We Will Oppose Obama As Long As He Supports War *ADD YOUR NAME + "9/11 Truth Activist" +
http://warisacrime.org/primary
ADD YOUR NAME Click here to sign: http://warisacrime.org/petition/56390
*first name, last name...followed by 9/11 Truth Activist
We Will Oppose Obama As Long As He Supports War
ADD YOUR NAME
We the undersigned share with nearly two-thirds of our fellow Americans the conviction that our wars in Afghanistan and Iraq should be ended and that overall military spending should be dramatically reduced. This has been our position for years and will continue to be, and we take it seriously. We vow not to support President Barack Obama for renomination for another term in office, and to actively seek to impede his war policies unless and until he reverses them.
Since he became president, Obama has had three opportunities to work with Congress to reduce military spending, but instead has championed increases in that spending each time, despite the fact that this spending represents a clear threat to the economic future of our country. He has continued as well to try to hide the true costs of the wars by funding them with off-the-books supplemental spending bills, despite the fact that he campaigned against this very practice.
The President has escalated a war on Afghanistan in which rising civilian deaths and atrocities have become routine.
He has given the CIA even greater freedom of action to launch lethal drone strikes against civilian houses in Pakistan on mere assumption of some connection with Taliban or other organizations, despite the warning from the U.S. Ambassador in late 2009 -- revealed in a Wikileaks cable -- that such attacks could "destabilize" the Pakistani government, despite many reports that civilians, including children, are disproportionately victims, and despite the contention of the United Nations and many U.S. allies that this practice is illegal.
Obama has approved an increase in covert operations by CIA-controlled Afghan troops into Pakistan, and his administration has remained silent while the U.S. command in Afghanistan leaked to the New York Times plans for new Special Operations Forces raids into Pakistan aimed at Afghan Taliban targets.
The President has expanded the use of Special Operations Forces (SOF), operating in virtually total secrecy and without any accountability to Congress, in one country after another. SOF troops are presently in some 75 nations -- 15 more than when Obama took office.
President Obama has, on a later schedule than he campaigned on, finally reduced U.S. troop presence in Iraq. But he has not fully withdrawn U.S. combat forces from Iraq or ended U.S. combat there, his claims to have done so notwithstanding. His vice president has suggested, without correction by the President, the possibility of a U.S. military presence in the country even after the deadline for withdrawal under the U.S.-Iraq withdrawal agreement, if only through the use of military contractors.
The Obama administration has announced plans to form an army of mercenary troops from private military contractors in Iraq which is to have its own air force and its own fleet of mine-resistant military vehicles. The plan includes continued contracts with the company formerly called Blackwater, despite the knowledge that it was guilty of atrocities against civilians in that country, and despite the openly declared opposition of the Iraqi government to such a continued role.
Obama has overseen increased weapons sales to foreign nations, and assisting in those sales has been a major function of his State Department. He has approved increased funding for work on nuclear weapons, even while supporting an arms control treaty. He has established a policy of potential nuclear first strike against Iran or North Korea.
President Obama has argued for the justness of war-making in widely watched speeches from the Oval Office and in Oslo, Norway, where he was accepting a Nobel Peace Prize. He has, in his Oval Office speech last August, defended false statements that took our nation into the current wars and false statements that have prolonged them.
The President has supported sanctions against Iran and Syria that punish the people, especially children, and not the leadership, of those countries. He has sent ships and missiles to Iran's border. He has risked hostilities with North Korea through the ongoing construction of new military bases in South Korea and provocative war games exercises. His administration has helped a military coup succeed in Honduras.
President Obama has sought to allow more Israeli settlements in Palestinian territories. He has protected Israel's killing of activists on a humanitarian aid ship, not even protesting at the murder of an unarmed American youth. He issued a presidential memorandum on October 25, 2010, giving U.S. approval for the use of child soldiers by Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sudan, and Yemen. He has backed Indonesian armed forces that assassinated civilian activists in late 2009. He has expanded the U.S. military presence in Colombia, Costa Rica, Haiti, Guam, Italy, and Diego Garcia, as well as overseeing an enormous military base construction project in Afghanistan.
