Merry Christmas Jose Padilla (by the General's Inner Frenchman)

He paused as though he expected Furniture to speak. Furniture tried to shrink back into the surface of the bed again, away from the boot, away from the forcibly administered LSD and the PCP, away from the waterboarding and simulated executions, back into the isolation that had destroyed Jose and given birth to Furniture, the isolation Jose had hated but Furniture now craved.
--"A Reading from Orwell's 'Furniture'"

I've thought about Jose Padilla a lot since Pastor General John Ashcroft announced his arrest in May 2002. Originally, he was accused of attempting to build and use a dirty bomb. He was never indicted under that charge. Instead he was charged and convicted of conspiracy to materially aid terrorists, a very broad, catchall-type charge, the kind of charge desperate prosecutors used to get that prestigious terror notch on their swagger stick.

Between his arrest and trial, Padilla was brutally tortured:

In 2002, President Bush declared Padilla an “enemy combatant” and ordered him to be placed in military custody. U.S. officials seized Padilla from a civilian jail in New York and secretly transported him to the Naval Consolidated Brig in Charleston, S.C., where they held him for 43 months without charge. Interrogators subjected Padilla to torture and other egregious forms of abuse, including forcing him into stress positions for hours on end, punching him, depriving him of sleep and threatening him with further torture, “extraordinary rendition” and death.

He was also drugged with powerful hallucinogens and needed medication was denied to him.

By trial time, he was a broken man, suffering from Stockholm syndrome, extreme paranoia, and PTSD. His lawyer, Andrew Patel, described Padilla's mental state:

Mr. Padilla remains unsure if I and the other attorneys working on his case are actually his attorneys or another component of the government’s interrogation scheme...He is especially reluctant to discuss what happened in the brig, fearful that he will be returned there some day...During questioning [by his attorney], he often exhibits facial tics, unusual eye movements and contortions of his body. The contortions are particularly poignant since he is usually manacled and bound by a belly chain when he has meetings with counsel...I was told by members of the brig staff that Mr. Padilla’s temperament was so docile and inactive that his behavior was like that of "a piece of furniture."

Like furniture.

Currently, Padilla is serving time in one of America's harshest and most violent federal prisons, the Florence Supermax in Colorado, a place where guards beat the prisoners and prisoners disembowel each other and decorate their cells with livers and intestines.

His nightmare continues.

I won't argue that Padilla is completely innocent. I don't know. I do suspect that, if anything, his crime was minor, the kind of thing white people do and then brag about on Twitter without consequences.

Regardless of his guilt, it was wrong to torture him. We can't fix that. Nothing we can do can even come close to fixing that. But we can make his time at Florence a little easier by sending money to his commissary account, and at a place as violent as Florence, a little money in a commissary account can be very important.

How to send money to Jose Padilla's prison commissary account. 

1. Go to Western Union's "Send Money to an Inmate" Page
2. Select "Federal Bureau of Prison" as the facility name, enter amount you want to send, and click "get started"
3. on next page: click "send online"
4. Do the registration thing*
5. Receiver Info: Name: enter "Jose Padilla;" Inmates account# and last name: enter "20796424PADILLA" (just like that--no spaces)
6. Enter credit card info and finish up.

*I understand registration is a hassle, and I hate it, but it's the easiest way to do it. You can also send a money order by mail. (Inmate Number 20796-424). Or in the worst case (because I don't want to do it) you can send the money to me via paypal button at top and I'll send it on. Let me know in the comments below or on Twitter at @JC_Christian if you do that, but, again, I prefer that you don't.

If you disagree with me for doing this or you think I'm being unAmerican, a communist, all muslimy, a terrorist, etc, go fuck yourself. See, that's why I don't write anymore. I'm just too damned angry.

Fulfillment of "The Santorum Prophecy"

Righteous Bonobian Christians

I'm not really sure what swinging is, but I praise Jesus that good, god-fearing men and their not-men are doing it on a new web site called "Christian Swingers." This couple from Salt Lake City sounds like a lot of fun.

