Free Republic

The Cuban government and state-controlled press have disseminated the same bogus GI gang-rape photos that WorldNetDaily reported originated on porn sites. As previously reported by WND, the publication of the images and stories about the images added confusion to the unfolding Abu Ghraib crisis especially in the Middle East, where top newspapers and political sites published the hard-core porn photos side-by-side with genuine photos of abuse. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Cuba has published eight of the gang-rape porn photos under the heading, "Accusing Photos." A link on the Ministry's main page, called "The photos that...

(CNSNews.com) - A liberal group that monitors conservative media wants Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to remove radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh from the American Forces Radio and Television Services, formerly known as Armed Forces Radio. According to Media Matters for America, which describes itself as the first organization to systematically monitor the media for conservative "misinformation," Limbaugh has spent the past four weeks trivializing and condoning the U.S. mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners at the Abu Ghraib prison. "It is abhorrent that the American taxpayer is paying to broadcast what is in effect pro-torture propaganda to American troops," the group's...

Baghdad – Ibrahim al-Idrissi, 37, goes to work every day with a handgun in a holster on his hip. In most countries, the line of work Idrissi is in wouldn't require such firepower. But this is Iraq. Idrissi is the president of the Association for Free Prisoners, an Iraqi non-governmental organization that has been documenting the execution of political prisoners under the regime of Saddam Hussein. Many of Saddam's torturers and executioners are still at large. There have been two attempts on Idrissi's life, and three on the organization's headquarters in Baghdad. "Fortunately, their aim hasn't been very good so...

"This is no different than what happens at a (college fraternity) initiation. And we're going to ruin people's lives over it and we're going to hamper our military effort ... because (the soldiers) had a good time. You ever heard of emotional release? You heard of the need to blow off steam?" -- Radio commentator Rush Limbaugh on the Iraqi prisoner torture scandal. Those comments probably shocked few of Limbaugh's 20 million listeners. Today, with the release of these pages -- reputed to be culled from Limbaugh's personal college schedule -- it's far easier to understand why. We can...

The 27-year old porn filmmaker behind the fake rape photos that sparked an international controversy spoke out today on the flap from her office in Budapest, Hungary. The bogus 'gang-rape' photos that were published around the world in newspapers and websites and presented as evidence of U.S. crimes in Iraq or as alleged evidence, were still shots taken from porn movies produced by Andrea Marchand. The movies and still shots appear on the Hungarian website "Sex in War." In many cases, the perpetrator of the hoax and its variations has remained unidentified. The Budapest-based filmmaker has been making graphic movies...

Torture Existed Before Abu Gharib, But Why No Coverage?When the Abu Ghraib prison abuse crisis exploded, I analyzed the reactions coming from the Arab World. In an election year, the stakes are high for all parties involved. Each side wants a convenient "truth". The Bush Administration talked about "bad apples." While on the offensive, the opposition talks of a "systemic problem." President Bush went on Arab TV, while his opponents rushed to speak on behalf of the "humiliated Arab world." But as General Abuzeid put it since Day One, it sounds as if "the issue is making more noise in...

LONDON (Reuters) - At least one soldier has been arrested over fake pictures showing alleged mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners by British troops, the defence ministry says. The photos were published in the Daily Mirror just days after similar ones were published in the United States showing U.S. soldiers abusing prisoners, shocking the world and causing widespread anger in the Arab world. A spokeswoman would give no further details about the arrest by the ministry's Special Investigation Branch (SIB). "The SIB, as part of the ongoing investigation, arrested somebody to be questioned under caution," she said. "At least one person has...

(CNSNews.com) - Efforts to discredit radio news commentator Rush Limbaugh escalated this week with a new radio ad campaign hammering Limbaugh for comments he made about the abuse of Iraqi inmates at the Abu Ghraib prison. Still unresolved, meanwhile, is the Palm Beach County, Fla., prosecutor's investigation of Limbaugh for possible "doctor shopping" in connection with Limbaugh's admitted former addiction to painkillers. The separate media and legal challenges to Limbaugh are part of a longstanding strategy employed by the political left, according to Mark Levin, director of the Landmark Legal Foundation and a supporter of Limbaugh. "There's no question they've...

<p>May 18, 2004 -- CANNES, France - President Bush need not lose any sleep over Michael Moore's much-hyped "Fahrenheit 9/11," which turns out to be a wet firecracker. Moore's virulent feature-length attack on Bush, which premiered yesterday to a 20-minute standing ovation at the Cannes Film Festival, falls far short of delivering on the filmmaker's extravagant promises of election-swinging revelations.</p>

Donald Rumsfeld was, fielding unfriendly fire on Tuesday over the military's torture of Iraqi prisoners. This time, his usual pose of barely concealed contempt seemed more like scarcely repressed rage. Every muscle in his body was tensed, and his shoulders looked like wire hangers were holding them up. It was Rummy's Strangelove-ian attempt to keep from shrugging. Hey, the voice within him longed to say, those fuckers are lucky to have their fingernails. But Rummy is a master of extenuation. When Baghdad was looted while the U.S. army stood by, he uttered his most famous euphemism: "Stuff happens." Now he...

