Obama's War Surge

[awepittance]

i know you said you would probably respond today karmakramer , but ill be patient :)

 

here is an interesting article that dovetails into what we were talking about earlier

 

For OpEdNews: Ralph Lopez - Writer

 

UK Guardian:

 

A senior Taliban minister has offered a last-minute deal to hand over Osama bin Laden during a secret visit to Islamabad, senior sources in Pakistan told the Guardian last night...

 

 

For the first time, the Taliban offered to hand over Bin Laden for trial in a country other than the US without asking to see evidence first in return for a halt to the bombing, a source close to Pakistan's military leadership said.

 

The Taliban have offered to hand over Bin Laden before but only if sufficient evidence was presented. Bin Laden is wanted both for the September 11 attacks and for masterminding the bombings of two US embassies in East Africa in 1998 in which 224 people were killed. He is also suspected of involvement in other terrorist attacks, including the suicide bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen last year.

 

(edited out for length)

From its first days in office in January of 2001 the Administration of George W. Bush meant to launch military attacks against both Afghanistan and Iraq. The reasons had nothing to do with terrorism.

 

This is beyond dispute. The mainstream press has either ignored the story or missed it completely, but the Administration's congenital belligerence is fully documented elsewhere.

 

Attacking a sovereign nation unprovoked, however, directly violates the charter of the United Nations. It is an international crime. The Bush Administration would need credible justification to proceed with its plans.

 

The terrorist violence of September 11, 2001 provided a spectacular opportunity. In the cacophony of outrage and confusion, the Administration could conceal its intentions, disguise the true nature of its premeditated wars, and launch them. The opportunity was exploited in a heartbeat.

 

Within hours of the attacks, President Bush declared the U.S. "...would take the fight directly to the terrorists," and "...he announced to the world the United States would make no distinction between the terrorists and the states that harbor them." [1] Thus the "War on Terror" was born.

continues here http://www.opednews.com/articles/Obama-Lied-Taliban-Did-No-by-Ralph-Lopez-091202-612.html

 

and another from the BBC saying basically the same stuff here

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/1550366.stm

 

found a good quote from the bbc article

it was doubtful that Washington would drop its plan even if Bin Laden were to be surrendered immediately by the Taleban.

[Guest Spittal]

Obama is nothing more than a con-man.

[cichlisuite]

Bush's administration and countries that have collaborated should have been prosecuted by international laws and authorities as scam politicians and pro-war agitators. they're miss-leading, fact frauding criminals against human rights and country sovereignty. i think we're being witness to the most transparent (or obvious) financial crime campaigns in the history.

 

no other explanations, political critiques or opinions are in place.

 

end of story.

[Guest mafted]

Obama is nothing more than a con-man.

 

How so?

 

Do you think it's really possible to keep 300,000,000 people happy all at the same time?

[Guest mafted]

Bush's administration and countries that have collaborated should have been prosecuted by international laws and authorities as scam politicians and pro-war agitators. they're miss-leading, fact frauding criminals against human rights and country sovereignty. i think we're being witness to the most transparent (or obvious) financial crime campaigns in the history.

 

no other explanations, political critiques or opinions are in place.

 

end of story.

 

Cheney should, anyway.

 

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/cheney/

 

"For three decades Vice President Dick Cheney conducted a secretive, behind-closed-doors campaign to give the president virtually unlimited wartime power. Finally, in the aftermath of 9/11, the Justice Department and the White House made a number of controversial legal decisions. Orchestrated by Cheney and his lawyer David Addington, the department interpreted executive power in an expansive and extraordinary way, granting President George W. Bush the power to detain, interrogate, torture, wiretap and spy -- without congressional approval or judicial review."

 

That, and the lack of WMD's, are why people detest the Bush Administration - not because he beat Gore. The implications of what Cheney did and tried to do are light years more detrimental for America than Obama has even scratched the surface of. It's ridiculous that he's held to the same vitriol as Bush when all he has done, basically, is attempt to fix the messes that he was given. I don't agree with everything Obama does or says but I do think he is at least owed a chance.

[marf]

I like Obama, its just that big business controls politics. How can you really change that?

[delet...]

obama hasn't tried to fix anything in anyway except via rhetorical flourish. It's lipservice on a pig. On the dems biggest progressive domestic issue, one that most of the country favours. He has actively worked against the interests of his party. He's a scumbag. The last real democrat president was carter.

[joshuatxuk]

Bush's administration and countries that have collaborated should have been prosecuted by international laws and authorities as scam politicians and pro-war agitators. they're miss-leading, fact frauding criminals against human rights and country sovereignty. i think we're being witness to the most transparent (or obvious) financial crime campaigns in the history.