They even have this status thingy that lets you to update others about your Jesus-based swinging lifestyle:

The Righteous Rantings of an Unheartlandishly-Hued Patriot

I paid a visit to the Thinking Housewife expecting to see charges of heresy lodged against the homosexualist-loving usurper Pope who replaced our revered Pöpenfüherer. Instead, I found an unheartlandisly-hued, paragraph-fearing patriot righteously ranting about his own inferiority:

With the black race, regarding important matters that form functioning societies, the issue cannot be reduced to terms such as “less functioning” and “less capable.”  Rather, blacks as a group are largely incapable of the markers of normal civilization and healthy societies, as exemplified by the likes of Haiti, Detroit, East St. Louis, south-side Chicago, and much of the African sub-continent (unless one deems wretched villages and slums teeming with bastardy, absentee fathers, polyandry, crime at peerlessly high levels, disease, and ignorance as functioning).  In other words, the black race does not seem to fall within a clear behavioral continuum with the rest of humanity, but inhabit its own unique area that has little overlap with those of other races.  For instance, does any other place on Earth, during peacetimes, fall to such ruination and seeming hopelessness as black-occupied lands?  One might proffer the Muslim world as an example.  Indeed, Islam has corrupted Middle Eastern peoples to staggering obscenities, but their problems are mostly religious.  The problems of blacks chiefly lie with themselves.

If only he had thrown in a few random caps followed by a series of exclamation marks, we'd have the makings for our first unheartlandishly-hued conservative superstar. Yet, I dare say that even without those required embellishments, Mr. A Reader has a bright future as a minority outreach director for the GOP and Fox News Channel's official "The Problems with Negroes Consultant."

But then again, maybe I've fallen victim to creeping liberalism by praising this patriot. Perhaps the Thinking Housewife's Donald expresses a more proper conservative response:

I doubt that the writer is actually a negro. I am in my 60′s and grew up around colored people, and I have never heard such thoughts and feelings coming from them. No not even once. That kind of deep and critical self-reflection is so very rare among blacks that I suspect hoaxcraft.

Let no one say that post-racial conservatives are afraid to have a dialog on race.

Apologies for disappearing

I was waiting until I felt up to writing a long, clever post before writing this, but I'm just not there, so this will have to suffice for now.

I apologize for totally disappearing without explanation, You  have brought a great deal of joy into my life and I feel like I've treated you badly by not posting or communicating.

I haven't been feeling well. I am in near constant pain throughout my body and am exhausted. My doctors are trying to figure it out, but can't pinpoint the problem, yet.

My job has been demanding as well. By the time I get home, I'm too tired and in too much pain to pay the attention I feel I need to pay to writing. And after over 15 years of being the General--at least ten of which were here on this blog--it's tough to keep the old guy fresh. Too tough when I feel like this.

I'm going to take a break from posting for awhile. I don't know when or if I'll be back, but thank you all for the joy you've given me all these years. It's been wonderful.

Thanks to you who've sent emails. I apologize for not reading them all. I've just been overwhelmed.

Apologies

Sorry about the lack of posts. My inner Frenchman is trying to assassinate me. I'll be back Monday with details and an announcement.

Obama's Gun Grabbing, UN Tax, Mexican Peoplization, and Depantsing Plot

The Conservative Majority sent us this here robocall on Friday. It struck something very deep inside of me. The guy who recorded it sounds like that drunk guy at the bar who punches anyone he believes might not be showing enough enthusiasm for the Seahawks.

But it's the message that's important: "serious conservatives who aren't afraid to fight" must impeach the FURRIN' OBAMUNIST USURPER, whose middle name is Hussein, before he:

• "Wipes out" the Second Amendment
• Releases the terrorist supermen from Gitmo
• Allows Mexicans to be treated like real people
• Makes us pay taxes to the United Nations
• Pulls down our pants and taunts us.

OK, I added that last one, myself, but mark my words. Once he's taken our guns, he's going to have agents of the ACLU pull down our pants so he can make fun of the size of our little soldiers.

Oh, and they also reminded me that Obama probably wasn't even born here.