You want scandal? How about this?.
Because nothing says "freedom" quite like a government covertly assassinating its own citizens.
Because nothing says "freedom" quite like a government covertly assassinating people.
Fixed that for you. Saying anything else is hypocrisy.
Not really. A nation is by definition admitting to its tribalism, people on the inside get treated one way and people on the outside get treated another.
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"I would suggest you should have had a far more responsible father."a disgusting comment.
I don't know, it's like...
Mini-Rant on the War on Terror
So, 9/11 comes along and all of a sudden they ram through a bunch of attacks on domestic civil liberties and international human rights in the name of anti-terrorism and completely unprecedented police state measures like warrantless wiretapping, torture, drone assassinations, rendition, prosecutions under the frickin' Espionage Act, etc., etc. become the new norm.
And it seems reasonable, because, hey, it's only to get al-Qaeda.
But then they start doing things like using Homeland Security to spy on Occupy. And then they start prosecuting ex-CIA dudes who whistleblew about torture under Bush II. And then it turns out that something like one-third of all prosecutions in the United States on terrorism charges post 9/11 have been basically dudes set up by the FBI. And then it turns out they can declare martial law in a major American city and basically nobody says shiznit.
But, hey, you know, it's to get the terrorists, it's to get al-Qaeda.
And then Christopher Stevens gets blown up by "our" al-Qaeda-connected allies in Libya (who were mad at Qadaffi, btw, because he tortured a bunch of them at the behest of the CIA) in what appears to be the middle of him secretly arranging weapons transfers to "our" al-Qaeda-connected allies in Syria (while "we" are lying through "our" teeth and saying no such thing is happening).
And at some point you've just got to come to the conclusion that the government is lying every other time it opens its mouth; and that you gave away a bunch of your rights so that the US gov't could go rampaging around the world pulling cloak and dagger shiznit with the same people that you allegedly gave up your rights to fight. But you'll never know about it until 90 days after it's happened because it's classified information and they prosecute the whistleblowers who reveal their dirty secrets.
TL;DR--When the American government says it is only killing people giving aid, comfort, or information to an organization trying to kill Americans, when they themselves are giving said organization aid, comfort and guns, I see no pressing reason to believe them.
I disagree with you in places. But I can't help but to respect your argument overall.
Not really. A nation is by definition admitting to its tribalism, people on the inside get treated one way and people on the outside get treated another.You want scandal? How about this?.
Because nothing says "freedom" quite like a government covertly assassinating its own citizens.
Because nothing says "freedom" quite like a government covertly assassinating people.
Fixed that for you. Saying anything else is hypocrisy.
So it's okay if a few "hadjis" die, but not if the victims are US citizens?
What'd you call that?
So it's okay if a few "hadjis" die, but not if the victims are US citizens?
What'd you call that?
Tribalism.
Since we've gotten back into this, what do people think about the announcements today about the drone program?
Moving it to the Pentagon can only be a good thing. I don't actually trust the military not to abuse it, but they can't be worse than the CIA.
Getting a little more clarity on what the criteria will be and maybe a little oversight will be good as well.
I'd rather see the program ended, but even baby steps help.
I've been reading about Colonel James Steele, lately, so I'm not terribly thrilled about it.
Recently, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) and the Guardian newspaper have highlighted the widespread torture and assassinations by the U.S. at the height of the occupation of Iraq. A BBC documentary released in March, Searching for Steele, recounts the central role of the U.S. in setting up and funding “Special Police Commandos” (SPC) to quell the Sunni insurgency against the occupation. These Commandos developed into Shi’ite-dominated death squads. The country descended into a sectarian civil war that by some accounts has claimed the lives of 100,000 Iraqis.
A slew of recent works of investigative journalism illustrate that the machinery of U.S. state terror is passed relatively seamlessly between Democratic and Republican administrations. In a review of Jeremy Scahill’s new book, Dirty Wars: The World Is a Battlefield, his fellow Nation writer Tom Engelhardt describes how imperialist Commanders-in-Chief Bush and Obama “transformed an increasingly militarized CIA, a hush-hush crew called the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), and a shiny new ‘perfect weapon’ and high-tech fantasy object, the drone, into the president’s own privatized military” (Nation, 23 April).
