Featured Post for 05-/15-05/22: Obama at this point, by covering up for official torture, and by signing on to and expanding the war in Afghanistan, is dooming his presidency, further staining the reputation of the United States, and ultimately furthering the decline of the country that was set in motion by his predecessors.
The illogic of Obama’s position on these photos is stunning. Since we know the photos exist, the refusal to make them public can only feed a sense that they must be worse than the horrific photos of torture at Abu Ghraib Prison which were already released. Nobody is going to assume that the photos in the White House’s possession are less offensive than what has already been discovered and made public–for why would the administration be worried about that?
The truth is always better than a cover-up, and what we now have the president advocating is a cover-up of American torture. FULL STORY
34 comments ↓
When the “peace” candidate covers up for war crimes and torture, and at the same time escalates war….it sickens me so much, it’s hard to put it to words.
If the US Constitution guarantees presumption of innocence — until proven guilty (as stated in the full article), then why are suspects handcuffed, and in some cases, shackled, and imprisoned, to await trial? It smells of guilty until proven innocent, to me!
To some of us, he sounded just like Bush while he was on the campaign trail. Those of us who didn’t have the blinders on, that is!
First off, I am offering this as constructive criticism to help make the Populist movement seem intelligent. This article does not do so.
First off… What are these “photos”? They were randomly introduced. There is nothing to clarify or even define what they are. They are, for all I know, images conjured from the ether. They have no real existence, signifigance or meaning. This is poor writing, and damaging to Populism. Maybe “photos” symbolizes something else which my feeble mind can not understand. If so, make this clear.
Secondly, the article focuses more on the wrongness of the war in Afghanistan (which was started by Bush) than showing Obama’s seemingly sudden Bushist leanings. It is a misrepresented article at best, and probably a misjudgement in and of itself.
There were a few good points, but the grindingly terrible writing makes it all worth discarding, for nothing written so poorly could contain such terribly important truths.
Please step it up,
Withershins
It is rather difficult to identify the photographs when the photographs are hidden.
Afghanistan is now – just as the writer said – Obama’s war, as it is he that is escalating it.
Before I would judge another’s writings as poor, I would check my ability to convey a thought first. I strongly suggest this for Withershins, as I read and reread his last paragraph three times and still find it meaningless, rambling as if he is suffering a mental meltdown, and lacking in conveying a complete thought.
In fact, Witherspins had an unintended consequence I do not believe his apparent ego considers possible. He unintentionally showed his lack of intellect and that he sorely lacks the ability to clearly think and convey his thoughts to others throughout his commentary.
Obama never represented himself, during the campaign, as anything other than a very centrist Democrat – so the fact that so many “liberals” and “progressives” saw in him a savior can reflect nothing other than the collective ignorance or naivité of the American electorate.
Those who understood that it was the Bilderberg global elite who chose Obama over Clinton would recognize that – regardless of the promise of his past – the current president is as much a pawn on the Grand Chess Board as any other.
For insight into the Bilderberg origins of the current global economic depression, read: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=13526
Riversong, you must have missed the part where Withershins himself admitted to possessing a “feeble mind”. Cut the guy some slack, he needs it.
Lindorff’s article is as true as it gets.
Obama is a huge disappointment. Did I, in the run-up to the election notice a short little piece about Cheney and Obama being distantly related? Or was it Bush and Obama?
Whatever, it makes no difference. Reality has shown that we are now in the first installment of the continuation of the Bush policies. Once again the electorate have proven that a vote for the lesser of two evils gets you the same result - evil.
Will we ever administer “enhanced smarts” to ourselves and learn from history? Why don’t we begin to seriously talk about promoting a viable third party?
Cliff,
I made no comment about Withershins. Whatever are you refering to? I was speaking of Americans in general.
But I will address your own naiveté. The “evil” which you describe was not inherited from Bush/Cheney – it has been central to the American political landscape at least since the Mexican-American War and our continual imperial expansion.