At the 1991 annual convention of the American Popular Cultural Association, an event best described as “the Gong Show of American Academia,” I presented a paper on the air war in Vietnam. On the panel before ours, a professor from a women’s studies program at an Ivy League university discussed her work on pornographic movies and the Vietnam War. She showed scenes in which porno actors in GI garb ravish a bound female Viet Cong, savagely cutting off her unique, “black leather” VC pajamas. According to the professor, the scene captured the depravity of American soldiers, reflected the corruption of...

The Boston Globe today tried to distance itself from its admitted error in publishing pornographic photos fraudulently depicting the rape of Iraqi women by American GIs by blaming the city councilor who distributed the pictures at a press conference. In an editorial, the paper admitted for the first time the photos were "bogus" and "appeared" to be taken from a porn site, but in a separate article, the Globe's ombudsman claims she still has failed to discover the source of the photos and still has not confirmed or denied their veracity to readers. The photographs – uncovered by WorldNetDaily as...

The editor of the Daily Mirror has resigned after admitting its alleged Iraqi abuse pictures had been "a hoax". Piers Morgan's decision came as the paper "apologised unreservedly" for printing the pictures. The editor, one of the best known faces in Fleet Street, had earlier brushed away growing pressure on him to quit. The Queen's Lancashire Regiment, subject of the abuse allegations, had said the pictures were "utter and complete nonsense". Military figures for the regiment said the photos are fake and that the newspaper should apologise. In a hard-hitting press conference at Fulwood Barracks, Preston, key figures for the...

It was 10 days ago now that WorldNetDaily first blew the whistle on the fake rape photos that were being disseminated internationally in an effort to exaggerate the extent of the Iraqi prisoner abuse scandal. Explicit photos depicting rape of Iraqi women by U.S. American GIs were picked up from porn sites in the U.S. and abroad by Arab and Muslim propagandists and posted on Internet sites and published in newspapers. Certainly, these horrifying bogus images of brutality have persuaded millions that the prisoner abuse scandal is far worse than it really is. Perhaps those expectations are par for the...

Globe caught with pants down: Paper duped into running porn photos The Boston Globe was reeling yesterday after graphic photos of alleged sexual abuse of Iraqi women by U.S. soldiers turned out to be staged shots from a hardcore porn Web site. ``This photo should not have appeared in the Globe,'' editor Martin Baron said in a statement. ``First, images portrayed in the photo were overly graphic. Second, as the story clearly pointed out, those images were never authenticated as photos of prisoner abuse. There was a lapse in judgment and procedures, and we apologize for it.'' The ``lapse'' came...

So now we see in all their starkness the double standards of the western media. Day after day, the shocking images from Abu Ghraib prison have been plastered all over the media. Yes, the abuse they have revealed is disgusting and appalling and it is right that it should be exposed and that we should be horrified. But nowhere near this attention is being paid to far worse barbarism being committed by our enemies. As Jeff Jacoby observes in the Boston Globe: 'Poor Nick Berg. The anybody-but-Bush crowd isn't going to rush to publicize his terrible fate with anything like...

<p>Nonstop news coverage of Iraqi prisoner abuse has yet to become sensational, some insist. But they agree it ultimately could exact a toll on the U.S. military.</p> <p>"Yes, it must sadden our troops to see these accounts, it must make them angry. Maybe it does expose them to greater danger," said ABC's Ted Koppel.</p>

The photographs purporting to show British soldiers urinating on an Iraqi prisoner are fakes, an inquiry has decided. Defence minister Adam Ingram was set to reveal that the images showing a hooded "victim" were actually taken in northern England. Army investigators are understood to have identified the four-tonne Bedford lorry in which the pictures were taken and tracked it down to a barracks in Preston, rather than Basra. The pictures - apparently showing a man being beaten, kicked and hit with a rifle butt - caused worldwide outrage after they were published in the antiwar Daily Mirror.

Globe caught with pants down: Paper duped into running porn photosBy Herald staffThursday, May 13, 2004The Boston Globe was reeling yesterday after graphic photos of alleged sexual abuse of Iraqi women by U.S. soldiers turned out to be staged shots from a hardcore porn Web site.      ``This photo should not have appeared in the Globe,'' editor Martin Baron said in a statement. ``First, images portrayed in the photo were overly graphic. Second, as the story clearly pointed out, those images were never authenticated as photos of prisoner abuse. There was a lapse in judgment and procedures, and we apologize for...

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The independent businessman who was beheaded in Iraq wrote colorful e-mails to family and friends at home, foreign dispatches that showed a 26-year-old with limited Arabic skills traveling solo through dangerous parts of the country. The January e-mails, in what now seem to be chilling references, also describe Nicholas Berg's work near the Abu Ghraib prison — "a notorious prison for Army and political prisoners," he wrote — and his brief detention by Iraqi police. His killers cited the abuse of prisoners by U.S. personnel at Abu Ghraib as the reason for Berg's killing. The abuse was...