Mr. Hayden [CIA Director for the last two years of the Bush Administration] said he had opposed the release of the memos, even though President Obama has said the techniques will never be used again, because they would tell Al Qaeda “the outer limits that any American would ever go in terms of interrogating an Al Qaeda terrorist.”
i don't remember what show i was watching this weekend but one of the guests speculated on what the reaction would be not if but when a former detainee perpetrated an act of terrorism against the U.S.
both sides will say, "See! I told you so."
and it will fly into the face of the men who fought for the freedom...
“Should any American soldier be so base and infamous as to injure any [prisoner]... I do most earnestly enjoin you to bring him to such severe and exemplary punishment as the enormity of the crime may require. Should it extend to death itself, it will not be disproportional to its guilt at such a time and in such a cause… for by such conduct they bring shame, disgrace and ruin to themselves and their country.”
the more i've been reading about Obama's release of the torture memos and his decision not to pursue any legal maneuvers the more it seems that most people do not like his stand.
i don't either.
with all the talk during the campaign with emphasis on the Rule of Law, as a lawyer he is shirking his legal and ethical standards as an officer of the courts.
the best argument i've heard was Keith Olbermann's Special Comment last night. Olbermann lays out the argument succinctly bringing in historical reference that is quire indisputable, going all the way back to the Civil War.
you can watch and read Olbermann's Special Comment over at Crooks and Liars. it's really to the point.
The litany of crimes and blunders by the Bush Administration began with an interview on Keith Olbermann last night of NSA Analyst Russell Tice who said that private citizens, including journalists, were wiretapped and eavesdropped - all secretly and without permission from the courts. [see Buzzflash: NSA Spied on Journalists]
As i said in previous posts, the truth is going to start coming out. The one thing it's going to prove is how distressed the government actually became and how compromised.
Previous administrations may have weakened the Executive Branch with actions that were taken, but the Bushies has put the entire constitutional system at question and in jeopardy. They have taken the Declaration of Independence and put it on its head.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Powe
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Yes, these are lines taken directly from the Declaration of Independence. The he in the lines refers to another George - the III.
It is going to take a long time to reestablish the democracy we've enjoyed for more than two-hundred years, to put the separation of the three branches back into place so that they can provide checks and balances again, and to build the trust the people have in their government.
Mr. Obama has his work cut out for him. It will take some time, but the one thing history has proven, whether it be the Civil War, Teapot Dome, or Watergate, we've been able to step up and correct the abuses that knocked the march forward off its tracks.
I just hope that this time these abuses are not so earth-shattering that they can't be fixed. Being the cynic that I am, I'm not at all sure it can happen in my lifetime.
I do have one suggestion that I think will help - term limits in the House and Senate just as in the Presidency and eliminate life-tenure for justices and judges. Six consecutive two-year terms for Representatives and two for the Senate. Twelve years is long enough. Reevaluation of judges and justices on a set schedule by both/either legislative and citizen election procedures. If these men/women don't have to be politicking and running for reelection starting the day after an election, perhaps the focus will be on bringing about the true reasons for government - a contract between citizens for their own and future generations, justice for all people, equality for everyone and a sharing of the benefits equally.
Senate Republicans hope to delay a vote on the confirmation of Eric Holder to become attorney general in order to pressure him to say whether he will prosecute intelligence agents for torture if they were following orders and acting within what they believed to be legal guidelines.
Holder told the Judiciary Committee last week that waterboarding is "torture" and therefore illegal. Susan J. Crawford, the top Bush administration official overseeing the trials of detainees, told the Washington Post that at least one individual held at the prison center at Guantanamo Bay was "tortured."
The question Republicans want answered before Holder is confirmed: Will you prosecute those who took part in that torture? Ryan Grim, Huffington Post, January 21. 2009
He's not gone one day and the "rule of law" question is one of the first things to be questioned. Sen. Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) is blocking the
Even Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), later in the day, said that it would be impossible for any prosecutor to say who should or should not be prosecuted before s/he gets the facts or even knows what actions were committed. Cormyn himself was a prosecutor in a former life; he knows better. Said Graham,
agreed with Sen. Leahy that Holder can't rule out prosecutions before he becomes the top prosecutor.
"What I believe we should do is not politicize this, the idea of prosecutions coming from the hard left. Making a commitment that we'll never prosecute someone is probably not the right way to proceed, either," he said. "I think President Obama's administration is going to have a forward look on this, unless there's something egregious out there I think they'll move on. But no I don't expect him to rule it in or rule it out."
"In individual cases, if there's allegations of mistreatment judges can handle that and you can determine what course to take," he said.