 

no other explanations, political critiques or opinions are in place.

 

end of story.

 

Cheney should, anyway.

 

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/cheney/

 

"For three decades Vice President Dick Cheney conducted a secretive, behind-closed-doors campaign to give the president virtually unlimited wartime power. Finally, in the aftermath of 9/11, the Justice Department and the White House made a number of controversial legal decisions. Orchestrated by Cheney and his lawyer David Addington, the department interpreted executive power in an expansive and extraordinary way, granting President George W. Bush the power to detain, interrogate, torture, wiretap and spy -- without congressional approval or judicial review."

 

That, and the lack of WMD's, are why people detest the Bush Administration - not because he beat Gore. The implications of what Cheney did and tried to do are light years more detrimental for America than Obama has even scratched the surface of. It's ridiculous that he's held to the same vitriol as Bush when all he has done, basically, is attempt to fix the messes that he was given. I don't agree with everything Obama does or says but I do think he is at least owed a chance.

 

@ Godwin Austen - That straightforward conclusion is equivalent to Obama's Administration is a group of liberal elitists bent on transforming America into a socialist nation.

 

Don't get me wrong, I think particulary individuals, like Cheney as mentioned, are guilty of obvious corruption charges and misleading the American public on the case for war in Iraq. But I seriously doubt Bush, Colin Powell, or to some degree Rumsfeld went to war to slaughter thousands of civilians, torture whoever they please, and jeopardize the reputation of our country to the worldwide community because they are evil technocrats. If buy into that mentality then you would have to endorse the idea that Obama is a New Order pawn.

 

Iraq wasn't a war fought for oil supply or to fufill endless contracts with defense companies, it was fought because of the misguided neo-conservative policy of Bush dictated we engage in a premptive strike on Iraq to establish a permanent policing mission in the middle east. It's aggressive, pro-war, and I don't agree with it. If we really were bent on fighting terrorists and those guilty for the 9/11 we could do so without nation-building. Obama won't (and can't) bring a new strategy to Aghanistan nor is he fighting "the right war." A surge in Aghanistan will not differ from that in Iraq, in fact it'd likely be less effective. All is he is doing is shifting deployment levels and adding a arguably useless timetable. We should just leave now.

[marf]

Republicans like war, democrats like to fuck up the economy and put computers in schools with lots of black kids

[awepittance]

democrats seem to like war also if memory servers. they did after all vote for the authorization to use force in iraq. When it became trendy for the democratic party to be anti war then all the senators started to change their tune in time for the 2004 election.

 

edit: big business controls politics yes, but there are a few things Obama could do in his presidency with a simple pen to paper that he has failed to do or may never do

 

-repeal don't ask don't tell

-stop the DEA from raiding medical marijuana facilities in states that have passed laws allowing it

-stop defending and propping up the protection of marriage act, this is something we expect republicans to do, not democrats

-stop playing into the George W Bush era of the war on terror, instead take a similar to the approach John Kerry suggested in the 2004 election.

-bringing some form of accountability to people who authorized torture

-instead of just closing Guantanamo, stop the practice of kidnapping people and sending them to prisons that aren;t under US law. Bagram in Afghanistan is now the new Guantanamo.

-stop going around the US justice system to prosecute 'terrorists' we are holding currently. He's prosecuting KSM in federal court, but still having most detainees in a form of limbo indefinite detention

- stop blocking the release of evidence (ie pictures) that will prove without a doubt that torture is not the product of 'a few bad apples' but a widespread systematic policy

[awepittance]

I don't agree with everything Obama does or says but I do think he is at least owed a chance.

 

what is your time frame for 'a chance' ? it's already been one year and developments are not promising (see list above). How long should we wait to complain while Obama emulates Bush behavior?

 

edit: what's dangerous to me about what's happening is that under Bush we accepted that he was doing the things he did because he was a neo-conservative radical who's whitehouse was basically populated by insane people. Now practically the same policies are being carried out and supported by a smart, well spoken, harvard constitutional law professor who is 'pragmatic' . The danger i see in this is that these policies are now being thought of as 'normal' and 'rational' not insane or radical like they once were.

[delet...]

democrats seem to like war also if memory servers. they did after all vote for the authorization to use force in iraq. When it became trendy for the democratic party to be anti war then all the senators started to change their tune in time for the 2004 election.

 

edit: big business controls politics yes, but there are a few things Obama could do in his presidency with a simple pen to paper that he has failed to do or may never do

 

 

-stop the DEA from raiding medical marijuana facilities in states that have passed laws allowing it

 

 

he did this the other week. Told the justice department to not worry about it anymore.