President Obama has not closed the prison at Guantanamo Bay and continues to maintain a network of detention facilities in Afghanistan through which prisoners, according to the most recent information available, are still being subjected to harsh treatment. He has claimed the right to imprison people, including American citizens, indefinitely without charge or trial, thus further cementing in place the elimination of the rights of prisoners of war and the elimination of the right of habeas corpus for anyone, as well as the rights found in the Fourth through Eighth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. The President has claimed the power of rendition. His CIA Director Leon Panetta and his senior advisor David Axelrod have asserted, without correction by the President, that the President maintains the power to torture. In the recent case of Gulet Mohamed, the Obama administration, for a time, claimed the power to forbid an American to reenter the country, absent any conviction or even any charge of a crime, and apparently collaborated with Kuwait to torture that American. The President has also openly claimed the power to order the assassination of Americans abroad. In Iraq, the U.S. military has continued to work with and protect from accountability an Iraqi military that is known to regularly use torture.
The President has expanded the use of warrantless spying. Under his leadership, the FBI has infiltrated peace groups and raided the homes of peace activists. It has set up and entrapped in terrorism charges people whose training and motivation came largely or even entirely from the FBI. He has supported the re-authorization of the PATRIOT Act, which strips away Americans' civil liberties.
President Obama, in direct violation of the Nuremberg Charter, a U.S. treaty commitment, has publicly instructed his Attorney General not to prosecute individuals responsible for crimes, including torture. His administration has worked hard to provide retroactive immunity to corporations engaged in warrantless spying and individuals engaged in sanctioning torture. He has kept secret a vast trove of documents, photos, and videos pertaining to prisoner abuse. He has advanced unprecedented claims of secrecy powers in defending the crimes of his predecessor. President Obama's White House has put great pressure on European states not to investigate or prosecute U.S. war crimes.
This president has restricted the release of the names of White House visitors and has pursued the prosecution and punishment of government whistleblowers more aggressively than any previous president. His administration is responsible for the cruel and unusual lengthy confinement in a 6' by 12' cell, prior to any trial, of alleged whistleblower Bradley Manning. His vice president, Joe Biden, has publicly labeled an Australian journalist, Julian Assange, a "terrorist." President Obama has used a private propaganda firm that had been exposed planting lies in Iraqi media, to screen potential embedded reporters for coverage of the U.S. military. He has used the military to restrict reporting by American journalists on an oil spill in American waters.
Perhaps most perilously, President Obama has claimed the right to engage in many of these activities without the authorization of Congress. He has even claimed the power first developed by his predecessor to rewrite new laws through the extra-Constitutional use of presidential signing statements. Expanded powers that are not opposed now will be far more difficult to oppose later with another president able to claim past precedent.
The President's own deficit commission recommended cuts of $100 billion to the military budget. The United States spends about $1 trillion each year on the military, through a variety of departments, and has spent over $1 trillion already on the wars on Iraq and Afghanistan. Over half of every U.S. dollar of income tax is going to war making. The Department of Defense budget alone is larger than the military expenditures of the next largest 16 militaries in the world combined. That budget could be cut by 85% and still be the largest in the world. In addition to the lessening of hostility toward our country that would result from a significant decrease in U.S. military presence around the world, by shifting our financial resources we could create jobs, green energy, top quality free education, public transportation and infrastructure. We could also end all talk of reducing our Social Security or health coverage. We intend to support public servants who put our money where it serves the public.
We are not concerned with whether President Obama is acting enthusiastically or reluctantly in pursuing a militaristic policy abroad and more repression of dissent at home. It matters little whether he is submitting to powerful forces or freely following his preferred course. We do not elect his soldiers or spies, his advisors, his campaign funders, or the owners of our major media outlets. We elect the president. We will not support his nomination for another term, and we believe that a large proportion of Americans who voted for him in 2008 will not do so again unless he reverses the most egregious policies to which we have referred -- especially by taking decisive steps to end the war on Afghanistan and to make deep cuts in the military and war budgets.
ADD YOUR NAME
Some of those who have signed:
Nic Abramson, U.S. Boat to Gaza
Meredith Aby, MN Anti-War Committee
Elliott Adams, president, Veterans For Peace
Will Allen, author, The War on Bugs
Maria Allwine, Pledge of Resistance Baltimore
Vicki Andrews, Peace Circle - Grand Rapids MN
Jean Athey, coordinator of Peace Action Montgomery (MD)* and national board member, Peace Action*
Nellie Hester Bailey, Harlem Tenants Council & Black Agenda Report
Anna Baltzer, activist
Missy Beattie, activist and writer
Mark Bebawi, producer/host, The Monitor, KPFT
Medea Benjamin, cofounder, Code Pink*
Frida Berrigan, War Resisters League*
Toby Blome, activist, Bay Area Code Pink
William Blum, author of books on U.S. foreign policy
Leah Bolger, CDR, USN (Ret), Vice-President, Veterans For Peace
Roy Bourgeois, founder, School of the Americas Watch
Linda Boyd, activist
Lenni Brenner, author, Zionism in the Age of the Dictators
Jean Hay Bright, Maine's 2006 Democratic US Senate candidate
Elaine Brower, military mom, World Can't Wait
Mike Byerly, Alachua County Commissioner, Gainesville, Fla.