It is going to take a long time to re-institute the Constitution. I fear the damage to it may be much greater than anyone of us knows. This was an exceptionally dark period in American history and the history of democracy.
what's the old saying about power? maybe it's time for term limits in the U.S. Congress. the old farts like Cormyn. if you break the law, you break the law. since when could Congress, or any other legislative body, pass a law that says no one should be prosecuted for breaking the law - before the law's been broken?
also, given the fact that even Tsar George himself last week said that there was torture, anyone who did the waterboarding or any other act had to know what they were doing was illegal, no matter what they were told. at the very least they should have known it was immoral.
what if, in one or two years time, we discover that Dick Cheney was actually not the driving force behind the hard rhetoric and hawkish stances of the Bush Administration but was actually the one reining the Tsar in all along the way?
sadly, we are entering the smear portion of the campaign that uses Rovian tactics and will use everything in his playbook to scare the s*** out of people. the Mcpain campaign has even said they are going to speed up the message that Obama is not forAmerica.
they know what they are doing. it worked for them in 2004. sadly, many people, and the older generation especially, will fall for it all. they feel that they have a chance at loosing everything and they look to keep what they have for their kids, their retirement, their savings, etc.
the Rovian tactic is to tell them such things as Obama will tax them and spend their money on others; Obama will weaken the security of the U.S. by getting us out of Iraq; Obama caused the credit crisis; or Obama is to blame for the inflated price of oil up. finally, they will tell people that he doesn't have the experience to be president, at the same time as McCain chose a V.P. candidate with absolutely no experience.
what they won't tell people is that the credit crisis was partially caused by the Tsar's meddling in Iraq, that the billions of dollars we send over to Iraq in any two week period would bolster Social Security and provide health care benefits for everyone in the country for years, that the amount already spent in Iraq was enough to rebuild every road, bridge AND school in the country, or that the U.S. does nothing more than launder the money that the Tsar borrows from China to send to Iraq.
mcpain hopes that the U.S. electorate is stupid. if you listened to pundits, on both the left and the right, it's probably the one thing on which they all agree, of course for different reason. the right because they can get what they want and the left because they don't understand how people can't tell the difference between two candidates.
i certainly hope they are both proven wrong on November 4.
personally, i am asking people i know who are saying that they just can't vote for Obama to stay home and not vote at all. a no vote is better than one against progress and change...
maybe, i need to put my own mantra, based on Hopi Native American lore and beliefs, that "When hope is gone, live is over." on a wider bandwidth...
if anyone has any doubts about the disaster of the last eight years, this is the only information you need...
any questions?
I have one. How is the Mcpain economic plan going to help out?
The McCain Plan to Cut Oil Company Taxes by Nearly $4 Billion
The centerpiece of Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) tax plan is two huge tax cuts for Ameri-can corporations. As president, McCain would cut the corporate tax rate from 35 per-cent to 25 percent and allow corporations to deduct immediately all of their investments in equipment and technology. Reducing the corporate tax rate alone would deliver a $3.8 billion tax cut to the five largest American oil companies, according to a Center for American Progress Action Fund analysis of those companies’ financial statements....
The McCain plan would deliver approximately $170 billion a year in tax cuts to corporations, including some corporations that are very large and profitable. Just one of the proposals—cutting the corporate rate from 35 percent to 25 percent—would cut taxes for five largest U.S. oil companies by $3.8 billion a year (see table below). The five corporations analyzed—ExxonMobil, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Valero Energy, and Marathon—are the five largest oil companies as ranked by Fortune Magazine. All are members of the Fortune 50. Together, they earned $80 billion worldwide in 2007
i frequently, no always, refer to the current president as Tsar George. there are reasons for this.
while working on my B.A. i majored in History. my main focus was on constitutional history, but since i was also taking Russian Language classes, i took a number of classes dealing with Russian history. one of my Russian teachers actually was a member of the Romanov family and had gone into exile; so she had fascinating stories. i was entranced by the years leading up to the Russian Revolution of 1917 and it's precursor in 1905. in my opinion the entire fault can be laid at the feet of the Romanov's.
there is a quote about Tzar Nicholas II that explains my feelings on the point:
In reality, he was a weak and indecisive man dominated by his wife and isolated from the socio-economic problems of his own country.
though no one can attest to Barbara Bush being dominating, the rest of the quote hits home about the last eight years.
the only thing i see Tsar George being decisive about in the last eight years was going to Iraq. there is another parallel between George II and Nicholas II in this:
The Russians had no contingency plans for a partial mobilization, and on 31 July 1914 Nicholas took the fateful step of confirming the order for a general mobilization. Nicholas was strongly counselled against mobilization of the Russian forces but chose to ignore such advice.
sound familiar?
so, hopefully, you can see why i have referred to Mr. Bush as Tsar George Bushanov. not because of the autocracy he tries to enforce but because as George Santayana said, "Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it." [i even have it at the top right of this website...]
you may also be able to tell my connecting Dick Rasputin as Tzar George's sidekick. you can read about Grigori Rasputin and see the parallel's.