[awepittance]

he did this within the first few months of his presidency also, but the raids kept happening. i think time will tell if his policy is actually genuine or not. I'm willing to concede on that one though ;)

[marf]

Awepittance, thanks for the insight actually. If Obama is so seemingly flaccid why are the republicans so scared of him? I wonder if its just been an opportunity to make a dollar by stoking the fire of fear the right wing public has for a black president. He even kind looks like he could be Cuban. Like you said, he really hasn't done much.

[awepittance]

thats the key question isn't it? what put republicans in such a furvor to think that this man is a 'radical leftist' or a 'socialist' ? is it because he's black? or ist it simply because they can't cope with loosing the whitehouse to a democrat? During Clinton's reign there was a similar hysteria, but not to this degree. Republicans everywhere said bill clinton was a murderer, a communist and a hippy..

 

What's interesting to me about that Glenn Beck vs the whitehouse dynamic, is that in my eyes the ridiciulous level of backlash for him basically doing nothing (or continuing the bush policies) gives him a free pass to actually make drastic sweeping change. How much worse can the insults from the republican camp get? they already think the guy is a secret muslim who pals around with terrorists. they've called him a nazi, hitler, a radical socialist, a communist in masse, and this is not just coming from a minority of the republican party, it's regurgitated on every right wing talk radio show imaginable.

[delet...]

Their hysteria has gone up in proportion to their lack of power. There's less of them there, so those that are have to shout louder sort of thing. Plus that whole idea about their shrinking base leaving them with only the most radical birther stereotype to play to.

[joshuatxuk]

democrats seem to like war also if memory servers. they did after all vote for the authorization to use force in iraq. When it became trendy for the democratic party to be anti war then all the senators started to change their tune in time for the 2004 election.

 

edit: big business controls politics yes, but there are a few things Obama could do in his presidency with a simple pen to paper that he has failed to do or may never do

 

-repeal don't ask don't tell

-stop the DEA from raiding medical marijuana facilities in states that have passed laws allowing it

-stop defending and propping up the protection of marriage act, this is something we expect republicans to do, not democrats

-stop playing into the George W Bush era of the war on terror, instead take a similar to the approach John Kerry suggested in the 2004 election.

-bringing some form of accountability to people who authorized torture

-instead of just closing Guantanamo, stop the practice of kidnapping people and sending them to prisons that aren;t under US law. Bagram in Afghanistan is now the new Guantanamo.

-stop going around the US justice system to prosecute 'terrorists' we are holding currently. He's prosecuting KSM in federal court, but still having most detainees in a form of limbo indefinite detention

- stop blocking the release of evidence (ie pictures) that will prove without a doubt that torture is not the product of 'a few bad apples' but a widespread systematic policy

 

He still hasn't closed Gitmo yet, even if it is a superficial campaign fufillment. I know he's changed his mind since he came into office; the question is was he planning to since before he won or whether the classified material he came across as the new president altered his policy. Extraordinary rendition will continue, it was implemented by Clinton first anyway. The new admin has kept most of the Bush admin's lawyers defending the use of Gitmo and military courts.

 

As for the other stuff, it comes across that he just doesn't have the balls to implement changes. Those are all issues that could seriously sway libertarians like myself to liking him quite a bit. Especially continuing the drug war on the marijuana front; I can't stand anyone who has tried cocaine yet agrees with keeping pot illegal.

[delet...]

Also, the dems really have a shot at change this time. So the repubs must act strong.It doesn't matter if it makes them look like a circus freakshow today or next week. They're playing the long game, just chipping.

[cichlisuite]

@ Godwin Austen - That straightforward conclusion is equivalent to Obama's Administration is a group of liberal elitists bent on transforming America into a socialist nation.

 

Don't get me wrong, I think particulary individuals, like Cheney as mentioned, are guilty of obvious corruption charges and misleading the American public on the case for war in Iraq. But I seriously doubt Bush, Colin Powell, or to some degree Rumsfeld went to war to slaughter thousands of civilians, torture whoever they please, and jeopardize the reputation of our country to the worldwide community because they are evil technocrats. If buy into that mentality then you would have to endorse the idea that Obama is a New Order pawn.

 

Iraq wasn't a war fought for oil supply or to fufill endless contracts with defense companies, it was fought because of the misguided neo-conservative policy of Bush dictated we engage in a premptive strike on Iraq to establish a permanent policing mission in the middle east. It's aggressive, pro-war, and I don't agree with it. If we really were bent on fighting terrorists and those guilty for the 9/11 we could do so without nation-building. Obama won't (and can't) bring a new strategy to Aghanistan nor is he fighting "the right war." A surge in Aghanistan will not differ from that in Iraq, in fact it'd likely be less effective. All is he is doing is shifting deployment levels and adding a arguably useless timetable. We should just leave now.

i agree with you, but i still think it's ignorant to believe that bombing entire country under some vague pretext has any good or legitimate intention behind. they've gained economical and geo-stratetic benefits for a bonus then? what other benefits you think are from 'policing'? why would you want to police (be it diplomatic-way or rocket-way) middle-east in the first place?

