President Barack “Midnight Raid” Obama: End Your Wars at Home and Abroad
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by BAR executive editor Glen Ford
Last week’s FBI raids likely signal that the Obama regime has begun a major campaign to criminalize and crush the Left. Think COINTELPRO, 21st century-style. President Obama, the constitutional rights lawyer who claims the right to kill at will, seeks to strangle the activist opposition to his wars and pro-Wall Street policies. “For targets not marked for oblivion, there awaits a grand jury with boundless powers to ensnare anyone.”
President Barack “Midnight Raid” Obama: End Your Wars at Home and Abroad
by BAR executive editor Glen Ford
“Grand juries are places where rights are butchered, and we can clearly see the broad outlines of a mass prosecution strategy unfolding, in which grand juries are the engines of political destruction.”
Last week’s FBI raids in the Twin Cities, Chicago and Durham, North Carolina amount to a declaration of war on the activist Left, in which grand juries are deployed as omnibus weapons of political persecution under an infinitely expandable anti-terrorism rationale. The constitutional lawyer in the White House has tossed the founding document into the National Security State shredder, as he prepares for global capitalism’s High Noon encounter with – anyone and everyone that resists.
A government that claims the right to kill U.S. citizens without even a whiff of due process and for reasons that are secret to the public and to the victim, has broken with every notion of the rule of law since the Magna Carta. The Obama Justice Department has spent every available hour since Inauguration Day building upon George Bush’s fascist logic in an attempt to fashion a flawless Orwellian police state doctrine in which secrecy and security are entwined like a strand of DNA. For targets not marked for oblivion, there awaits a grand jury with boundless powers to ensnare anyone, absolutely anyone.
The scope of information demanded of some of last week’s FBI victims – demands with which no one can fully comply, such as all records of domestic as well as foreign travel since the year 2000, or a list of all “contacts” that might somehow have bearing on the conflict in Colombia or the Mideast – is naked proof that the intent is to smother, entangle and utterly demobilize the target. The Obama administration is constructing a legal minefield in which any honest activist can be charged with lying to federal officers or a grand jury by commission or omission – each count of which is punishable by years in prison.
“The intent is to smother, entangle and utterly demobilize the target.”
It is not brave, but prudent and self-protective, to refuse to discuss one’s political work or opinions or much of anything at all with FBI agents, as was reportedly the case with all of the recently targeted individuals. But grand juries are places where rights are butchered, and we can clearly see the broad outlines of a mass prosecution strategy unfolding, in which grand juries are the engines of political destruction. As Ron Jacobs wrote in Counterpunch, “There is a grand jury being convened in October 2010 with the intention of perhaps charging some of the people (and maybe others) subpoenaed on September 24. These raids are an attempt by the federal government to criminalize antiwar organizing.”
This is much more serious than merely “harassing” the anti-war movement. The Obama regime would not be going to so much trouble to systematically negate the Constitution just for the fun of it. They have a serious offensive in mind, which may have already begun.
U.S. intelligence services know perfectly well that activists like those raided last week barely have the material resources to put out slim periodicals or keep web sites updated. They cannot possibly provide “material support” to “terrorists” unless political statements against war (or silence in a grand jury) can be construed as, somehow, “support” for those the U.S. government deems terroristic. If the aim is to push anti-war and other social activists to the very edge of the cliff, where they will either shut down or fall into the carefully constructed legal abyss – that’s not harassment, that’s a campaign to “neutralize” the Left, in COINTELPRO terms.
“Those who profit from these wars and U.S. support for oppressive governments like Israel and Colombia hope that by having a Black President, it will discourage African Americans from speaking out in protest against these raids.”
As Black Workers for Justice stated, “We’ve seen these FBI and government raids and attacks on African American leaders and activists during the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. Medgar Evers, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Jr., and members of the Black Panther Party, among others, were assassinated, jailed, beaten and driven into political exile for leading demonstrations and speaking out against racism, U.S. wars and other injustices…. Those who profit from these wars and U.S. support for oppressive governments like Israel and Colombia hope that by having a Black President, it will discourage African Americans from speaking out in protest against these raids, and against attacks on other social justice fighters. Dr. King said that during times like these, ‘We must break our silence!’”