The BBC documentary focuses on one James Steele, an army colonel whose career shows in microcosm that, in order to intimidate and quell an entire population, the imperialists must resort to indiscriminate terror. A specialist in the dark arts of counterinsurgency, Steele is a shadowy figure who began his career during the Vietnam War. He then served in the 1980s as an adviser in the U.S. imperialists’ dirty wars in El Salvador, Nicaragua, Panama and who knows where else in Central America, overseeing local anti-Communist death squads. For a couple of years starting in 2003, Steele was brought out of retirement to serve as a consultant to the Bush administration and U.S. military tops in Iraq.
At the outset of the occupation in 2003, the U.S. rulers disbanded the Iraqi military and attempted to build a new one from scratch. It became apparent that this was a fiasco as the new recruits began deserting and retreating en masse when confronted by effective insurgent fighters. The most sophisticated and best-organized elements of the diffuse insurgency were Sunni, exemplified by the revolt in Falluja in 2004. To counter this armed resistance, the Iraqi puppet government formed the SPC, initially made up of former members of Hussein’s special forces and Republican Guard. Impressed by the caliber of these fighters, General David Petraeus—whom Obama appointed to head the CIA in April 2011—created a $2 billion fund to provide them arms, ammunition and supplies.
Drawing on his experience in Central America, Steele was called in to advise this force and help run a network of “interrogation centers” across Iraq. Former prisoners at these facilities and war logs turned over to WikiLeaks have recounted some of the methods by which prisoners were interrogated: electric shocks; rape and sexual molestation; amputations; burning with acid; beatings with shovels, cables and chains; stomping on prisoners’ heads; hanging them by their hands until their shoulders were dislocated and pulling their ears with pliers. Steele had lengthy meetings with the leader of the SPC, requested that specific detainees be interrogated, and was regularly present at the main interrogation center where the machinery of torture ground on and on. The U.S. military gave its imprimatur in June 2004 when it directed troops not to investigate acts of torture by Iraqis on Iraqis.
As the insurgency grew, Washington stepped up its divide-and-rule policy, inflaming conflicts between Shi’ite and Sunni Muslims. In early 2004, the ban on Shi’ite militias joining the SPC was lifted and commandos were drawn increasingly from militias such as the Badr Brigades, which had scores to settle with the Sunnis going back at least to Hussein’s brutal, decades-long rule. By the spring of 2005, the SPC was 5,000 strong and had established a fearsome reputation on the streets of Iraqi cities. In Samarra, the heart of the Sunni insurgency, the SPC conducted a citywide raid, going door-to-door and packing hundreds of people off to its torture facilities. In September 2005, Steele sent a memo to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld stating that the SPC was essentially a Shi’ite militia involved in “death squad activities”—as surely he would know.
Alongside the SPC, the secretive, elite U.S. military force known as Joint Special Operations Command was operating independently inside Iraq. A JSOC team of roughly 1,000 had entered the country before the U.S. invasion in order to hunt down “high-value targets.” As the invasion got underway, the special ops forces in the war zone were given wide latitude, and JSOC engaged in wholesale massacres during the U.S. army’s march to Baghdad.
JSOC ran the most infamous torture facility in Iraq out of a Hussein-era military base near the Baghdad airport called Camp NAMA, an acronym for “Nasty-Ass Military Area.” Prisoners brought to this facility were subjected to severe beatings, sleep deprivation, sexual humiliation, electric shocks and burns. The SPC and JSOC developed as two prongs of the imperialists’ counterinsurgency strategy in Iraq, with JSOC a technologically sophisticated death squad that would become an integral part of Obama’s “war on terror” around the world. Its kill list would grow accordingly.
I disagree with you in places. But I can't help but to respect your argument overall.
That's all I want, Comrade Freehold, just a little respect. And an end to racist depictions of goblins in Pathfinder materials. And a goblin lass to settle down with and raise a family...
That's all I want, Comrade Freehold, just a little respect. And an end to racist depictions of goblins in Pathfinder materials.
You mean they should be elevated to a Core PC race?
And a goblin lass to settle down with and raise a family...
