Podcast #133

Journalist Paul Fitzgerald on US drone attacks; Nancy Talanian on adopting refugees from Guantanamo. Fitzgerald and his wife Elizabeth Gould first covered Afghanistan for CBS in 1981, later for PBS. We talk about their latest dispatch at Boiling Frogs about the negative impact of US drone strikes, which kill 50 civilians for each alleged terrorist assassinated. We talk about Karzai's visit to Washington, the US efforts to undermine his peace feelers to the Taliban and other opponents, Gen. McChrystal's spin on "progress" in the war, and much more. Fitzgerald refers listeners to an article by Nathan Freier linked here. Talanian is director of No More Guantanamos and talks about a Russian named Ravil Mingazov who was ordered released on May 13 by a federal judge, after 8 years at Guantanamo without charge or trial. The towns of Amherst and Levitt have offered to accept Mingazov and another prisoner. While Obama has pledged to close Gitmo, his Justice Dept. continues to hold men the courts have ordered released and to use legal maneuvers to continue to detain innocents. We also talk about the administration's efforts to block legal action by Canadian Maher Arar to vindicate his rendition, torture and imprisonment by the US. The second segment starts at about 57:13