Or, as the Freedom Socialist Party and Radical Women put it, in a joint statement, “the Obama administration is continuing COINTELPRO-type operations the FBI used in the '60s and '70s to divide the movements and smash dissent.”
A friend reminded me that, just as Nixon was thought to be the only U.S. president that could have pulled off the “opening” to China, based on his well-earned reputation as an arch anti-communist, so the First Black President might be the one that unleashes the 21st century police state in all its techno-horror. A Black president with a degree in constitutional law, who can still no do no wrong in the delusional eyes of strong majorities of African Americans, some of whom would remain in his corner even if Obama, himself, knocked down their doors in the wee hours of the morning.
If it is legal for Obama to kill Americans in total secrecy and impunity, with no explanation or even acknowledgement necessary, surely it is a lesser affront to an irrelevant Constitution to strangle the Left with grand juries.
“We demand that President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder order an end to 'police state' tactics by the FBI and other security agencies and that the Justice Department investigate the Sept. 24 raids."
Even Obamite-ridden United for Peace and Justice is upset, although not enough to confront the president, directly. The FBI is “a recidivist agency whose abuses have unfortunately recurred throughout its history,” said UFPJ, lamely. So, this is a problem of one agency, disconnected from the larger administration? What about Obama, the boss-man? The UFPJ will be cheering him and the Democrats on Saturday, October 2, as head of the official “peace table” at the NAACP and Big Labor’s mass rally in Washington, while the United National Anti-War Committee (UNAC), the Black is Back Coalition and tens of thousands of folks that demand an immediate end to U.S. wars of aggression, bailouts of Wall Street, mass Black incarceration, a multi-million jobs public employment program and a halt to U.S. aid to Israel, will form a distinct and separate contingent. By their demands, ye shall know them.
The Green Party was, in its anger, bold enough to mention the president’s name. “We demand that President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder order an end to 'police state' tactics by the FBI and other security agencies and that the Justice Department investigate the Sept. 24 raids," said Theresa El-Amin, Green Party co-chair. "We demand that grand jury investigations and subpoenas in connection with the raids be canceled immediately. We demand that President Obama restore the rule of law and order all security agencies and police forces to cease spying on citizens without obtaining a warrant. We encourage everyone to protest the FBI's lawless and outrageous actions as loudly as possible."
Obama’s newest assault on the Left has generated new demands for the October 2 rally. The San Francisco Labor Council, after resolving that the FBI raids “are reminiscent of the Palmer Raids, McCarthy hearings, J. Edgar Hoover, and COINTELPRO, and mark a new and dangerous chapter in the protracted assault on the First Amendment rights of every union fighter, international solidarity activist or anti-war campaigner, which began with 9/11 and the USA Patriot Act,” put forward a demand to choke the pep rally out of labor’s Democratic cheerleaders: “that this Council urge the AFL-CIO to ensure that denunciation of the FBI raids is featured from the speakers' platform at the October 2, 2010 One Nation march in Washington, DC, possibly by inviting one of those targeted by the raids, for example the SEIU chief steward whose home was raided, to speak at the rally.”
Will the NAACP and Big Labor allow it to happen? By their cowardices and betrayals, ye shall also know them.
BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.
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Comments
great job
this was a really quality article. In theory I’d like to write like this also – taking time and real effort to make a interesting article… but what can I say… I procrastinate a lot and never seem to get it done
Tibi Dress
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Craigslist Baltimore
"This is insanity" - Glen Ford
Ominous new Gallup findings for Democrats: Blacks still love Obama, others not so much
October 4, 2010 | 2:54 am
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2010/10/obama-approval-gallup...
The good news for President Obama is his popular support among blacks is holding steady at 91%.
The bad news is no other group of potential voters likes him that much.
In fact, 29 days before his first midterm elections, the Democrat's approval ratings remain mired below 50%.
A new Gallup Poll this morning finds his approval rating for September was 45%, almost the same as August's 44%. Obama's not exceeded the crucial 50% level in a single month so far this year.
Since Obama's name is not on any ballot Nov. 2, the proportions of Americans who like or dislike the fellow on Oct. 1 of a midterm election year shouldn't matter, in theory. However, history indicates otherwise.