That one you have to do on your own.
nd an end to racist depictions of goblins in Pathfinder materials. And a goblin lass to settle down with and raise a family...
It's not racist if it is factually accurate.
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And an end to racist depictions of goblins in Pathfinder materials. And a goblin lass to settle down with and raise a family...It's not racist if it is factually accurate.
Not really.
Tell it like it is, brother! Let everybody know!
I thought about your question some more, Comrade Jeff, and I think I am a little chilled by the prospect of what, at least, was considered a secret policy that they had to keep hush hush and now they can "normalize" drone assassinations and make it seem like it's just a regular part of warfare.
[Shudders]
Actually, a small race that is neither slow, nor excessively cute would be a good addition.
Huh... an offtopic post that wandered on topic for the pathfinder game...
In the advanced race guide there is an option for halflings to trade their +2 to climb and acrobatics for a 30 foot movement rate. Given that the 30 foot movement rate is effectively a +4 to their acrobatics rolls, it should be a no brainer to take. EVERY pc halfling should have a 30 foot movement now.
You guys are talking about hobbitses when the topic is obviously goblins. Where is Comrade Freehold?
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I acknowledge your point, but that's not what we're discussing right now. Andrew R seems convinced that Obama promised that he wouldn't do this (prosecute leaks of sensitive information), when in fact he promised nothing of the sort, because that would have been insane.Just to make sure: Citizen R. is this what you are convinced of?
Im convinced he promised the most transparent administration and instead is harassing the press and assassinating citizens.
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Don't be afraid to include an apostrophe here or there.
Im convinced he promised the most transparent administration and instead is harassing the press and assassinating citizens.I acknowledge your point, but that's not what we're discussing right now. Andrew R seems convinced that Obama promised that he wouldn't do this (prosecute leaks of sensitive information), when in fact he promised nothing of the sort, because that would have been insane.Just to make sure: Citizen R. is this what you are convinced of?
Yeah, that's what I thought.
I wanted to make sure my conflicting pre-existing antipathies weren't coloring my reading comprehension skills.
Down with Obama!
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Im convinced he promised the most transparent administration and instead is harassing the press and assassinating citizens.I acknowledge your point, but that's not what we're discussing right now. Andrew R seems convinced that Obama promised that he wouldn't do this (prosecute leaks of sensitive information), when in fact he promised nothing of the sort, because that would have been insane.Just to make sure: Citizen R. is this what you are convinced of?Yeah, that's what I thought.
I wanted to make sure my conflicting pre-existing antipathies weren't coloring my reading comprehension skills.
Down with Obama!
In all fairness down with damn near all politicians. Seems no one that wants the job deserves it.
Im convinced he promised the most transparent administration and instead is harassing the press and assassinating citizens.I acknowledge your point, but that's not what we're discussing right now. Andrew R seems convinced that Obama promised that he wouldn't do this (prosecute leaks of sensitive information), when in fact he promised nothing of the sort, because that would have been insane.Just to make sure: Citizen R. is this what you are convinced of?
This probably is the most transparent administration in the history of the country.
And, like others who've chimed in similarly, I don't see a significant moral difference between kill strikes on foreign nationals engaged in terrorism abroad, and kill strikes on U.S. citizens engaged in terrorism abroad.
This probably is the most transparent administration in the history of the country.Im convinced he promised the most transparent administration and instead is harassing the press and assassinating citizens.I acknowledge your point, but that's not what we're discussing right now. Andrew R seems convinced that Obama promised that he wouldn't do this (prosecute leaks of sensitive information), when in fact he promised nothing of the sort, because that would have been insane.Just to make sure: Citizen R. is this what you are convinced of?If true, that's a very sad comment on this country.
If it's even close, it's still very sad.
I don't mean "transparent" in the sense that this is a government which no longer keeps secrets. And Obama didn't mean that either.
What was meant by "transparency" is the idea that we, as citizens, have a much greater level of access to the goings-on of the government. Part of this is naturally due to the expansion of internet use, and the decision to utilize the internet as an avenue of information to the general public. Part of it is a commitment to publicizing information that was simply not publicized previously. Part of it is an effort to organize information about the government in a way that can be accessed by anyone.