Most of the policies that the “left” has objected to in the Bush regime were initiated by Clinton without much notice or resistance. And Clinton merely accelerated the neo-liberal expansionism and police-state activities of his predecessor. He signed the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998 which called for regime change, initiated extraordinary rendition, bombed Yugoslavia (shock & awe) for 78 continuous days, signed the predecessor to the Patriot Act, the Anti-Terrorism Act of 1996…
And third party politics – if the duopoly will even allow it – will not bring real change to America, as substantive change has always been driven from the grass-roots. Jefferson was certain that continued democracy would require a revolution every generation. We’re long overdue.
I seem to remember voting for Obama because he told us our troops would be coming home. Guess he simply had no idea what he was talking about. Clearly, he was more interested in getting the job than making sure the American people got a great leader. Not that McCain was that leader, but Obama had to have known that making a statement that he would bring troops home was complete BS. I should have been wiser, though it may not have changed my vote.
Ares,
You evidently weren’t listening carefully. Obama never promised anything other than a “responsible phased withdrawal” from Iraq, planned in collaboration with the military command and subject to “conditions on the ground”. He also promised to shift military resources and the combat mission to Afghanistan.
Obama promised to shift responsibility for the rebuilding of the Iraqi infrastructure that we destroyed onto the shoulders of the Iraqi people. This abandonment of our national responsibility is perfectly consistent with Obama’s current refusal to prosecute those responsible for our criminal policies – both at home and abroad.
But the American electorate projected a false persona on Obama, just as it called VT Gov. Howard Dean a “peace candidate” in 2004 when, in fact, he was an imperialist, anti-gun control and pro death-penalty centrist. The American people have no one but themselves to blame for our dismal leadership (which includes Pelosi and most Congressional Democrats as well as the “Change You Can Believe In” administration). And we continue to suffer under the illusion that our “leaders” are going to initiate real change.
Robert, you make some important points. I believe many people just ignored that Obama never talked about a full withdrawal from Iraq, always talked about escalating war with Afghanistan, and had some pretty nasty rhetoric towards Iran and Pakistan.
I was always amazed when I saw someone wearing an Obama t-shirt with a peace-sign in the “O”.
The only peace candidates were marginalized by the parties and the media – Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich.
Michael Boldin states: “The only peace candidates were marginalized by the parties and the media – Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich.”
Of course, while Kucinich was an authentic peace candidate who has long advocated both non-interferance abroad and justice at home, Paul was an anti-imperialist free-market property-rights capitalist who opposed the kind of egalitarianism and socialized safety net that all other Western nations offer their citizenry.
So, while the power elites were able to easily marginalize the leftist Kucinich, there was scuttlebut that the Bilderbergers were considering assasinating Ron Paul. A right-wing anti-imperialist is far more threatening to the status quo, because Americans tend to be rather unquestioning believers in the mythology of free markets, private property and individual liberty.
Yeah, the anti-imperialist ron paul is a bigger threat, because he strikes at the heart of everything the imperial government does. It wages wars, it keeps us dependent on them at home, it tells us what we can drink and smoke, how much water can be in our toilet, and how much of our hard-earned income we can keep while the rest goes to their corporate buddies.
Ron Paul opposes all that, and he was the only one, that’s why he was hated by the establishment during the elections.
So we end up with Obama, the new Bush, keeping all the same awful powers that he stole from us.
Well, about all I can say is that I’m disappointed in the direction the U.S. has been going for many years and several presidents.
Unless there is a revolution, as mentioned by another writer, or a complete overhaul of government coming from outside the country called an “invasion” which is more likely, all of what I’m reading and hearing validate my decision to remove my family from the U.S.A. all together. There are better places to live in this world.
Riversong. I meant Ed instead of you, my mistake.
But as to the rest of your response.
I didn’t say Evil was inherited from Bush or anyone else. What I said was that when you choose evil, you get evil. And I suppose evil has been here since the Garden of Eden.