Presidents with approval ratings below 50% at midterm time see their party suffer substantial losses in its congressional membership, regardless of how much explaining and blaming the president attempts in the campaign leading up to what becomes, in effect, a referendum on the president.
And since Democrats currently hold substantial majorities in both the Senate and House of Representatives, they have substantially more seats to lose. A switch of 39 House and 10 Senate seats would give control of both houses to the Republicans for the first time since they lost it in 2007 after 12 years of GOP majorities.
Democrats (79%) and liberals (75%) still like Obama a lot.
But after that, his approval percentage goes to the deep south. Support among even young people is down: 57%. Hispanics: 55%. Moderates: 54%. Unmarrieds: 53%. Easterners: 52%. Women: 47%. Midwesterners and Westerners: 45%.
Men: 43%. Southerners: 41%. Independents: 40%. Marrieds: 39%. Seniors: 38%. Whites: 36%. Conservatives: 23%.
Amazingly, among Republicans Obama still manages to hold the support of 12%.
-- Andrew Malcolm
Good
It's good that he's trying to make things good for everybody. Not only outside but most especially inside the place where we are most vulnerable to war, our home.
Perth tourist guide
US war against democracy
US war against democracy continues in Latin America:
Ecuador President Correa victim of coup attempt on Sept 30. US involvement suspected. See video of story on rt.com (look for story "Failed coup indicates leftist policies rising in Latin America."
For a WTF moment, check out this story:: Iraqi govt agrees to pay 400 million to US citizens who filed claim for distress due to being used as human shields in Saddam's 1990 invasion of Kuwait. This story was reported on Sept 30 Mosaic Middle East news program. Go to linktv.org and click to Mosaic (under news) to watch video of this story.
PRIVILEDGED VICTIMS
Anyone who believes that the fractious and craven entity that some call the government of Iraq decided to make a payout for crimes allegedly committed by the defunct government of the deceased Saddam Hussein without being pressured to do so by the U.S. and its other Western benefactors is living in a dream world. I am willing to bet that the former "human shields" get their 400 million from the puppet Iraqi "government" long before the Black farmers in this country see dime one of the so-called settlement which they allegedly have with this government. Like everything else it touches, America has managed to create a hierarchy of victims in which some victims are more priviledged than others.
Don't seek relief from Holder
“We demand that President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder order an end to 'police state' tactics by the FBI and other security agencies and that the Justice Department investigate the Sept. 24 raids."
Excellent information from Mr. Ford, Enlightened Cynic, and the other usual suspects. BAR’s readers are an extension of the journal’s excellent staff.
Seeking support from Mr. Holder is futile. He’s the Manchurian Candidate’s hit man. And the material support provision of The Patriot Act is one of the most insidious pieces of legislation in the U.S.’s sordid history.
1. President-elect Barack Obama’s choice to be attorney general, Eric Holder, represented Cincinnati-based Chiquita International, the banana giant that paid $1.7 million to the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC), a group designated by the United States as a terrorist group. Moreover, Holder, as the attorney for Chiquita, may have been aware of arms and ammunition shipments to the AUC, which was involved in massacring Colombian peasants and union activists.
(http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_4051.shtml)
2. WASHINGTON - June 21 - Today, the Supreme Court, in Holder v. Humanitarian Law Project, upheld the extremely broad application of federal laws that prohibit material support for designated terrorist groups. The lawsuit challenged the application of the "material support" laws to organizations and individuals who seek to provide peacebuilding and human rights training to groups designated as terrorist organizations. Writing for a total of six justices, Chief Justice Roberts today rejected this challenge, finding that the application of the material support statutes to punish these groups' pure speech that seeks to further lawful, non-violent ends does not run afoul of the Constitution. Although the Court agreed that the statute's regulation of speech must be subject to a demanding level of scrutiny, the Court found that these sweeping restrictions were justified by the Government's interests in combating terrorism.
