Obama, the Jailer

As I write this, Puerto Rican journalists stage a demonstration on behalf of Oscar López Rivera, the political prisoner who has spent 33 years in U.S. jails for "seditious conspiracy", an archaic and obscure legal term meant to include anything the State wishes to accuse its opponents of. López has now been in jail six more years than Mandela.

Speaking of which, Lopez's daughter was recently in South Africa and met with Bishop Desmond Tutu, who was saddened by this cruel and unusual punishment, and disappointed with Obama, for not having liberated López. Interestingly enough, López and Mandela were both convicted of the same "crime."

Tutu and two other Nobel Peace Prize winners have come out in favor of López's liberation. Ironically, Obama, a Nobel Peace Prize winner himself, does not share their sensitivity, when it comes to human rights on his own doorstep.

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