Scott Camil, President, Gainesville Florida Chapter, Veterans For Peace
Patty Casazza, 9/11 widow, former 9/11 Commission Family Steering Committee Member
Oskar Castro, board member, War Resisters League
Zach Choate, operation recovery field organizer, Iraq Veterans Against the War
David Cobb, Move To Amend coalition*
Jeff Cohen, author/media critic
William John Cox, Voters Evolt!
Catarina Correia, video editor, coordinating committee member, National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance
Bud Courtney, New York Catholic Worker
David Culver, publisher, Evergreene Digest
Ronnie Cummins, national director, Organic Consumers Association
Matthew W. Daloisio, Witness Against Torture*
Nicolas J S Davies, author, Blood On Our Hands: the American Invasion and Destruction of Iraq
Elena Day, People's Alliance for Clean Energy
Frank Dorrel, publisher, Addicted To War
Sibel Edmonds, founder & director, National Security Whistleblowers Coalition
Cherie Eichholz, national board member, Veterans for Peace
Roy Eidelson, past president, Psychologists for Social Responsibility
Pat Elder, Coordinating Committee, National Network Opposing the Militarization of Youth*
Daniel Ellsberg, former State and Defense Dept. official, whistleblower of Pentagon Papers
Samuel S. Epstein, professor
Desiree Fairooz, Northern Virginians for Peace and Justice
Mike Ferner, national board member, Veterans for Peace
Joy First, National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance
Robert Fitrakis, professor, editor
Lisa Fithian, convenor, United for Peace and Justice
Margaret Flowers, M.D., Physicians for a National Health Program*
Glen Ford, executive editor, Black Agenda Report*
George Friday, Independent Progressive Politics Network
Sarah Fuhro, board member, Military Families Speak Out*
James Clay Fuller, retired newspaper editor
Monica Gabrielle, 9/11 widow, former 9/11 Commission Family Steering Committee Member
Bruce K. Gagnon, coordinator, Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space*
Lila Garrett, radio host
Nate Goldshlag, national board member and treasurer, Veterans For Peace
Michelle Gross, president, Communities United Against Police Brutality
Thomas John Gumbleton, retired Roman Catholic Bishop
DeeDee Halleck, founder, Paper Tiger Tv, Deep Dish Network, emerita professor, UCSD
Connie Hammond, Progressive Peace Coalition, Columbus, Ohio
Kathy Hass, activist, Central Florida Code Pink
Bill Habedank, Veterans for Peace
Jim Haber, coordinator, Nevada Desert Experience
Susan Harman, Progressive Democrats of America*, Code Pink*
David Harris, Veterans for Peace
David Harris, draft resister, author
Leslie Harris, activist, Code Pink Greater Dallas*
Bob Heberle, former national board member, Veterans for Peace
Chris Hedges, author, Death of the Liberal Class
Dud Hendrick, Maine chapter president, Veterans for Peace
Steve Hendricks, author, A Kidnapping in Milan: The CIA on Trial
Martha Hennessy, Catholic Worker
John Heuer, chair and national board member, NC Peace Action
Herbert J. Hoffman, vice president, Maine Veterans for Peace
Connie Hogarth, Cofounder WESPAC (Westchester Peoples Action Coalition)*
Lydia Howell, writer and host, "Catalyst", KFAI Radio
Sam Husseini, activist
Hugh Iglarsh, writer/editor
Rick Jahnkow, Committee Opposed to Militarism and the Draft*
Dahr Jamail, journalist/author
Mark C. Johnson, executive director, Fellowship of Reconciliation
Larry Kalb, former Democratic congressional candidate
Tarak Kauff, Veterans For Peace
Kathy Kelly, Voices for Creative Nonviolence*
Nada Khader, WESPAC Foundation
Joey King, national board member, Veterans for Peace
Howie Klein, publisher, DownWithTyranny.com
Michael Knox, professor and clinical psychologist
Georg Koszulinski, filmmaker
Joel Kovel, author, The Enemy of Nature, Overcoming Zionism
Andrew Kolin, author, State Power and Democracy: Before and During the Presidency of George W Bush
Steve Lane, activist
Jesse Lemisch, Historian, Emeritus Prof, John Jay Coll of Criminal Justice, CUNY
Rabbi Michael Lerner, Tikkun/Network of Spiritual Progressives
Linda LeTendre, LMSW Christian Peace Witness
Dave Lindorff, editor, Thiscantbehappening.net
Erik Lobo, Veteran For Peace
Ralph Lopez, JobsForAfghans.org
David MacMichael, Ph.D., former CIA analyst
