by
Paul Craig Roberts
PaulCraigRoberts.org

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The US government
is the second worst human rights abuser on the planet and the sole
enabler of the worst – Israel. But this doesn’t hamper Washington
from pointing the finger elsewhere.

The US State
Department’s “human rights report” focuses its ire
on Iran and Syria, two countries whose real sin is their independence
from Washington, and on the bogyman-in-the-making – China,
the country selected for the role of WashingtonÂ’s new Cold
War enemy.

Hillary Clinton,
another in a long line of unqualified Secretaries of State, informed
“governments around the world: we are watching, and we are
holding you accountable,” only we are not holding ourselves
accountable or WashingtonÂ’s allies like Bahrain, Saudi Arabia,
Israel, and the NATO puppets.

Hillary also
made it “clear to citizens and activists everywhere: You are
not alone. We are standing with you,” only not with protesters
at the Chicago NATO summit or with the Occupy Wall Street protesters,
or anywhere else in the US where there are protests. (ref)

The State Department
stands with the protesters funded by the US in the countries whose
governments the US wishes to overthrow. Protesters in the US stand
alone as do the occupied Palestinians who apparently have no human
rights to their homes, lands, olive groves, or lives.

Here are some
arrest numbers for a few recent US protests. The New
York Daily News reports that as of November 17, 2011, 1,300
Occupy Wall Street protesters were arrested in New York City alone.
Fox
News reported (October 2, 2011) that 700 protesters were arrested
on the Brooklyn Bridge. At the NATO summit in Chicago last week,
90 protesters were arrested (Chicago
Journal).

In the US some
protesters are being officially categorized as “domestic extremists”
or “domestic terrorists,” a new threat category that Homeland
Security announced is now the focus of its attention, displacing
Muslim terrorists as the number one threat to the US. In September
2010, federal police raided the homes of peace activists in Chicago
and Minneapolis. The FBI is trying to concoct a case against them
by claiming that the peace activists donated money to the Popular
Front for the Liberation of Palestine. As demanded by Israel, the
US government has designated the PFLP as a terrorist group.

In Chicago
last week, among the many arrested NATO protesters with whom the
State Department does not stand are three young white americans
arrested for “domestic terrorism” in what Dave Lindorff
reports was “a warrantless house invasion reminiscent of what
US military forces are doing on a daily [and nightly] basis in Afghanistan.”
If the US government, which stands with protesters everywhere except
in America, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Palestine, can make
this into a terrorism case, the three americans can be convicted
on the basis of secret evidence or simply be incarcerated for the
rest of their lives without a trial.

Meanwhile the
three american “domestic terrorists” are being held in
solitary confinement. Like many of the NATO protesters, they came
from out of town. Brian Church, 20 years old, came from Fort Lauderdale,
Florida. Jared Chase, 27, came from Keene, New Hampshire. Brent
Betterly, 24, came from Oakland Park, Florida. Charged with providing
material support for terrorism, the judge set their bail at $1.5
million each.

These three
are not charged with actually throwing a Molotov cocktail at a person
or thing. They are charged with coming to Chicago with the idea
of doing so. Somehow the 16 federal intelligence agencies plus those
of our NATO puppets and Israel were unable to discover the 9/11
plot in the making, but the Chicago police knew in advance why two
guys from Florida and one from New Hampshire came to Chicago. The
domestic terrorism cases turn out to be police concoctions that
are foiled before they happen, so we have many terrorists but no
actual terrorist acts.

Two other young
americans are being framed by their Human Rights Government. Sebastian
Senakiewicz, 24, of Chicago is charged with “falsely making
a terrorist threat,” whatever that means. His bail was set
at $750,000. Mark Neiweem, 28, of Chicago is charged with “solicitation
for explosives or incendiary devices.” His bail is set at $500,000.

This is human
rights in america. But the State DepartmentÂ’s human rights
report never examines the US. It is a political document aimed at
WashingtonÂ’s chosen enemies.

Meanwhile,
Human Rights america continues to violate the national sovereignty
of Pakistan, Yemen, and Afghanistan by sending in drones, bombs,
special forces and in Afghanistan 150,000 US soldiers to murder
people, usually women, children and village elders. Weddings, funerals,
childrenÂ’s soccer games, schools and farmersÂ’ houses are
also favorite targets for WashingtonÂ’s attacks. On May 25 the
Pakistani Daily Times reported that Pakistani Foreign Office spokesman
Moazzam Ali Khan strongly condemned the drone attacks: “We
regard them as a violation of our territorial integrity. They are
in contravention of international law. They are illegal, counter
productive and totally unacceptable.”

The US reportedly
funnels money to the Iranian terrorist group, MEK, declared terrorists
by no less than the US State Department. But it is OK as long as
MEK is terrorizing Iran. Washington stands with MEKÂ’s protests
delivered via bombs and the assassinÂ’s bullet. After all, we
have to bring freedom and democracy to Iran, and violence is WashingtonÂ’s
preferred way to achieve this goal.

Washington
is desperate to overthrow the Syrian government in order to get
rid of the Russian naval base. On May 15 the Washington Post
reported that Washington is coordinating the flow of arms to Syrian
rebels. WashingtonÂ’s justification for interfering in SyriaÂ’s
internal affairs is human rights charges against the Syrian government.
However, a UN report finds that the rebels are no more respectful
of human rights than the Syrian government. The rebels torture and
murder prisoners and kidnap civilians wealthy enough to bring a
ransom.

NATO, guided
by Washington, went far outside the UN resolution declaring a no-fly
zone over Libya. NATO in blatant violation of the UN resolution
provided the air attack on the Libyan government that enabled the
CIA-supported “rebels” to overthrow Gadhafi, killing many
Libyan civilians in the process.

Under the Nuremberg
standard (principle
VI.a.i), it is a war crime to launch a war of aggression, which
is what Washington and its NATO puppets launched against Libya,
but, no sweat, Washington brought Libya freedom and democracy.

Assassinating
foreign opponents is the WestÂ’s preferred diplomacy. The British
were at ease with it, and Washington picked up the practice. In
his book, The
Decline and Fall of the British Empire, Cambridge University
historian Piers Brendon, the Keeper of the Churchill Archives, reports
from the documents he has at hand, that in the build up to the “Suez
Crisis” in 1956, British Prime Minister Anthony Eden told Foreign
Office minister Anthony Nutting, “I want him [Nasser, Egypt’s
leader] murdered.”

Brendon
goes on to report: “Doubtless at the Prime Minister’s
behest, the Secret Intelligence Service did hatch plots to assassinate
Nasser and to topple his government. Its agents, who proposed to
pour nerve gas into NasserÂ’s office through the ventilation
system, were by no means discreet.” The secret agents talked
too much, and the scheme never came to fruition.

Last week in
Malaysia a war crimes tribunal found George W. Bush, Dick Cheney,
Donald Rumsfeld and their legal advisers, Alberto Gonzales, David
Addington, William Haynes II, Jay Bybee, and John Choon Yoo guilty
of war crimes. (ref)

But donÂ’t
expect Washington to take any notice. The war crimes convictions
are merely a “political statement.”

May
30, 2012

Paul
Craig Roberts, a
former Assistant Secretary of the US Treasury and former associate
editor of the Wall Street Journal, has been reporting shocking cases
of prosecutorial abuse for two decades. A new edition of his book,

The
Tyranny of Good Intentions,
co-authored with Lawrence Stratton, a documented account of how
americans lost the protection of law, has been released by Random
House. Visit his website.

Copyright
© 2012 Paul
Craig Roberts

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