(http://www.ucimc.org/content/constitution-project-dismayed-
supreme-courts-rejection-constitutional-challenge-provisions-m)
"MEET THE NEW BOSS"
I'm still tripping about the fact that no major Black institutions, let alone the so-called Black president has come down hard on the FBI after it leaked out that they consider historically Black colleges to be places which require intensive surveillance. Apparently, anytime America sees a group of blacks assembled at any place for any reason, a rebellion or riot must be in the making. I guess that in 2010 America, the "law enforcement" community still sees suppression of Blacks as one of its primary duties. Once a slave, always a slave. COINTELPRO never died, over the years, successive governments under the control of both of the two major parties of course, have made most of the outrageous behavior that "our" government was involved during the 1950's 1960's and the 1970's both internationally and domestically, legal. The same constitution that allowed slavery and jim crow has always contained provisions which allow the government; federal, state, and local to assume dictatorial powers during an emergency. Once this government claimed to be involved in a forever war with some elements of Islam, and that all who oppose the policies of Western powers in other parts of the world are either enemy combatants or sympathizers, it was open season on all forms of dissent. The Who sang about the phenomenon of "revolutions" which fail to bring about actual change way back in the 1960's. Time (and the Obama administration) have shone that their cynicism was right on the mark.
In a nutshell....
"COINTELPRO never died, over the years, successive governments under the control of both of the two major parties of course, have made most of the outrageous behavior that "our" government was involved during the 1950's 1960's and the 1970's both internationally and domestically, legal."
That pretty much sums it up Peasehead, you hit the nail on the head with that summation. I thought the (Frank) Church Commission made assassination illegal? If we wanted to "overthrow Sadaam Hussein" if we wanted "regime change" then why didn't we just our assassination squads now roaming the planet along with the Israelis to do it? Why did we have to destroy one of the oldest civilizations on earth and destabilize the world in the process? AND, actually make America weaker? Americans are the biggest dolts on the planet. The land of Cognitive Dissonance.
A FLOOD OF DRONES
Our government must think that Pakistanis are even more dumb than Americans. For the last several weeks, the mainstream press has been running articles which brag about how much the amount of U.S. aid to flood-ravaged Pakistan is increasing while simultaneously reporting (without a trace of irony) that drone strikes (which are not legal and which often kill innocent civilians) have increased exponentially at the same time. Cynic that I am, I always suspected that the sole purpose of the increased aid was a lame attempt to squash public criticism by Pakistanis of drone strikes and special operations mischief on the ground within the borders of their allegedly sovereign nation. It looks like the heavy handedness of Obama's CIA has made the success of this "hearts and minds" effort even more unlikely.
Great
It's a good thing this man really tries his best to make things good for everybody. If you solve your crises at home, it will not be long until you can solve your country's bigger worries.
corporate and wedding band perth
Antiwar Groups to Obama: "Thanks for nothing, asshole"
http://original.antiwar.com/kevin-b-zeese/2010/09/29/obama-continues-bus...
"The escalation of wars abroad by the Obama administration is moving forward alongside escalation against antiwar activists at home. The groups targeted in the most recent raids in Illinois and Minnesota, while Marxist in ideology, endorsed and supported the election of President Obama."
This is an excellent article and also provides some means of lodging your protests against these draconian raids.
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/9/27/fbi_raids_homes_of_anti_war
"By the Power invested to me under the US. Constitution.."
I hereby declare you ALL, you anti-war, anti-imperialists dissenters to be "Enemies of the State." I hereby invoke the State's Secret Act and the "Unitary Executive Theory," and by promulgating this Presidential Finding, not subject to judical review, (in fact we deny it's existence--"no comment") that you are subject to "extermination" when and whereever found. "Due Process" you ask? Fuck due process, the process that is due is what I find due in my inestimable and non-reviewable judgment. I'm the goddamn President, after all." (Executive Clemency is granted E.C.)
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/radio/2010/09/28/assas...
(On a side note, there's a new biography out on "investigative reporter" Jack Anderson. It seems the Nixon Dirty Trickers actually gave serious consideration to assassinating Anderson who was engaged in a fierce battle with Nixon. Charles Colson and other maggots met with the CIA's poison expert among others to discuss assassination techniques. No shit folks, it was on NPR this morning. "The more things change....").
http://us.macmillan.com/poisoningthepress
"Democracy?" There is no damn democracy, if there ever was one. All smokes and mirrors. Even the establishment types are getting fed up with this shit.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/09/30/lobbying-dc-lobbyists_n_744878....