Sarah Martin, subpoenaed antiwar and international solidarity activist
Gene Marx, national board member, Veterans for Peace
Ethan McCord, IVAW, VFP, former army specialist from "collateral murder" video
Ray McGovern, former CIA analyst
Cynthia McKinney, former U.S. Congresswoman and 2008 Green Party Nominee for U.S. President
David McReynolds, Socialist Party USA*
Bob Meola, War Resisters League National Committee* and Courage to Resist Organizing Collective*
Michael T. McPhearson, co-convenor United For Peace and Justice, former executive director of Veterans For Peace
Camilo E. Mejia, activist, resister
Linda Milazzo, activist, writer
Dede Miller, activist
Mark Crispin Miller, author, professor
Nick Mottern, Consumers for Peace
Gael Murphy, co-chair, Legislative Working Group, United for Peace and Justice*, co-founder, Code Pink*
Robert Naiman, Just Foreign Policy*
Bruce Nestor, past president, National Lawyers Guild
Brad Newsham, activist
Georgianne Nienaber, activist and author
Stirling Newberry, former military contractor
Max Obuszewski, Baltimore Nonviolence Center
Jeanne Olson, veteran, activist
Paul Ortiz, Veterans for Peace, author
Michael Parenti, author and activist
Cynthia Papermaster, director, National Accountability Action Network*
Judith Mahoney Pasternak, War Resisters League*
Jeff Paterson, Courage to Resist
Lewis Pitts, Legal Aid of NC
Gareth Porter, author and journalist
Bill Quigley, Center for Constitutional Rights and professor of law, Loyola University New Orleans*
Jesselyn Radack, former Department of Justice legal adviser
Garett Reppenhagen, chair of the board of directors, Iraq Veterans Against the War
Ward Reilly, advisory committee member, Iraq Veterans Against the War, Veterans For Peace, VVAW
Jill Richardson, author
Katie Robbins, national organizer, Healthcare-NOW!
David Rovics, singer/song writer
Coleen Rowley, retired FBI agent, one of TIME's 2002 Persons of the Year
Richard E. Rubenstein, author, Reasons to Kill: Why Americans Choose War
Stephanie Rugoff, project coordinator, War Criminals Watch
A.F. Saidy, M.D., Coalition for Peace in M.E. in L.A.
Nicole Sandler, radio host
Lisa Savage, Code Pink Maine*
Linda Schade, WikiLeaksisDemocracy.org
Bill Scheurer, PeaceMajority Report
Sue Serpa, coordinator, JobsForAfghans.org
Jamilla El-Shafei, Peace Action Maine, Code Pink
Joanne Sheehan, coordinator, War Resisters League New England
Robert Shetterly, artist, Americans Who Tell the Truth
Gar Smith, Environmentalists Against War
Michael Steven Smith, Law and Disorder Radio; board member, Center for Constitutional Rights*
Kaitlin Sopoci-Belknap, Democracy Unlimited
Jeffrey St Clair, CounterPunch
John Stauber, author, Weapons of Mass Deception
Josh Stieber, conscientious objector
John Stockwell, former intelligence officer, author
David Swanson, WarIsACrime.org
Rev. James L. Swarts, professor, Veterans For Peace, Progressives In Action Peace Committee Chair
Dennis Trainor, Jr., NoCureForThat.org
Diane Turco, Cape Codders for Peace and Justice
Sue Udry, Defending Dissent Foundation*
Elizabeth De La Vega, former assistant U.S. attorney, author
Robert C. Walter, Peace Action Maine, associate member of Veterans for Peace
Harvey Wasserman, author
Janet Weil, military family member
Alison Weir, president, Council for the National Interest
Beverley Whipple, Fla. chapter leader, Military Families Speak Out
Paki Wieland, activist
S. Brian Willson, Viet Nam Veteran, activist
Diane Wilson, shrimper, activist, author, Veterans for Peace
Marcy Winograd, former Democratic congressional candidate
Ann Wright, US Army Reserve Colonel and former US diplomat
Bill Wylie-Kellermann, pastor, St Peter's Episcopal Church - Detroit
Dan Yaseen, Peace Fresno
Charles M. Young, contributing editor, Thiscantbehappening.net
Kevin Zeese, Voters For Peace
Maggie Zhou, Climate SOS
http://warisacrime.org/primary
ADD YOUR NAME Click here to sign: http://warisacrime.org/petition/56390
*first name, last name...followed by 9/11 Truth Activist
We Will Oppose Obama As Long As He Supports War
- Joe's blog
- Login to post comments
Are you aware
Are you aware that President Obama claims to believe the official government conspiracy theory? Are you aware that he considers it an established "fact" that is not to be debated?
