Freedom!

Remember those coarse, fear-encrusted statements from Cheney? Statements that had no value, no truth, no reality; designed solely to manipulate even further the people of this country who were (and are) tired and unemployed and in debt and, for the most part, sick to death of hearing more Bush Crime Family bullshit -- especially if it comes from the sick mind of Dick Cheney.

Last week four of these men, Uighur Muslims from western China, men called "terrorists" by Dick Cheney, were released from our Cuban torture facility and flown to St. George, Bermuda, after enduring seven years of illegal detention, a year of which was in solitary confinement.

Their story of capture, imprisonment, and denial of rights is similar to the stories of many of those still held at Guantanamo by . . . who? the military? the CIA? the DIA? private contractors? the Obama Administration? Who? According to the New York Times the four "were among a larger group that hid in mountain caves near Jalalabad after their camp was bombed by American forces in late 2001. Hungry, frightened and unarmed, they made their way to Pakistan, where villagers turned them in to the authorities in exchange for American reward money." In other words, my words, these men were sold, but to whom? the U.S. military? CIA? private contractors? for how much? twenty dollars? ten? a hundred? why? who decided to "buy" them? what was the point? who was rewarded for rounding up more "terror" suspects?

After six years in prison (for what? convicted by whom? defended by whom? guaranteed what rights?)American officials concluded that the men should not be considered enemy combatants and an American court ordered their release. But, Cheney insisted! Cheney warned! Cheney demanded they be kept locked up! Forever!

However, Cheney was on his way out. Cheney no longer had the power -- illusory and immoral as it was -- to order the non-person status of these men to continue. The only thing that delayed their release was finding a host country to accept them. We Americans are too terrified, too cowardly, too brain-dead, unable to distinguish Dick Cheney's irrationality and criminal activity from  reality.  So, we said no. You can't come here. We don't want you. You're proof of our crazed and criminal behavior since the national nervous breakdown we experienced on September 11, 2001 -- a breakdown facilitated by and encouraged by Dick Cheney and his subordinates in the Bush Crime Family. A breakdown that continues to this day -- with no end in sight.

According to the Times, the Bush Crime Family...

...walked a thin line in the handling of the Uighurs. It sought China's support in antiterrorism efforts after the Sept. 11 attacks, branded an obscure Uighur independence group as terrorist and, in 2002, allowed Chinese officials into Guantánamo to interrogate Uighur captives. The four men released here said that interrogation was a low point of their Guantánamo incarceration, with Chinese officials questioning them for long hours without food and threatening them and their families.

We freedom-loving Americans had cut a deal with the Chinese. Don't call in all our bad debt, we told them, and in return we'll label as terrorists these freedom-fighters who want to escape your insane corporate fascism and you can even come to Cuba and "interrogate" them. Such a deal, eh?

And now, one of these "terrorists," one of these "detainees," one of these "worst of the worst," a man named Salahidin Abdulahat, 32, had this to say to the Times: "I went swimming in the ocean for the first time ever yesterday, and it was the happiest day of my life."

Are we not ashamed?