President George W. Bush is traveling in Africa this week to promote AIDS relief efforts and raise awareness of cervical and breast cancer, Amnesty International, is urging three nations to arrest him during his visit for "crimes under international law."
AI is the largest human rights group in the world and said Thursday that "there is enough evidence in the public domain" to justify either Ethiopia, Tanzania and Zambia arresting the former president during his expected visit to the region, which started Thursday and lasts until Monday. He's traveling with his wife, Laura, and daughter, Barbara. The group said, "the three nations should investigate "his alleged involvement in and responsibility for torture."
Matt Pollard, senior legal adviser for the American branch of AI, said "All countries to which George W. Bush travels have an obligation to bring him to justice for his role in torture." And he went on, the president's visit is "notable for its public awareness campaign on women's cancer," but the humanitarian nature of the mission does not "lessen the damage to the fight against torture caused by allowing someone who has admitted to authorizing waterboarding to travel without facing the consequences prescribed by law. International law requires that there be no safe haven for those responsible for torture; Ethiopia, Tanzania and Zambia must seize this opportunity to fulfill their obligations and end the impunity George W. Bush has so far enjoyed."
What intrigued me most, aside from just the idea of arresting a former U.S. president on foreign soil, are the nations he'll be visiting. Because the first thought to pop into mind was the famous Peter Sellers movie, The Mouse That Roared wherein the following scene took place:
Prime Minster Count Rupert Mountjoy of the tiny, financially strapped country, Fenwick, says: We must declare war on the United States.
Benter: But we can never win such a war!
Prime Minster Count Rupert Mountjoy: Of course not, but we could win the peace. I've given this a lot of thought gentlemen and I'm perfectly positive that I am right. You must remember, the Americans are a very strange people. Whereas other countries rarely forgive anything, the Americans forgive anything. There isn't a more profitable undertaking for any country than to declare war on the United States and to be defeated.
Another scene has the United States Secretary of Defense saying: A fine thing, the United States and the Grand Duchy of Fenwick are at war, and it takes the F.B.I. to find out about it.
So, I can just imagine any, or all, of these three little African countries arresting "W" and throwing him in the slam, and then the U.S. sending in the military to get him out. I doubt it would be done as dramatically as the Kuwait invasion and Desert Storm, but would likely be called something like Operation Flyswat and involve a Navy Seal and a Piper Cub.
But nonetheless, I think it's remarkable that folks like this Amnesty guy go around shooting their mouths off without fear of retribution and have to wonder exactly what they'd do if they ever had to back their BS up.
That's it for today folks.
Adios
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