The President is an ordinary citizen
The President is an ordinary citizen who is temporarily holding an administrative job. He is not exempt from the same requirements to be truthful that apply to all other citizens.
He has had a chance to show his allegiance
And he failed
There is no Democrat who
There is no Democrat who could publicly contradict the official story of 9/11 without losing their political viability. The larger context of the statement you are providing video for is a speech to the middle east in which Obama says that the US is not at war with Islam. In the bigger picture this speech did help more than harm because it softened the US posture toward the Islamic world, thus undermining one of the goals of the Bush administration. Many conservatives criticized Obama for apologizing for US policy. In my interpretation that is part of what he was doing and that is a good thing.
9/11 truth is political viability.
1. Please don't make excuses for Barack Obama.
2. I am not interested in the larger context of this speech. He uses his pulpit to defend and reinforce a lie. Did you know that 9/11 was the largest domestic terror psyop this country ever experianced?
3.I did more fundraising and phone banking for then any other candidate in my life ( and even froze my ass off in Jan 2009 in D.C as he was sworn in) Barack Obama.
It's called buyer's remorse.
Get used to it.
There is no politician...
"There is no Democrat who could publicly contradict the official story of 9/11...."
There is no politician from any major party that can. If they cannot for fear of losing their credibility, then what else are they not doing? If they can't face the truth, how can we implement the correct solutions. Then why support them at all? Sorry Vulich, it is the old myth that there is a difference between Dems and Reps which is driving this country right off a cliff and the ONLY way to stop it is to face the facts, hit the brakes and turn around. Our issues cannot be reconciled by any major political party since they are part of the problem. Our best bet is to quit supporting the system. Support independent candidates like Cynthia McKinney that are not afraid to speak their minds. Democrat/Republican are just names with no real differences when it comes to fundamental changes in our society. They are two heads of the same monster executing an agenda that only includes the few at the top of the pyramid.
Keep speaking truth to power and the truth will win out at some point. It always does.
dtg
9/11 cover up is Job #1 for Obama
There is no escaping the fact that he is covering up for the previous adminstration's crimes, which now makes him complicit after the fact. I wish It wasn't so, I voted for the guy too, but there's no getting around misprision of treason: if you know about treason and fail to speak up, you're also guilty. I have the same sinking feeling even about Ron Paul. I fact, I'd be shocked if anyone in congress or the White House doesn't know the awful truth. It's an open secret of the first order. Which is part of what makes the whole situation so damn hard to address. There's a photo of Obama from some time in the first week of his transition where he has an absolutely haunted look in his face. I told my wife at that time, "they must have just told him the truth about 9/11 and what he was expected to do."
Makes him complicit.
You bet he is complicit. All of them are. Even Ron Paul. I voted for Obama also. That was a mistake but who can you vote for? They all know 9/11 was an inside job. How could they not know?
"Cognitive Infiltration"
http://www.kpfa.org/archive/id/67100
Guns and Butter - "Cognitive Infiltration" with Tod Fletcher
January 26, 2011
http://911blogger.com/news/2011-01-26/guns-and-butter-cognitive-infiltra...