“Where there is enough evidence to charge someone with a crime, we vigorously prosecute,” he said. “But not every wrong, or even every violation of the law, is a crime.”
U.S. Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey, August 12, 2008, New York Times.
His statement is in regards to the hiring scandal in his office under the previous AG, Alberto Gonzalez, where political affiliation and beliefs were the guiding principle to join the Department. He is not going to pursue any criminal charges against those who perpetrated it.
that whirring noise you are hearing loudly all across the United States is Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, Oliver Wendall Holmes and many many other spinning in their graves.
Joseph Stalin would be proud though! This administration has successfully turned the entire country into a gulag... in reverse for some cases.
The United States is negotiating deals with European countries to exchange fingerprint and DNA data in criminal and terrorist cases, and in some circumstances to transfer data on race or ethnic origin, political and religious beliefs, or sexual orientation.
Such agreements are a condition for granting citizens of newer European Union member states the right to enter the United States without visas, and for maintaining that right for older E.U. members. U.S. citizens already enjoy such a right when traveling to Europe.
when's the last time you heard of a Jehovah Witness, Black, Montengran gueer strap a bomb around his middle and get onto a Unite Airlines 777 and fly to the United States?
or...
when's the last time you ever heard of a Jehovah Witness, Black, American gueer get on a plane and fly to Montengro with a bomb strapped around his middle?
you see it's going to go both ways. they can tell the U.S. who is a Jehovah Witness, Black, Montengran gueer and we can tell them who is Jehovah Witness, Black, American gueer.
The report says everyone was upset because the year before, 1999, oil was at $10/BBL. Gore blamed the oil companies and candidate (now tsar) George Bush blamed the Clinton White House.
Here's the part that sent me into hysterics:
Bush said oil prices would fall in his administration, yet they have hit the stratosphere with record profits for the oil companies.
Remember last week I said I was happy because I paid $67 to fill my tank because it was the first time in weeks under $70? [stop-gap or windfall?]
Well, back in 2000 the price of gasoline was averaging $1.54 a gallon. That would mean I paid approximately $23.10 to fill up my tank! I probably b****ed about it back then, or at least thought about how high it was and shook my head.
Now, I cringe every time I pass the gas station...
and I'm not talking about Iraq or Afghanistan. Those don't seem to work anyway.
They are attacking the "public".
In another move to take more and more away from the people they are pushing a bill up for a vote tomorrow in the Senate that would keep more of the truth from us.
The administration has proposed cutting the public broadcasting budget by 56 percent -- putting at risk vital news, educational and cultural programming that millions of Americans say they prefer to commercial media.Freepress, 23 June 2008
Built into the laws have always been a requirement to collect local viewer data, report factual materials, provide educational opportunity, and programs of public interest. A lot of the programming is also backed by both private and public grants, giving more meaning to reflecting the needs and wishes of the public. In other words, telling the truth or allowing the public to decide for ourselves.
More and more the "public" is becoming a concept rather than a reality as a result of the Bush/Cheney seven year fiasco. More and more is being done for big business and less and less for the people at our expense.
Business needs to realize that it is the "people" that keep them going. What would they do if the "public" decided to stop paying their bills? Oh, wait, Bush/Cheney would bail business out.
Let your senators know directly by sending them an online letter via Freepresshere and sign a petition they have working to make all lawmakers aware that you want public broadcasting to be fully funded and additional funding provided here.
This is not from any fly-by-night scare mongering organization or person. It's from the American Civil Liberties Union. They even fight for the bad guys to protect all of our rights guaranteed by the Constitution.
Right now, when I call one of my favorite pizza/chicken delivery joints, they answer with "Can I take your order Mr. I******?" and then repeat my address and phone number as a double check before I say anything. They probably could even just process the order without asking me what it is because it very seldom varies. This is just from using Caller ID.
The Bush/Cheney administration is doing all they can to save us from terrorists, whether we think it's necessary or not, BUT what else are they doing with the information they are gathering? To whom are they giving the information? For what purposes are they giving/using the information?
AND what will the next presidential administration do with it? I would hope they hit the delete button so that it all goes away. While I don't believe that there really is anyone smart enough to put together a fool-proof conspiracy, I do believe that there are idiots out there that will do anything to feed their egos and their pockets. [I think the ego thing is the scarier.]
If the telecoms have been gathering information on the orders of the government using a catch-all-you-can technique and then screening everything on the chance they'll find something on luck, it makes you wonder what they've given to the oil companies, the airlines, the insurance companies... not etc. but rather ad nauseum...
this is not our Founding Father's country anymore...
A number of posts ago, I mentioned that the dollar was starting to lose its shine as the currency of choice in the world economy. With the Euro so far ahead of the dollar it was inevitable.
