Managed Hypocrisy

There are few things that the Kremlin pot does better than calling the White House kettle black.  A new report from the Foreign Ministry has proved this point aptly:

The 90-page Russian report slams EU nations, Canada and Georgia, but reserves its longest section of 20 pages for what it says are violations by the United States. The report does not cover Asia, Africa or the Middle East, other than a five-page section criticizing the NATO operation in Libya.

Moscow laments the ongoing operation of the “notorious” prison in Guantanamo Bay, where terrorism suspects have been held since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, and criticizes President Barack Obama for “legalizing indefinite and extrajudicial custody and the return of court martials.”

The report accuses the U.S. of prying into citizens’ personal lives and violating the rights of Muslim Americans in the fight against terrorism. It also points to errors made by American courts.

“Judicial errors are the Achilles heel of American justice as concerns capital punishment,” the report argues. It notes the roughly 130 people sentenced to death in the past 30 years who were later cleared of the charges, some after they were executed.

Whilst many liberal observers would second the criticisms of ‘Gitmo’ and could indeed name further breaches of civil liberties committed on US soil, (interestingly the report didn’t mention Occupy Wall Street), I think all can agree this is hardly the point of the excoriating dossier.