You seem to be trying to blame the left for today’s situation. When someone tries to shift the blame from Bush and the Republicans to anyone else for the last eight years , now at best that is bordering on stupid.
I said Obama was beginning to act like Bush Re-Incarnate. That is what Lindorff wrote. And I agree.
And since you reject the idea of a Third Party and seem to choose revolution instead, I have to remind you that anything that would accomplish Changed Governance to the better, a return to constitutional law, would be imminently preferable to revolution.
You sound like someone who wants to help the Republican party survive. Am I wrong?
Cliff,
You stated that Obama was offering “the continuation of the Bush policies”, as if something new started with Bush. Of course the “left” – the most ineffectual left in any modern democracy – is complicit, since it failed to object to the same policies when Clinton enacted them.
You missed the entire point – these “evil” policies have been as American as apple pie at least since Andrew Jackson.
And, yes, you’re just as wrong in the rest of your conclusions.
Riversong.
I’m not wrong about you Riversong. You reveal yourself.
Bush was the worst President this Country has every had and hopefully will remain the worst.
How bad Obama becomes is still to be seen.
I believe in standing up for America – not my aberration of a Party. I will never vote for a Republican Candidate again and I ask everyone that reads this to join me, even you Riversong.
Cliff,
You couldn’t be more wrong about me, as you couldn’t be more wrong about the American political landscape. Unfortunately, you perfectly represent the historical ignorance and political naiveté that is pandemic among the American populace. And that is why America continues to get exactly the leadership it deserves.
Riversong. Do you believe that the authorizers of the torture should be brought up on war crimes?
Do you believe that Bush and Bunch are War Criminals?
Do you believe that the Republican Party has the best interests of America at heart?
The Democratic Party?
I recognize your type.
Anyone who thinks that either the Democrat or Republicn parties has the “best interests of america at heart” is ignorant or a partisan hack, in my humble opinion.
Well, violating the constitution and killing more people around the world is somehow good for the country, but I don’t think so. the political machine is working for the political machine.
I don’t know if it goes back as far as Jackson, but it sure didn’t start with Bush.
“A peculiar notion has arisen of late, maintaining that things like torture, domestic spying and illegal wars are all attributable to the Right — namely, the administration of President George W. Bush — and are in fact historical anomalies, not at all in keeping with the traditions of these great United States . The idea that war crimes and civil liberties violations are strictly conservative affairs is particularly comforting to wide-eyed Democrats in awe of America’s First Black President ™, and it affords the heirs to the same liberal establishment which brought us Vietnam and Hiroshima another opportunity to grandstand about their commitment to human rights even as the noble humanitarian Barack Obama continues to extra-judicially murder foreigners with unmanned drones. Unfortunately for partisan Democrats – and even more so the victims of U.S. exceptionalism – American imperialism and its associated evils have long enjoyed bipartisan backing, though liberals tend to be somewhat more sheepish about their support for killing, torturing and maiming poor people overseas.”
Condemning Torture, Condoning Mass Murder
By Charles Davis
http://www.strike-the-root.com/91/davisc/davisc1.html
“Let’s just forget about the fact that Obama never lifted a finger to stop Israel’s two week rampage through Gaza which killed 1,100 unarmed civilians and destroyed much of the critical infrastructure. And let’s give him a pass for equivocating on Iran, Georgia, missile defense in East Europe, Cuba, NAFTA, FISA, torture, war crimes, the Employee free Choice Act (EFCA) and any other issue that’s important to liberals, progressives, leftists or anyone else who eats with a fork or walks on two legs. And let’s excuse Obama for stepping up the air war in Afghanistan even though another 140 Afghan villagers were blown to bits 10 days ago while sitting in their schools, sleeping in their beds or having dinner with their families. (After all, Obama did say he was sorry, didn’t he?)
