Obama's first evil act as president

[chiggerbit]

Not to go off on another tangent, but one of the victims of that "quality" of LAT reporting--yeah, I think they got punked and then the punkers got punked themselves--is the news business itself. There's not much news credibility left. Who wants to pay for that crap by subscribing? Spin and reverse spin doesn't make for real news coverage, but it's cheap. No need to pay for real investigative reporters. Good article here:

http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/420 ... ss_exodus/

[chiggerbit]

And as far as "investigative reporting" goes, we have our own "investigative reporters" here, and c2w is one of them whose pearls of wisdom I value. I wasn't being facetious about that, c2w, didn't understand for awhile that you might have thought that. So please don't clutch your pearls to your bosom in your replies. I value those who dig down into the depths of mind-numbing and forgotten reports and documents etc., and bring them back to us, exposed in a new light. Thanks, c2w. Thanks to you, too, Jack.

[compared2what?]

Noriega was a prisoner of war.

Yer kidding!! That wasn't a war, it was a military training exercise. Besides, wasn't that another case where Congress never declared war? Still, how do you get from being a POW to being tried for a US crime that you didn't commit in the US?

Because, you know, it seemed just about as bad as bad could be at the time.

Agreed, and that's why it feels kind of weird to be arguing about the differences between rendition and extraordinary rendition today.

I hear that.

[stefano]

Goodness! What is professorpan to think?

Talking Blues: Gitmo Gets Harsher Under "Progressive" Rule
Chris Floyd

Talk is cheap; actions speak volumes. And it seems Barack Obama is compiling quite a volume for himself at America's flagship concentration camp in Guantanamo Bay. As Andrew Wander reports, conditions for prisoners at Gitmo have grown worse since Obama took office: Guantanamo conditions 'deteriorate'.

Of course, Gitmo is by no means the worst pit in America's worldwide gulag, which Obama has kept wide open for business, while fighting strenuously in court to retain all of Bush's authoritarian powers over the lives and liberties of anyone the president arbitrarily deems a suspected terrorist. And of course, he hasn't, uh, closed Gitmo, as he made a solemn promise to do within a year of his inauguration. But whether he eventually gets around to the PR show of shutting down this one camp, the fact that his administration has imposed an even harsher regime on its denizens of limbo is, literally, atrocious.

One can only assume that this has been done as some sort of compensation mechanism for Obama's promise to close the joint; every president now must continually prove that he is "tough enough" to do the dirty work – killing civilians, spying on citizens, kidnapping people and putting them in concentration camps, etc. -- required to keep the imperial war machine going. Any gesture – however hollow – toward an alternative approach must be balanced with harshness elsewhere.

This works on the domestic front as well, of course. For example, you can't have even a hollow and perverse gesture at health care reform without condemning poor women to die in back-alley abortions. Somebody has to pay, in blood and suffering, for every attempt at amelioration in the system; that's the modern American way.

Wander writes:

Within days of Obama's inauguration and subsequent announcement that he would close Guantanamo, prisoners say authorities introduced new regulations and revoked previous privileges at the prison.

"They took away group recreation for prisoners in segregation, which was the only time we saw anyone," Mohammed el Gharani remembers. [Gharani "They took away the books we had from the library. They even sprayed pepper spray into my cell while I was sleeping, so I'd wake up unable to breathe."

Gharani says he was beaten so badly by guards that he is still suffering pain today.

..."I am in the very same cell, wearing the same uniform, eating the same food, yet treated much worse compared to mid-2008," [a current] prisoner writes. "We are unable to understand the goals of the policy of more restrictions and inflexibility."

[compared2what?]

Goodness! What is professorpan to think?

Conversely, what would Obama need to do for you to say "That was fucked up; Obama is worse than I'd hoped"?

I'm sure he will do plenty of things that will piss me off. And I will be outspoken when that occurs, just as I've been outspoken about any politician, regardless of party.

I think that given the above, one has to take him at his word and assume that whatever it is, it doesn't piss him off.

Because had that occurred, he would have spoken out.

[Luposapien]

I didn't wade through all 16 pages, so I don't know if anyone has suggested this response to the thread title yet, but, and mostly seriously:

Obama's first evil act as President was becoming President.

I don't believe that anyone who actively seeks political power should be trusted with political power.

[Sounder]

This is a bump for page six, not for anything related to the ex-pres.

[seemslikeadream]

Trump signs order to keep Guantanamo open
By Ryan Browne, Elise Labott and Barbara Starr, CNN
Updated 3:00 AM ET, Wed January 31, 2018

https://www.cnn.com/2018/01/30/politics ... index.html

no porn star pay off

no 20 women alleging abuse

no lying every 5 minutes

no staff member fired for beating up his 2 wives

no loving nazis or inviting them into the White House

no Alex Jones in the White House Press

no plans for a May Day parade

not one bankruptcy

no grabbing by the pussy statement

no hatred for people of color

no 1500 lawsuits

no hatred of women

helping DACA


believing in Climate Change


I could go on

[Grizzly]

Obomba's first Civil act as pRESIDENT, was to drone a wedding party in Pakistan. Killing many women, children and men at a wedding party.

^^^ what's Trump got to do with that? Are we board sliding topics?

[seemslikeadream]

But, GRISSLY Don't give two fucks. To be honest.

I have never once listened to Trump. Don't give a fuck to be honest.

oh and trump loving American nazis that kill Americans

LABELS ALL OF AFRICA/HAITI "SHITHOLES"

Day 84
:: Authorises use of "mother of all bombs" targeting IS militants in Afghanistan

Signs legislation allowing states to withhold federal funding from Planned Parenthood

Day 76
:: Authorises missile strikes against Syrian regime

Day 68
:: Signs Energy Independence executive order, dismantling Obama environmental regulations

Day 64
:: Signs permit for builder TransCanada to build Keystone XL pipeline

ripping fathers from their children and sending them back to Mexico when they have been here all their lives

picking a nuclear fight with NK

trying to ban all Muslims

building a fucking WALL

DESTROYED THE ENVIRONMENT

ENCOURAGED POLICE BRUTALITY

PUSHING “FAKE NEWS”

AUTHORIZED MORE ARRESTS BY ICE

PUETRO RICO

LET THE GUY THAT DID THIS AND MORE WORK FOR HIM

[Sounder]

No really, my intentions have nothing to do with Mr. Obama. I was searching for the Eighteenth Amendment and came across some interesting material from vigilant on the Thirteenth Amendment. Also i tend not to compare, criticize or focus on individual people anyway because, in the end, they are less formative to our experiences than are events and/or, better yet ideas.

[seemslikeadream]

No really, my intentions have nothing to do with Mr. Obama. I was searching for the Eighteenth Amendment and came across some interesting material from vigilant on the Thirteenth Amendment. Also i tend not to compare, criticize or focus on individual people anyway because, in the end, they are less formative to our experiences than are events and/or, better yet ideas.

well you could have taken the quote and reposted just that part somewhere

[Sounder]

I will try to be more aware of possible misunderstandings, created by my somewhat brief posting style, in the future.

[Cordelia]

SLAD, can you ratchet down the graphic billboard size photos, please?

[seemslikeadream]

I can not do that...I don't know how ..if you do please let me know and then we both can ratchet down the graphic billboard size photos....OK?

it is not my photo

you post really big pics in the image thread all the time

what's the problem? Is it the big black eye that upsets you?

sorry it is not like one of your pretty pictures ...only big pretty graphic billboard size photos are allowed?

Please explain to me the difference...what is your problem?


Guess what both pics are the very same size