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/09/30-10
Add to the corporate control the fact that the Pentagon runs this country and you have full blown fascism. There has been no political dissent in this country for years. Whether it was a 20 something white college student questioning Kerry getting snagged, or the disgruntled and disaffected protesting G7 or RNC or DNC conventions, or whether the routine establishment of "free speech zones" all around the country. Or local law enforcement authorities in the Gulf covering up BP's crimes by denying reporters, local government officials, scientists, enviromentalist and the public access to BP's "cleanup operations." And people have to nerve to ask, "who you gonna vote for." Don't make me get laugh so hard I get a hernia people.
Didn't yall know, "We are all Georgians now?" Or is that Russia or the Soviet Union? (Except our Gulags are all over the planet and air conditioned).
http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2008/08/12/4431528-mccain-we-are-al...
p.s. Obama was in my neck of the woods yesterday, talking to the 98% of white folks that constitutes Des Moines; my local paper headline (perhaps the national one also??) based upon his visit is: Obama says, "we're on the right path." lol I knew that'd get a chuckle out of yall. Laugh your hearts out kiddies, the opportunities for such are dwindling, next week you'll be "Enemy Combatants," subject to the might and majesty of the US Gummint.
p.s.s. First rule of law school and the basis of soverign immunity and eminent domain: "The King can do no wrong." The (Con)stitutional scholar forgot to tell yall that. lol
As with Bush,
with Obama every month or couple of months there seems to be some new critical point where one wonders how anyone with a sincerely working mind at all can fail to see the dire straits we are in with this man, and with the system he represents.
But two days after the raids I got a mass email from an 'alternapundit' calling on the Antiwar movement to support the Democrats. I couldn't help but respond with reference to the raids, and after an extended email exchange, basically got called an extremist for my troubles.
After it was over I felt sick for a while. How can someone so committed to dishonest partisan apologetics live with themselves? But it seems that the rallying cry of "pragmatism" soothes any pangs of conscience or doubt.
I noticed the timing of the raids. I remember the 1960s...
The good news is that they can't lock everyone up if people resist. Can't get everyone fired, etc. I remember hearing William Moses Kunstler Esq. say that the police state was here in the 1990s not too long before he died. I also noticed a story on a rare "stop" on the dial at NPR news and same on commercial radio, about a week ago, citing some baloney about "radicals" in the U.S. The word "radicals" was bait....
Well
Thank you Glenn and enlightened cynic. We're screwed, black and white, yellow and red.
Do Democratic Party "Loyalists" need any more evidence??
Goodness gracious... the Peace Laureate and Constitutional Scholar, the former Editor of the "Haaa vud" Law Review has brought the Police State into full bloom. There was an astute blogger whose handle I forgot who once wrote, and I'm paraphrasing, "historical and social currents/events that used to evolve over a generation are now evolving faster." I've always shared that feeling, but frankly, didn't think matters would evolve THIS rapidly. I thought it would take the next election cycle for Tea Party and Republican Thugs and Xenophobes to complete the trifecta. Little did we know the Peace Laureate beat them to it.
If an intellectually honest person took a look into the mirror and a step back, how could they not conclude that Obama is indeed worse than George W. Bush. More likable than George no doubt, but a fucking monster on policy. Isn't the evidence fairly conclusive that Obama has stretched Bush's "Unitary Executive Theory" to the point of no return? Anyone who wants to bother themselves with the proof can find it on many blogs, ones like BAR, Antiwar.com, Chris Floyd and Glenn Greenwald. As a lawyer, Greenwald masterfully dissects the policy and legal implications of Obama's actions, (and he's an excellent media critic as well). I'm not going to sit here at this time to give a litany of links, I'm sure I will later out of sheer frustration,-- to drive the point home.