“But now Obama is backing off on his promise to withdraw troops from Iraq in 16 months. And, now he’s planning to restore Bush’s kangaroo courts (Military tribunals) for prisoners at Guantanamo who’ve never even been formally charged with a crime! And, now, he’s threatening to hold some prisoners indefinitely in the U.S. without trial.”
Buyers Remorse
Is It Too Late To Swap Obama For McCain?
By Mike Whitney
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22640.htm
“Now President Obama has elevated the most notorious of the psychopaths, General Stanley McChrystal, to head the US and NATO military command in Afghanistan. McChrystal’s rise to leadership is marked by his central role in directing special operations teams engaged in extrajudicial assassinations, systematic torture, bombing of civilian communities and search and destroy missions. He is the very embodiment of the brutality and gore that accompanies military-driven empire building.”
Obama’s Animal Farm
By James Petras
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22642.htm
“Torture has been routinely practiced from the early days of the conquest of the national territory, and continued to be used as the imperial ventures of the “infant empire” — as George Washington called the new republic — extended to the Philippines, Haiti, and elsewhere. Keep in mind as well that torture was the least of the many crimes of aggression, terror, subversion, and economic strangulation that have darkened U.S. history, much as in the case of other great powers.
“Accordingly, what’s surprising is to see the reactions to the release of those Justice Department memos, even by some of the most eloquent and forthright critics of Bush malfeasance: Paul Krugman, for example, writing that we used to be “a nation of moral ideals” and never before Bush “have our leaders so utterly betrayed everything our nation stands for.” To say the least, that common view reflects a rather slanted version of American history. ”
Unexceptional Americans: Why We Can’t See the Trees or the Forest
The Torture Memos and Historical Amnesia
By Noam Chomsky
http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175073/noam_chomsky_unexceptional_americans
Now Riversong you understand why I speak of the Two Headed Monster ( Republicans and Democrats ).
If you defend one and you are defending the other.
A failure to prosecute War Crimes that anybody commits is a support of their crimes.
That Riversong is my message, was my message, and will be my message as I call for the end of the Republican Party. I when I say Republican Party I mean them first because they are out of power.
Today in my State Newspaper the Editorial Cartoon was the burning twin towers and the caption “2974 reasons for supporting “enhanced interrogation”.
Such a sick thing surprises me even though I know how supportive they were for the Bush Administration and the killing fields in the Middle East. This paper is proud of its support for the Republican Party.
This Riversong is what is wrong with the Two Headed Monster in Washington.
There is no moral reason to support torture.
Afshin Rattansi and Daniel Estulin and the Bilderberg Conspiracy 2009 http://www.presstv.com/programs/player/?id=95371
Cliff Carson,
What you, in fact, said was “we are now in the first installment of the continuation of the Bush policies” (as if these policies began with Bush) and ”When someone tries to shift the blame from Bush and the Republicans to anyone else … is bordering on stupid.”
What all those who are incensed about the Bush/Cheney lawlessness - particularly Democrats and supporters of Obama – fail to understand or acknowledge is that we are a nation built on genocide, expansionism, aggressive warfare, economic imperialism and we are a people collectively guilty of hundreds of years of torture and pillage and mayhem.
None among us has the moral standing to decry such mild behavior as “enhanced interrogation”, when we are each guilty by association and silence – if not active participation – of generations of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
We are a nation both ignorant and hypocritical. And you, Cliff Carson, fall squarely into that category. You would be well advised to cease placing your foot deeper into your mouth.
Riversong. You keep on trying to shift blame of the Bush Administration atrocities to the Obama Administration and that is stupid.
You know it, I know you know it, and yet you continue to act like you don’t. You may believe that you are some kind of superior intellectual, but I got you pegged. You remind me of the guy W. C. Fields once admonished , when Fields told the guy
” Well Sir I believe that between the two of us we know everything there is to know in this world, You know everything except that you are a fool, and I Sir know that”.
You are nothing but an apologetic voice for the Bush insanity.