Rising numbers of Chinese exporters are shunning the US dollar or devising ways to offset the impact of the falling currency as they confront rising labour and raw material costs at home.
According to Alibaba.com, the online company that matches Chinese suppliers with international buyers, the vast majority of their almost 700,000 Chinese suppliers no longer use dollars to settle non-US transactions in order to minimise foreign exchange risk.
Though it may be a backdoor move using it only for non-US sales, it's a big deal. The confidence in the dollar is waining vastly and quickly.
Today, the Euro is worth $1.5759. That means that if something in Europe costs €1 we actually have to pay $1.58 or almost 50% more. What company wants to spend that much more for anything? Considering that, using a non-specific rule-of-thumb, the typical margin on merchandise is usually around 33% in order make a profit, everyone starts in the hole. Of course, someone has to pay for it. Guess who?
You got it. You and me...
So, is there blame in this. How about a hint? At the end of 2000 the United States budget had a a surplus of $230 Billion. Today, as of 2:25:13 AM GMT, the US deficit was $9,414,329,649,218.93 according to the US National Debt Clock!
I can't wait to read and hear the spin and conspiracy theories that are going to come out of this one.
we'll just have to wait and see. the wagging tongues are still trying to decide how they are going to cover this.
Right now they are saying it's the bush/cheney administration's dirty works. soon it will be McCain. then it will be Hillary. what about bin Laden? what about the pope?
Why isn't anyone asking the really simple question of
HOW IN THE HELL IS THE GOVERNMENT GOING TO PAY OFF THE $4-5 TRILLION THAT THE BUSH/CHENEY ADMINISTRATION HAS PUT US INTO DEBT FROM A CLINTON/DEMOCRATIC BALANCED BUDGET WITH A SURPLUS OF BILLIONS OF DOLLARS?
So?
Why isn't anyone asking that question?
The Republicans won't touch it with a trillion foot pole. Obama, Clinton and Edwards all said that they were going to let the Bush/Cheney tax cuts on the wealthiest expire. That's not a tax increase. That cut is a gift being given to people who don't need a gift.
If you or I, assuming that you don't make over $200,000 as I don't [especially being retired now], need to pay for things we either go into more debt by borrowing more money - Bush/Cheney owe the Bank of China lots of money, get another job to pay for the bills, or spend less.
Of course, we also need to eat, put a roof over our heads, educate our children, insure ourselves and families, etc. You know, all of the "regular" stuff that the rich don't even have to think about; they pay people like us to take care of it for them. Why are you and I paying the full tax rate and they get all the breaks, that are called loopholes? They are more like nooseholes around our necks than loopholes for the wealthy.
And now Tsar George wants to send me a check for $800 to spur on the economy. You know what I'm going to have to do with that check? The same thing you probably will have to do: pay off some of the bills we already owe. It's really only going to help Visa and Mastercard, not you or me.
I know. Why don't we all invade another country? Say, Canada? No, wait. Mexico!
The Republicans all bitch that all of Mexico is living here right now. Instead of deporting them. Why don't we make Mexico the 51st state. That would work. An untapped source of additional taxes because they don't make over $200,000 down there. They would then double the amount of money the IRS collects.
There are all these fights going on about rights to privacy with the Bush/Cheney adminsitration's penchant for knowing everything about everyone in the country to prevent suicide bombers from attacking U.S. citizens and soil. In addition to the telephone companies handing over lists of calls to/from American citizens, one of the major aspects is the federal government screening personal emails. The fight looms large.
I received my regular email from Amazon.com. It's a list that their computer program puts together based on things that I've purchased in the past called Amazon.com recommends.... I wondered what profile an agent would create on me from, not just the email but the extended list on the website, the things suggested. Here are some, there are a couple of hundred for me, recommendations:
So, I drink coffee; I'm pessimistic of the future of America; I don't believe in god; I hate the Bush/Cheney administration; I'm a liberal; I work in the area of gifted education part-time; I'm overweight; I'm an opera queen; I speak French, or at the least listen to French music; I'm a Keith Olbermann junkie; and I'm queer.
It's the last one that really will blow my cover - Dora's Buildable House. This one makes me really dangerous, probably a pervert or someone who needs to know the set-up of a typical American house in order to design suicide bomb placement!
The truth is that I know the cutest three-year old girl who absolutely adores Dora the Explora and bought her the globe/software for Christmas.
yep, I'm dangerous all right.
more than they know...
[how's that for a set-up to get the Gestapo agent thinking twice about my profile?]
better go to Amazon.com and check you own profile out. you never know what they might find.
Huckabee wants to take America "back to Christ" over at AmericaBlog.com - of course, this leaves out Jews, Muslims, Hindi, etc, but the bigger problem just may be what kind of Christian is he talking about? There are many types of Christians - Catholic, Episcopal, Baptist, Methodist, etc, or is it just his kind of Christianity?