[awepittance]

DOJ to the Rescue… of John Yoo

By Scott Horton

 

The Holder Justice Department has filed a sweeping amicus brief in the Padilla v. Yoo case before the Ninth Circuit, seeking to make absolute the immunity granted Justice Department lawyers who counsel torture, disappearings, and other crimes against humanity. The case was brought by Jose Padilla, who claims that he was tortured as the direct result of memoranda written by Yoo, now a law professor at Berkeley. At this stage, the case does not address the factual basis of Padilla’s claims, but documents that have been declassified by the Department of Justice make it clear that the charges have a firm basis in fact. Here’s the portion of the opinion authored by a lifelong Republican, Bush-appointed judge that the Justice Department found so objectionable:

 

Like any other government official, government lawyers are responsible for the foreseeable consequences of their conduct….

 

The Holder Justice Department insists that they are absolutely not responsible, and that they are free to act according to a far lower standard of conduct than that which governs Americans generally. Indeed, this has emerged as a sort of ignoble mantra for the Justice Department, uniting both the Bush and Obama administrations.

 

(edited for length)

 

Finally, there is the question of criminal accountability. In the face of actual criminal investigations, the DOJ has behaved usually like a criminal accused, and intent on obstruction, not like a law enforcement agency. Criminal investigations involving the conduct of Yoo and his fellow torture-memo writers are underway at this moment in a number of foreign jurisdictions, most notably including the two pending criminal cases in Spain. It’s noteworthy that the U.S. Justice Department, presented with letters rogatory from the Spanish court probing into the torture of Spanish citizens at Guantánamo and the role played by DOJ lawyers in this process, elected not to respond. Attorney General Holder traveled to Europe at the outset of his term, promising European justice officials a new era of cooperation. But in the first significant test case, he has continued the Bush-era cover-up of potentially criminal misconduct deep inside the Justice Department.

 

continued here - http://harpers.org/archive/2009/12/hbc-90006184

[chenGOD]

 

- stop blocking the release of evidence (ie pictures) that will prove without a doubt that torture is not the product of 'a few bad apples' but a widespread systematic policy

 

Interestingly enough, I got to see a talk here a couple of weeks ago by Philip Zimbardo (the stanford prison experiment guy). He was asked to testify on behalf of one of the guards who was found guilty of torture or whatever it was they were prosecuting them for. He basically said that it was the lack of oversight, combined with orders from high-ranking CIA employees demanding intel that led to the situation. The torture happened only in one area of Abu Gharib, and happened late at night when no supervising officers were around (there should have been supervising officers on duty all of the time). And I cannot remember if he said all, or most, of the prison guards were reservists. So there were a variety of factors that came into play.

Offtopic, but Dr. Zimbardo is a very nice fellow.

[Guest glasse]

I think Taliban and Al Queda are just the short term objective. The real strategy is here is probably about Iran. We are leaving a lot of equipment in Iraq, which we say we are giving to the new government to help them. Once the UN and NATO decide to go into Iran, we will be all set up to move in from both sides.

[delet...]

yeah, kudos to the bearded amongst us. Plus weren't one or two of the reservists prison guards back at home. (Memory hazy.) At the time that had me wondering about the treatment of US inmates.

[delet...]

I think Taliban and Al Queda are just the short term objective. The real strategy is here is probably about Iran. We are leaving a lot of equipment in Iraq, which we say we are giving to the new government to help them. Once the UN and NATO decide to go into Iran, we will be all set up to move in from both sides.

 

It's not just equipment there are large permanent bases being left behind. It made me chuckle seeing these latest media reports about how they are leaving non-military equipment behind when there troops exit iraq. They never mention the bases ever. It'll still be operation enduring freedom forever.

 

The other stuff they don't mention that they are leaving behind is a devastated iraq, tons of dust particle sized depleted uranium, and fucking no war reparations.

[chenGOD]

Awepittance: your comments re: republicans hating obama. Absolutely spot on. The man's wife could give birth to jesus as a full grown man and the right would complain about it being a black woman who gave birth to their lord and saviour.

 

Also, for those who are interested, there is an article by Samuel Huntington about the "clash of civilizations" which I will upload here. It's a little long for most of you I imagine, but give it a read and then ponder this fact: Huntington has been very influential in white house foreign policy.

Huntington - Clash of Civilizations.rtf