Keep on kneeling at the foot of your idols , and don’t forget to offer up reverent ditto’s time to time.
What a dipstick.
Anyone who believes that history began 8 years ago and thinks they see clearly when they’re not even looking with open eyes, clearly cannot be reasoned with.
I can’t understand how anyone would think Riversong is a bush-ite. He seems more like a socialist than anything. But that doesn’t matter to me.
This county, as Robert so correctly pointed out, was indeed founded on war, death and destruction. Whether it was Africans, or Vietnemese, or Philipinos, or Iraqis, or Koreans, or any number or people murdered by democrats and republicans.
Cliff, I’ve seen you make some great points here. How can talking about American policy as a whole over generations be considered “shifting blame from bush to obama”?
Spooner you are correct in your assessment that our policy as a whole is a problem. But Riversong is trying to use this fact to cleanse the Bush Administration of blame for what Bush and friends did. I never said our long term policy hasn’t been a driver toward Klepotocracy, it has. What I am insisting on is that this trend won’t stop until we do something to stop it. I have said punishment for criminal behavior is the key ingredient missing.
In fact I have said forever that was the problem. That’s why I keep calling for the end of the Republican Party. Just look what’s going on now, today from that corrupt institution. But that is not to Riversong’s liking. He wants to let the Bush bunch off the hook and and blame somebody new. It’s called the same ole same ole, the ending is always the same, the criminals get off scott free and the public pays.
He refuses to admit to the complicity of the Bush Administration, in fact he strains to try to blame anyone except the latest perpetrators of evil, that would be the Bush bunch. Obama may not be the realization of hope that many people thought they might get. But his Administration sure as hell are a fresh breath compared to Bush.
Riversong and Rush want Obama to fail, even though they know it would hurt America. They know that would help the Republicans. I am not an Obama fan, but when I see someone trying to salvage a corrupt Administration by blaming the mess on the newcomers, what I see is a misguided soul at best, and an accomplice at worst.
Riversong’s tune is that today can’t be his Party’s fault unless one can prove 100% blame on that Party. That can’t be done because its not true, both parties are corrupt, and there has been increasing corruption with each succeeding Administration for the last 50 years. I say its because we continue to forgive their criminal activity.
But that shouldn’t be a pass for Bush. What America needs to do is go after the criminals and set an example for the future. Right now the Bush Administration is the most corrupt and vile that has ever been in power. That would be a great place to start.
And now would be the best time to start.
No one can change the past. It is unchangeable. But the future is altogether different. What we do now, in our present, will set our future.
Our Federal Anti-Torture Laws Must be Enforced so that our leaders are never allowed by law to use Torture on you and I, the citizens.
SIGN THE PETITION calling for Prosecution of those that Conspired To Torture at
http://ANGRYVOTERS.ORG
.
Our Federal Anti-Torture Laws Must be Enforced so that our leaders are never allowed by law to use Torture on you and I, the citizens.
SIGN THE PETITION calling for Prosecution of those that Conspired To Torture at
http://ANGRYVOTERS.ORG
.
Obama is still better than Bush, Cheney and McCain…. BUT that may not get him re-elected if lets down a large number of voters by refusing to
Prosecute the Torturers and getting out of Afghanistan, the graveyard of empires.
Get out in the streets in front of your Congressional Representative's office and raise hell.
Start your own "prosecution" protest group.
KEEP ASKING ALL POLITICIANS AT ALL PUBLIC EVENTS
"WHY DO YOU SUPPORT TORTURE?"
If they aren't actively calling for enforcement of our Federal Torture Laws, They DO Support Torture and a dual standard of Justice.
SIGN THE PETITIONS
Demanding
prosecution for all those leaders
in Bush's Administration that Conspired to Torture at ANGRYVOTERS.ORG
http://ANGRYVOTERS.ORG
Only Prosecution Stops Torture,
Abuse of Power, our Constitution, & Rule Of Law
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