But I ask all "inquiring minds": What more EVIDENCE do you need to see that the 'anti-war Candidate is as Beverly states a Manchurian Candidate? Is there any one here who deny's his escalated and unleashed the US military and corresponding security appartuses,-- CIA, HLS, ICE, Pentagon,-- in ways not seen since US Gunboat Diplomacy era? The Peace Laureate has even pushed the envelop by conducting military operations in the South China Sea, re-arming Georgia, and let's not forget how they sanctioned Zelaya's coup, or put 80 warships in Costa Rica last month. DON'T GET ME STARTED GODDAMNIT!! Africom, Somalia, Sudan, Ugandan troops, record arms sales to the Saudi's? WTF??? And I haven't even mentioned leaving 50,000 combat troops in Iraq which he turned into peace keepers by clicking his heels twice, or sending 30,000 troops on a fool's errand in Afghanistan. And the shit-hole media won't tell you that with each troop increase OR DECREASE, there is an corresponding INCREASE IN BLACKWATER , MIC contractors. Who do yall think guards the US State Dept. staff?
The point of this MINOR litany, is that the Peace Laureate is committed to the US War machine, "till death do we part," and to that end, the "antiwar President" is now unleashing the dogs on antiwar-protesters. I said, jokingly, several months ago, that BAR would be targeted for "giving aid and support" to so-called "terrorists," welll... my friends were are truly on the threshold, the precipice ,and it won't be too long that "free speech zones" are expanded to the internet or speech (written, spoken, etc.) that is anathema to militarism or corporatism (it's evil twin) will be CRMINIALIZED by the Peace Laureate and (Con) Law Scholar. McCarthy would be so proud.
WHAT MORE EVIDENCE DO FENCE SITTING PEOPLE NEED!!!! to understand Obama, to grasp that this "lesser evil" bullshit is just that, bullshit???
I won't even address, not at this time anyway, that Obama has proven to be more dangerous than Bush because Bush generated active protest, strong reactions and dissents, some friggen fight while Obama dismissed the "Progressives" and "Leftists" in front of his rich friends, but schmoozes them up in his campaign chats and turns them into gutless wimps. Greenwald breaks that down to. Obama has eviscerated the Dummocratic Party or at least what's left of it's 'progressive" influence, and he's marganilized the ENTIRE "Left" in the process, while cultivating and providing succor to the Right Wing.
What a wonderful and bloodless "coup de etat?" Pulled off by one of the emptiest suits of all time, even Court Scribe Bob Woodward talks about how the Generals punked his little ass, handcuffed the little twerp, OR, is OBAMA JUST DOING OBAMA? What a sorry individual coupled with a sorry-ass excuse by his "supporters." "Huge Sigh...." "If only they would let Obama be Obama."
Aha,.. that's it, that's the ticket for 2012 folks, fuck "Hope and Change," that didn't work, the new slogan and game is: "If Only they Would Let Obama be Obama. Give the Peace Laureate another chance, 2012 will be different folks." I'm gonna change, please believe me. LOL
Glenn Greenwald seems to be
Glenn Greenwald seems to be sitting this one out, and if he does, I will judge him by it. Not that that will mean anything other than to me, but still...
For a minute anyway...
I would wage he'll definitely get around to it. I believe he's in one of those book deadline phases and doing some appearances. I look for some response regarding the raids next week, here's what he posted today, still very relevant to this discussion:
Andrew Sullivan quotes from an excellent column by Alex Massie in The Spectator. Massie points to Obama's assassination program and writes: "you can make an argument that Obama's actions are worse than Bush's since a) he wasn't charged with cobbling together a security framework in the confused, panicked aftermath of 9/11 and b) he actually, you know, once campaigned against quite a lot of this stuff." Andrew, basically objecting to Massie's claim, makes several points in response that merit attention and, at least for me, prompt various questions. Andrew:
But a single American al Qaeda terrorist in a foreign country actively waging war against us seems to me to be a pretty isolated example.
First, Awlaki is most certainly not a singular case. Obama's "hit list" has at least four Americans on it; Awlaki is the only one whose identity we know. From The Washington Post's Dana Priest in January: "After the Sept. 11 attacks, Bush gave the CIA, and later the military, authority to kill U.S. citizens abroad . . . . The Obama administration has adopted the same stance. . . . . As of several months ago, the CIA list included three U.S. citizens, and an intelligence official said that Aulaqi's name has now been added."
