This sounds kind of crazy but really, why not?

Spanish MPs push for apes' rights
Spanish Socialist MPs hope to persuade parliament to back a landmark project seeking human-like rights for apes such as chimpanzees and orang-utans.
Campaigners say the intelligence and self-awareness shown by apes mean they deserve rights to life, freedom and protection from torture.

Parliament's support would not be law, but would mean a commitment to the work of the NGO, the Great Ape Project.

The proposal has raised eyebrows and opposition in many areas.

One Spanish archbishop described the idea as ridiculous.

But for conservationists and Green MPs behind the proposal, it is a serious issue.

Best interests

Green MP Francisco Garrido, who proposed the motion, says these creatures "so close to humans" have until now been considered as "mere objects or play things".

I do think it is possible that we might want to extend this to other animals... perhaps as we discover more about elephants and dolphins
Peter Singer
Great Apes Project

"The great apes have been tortured, mistreated, enslaved and murdered," he says on his website. "The habitats where their live have been wiped out and, according to the UN, they are in serious danger of extinction."

His colleague, Green MP David Hammerstein, told the BBC's World Today programme: "They show a degree of intelligence and awareness and, indeed, self-awareness.

"Their social and emotional needs are at the same level as handicapped people, small children, elderly, mentally impaired people - and they all have rights."

He insisted that they were not asking that the apes be given "legal or human rights".

"What we are talking about is very basic legal protection of rights which will guarantee each chimpanzee, bonobo or orang-utan the opportunity to live out his or her life according to his or her best interest," he said.

The international Great Ape Project is supported by environmentalists, conservationists and scientists.

But Professor Steve Jones, of London University, says the idea is an "overstatement of what science, what biology can tell you".

"As most people know, chimpanzees share about 98% of our DNA, but bananas share about 50% of our DNA and we are not 98% chimpanzee or 50% banana, we are entirely human and unique in that respect," he said.

"It is simply a mistake to use an entirely human construct, which is rights, and apply it to an animal, which is not human. Rights come with responsibility and I've never seen a chimp being fined for stealing a plate of bananas."

Other species

Archbishop of Pamplona and Tudela Fernando Sebastian said he could not believe it was even being proposed.

"We don't give rights to some people - such as unborn children, human embryos, and we are going to give them to apes," he said.

But Peter Singer, founder of the Great Ape Project says it need not stop with apes.

"I do think it is possible that we might want to extend this to other animals, perhaps progressively, perhaps as we discover more about elephants and dolphins," he told the BBC.

"Or maybe even more familiar animals like dogs or pigs, we might think that we owe them more in terms of moral status than we are currently inclined to give them."

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/europe/5058986.stm

Published: 2006/06/08 12:29:25 GMT

© BBC MMVI

I contend that the term "strike out the side" is used incorrectly quite frequently, and by people who should know better. Three up, three down, all on strike-outs is striking out the side. You cannot, for instance, give up a lead-off double and then come back and "strike out the side". What about that first guy? Isn't he part of "the side"?

I have the radio on downstairs, a.m. (amplitude modulation not ante meridian), and I heard a commercial while I was down there

"Have you ever shook somebody's hand and just moments later you can't remember his name?" Blahblahblah starts to sounlike they have a drug for you and shure nuff they do. Didn't catch the name but it contains proprietary neuropeptides so get some if short term memory's a problem.

Fromm the BBC News web-site again:


Guantanamo inmates attack guards
Inmates at the US detention centre at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba have clashed with guards who were trying to prevent another detainee from hanging himself.
The detainees used weapons crafted from fans and light fixtures, but the disturbance was quelled with minimum force, the US military said.

Six inmates were hurt in the clash, the US said. Earlier three inmates tried to kill themselves with prescribed drugs.

Thursday's incident coincides with a UN call to the US to close down the camp.

The UN Committee against Torture said the US should release detainees or give them access to a judicial process.

Free association

The BBC's Adam Brookes in Washington says this is the first time that details have emerged of such an incident involving more than one inmate, although individuals regularly resist guards.

The definitions and legal limits of the structures and the practices the US has followed are all being tested - and in many cases found wanting
Paul Reynolds, BBC News website


US military spokesman Cmdr Robert Durand said guards responded to an attempted suicide in Camp 4, a less restrictive part of the facility where detainees are allowed to associate freely as a reward for good behaviour.

"Minimum force was used to quell the disturbance and prevent the suicide," he said.

Another military spokesman, Rear Adm Harry B Harris Jr, said the suicide attempt had been staged in order to lure the guards.

He said the detainees were eventually subdued and six were treated for minor injuries.

None of the detainees involved has been named. All those involved in the clash were removed to higher-security parts of the centre.

The military says there have been 39 suicide attempts in the camp since 2002, and hunger strikes have been common as detainees protest against their continued detention without trial.

About 460 detainees are held at Guantanamo, which opened after the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.

Detainees are being held without charge or trial and lawyers who have visited the facility say many of them suffer from depression.

'Immediate measures'

The call by the UN torture committee to close Guantanamo was accompanied by recommendations that secret US detention facilities abroad should be closed.

UN COMMITTEE AGAINST TORTURE
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It called for "immediate measures" to eradicate torture and ill-treatment of detainees by US military personnel "in any territory under its jurisdiction".

John Bellinger, a legal spokesman for the US state department, said the report contained "factual and legal inaccuracies".

Some "acts of abuse" had occurred in the past, he said, but the US was taking steps to prevent any repeat.

"I think without a doubt our record has improved over the last few years," he told the AFP news agency. "We take our obligations under theconvention seriously."

The committee has asked the US to respond within a year to its recommendations.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/americas/4998928.stm

Published: 2006/05/19 20:47:18 GMT

© BBC MMVI

Am I one of them? I feel complete empathy with these detainees. I do not know their stories and the way my government is operating I never will. Either charge and try these people or release them! Is that not the American way? Are we not Americans? When (and why) did we become a repressive human rights violating fascist regime? And can we go back? Now?!

From the BBC News web-site:
US 'must close Guantanamo camp'
The US should close the Guantanamo Bay camp in Cuba and any secret "war on terror" detention facilities abroad, a United Nations report has said.
The UN Committee against Torture said that detaining persons in such conditions was a violation of the UN Convention against Torture.

It also urged the US to put in place "immediate measures" to eradicate torture of detainees by its troops.

The committee's report follows a hearing in early May into US conduct.

"The state party should cease to detain any person at Guantanamo Bay and close the detention facility," the 11-page report said.

It also urged the US to "rescind any interrogation technique" that constituted torture, such as the use of dogs to scare detainees.

The report was compiled by a panel of 10 experts who heard testimony in early May from a delegation of US officials into its "war on terror" conduct.

Story from BBC NEWS:

Bush's response (my prediction): "We don't torture, don't condone torture and we have no "secret camps". We will close the Guantanamo Bay facility when it is no longer needed. The enemies of freedom are everywhere."