The Cheney archipelago

DEMOCRACY
ISSUES PLAGUE
US/RUSSIA TIES

By Henry Cabot Lodge
Diplomatic Correspondent

MOSCOW –  The city believed by ex-actor Fred Thompson (R – Glue Factory) to be the capital of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (1917-1991) is gripped by an increasing level of concern over the future of the reliatonship between the Russian Federation and the world's greatest self-proclaimed superpower, the United States.

Sources close to Vladimir Putin remained concerned about anti-democratic trends in the U.S. including secret prison camps maintained by an all-powerful executive and outside the jurisdiction of any court.

Kremlin America-watchers, known as Chenologists, believe that progress on important  issues such as arms control, Iran, Kosovo and nuclear nonproliferation is being threatened over worry about the incresingly undemocratic and indeed autocratic drift of the United States.

The Chenologists profess deep unhappiness over the many recent incidents of anti-democratic "backsliding" in the US since George Bush was installed as US President by a shadowy undemocratic institution that calls itself the "Supreme Soviet." [Surely, Court? – Ed.]

Sources close to the popular and democratically-elected Russian President Vladimir Putin note that while Putin would be re-elected by large majorities if an election were held today, President Bush would be chosen by approximately 24% of US citizens, according to recent polling data.

These sources point to a series of disturbing anti-democratic developments over the past seven years, beyond the undemocratic manner in which US President Bush was placed in office. "We have seen an alarming concentraiton of absolute power in the hands of Bush and his shadowy sidekick Cheney and a corresponding atrophy in formerly robust democratic institutions such as the US Congress, which now appears to have been reduced to an almost powerless status," these expertrs told the Spy.

As a result of the seizure of absolute unchecked authority by what Russian experts believe to be dangerously provincial and paranoid personalities, the rights of US citizens have been systematically whittled back, they note.  "For example, the Bush Regime claims the right to imprison any US citizen without trial forever if Bush or Cheney believes that person to be a threat to national security, whatever that means," these experts claimed.

"Even more disturbing, the Bush Regime believes that it has the right to torture any such individual as it sees fit, regardless of whether such degrading and cruel treatment is in  conformity with the Geneva Conventions or other norms of basic human decency commonly accepted by civilized nations."

"The US Government maintains an array of secret prisons, including a major facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where individuals believed to threaten the regime disappear perhaps forever," they noted. "We call it the Cheney Archipelago."

Russian diplomats have forcefully expressed to their U.S. counterparts their concern about the suppression of human rights in the US but have been told it is an internal US matter. 

These experts also point out that persons incarcerated on the whim of the Bush Regime are no longer permitted to challenge the lawfulness of their detention in impartial courts. Instead, they are forced to appear before kangaroo "military commissions" whose members are carefully vetted to insure that they will folloow the regime's will.

The failure of the US to adhere to democratic norms is threatening US-Russian relations. According to informed sources in Moscow, negotiating sessions are now dominated by Russian demands for restoration of democracy and the rule of law in the US. Thus far, these demands have been met with a US stonewall.  

Although the failure of the US to live up to basic standards of democracy and human rights has strained US-Russia relations, some Kremlin Chenologists refuse to despair: "We can not give up hope just because we see no immediate results from our efforts. We have to believe that our pressure, combined with that of other advanced democracies, will eventually have an effect even on a regime as primitive and isolated as the Bush-Cheney government."

But other sources close to Putin fear that the damage to the relationship is irreparable. "How can we be expected to make progress on bilateral issues when one of the parties is unwilling to abide by legal norms accepted by civilized nations? The Bush Regime has even stated that they do not regard treaties as binding on them," they point out. "Who does George Bush think he is anyway, Stalin?"