Governments - at least, governments that can be considered world powers - cannot be transparent in the sense that they do not keep secrets. Powerful governments must have the capability to restrict access to certain information that they deem vital to their own security and well-being. But, outside that scope, it behooves us to make our government as open as possible to engage ordinary civilians, because a democratic government works best when its people are actively involved in their own governance.
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Im convinced he promised the most transparent administration and instead is harassing the press and assassinating citizens.This probably is the most transparent administration in the history of the country.
And, like others who've chimed in similarly, I don't see a significant moral difference between kill strikes on foreign nationals engaged in terrorism abroad, and kill strikes on U.S. citizens engaged in terrorism abroad.
I, of course, am a revolutionary internationalist to the core, but I thought these comments by Jeremy Scahill above were worth considering:
"So, I mean, I really think that Congress needs to step it up and ask how these Americans were killed. But I also think that, on both a moral level and, my understanding, also on a legal level, it really is irrelevant whether they’re Americans or not Americans. Why I think it’s important to focus on these cases is because how a society will treat its own citizens is a good indicator of how it’s going to treat noncitizens around the world. And if the basic standards of due process are not being afforded to American citizens, then they certainly are not going to be afforded to non-American citizens. So I see this as a very high-stakes issue that we’re facing right now, and we have a Congress that largely is failing to ask the right questions."
Also, I would like to point out that the question isn't really about killing those engaged in terrorism. It's about killing those the Obama administration accuses of being engaged in terrorism. Like the victims of "signature strikes" where all militarily-aged men are considered terrorists, and when they're killed, they're counted as terrorists. Like Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, who had an irresponsible father, who the government has never presented any evidence against except for youtube videos of him preaching against the West. Etc., etc.
As for the secrets that all world powers must keep and Obama's transparent administration, let's take a look at some of these secrets again:
--The evidence against Anwar al-Awlaki.
--Why Abdulrahman al-Awalaki was killed.
--The fact that Jude Kenan Mohammad was killed two years ago.
--The fact that the US was helping supplying weapons to the Syrian rebels for a whole year while Obama was saying they weren't.
--The DOJ White Paper justifying the assassination of American citizens.
--The very existence of the Obama Kill List.
Etc., etc.
Even if it is more transparent than previous administrations (and I'm not even sure if that's true --"In some ways, his administration is even worse than the Bush team when it comes to abusing the privilege of secrecy". says the NYT), then Comrade Jeff is correct: it's very sad.
Chris Matthews discusses why the IRS scandal will hurt the government.
Overall, I think Matthews is right. Even though, as wolf and meat point out, you can argue the scrutiny is deserved because almost everyone abuses that particular tax exempt designation, the public doesn't care about that. They don't because the IRS is the most feared agency in the federal government. People put up with it because they trust the agency plays fair.But calling that trust into question puts into jeopardy faith in the federal government. The left is frustrated by this and because Obama doesn't seem to be willing to fire people. He probably doesn't like direct confrontation.
There are reports that the scandal was brewing for awhile, but Obama says that he only just learned of it. If true this means his people shelter him from bad news and confrontation.
Management 101, if you can't handle firing people, then you have to give the power to someone else who will do the job.
Firing people? You mean like Steven Miller, the acting IRS commissioner and Joseph Grant, commissioner of the agency's tax-exempt and government entities division?
Technically they resigned, but at that level that's pretty much how it works. Or does Obama really have to hold a press conference and say "You're Fired" for it to count?Or should he have fired them before the audit and investigation was done? "Oh there are rumors of scandal, fire someone!!!"
I do agree that this is going to hurt, mostly because people already dislike the IRS and are willing to believe bad things about it.
Problem is Steve Miller was resigning in early June anyway according to reports, so that comes across as the lightest of wrist slaps.
And Joseph Grant is retiring, so presumably he still gets all his benefits and pension, so again, no punishment.
Matthews was...
Actually, we made strong laws to protect the bureaucrats specifically from firing in instances like this to prevent corruption. We need to protect them from being replaced for political reasons, and this witch hunt certainly applies. You need to show deliberate severe misconduct on their part (which to my knowledge hasn't happened), and until the investigation is complete, we wont have that. This investigation could take years. Obama has no power to fire anyone that is not a political appointee without a battle in the courts.