Excerpt from article:
Greenwald: Also, the language Andrew uses -- "a hot and dangerous war" -- implies that the person being targeted is involved in some sort of active hostilities at the time we kill him. But that's not the case. The kill order permits them to be targeted no matter what they are doing at the moment the drone lands on their head: sleeping, playing with their children, riding in a car with their parents, anything else far away from a battlefield. Besides torture, if the President has the authority to order American citizens killed without a shred of due process under those circumstances, what doesn't he have the power to do provided he simply accuses them of being an Al Qaeda Terrorist? I spent years asking that question during the Bush/Cheney era without getting an answer -- Al Gore asked the same question in 2006: "under the theory by which these acts are committed, are there any acts that can on their face be prohibited?" -- and sadly, the question is every bit as relevant now."
If the President can torture and assassinate anyone he deems an A.Q. terrorist (without evidence or shred of fact), AND he can have his FBI and Homeland Security goons break into your homes for "giving material support" to terrorists, then there are no FUCKING PROHIBITIONS ON WHAT HE CAN DO!! The concept of "free speech" is absolutely dead. What if I write in my local opinion page, "Israel is a racist, terrorist-centered state and Hizbollah is valid resistance movement, so is Hamas." Or that Chavez is a hero and model for social reform. What if I pass out pamplets at Awlaki's trial (assuming we know wtf it is) decrying the Government's action's? What does that make me? America the Beautiful, free, unfettered speech for corporations, criminalization of free speech for ordinary citizens. What a clusterfuck.
My oh my, and Black folks sit up here wondering if Eddie Long is bi-sexual and whether Obama will be re-elected in 2012. lol
I doubt if Greenwald will let this slide, it's too juicy to pass. Let's see if he writes about it next week. In the meantime, the Prez is:
"making a list and checking it twice, gonna find out who's naughty or nice..." Three more people on that list folks (at least the short list WaPo claims they know about, the longer one is in the shelf drawer), could it be YOU??
Unfortunately Cointelpro
Unfortunately Cointelpro didn't end in the 1970s - at least not in Seattle. In 1981 the FBI collaborated with Marcos agents to gun down Filipino cannery workers and union organizers Domingo and Viernes. Then then infiltrated and broke up CISPES - twice - and the Seattle chapter of ISO. And subjected white supporters of the African American Heritage Museum to intensive covert harassment. I write about all this in my recent memoir THE MOST REVOLUTIONARY ACT: MEMOIR OF AN AMERICAN REFUGEE (www.stuartbramhall.com). I presently live in exile in New Zealand.
The Manchurian Candidate
The Manchurian Candidate strikes again. Wayne Madsen's expose' about Obummer and family's CIA ties explains a lot about the president's wicked ways. Thanks, BAR reader Cynical Negro, for providing the link to Madsen's article (and the Dick Gregory You Tube videos about MLK's murder).
The question now is how do we stop the Manchurian Candidate from turning this place into a totalitarian state? Also, how do we convince the 99% of gullible dumbass citizens of either political stripe to fight against the govt's fascist onslaught?
how: hopefully using the ways folks did it before and some new
ways. #1: remember those like Howard Zinn whose autobio, You Can't Be Neutral on A Moving Train is practically a handbook of dissent, even if one just reads the introduction. There's lot online in print, video by Zinn www.howardzinn.org and he remained an optimist until he died. (I was sursprised that recently the FBI released 600 pages of crap about him from the late 1940s, surprised that they were following/watching him then.) Fear is what the FBI et al hopes to foster. They'll do harm to activists but while I am not the optimist that Zinn was (I knew him a bit by mail.), I think people can resist. Some tune out. Some quit.
P.S. I just got the movie "The Manchurian Candidate" on dvd for $6. I saw it "real time" and don't remember it exactly, but I'm not sure Obama is an exact parallel and I recall that's what the Right wing was calling him around the election, 2008. It is again, a Democrat doing what Dems would be screaming about if done by a Republican president. I have to do some reading about the Church Committee in Congress. There was a reference by Collen Rowley on Dem.Now a couple of days ago in discussing the raids. Yes, I know, this Congress is a batch of ....(I don't swear in print.) PPS My newest art was done just prior and made a reference to "Stasi NYC?" but it may be too subtle. Earliest "feedback" from a few who rec'd the art only commented on my street photos used in the art.