We discuss David Ray Griffin's newest book, Cognitive Infiltration, which is a deconstruction and debunking of Obama appointee, Cass Sunstein's, paper, "Conspiracy Theories: Causes and Cures", in which Sunstein proposes a new
FOIA
https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=obama+foia+bush
need for speed
The burden grows on Obama, as the awareness grows. The challenges will mount. The need for getting the reality out grows. We continue to amass, and we must keep going, at least as fast as thus far, because we must overcome their attempts to take us down, through their media operation, faster by internet contacting, while we can. The internet is closing down for us. I don't know how fast, but as it stands, about half the time I try to access something damning (yet another, and another) about our government, the availability of it lessens. Things I'd been able to access prior. The process of censorship is building. We all need to share and it may cost us the loss of someone in our lives, and that person may be so shallow, we could do better without them, if they are cowards. Let's drop links of relevance that will turn people around everywhere we can, like Facebook, etc.
I signed my name, then added...
-9/11 Truth Activist.
Which appears on the petition. for others signers to see.
___________________________________________________________________________________
http://www.opednews.com/articles/State-of-the-Union-Ignore-by-Coleen-Row...
State of the Union: Ignore the Elephant at Your Own Peril
By Coleen Rowley
opednews.com
We are soon going to hear about our "State of the Union," but no matter what is said and no matter how good the speech, the current war machine dominating the state of the union will remain difficult to turn around. Even a president with military leadership like Eisenhower quickly discovered his powerlessness 50 years ago. Someone totally lacking in military experience has an even harder time, especially given that the military industrial congressional complex in our Citizens United corporatocracy has only more firmly ingrained itself during these last 50 years. The only hope now resides in that long ignored branch of government the founding fathers called "we the people." Trusting in politicians and campaign promises has proven ineffective. Obama knew this himself when he once said: "you've got to make me do it."
I predict the elephant in the room will not just be the Republicans. It will be the wars and military occupations. No doubt Obama will say something euphemistic enough in his speech tonight about "the US having to vigorously pursue its national interests around the world" but this euphemism will actually mean that he's committed to continuing the costly military escalation that consumes half of all US tax dollars; that he's signed onto destructive shock and awe bombing campaigns despite the fact that over 90% of the casualties are women, children and civilians; and the harm from these 10 years of wars is blowing back onto our own country in a myriad of ways.
A rather long list of peace activists (including myself) have sensed the dire state of the union even before hearing the president's speech and have already signed this new statement: "We will oppose Obama as long as he supports war." It seems to me there's only one way to stop feeding the war machine and deal with the elephant in the room. More people must exercise their political muscle by exercising their democratic rights. It's easy, as a first step, to sign this pledge. And it would be nice to see the list of citizen signatures grow so huge that by the time Obama takes the stage tonight, he's forced to ad lib and change his prior stance on the wars. Citizens in a democracy not abdicating their own responsibilities are our only hope of gaining control over the elephant in the room.
Like the sign at the YMCA says -- the workout begins with the first step -- signing a simple statement can be the start. http://warisacrime.org/primary
SIGN: http://warisacrime.org/petition/56390 DON'T FORGET- "9/11 TRUTH ACTIVIST" or something like it.
Some of those who have signed:
Elliott Adams, president, Veterans For Peace
Patty Casazza, 9/11 widow, former 9/11 Commission Family Steering Committee Member
Sibel Edmonds, founder & director, National Security Whistleblowers Coalition
Daniel Ellsberg, former State and Defense Dept. official, whistleblower of Pentagon Papers
Monica Gabrielle, 9/11 widow, former 9/11 Commission Family Steering Committee Member
Leslie Harris, activist, Code Pink Greater Dallas*
Chris Hedges, author, Death of the Liberal Class
Dud Hendrick, Maine chapter president, Veterans for Peace
Dahr Jamail, journalist/author
Rabbi Michael Lerner, Tikkun/Network of Spiritual Progressives
Dave Lindorff, editor, Thiscantbehappening.net
Ray McGovern, former CIA analyst
Cynthia McKinney, former U.S. Congresswoman and 2008 Green Party Nominee for U.S. President
Michael Parenti, author and activist
Coleen Rowley, retired FBI agent, one of TIME's 2002 Persons of the Year
Ann Wright, US Army Reserve Colonel and former US diplomat
GOOD COMPANY!
Opposing Obama's Perpetual Wars
Obama is a warmonger.
We never withdrew from Iraq. He replaced the 50,000 withdrawn troops with "non combat" troops who are still combat ready! The torture still continues , secret prisons, rendition, guantanamo is still open with no real trials or evidence required. Did he investigate the Helicopter video wiki leaks released? He never investigated the Bush-Cheney crime spree which includes 911. No one was tried for torture. The drone stikes continue.