Obama has no power to fire anyone that is not a political appointee without a battle in the courts
Something people have either forgotten or just don't realize.
Im convinced he promised the most transparent administration and instead is harassing the press and assassinating citizens.This probably is the most transparent administration in the history of the country.
And, like others who've chimed in similarly, I don't see a significant moral difference between kill strikes on foreign nationals engaged in terrorism abroad, and kill strikes on U.S. citizens engaged in terrorism abroad.
I, of course, am a revolutionary internationalist to the core, but I thought these comments by Jeremy Scahill above were worth considering:
"So, I mean, I really think that Congress needs to step it up and ask how these Americans were killed. But I also think that, on both a moral level and, my understanding, also on a legal level, it really is irrelevant whether they’re Americans or not Americans. Why I think it’s important to focus on these cases is because how a society will treat its own citizens is a good indicator of how it’s going to treat noncitizens around the world. And if the basic standards of due process are not being afforded to American citizens, then they certainly are not going to be afforded to non-American citizens. So I see this as a very high-stakes issue that we’re facing right now, and we have a Congress that largely is failing to ask the right questions."
Also, I would like to point out that the question isn't really about killing those engaged in terrorism. It's about killing those the Obama administration accuses of being engaged in terrorism. Like the victims of "signature strikes" where all militarily-aged men are considered terrorists, and when they're killed, they're counted as terrorists. Like Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, who had an irresponsible father, who the government has never presented any evidence against except for youtube videos of him preaching against the West. Etc., etc.
As for the secrets that all world powers must keep and Obama's transparent administration,...
Sorry Anklebiter, this is a rather weak statement. If there was no evidence in this case, this would be a lot stronger. But there was real evidence here, on almost every terrorist kill claimed. That said, the loss of civilian life is stomach churning, and makes me wonder whether or not we are making enemies just as readily as we are killing them.
First article I get when I google search "signature strikes."
First two paragraphs:
---
Toward the end of a May 27 article in The Times about President Obama’s speech in which, among other things, he mentioned setting new standards for ordering drone strikes against non-Americans, there was this rather disturbing paragraph:
“Even as he set new standards, a debate broke out about what they actually meant and what would actually change. For now, officials said, ‘signature strikes’ targeting groups of unidentified armed men presumed to be extremists will continue in the Pakistani tribal areas.”
---
Emphasis added.
I can't claim to read every article that's ever been printed, but I'm pretty sure that the government has never presented any evidence against Abdulrahman al-Awlaki. According to Paul Craig Roberts (maverick ex-Reagan Treasury Undersecretary or something), Glenn Greenwald (expatriate columnist for the Manchester Guardian), and Jeremy Scahill (writes for The Nation, I think), the government has never presented any evidence against Anwar al-Awlaki, claiming, IIRC, that national security would fall apart if due process in the al-Awlaki case were followed. (Slight exaggeration on my part, IIRC, but not by much.) Jeremy Scahill further goes on to claim that Samir Khan was tried by some kind of grand jury in the States and that the charges were dismissed.
I'm just one goblin who follows the news. I don't claim to know everything. Can you find an article that lays out the government's case against either of the al-Awlakis?
First article I get when I google search "signature strikes."
First two paragraphs:
---
Toward the end of a May 27 article in The Times about President Obama’s speech in which, among other things, he mentioned setting new standards for ordering drone strikes against non-Americans, there was this rather disturbing paragraph:
“Even as he set new standards, a debate broke out about what they actually meant and what would actually change. For now, officials said, ‘signature strikes’ targeting groups of unidentified armed men presumed to be extremists will continue in the Pakistani tribal areas.”
---
Emphasis added.
I can't claim to read every article that's ever been printed, but I'm pretty sure that the government has never presented any evidence against Abdulrahman al-Awlaki. According to Paul Craig Roberts (maverick ex-Reagan Treasury Undersecretary or something), Glenn Greenwald (expatriate columnist for the Manchester Guardian), and Jeremy Scahill (writes for The Nation, I think), the government has never presented any evidence against Anwar al-Awlaki, claiming, IIRC, that national security would fall apart if due process in the al-Awlaki case were followed. (Slight exaggeration on my part, IIRC, but not by much.) Jeremy Scahill further goes on to claim that Samir Khan was tried by some kind of grand jury in the States and that the charges were dismissed.
