You read the story when it first occurred. Three Americans, two men and one woman, arrested in the mountains of Iran and held as spies. They were hiking along the border, didn't realize they had crossed over and were apprehended as spies. Outrage ensued.
About six months ago the woman was released on $500,000 bond. The US State Department ponied up that cash. The two other members of the menage a trois remained in a cozy Iranian prison. Think "Midnight Express" but with poorer hygiene and no room service.
Now apparently the vacationing judge who was apparently the only person in all of Iran with the credentials to sign the bail documents has returned to work. The boys will be coming home to mama for another $1,000,000 of taxpayer funds.
Freed Americans Should Show Shortly
Would these innocents abroad be engaged in espionage? Were they seeking some solitude for two-v-one sex games. Did they want a pastoral place to meditate? What did they bring for lunch on their hike?
Seriously, what were they thinking?
Of all of the mountains and valleys in the world what were they doing along the border of Iran? Wouldn't Yellowstone or Yosemite fill the adventure and exercise bill? How about Bavaria or the Appenines? Maybe New Zealand?
Why don't they get a job somewhere instead of being rich and stupid? Maybe they could enlist and get the same hike opportunity but with pay and benefits.
And when do we get our $1.5 mil back?
7 comments:
Ed,
Reports are the Omani's paid the ransom (I refuse to call it bail). As for what they were doing in that area I'll wait for the explantion when they get home.
~Leadfoot
If not in the employ of the U.S. when "detained," and we think we know the answer to that, little "Rainbow, Seth, and Pun'kin Boy" should be billeted at 8th and I and allowed the privilege of cleaning the latrines in the enlisted barracks of that and surrounding bases to the tune of $1.5M worth of labor. But, that's just me. regards, Alemaster
In principal, I am opposed to the taxpayers rewarding stupidity. One side of me says that the US should not be spending money to extricate them from their own predicaments.
But the other side of me knows that it might be a mistake not to have Foreign Service et al work on matters such as this and deny that they were spies because it might result in a "tell" to intelligence agencies. If we only work on such matters when such detainees are intelligence equities, then we may telegraph what we are doing. If we have a consistent policy of trying to spring them all, then it may be more difficult for our enemies and challengers to know whether they were spies or stupid American dolts that got in trouble abroad.
Real spies wouldn't be that stupid.
I constantly wonder why people want to travel to places like that. Girls go to questionable places in South America and get raped and murdered. People go to shady places in thee Middle East and end up in jail or beheaded. And as for hiking in Iraq, did they miss the little news item that there is a war there?
They were from Berkeley and Minnesota. One of the boys was an "Evnironmental Activist" and the other one was a "Freelance Journalist" (read: trust-fund kids on a lark.) She wasn't gainfully employed to any greater degree. No doubt they firgured that their liberal beliefs and Bush-hating credentials would be enough to give them free rein in whatever country they decided to wander through. Now they'll come back, sell their stories, and be even less productive than before.
Boy, I wish we could get half a mil from every illegal we catch in the US. Obama probably wouldn't need the tax hikes. Of course, our prisons are much nicer than what they're used to, so they'd probably just opt to stay.
For further enlightment, go to this link and turn it up:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpqryHybOwo
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