He tried to open his mouth about Israel building more settlements and then backed right off. Meet the new boss.
There is no democratic party left, we have Republicans and Republicans, and they're not small government republicans and never will be. Forget what the tea party says. It's all about National Security not social security. It used to be the rich got richer, now it's only the very rich get even richer. Single payer healthcare was immediately taken off the table even thought it makes good business sense, he folded the public option, then made it madatory for everyone to have insurance. We don't need for profit insurance we need healthcare.
The nobel peace prize. what an insult!
I respect all of your
I respect all of your opinions and welcome your criticisms. All I would like to say is that I don't think it should be a necessity in this movement to be anti-government. I believe that the correct reading of history is that bush stole the 2000 election and then infiltrated our government with his cabal and all hell broke loose. To me that is criminality, not an official government action. And when republicans lost power I believe that the people resisted the neoconservative project. Now you see republicans trying to extend the bush policies and obama trying to move us in a different direction, slower than I would like on some issues admittedly. But when they say he is soft on terror or a socialist that is spin produced by the conservatives and their friends in business who worry about the success of the obama agenda because it threatens to disrupt their objectives. If you look at any of the issues that have been cited here it seems clear to me that the problem isn't obama so much as a dysfunctional congress, the corporate media, and the military establishment. On guantanamo they decided to deny obama the proper funding to transfer detainees or put them on trial. Remember how freaked out guiliani got about placing khalid sheikh mohammed in a civilian court? Or how about firing mcchrystal because he was trying to box obama in on afghanistan? These are all examples of obama fighting for us, and if we fight him it is my opinion that we are helping the status quo and the republicans who brought us 911 in the first place. In summary I am anti corporation, not anti-government. I thought I would get at least a little sympathy from someone here but its cool. And also justin, whether fewer foias have been processed is not to do with obama as much as the agencies that are being petitioned. I imagine that many of the agencies are less forthcoming because they fear what the disclosures could do in the new political environment. Have you forgotted the biggest leak that obama has tacitly allowed? Wikileaks. The doj isn't prosecuting assange, even though you have folks on the right calling for his extradition.
Ok I can give you a sympathy vote
There is no question this is bush lite not full strength, but he is a major disappointment nonetheless. Don't count the DOJ out of a wikileaks trial just yet. I too am not anti-government. The full strength republicans are talking spending cuts ignoring the 3.8 trillion surplus Bush got from Clinton when the tax rates were in place. Yet they still stress more deregulation and tax relief to create jobs? That's just what they have had for the last ten years and look at all the jobs we have! Nonsense, first rate nonsense. However, the larger truth is the "democrats" could have swamped the Republicans and turned the country upside down if they had embraced 911 truth. I was naive to think they would or could. Bill Clinton gave us OK murrah on his beat so this goes much deeper. Aaron Russo said Rockefeller predicted a major world changing event no matter who won the election. We need to stop thinking that Obama is not part of the cover-up because he surely is. We need to think outside the box and I am not sure who should be president anymore. Past elections I voted Perot ( his press club speech before Iraq I was suberb) and Nader. I'm open to suggestions.
PS Gulianni should be tried for cover-up and disturbing the greatest crime scene in US history. Worse than a mafia bloodsucker!
Wikileaks "tacitly allowed" by Obama?
More and more I now subscribe to this view on Wikileaks:
http://www.veteranstoday.com/2011/01/23/webster-tarpley-wikileaks-a-cogn...
If Wikileaks was for real it would be dripping in 9/11 disclosures. Instead what we got was a pointed snub from Assange.
For all we know, Assanges's single attack on 9/11 Truth could have been one of Wikileaks primary goals from the onset. After all who better to discredit the movement than the government's biggest "threat".
watching clockwork orange
recognised prison from aerial view (as im studying the knowledge- to be a london taxi driver)
it's the same one Assange was held in- HMP Wandsworth
Face value
Yes, Bush stole the 2000 elections. And Gore and the Congressional Democrats went along with it--and proceeded to go along with all the 'hell [that] broke loose' over the years that followed. How anyone can observe that and continue to expect something better from the Democrats is beyond me. McKinney found herself isolated when she tried calling attention to what actually occurred in Florida, just as she did when she raised questions about 9/11. Because that's what Democrats and Republicans do. While pretending to squabble with one another, they close ranks on the things that are most important to maintaining the status quo. The interests that back both those parties don't want any light shed on electoral theft just as they don't (even moreso) with respect to 9/11. You seem to take political rhetoric at face value. The charges of 'socialist' and 'soft of terrorism' work like a smokescreen and are having their intended effect, just as similar rhetoric did under Clinton--to keep liberal-left voters in line, to lead them to think 'he must be doing something right if they hate him so much,' and so give him support no matter how much they would oppose those same policies were a Republican in office. It took me the better part of the Clinton years to start realizing this. I knew what to expect this time around, so I can't say I'm 'disappointed.'
