Reports have recently surfaced that a few frustrated American soldiers in Afghanistan may have desecrated the bodies of two dead Taliban fighters by burning them. Beyond this they are accused of taunting nearby villagers to be “lady boys†(which I take to be a militarized cognate of Arnold’s conventional “girly menâ€) for not coming out to retrieve fellow Muslim bodies purposely set on fire facing the West. Perhaps the soldiers doing this thought it silly that Afghan men do not wear Western pants and at the same time believe in resurrection of the dead.
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Trial by Ordeal
The headline of the October 20, 2005 New York Times says a lot: “Defiant Hussein, Lashing out at U.S., Goes on Trial.†Everyone involved in this scene, from the defiant defendants to the many victims under Saddam’s brutal dictatorship, knows what the verdict will be. We are trying Saddam Hussein in a televised court of legal process not to determine if he is guilty but to remind the world of his crimes against humanity. There is no innocence to presume. Nor is there a Johnny Cochran waiting in the wings with too-tight, blood-stained gloves.
All indications are that this trial will be an ordeal. Continue reading Trial by Ordeal