Nemesis... ?

We can only hope.

Bush cancels trip to Switzerland

(Reuters) - Former President George W. Bush has canceled a visit to Switzerland, where he was to address a Jewish charity gala, due to the risk of legal action against him for alleged torture, rights groups said on Saturday.

Bush's camp, and the organizers say it's not that, but rather the protests against him were threatening to become violent. Well that, or the presence of protests giving the charity a black eye (not that asking someone who admits to thinking torture is a good thing supporting you might not be worthy of a black eye).

The attempt of various human rights groups to get the signatories to the International Conventions Against Torture (which was one of Reagan's actually praiseworthy accomplishments; he said there were things civilised nations don't do. Bush doesn't seem to agree), to live up to the terms of the treaty; i.e. prosecute people who commit, or organise, torture, has been interesting.

Donald Rumsfeld fled Paris for Germany when a group in France filed a complaint.

I'm with General Sanchez; who was the commander of troops in Iraq when Abu Ghraib made the news; we need to have real investigations. He wants a truth commission. He is more restrained than I am. I want prosecutions. I want the Grainers and Englunds to have the comfort (cold though it may be) of seeing the people who told them; by establishing the conditions, that abusing people, degrading them and, yes, torturing them, was ok; are also in the dock.

The treaty obliges us to do that. If we won't it obliges others to do it.

The Swiss gov't is saying Bush has some sort of immunity, as a former head of state. Not everyone agrees, Dominique Baettig, a member of the Swiss parliament from the right-wing People's Party, wrote to the Swiss federal government last week calling for the arrest of Bush for alleged war crimes if he came to the neutral country.

Pinochet thought he had immunity, and on much firmer ground than Bush; the law in Chile said he was immune. That didn't matter to Spain; which invoked the clause in the treaty which says that if a nation won't prosecute it's citizens who torture, then it's open season on them; first come, first served.

If Interpol can serve a warrant on Assange, we can only hope they will do the same for Bush.

Synchronicity

Just after my last post I got a piece of comment spam to my reaction to the torture memos which I re-read.

I have to thank the spammers for that, because that post explains why I think Bush needs to be arrested.

It also explains why I couldn't sit on the jury in that case. I can't give him a fair trial. I am certain his own words have condemned him. I am also certain he knows he is guilty. The way he introduced the subject into interviews when he was flacking his book made it plain to me.

He brought the subject up. Why?

Because the guilty flee when no man pursueth.

Again, let's hope that lack of pursuit ceases.

Coping

I seem to be managing it fairly well. Not perfectly, mind, but fairly well.

I've been lucky, and I do mean luck, things which weren't much in my control.

1: I am fairly slight, and fairly fit. The first of these is none of my doing. I eat what I please, as much as I please, and this is the frame I've got. Yes, I stop when I am full, but I am lucky enough that what fills me doesn't seem to increase my mass.

Fit, well I like to do things, among them are walking and photography. The latter means I'm often carrying a fair bit while walking. I also bend into odd positions to get photos. Add the intermittent practice of Aikido, and I'm reasonably familiar with what my body can do.

That's been useful for several cases of my body not being able to keep itself up. I've had two odd falls, where the toes of my right (i.e. broken) foot started to take my weight and I just gave up and fell (this is best done when one does not have a crutch beneath one, just sayin').

Yesterday I was doing some yardwork and decided the safest course of action was in fact to fall to one side; so I did. ladymondegreen was, for just a moment, concerned that I might have fallen without intent, but was disabused before it became a question.

That won't, however, save one from accident. I did have a painful fall from the G.I, "kneelchair", which involved coming straight down on my bad leg. The cast kept my foot from twisting to the point of re-breaking the bone, but I can still feel where the break was strained, and my torqued knee, and jammed hip. I recommend against doing such things if one is possessed of a broken ankle.

2: I have a chronic condition. I am used to pain. This is a mixed blessing. It did incline me to getting more pain meds when I was running out. It also made me feel I might be being a bit of a wimp (that and the social stigma of opiates, combined with the unknown factor of "ooh... addictive"). tenacious_snail told me I wasn't thinking about it, I was doing it. ladymondegreen concurred.

2a: Take the meds. Part of the reason I was probably going to hie me to the doctor to get more meds is that I was engaging in "rationing behavior". I was waiting until the pain was, "bad" before taking a pill, because I was afraid I would run out, and then be without meds if the pain got, "really bad." I got new x-rays (healing apace), and the doctor said, with apologetic tones, and a a stern rebuke, "I'm giving you 40 more, but we can't do this again, ok?". Since I was thinking a dozen would probably be enough, I was happy. If I needed 47 percocet 5/325 from then (because I had seven left) there were worse problems.

2b Take the meds. The percoset doesn't completely kill the ache in my knee which comes of having the extra weight of the cast, the odd postures of not putting my foot down, the minor atrophy from not walking, the twists of the cast; and the folly of my not thinking to put a pillow in the bed to prob my knee, so the heel of the cast isn't trying to hyper-extend it), etc., but it does take enough away to make it possible to sleep. An hour spent tossing and turning and trying to not wake ladymondegreen could have been much reduced if I'd take a pill sooner.

3: I am competent. ladymondegreen made this observation yesterday. I asked what she meant by it (I had just hopped back into the house to look something up. The kneelchair and the crutches were both in the trunk and I didn't bother to get them). She said I knew what my limits are, and mostly stay inside them. Sometimes I push the envelope, but I tend to do it thoughtfully.

I was thinking about that today. She's right. Today, using kneelchair, crutches and other, improvised, prostheses, I cut some lumber, framed a pair of raised beds; and the walkway between them, and did a moderate amount of digging, and turning in of one of said beds. I also did some sweeping up of the mess I made yesterday when she and I repotted a grape. It was in a 3/4 barrel. I also vacuumed the house. It was a lot less than I could have done if I'd been able to put two feet on the ground, but I did it. I'm handicapped, I'm neither crippled, nor useless.

I am blessed in my friends and lovers. They have been a huge support, physically, and emotionally. I've been allowed to fend for myself in such ways as I can, and told to sit down and be helped when I can't.

4: This will end. I've been taking it a few days at a time. Right now the hard part is the next week. That's when the cast comes off, and the boot goes on. Right now there is what feels like a bit of the lint bandage which has glued itself to my heel. It's ungodly irritating, when I notice it. If it's not that, it's the callous of my heel coming off; which will be irritating in a very different way. I could have gotten the boot on Weds, when I got meds. The orthopedist said as much. He wasn't really in favor of it, and I decided against it.

I thought about it,and decided I was more likely to do something foolish, which made the rigidity of the cast a better idea. I suspect the boot will weigh more, and be bulkier too. That will make me want to do something less than ideal, such as pull an, "Elephant Man" and try to sleep without it. Better, I decided, to avoid the temptations. Tonight, I am thinking this may have been a less than wonderful decision, but given the fall yesterday, it was probably the right one.