I'm just one goblin who follows the news. I don't claim to know everything. Can you find an article that lays out the government's case against either of the al-Awlakis?
iirc, they started that they were members of Al Qaida several years ago.
I typed "evidence for al-awlaki" into google and got two NYT articles. The first one was old, before his killing, and didn't have a single substantiated word other than youtube videos and praising suicide bombers.
The second one, after he was dead, I was paywalled out of.
There's all kinds of smart dudes who were participating in this thread who usually jump all over me when I say something incorrect. Which leads me to believe I am not. But, maybe they're just ignoring me.
I appeal to them.
In the meanwhile, we can listen to my Official Politrolling Theme.
What scandal?
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Official Politrolling Theme.
Well, Comrade Jeff, whom I've always thought was one of the sharper politrolls on here (although a little soft on the need to smash racist, imperialist American capitalism through international proletarian socialist revolution) has been calling me on crap in another thread, which means he's not ignoring me.
Which also means, according to my impeccable and narcisstic logic, that I am the victor and the polls are closed.
Down with Obama!
Vive le Moi!
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Down with Obama!
U.S. President Barack Obama really was the best choice of a bad lot of candidates. He is not the problem.
The whole system is broken - possibly beyond repair.
U.S. President Barack Obama really was the best choice of a bad lot of candidates. He is not the problem.
Well, he's certainly part of the problem.
The whole system is broken - possibly beyond repair.
Vive le Galt!
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Ten Revelations from Wikileaks
This one is so good, it's worth cut-and-pasting:
•During the Iraq War, U.S. authorities failed to investigate hundreds of reports of abuse, torture, rape, and murder by Iraqi police and soldiers, according to thousands of field reports.
•There were 109,032 “violent deaths” recorded in Iraq between 2004 and 2009, including 66,081 civilians. Leaked records from the Afghan War separately revealed coalition troops’ alleged role in killing at least 195 civilians in unreported incidents, one reportedly involving U.S. service members machine-gunning a bus, wounding or killing 15 passengers.
•The U.S. Embassy in Paris advised Washington to start a military-style trade war against any European Union country that opposed genetically modified crops, with U.S. diplomats effectively working directly for GM companies such as Monsanto.
•British and American officials colluded in a plan to mislead the British Parliament over a proposed ban on cluster bombs.
•In Baghdad in 2007, a U.S. Army helicopter gunned down a group of civilians, including two Reuters news staff.
•U.S. special operations forces were conducting offensive operations inside Pakistan despite sustained public denials and statements to the contrary by U.S. officials.
•A leaked diplomatic cable provided evidence that during an incident in 2006, U.S. troops in Iraq executed at least 10 Iraqi civilians, including a woman in her 70s and a 5-month-old, then called in an airstrike to destroy the evidence. The disclosure of this cable was later a significant factor in the Iraqi government’s refusal to grant U.S. troops immunity from prosecution beyond 2011, which led to U.S. troops withdrawing from the country.
•A NATO coalition in Afghanistan was using an undisclosed “black” unit of special operations forces to hunt down targets for death or detention without trial. The unit was revealed to have had a kill-or-capture list featuring details of more than 2,000 senior figures from the Taliban and al-Qaida, but it had in some cases mistakenly killed men, women, children, and Afghan police officers.
•The U.S. threatened the Italian government in an attempt to influence a court case involving the indictment of CIA agents over the kidnapping of an Egyptian cleric. Separately, U.S. officials were revealed to have pressured Spanish prosecutors to dissuade them from investigating U.S. torture allegations, secret “extraordinary rendition” flights, and the killing of a Spanish journalist by U.S. troops in Iraq.
•In apparent violation of a 1946 U.N. convention, Washington initiated a spying campaign in 2009 that targeted the leadership of the U.N. by seeking to gather top officials’ private encryption keys, credit card details, and biometric data.