Hogwash, Mr. President By Robert Scheer
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article27347.htm
Raising awareness is what we
Raising awareness is what we do, but depressing confidence in our democratic system is in my opinion helpful only to those who wish to enforce the existing status quo. Obama, despite the areas where he has gone too far to forge a compromise, is pushing the country to the left on a huge range of issues, and I appreciate this. If you fault him for not being effective enough then I think you just need to take a closer look at America's political environment which at this time is roiling from the effects of a mass propaganda campaign on the right fueled by overheated rhetoric about bloody revolution (and in many cases funded by wealthy interests). In that environment it is harder for Obama to get the best policies through. I personally don't believe that the American system of democracy is fatally flawed and unable to produce results, I think it is a lack of confidence in our system that makes it so easy for our leaders to abdicate their responsibilities. It's strange to me that people always adopt this tactic of pointing out that democrats were complicit with the republicans in bringing about the bush era abuses just because they didn't fight harder to stop it. Remember the anthrax mailings? Some of that anthrax went out to Tom Daschle's office, then the majority leader in the senate. Clearly intimidation played a big role, if people weren't worried enough about hurting their political careers by opposing Bush, now they had to worry about possibly being assassinated if they dared to. How is that cooperation with the Bush regime? So no, I don't identify the democratic left with the actions of the Bush administration, and I like many people on the left cheered the election of Obama because it is a departure from those policies. I think it's too easy to just say "throw the bums out"; the reality is more complex, distinctions need to be drawn otherwise we look like the tea party, or other anti-government movement. Do you really want to alienate all of the people on the left, like me, who care about 9/11 truth? You know the right wing wants to co-opt all of this anger against the bush era policies and flip it around so that we support them all over again. They are very smart and they know that they can use all of this anti-government sentiment to their advantage. That's why I say tread lightly here. To support Obama does not mean that you believe there are no problems in the world, but to support 9/11 truth does not mean you have to oppose the entire existing political system.
Don't forget also that
Don't forget also that politically many of the democratic leadership were boxed in by the prevailing political culture in the aftermath of 9/11. The whole country believed we were attacked, and the whole country became instantly hawkish on national security making any democrat taking a principled stand against the whole thing look "weak". Now of course the official story is a lie and everything, but when the attacks happened nobody knew that, and everybody, the civilian population and the leadership of both parties rallied around the initial precept of the war on terror. So when we say they didn't fight Bush enough let's just remember the history, because we were all lied to it was politically impossible to oppose Bush so any Democrat listening to his constituents in the aftermath of the war on terror would be getting a clear message that they were angry and supportive of a US military response. What is important to me is which Democrats are now beginning to find their voice, and oppose the wars and the economic deregulation that have brought us to this point. If you all are looking for some red-meat here it is, we need an new investigation into 9/11 with subpoena power and I'm sure that if we did that we would be convicting people from the previous administration on war crimes charges. So I don't take this lightly, and I'm not saying let's hold hands with democrats and sing kum-ba-ya. Just remember serious people of all types of political persuasion care about 9/11 truth, not just those who think that the federal government is an inherently corrupt institution.
I consider
I consider the harboring of delusions about the Democratic party to be the number one reason why the left in this country got to be so weak in the first place. And I would feel as if I were enabling such delusions if I were to pretend otherwise. Its main mission for most of the period since the Civil War has been to prevent the emergence of a truly independent left, one that was truly independent of corporate interests. And, alas, it has succeeded spectacularly well; because year after year, decade after decade, progressives continue to project onto that party what they wish it to be, instead of seeing it for what it is--a party of war, colonialism, corporate hegemony, cooptation...and no friend of civil liberties. Liberals have no trouble attributing the track record of the Republican party to that party's actual beliefs (though unfortunately, they often tend to attribute it to 'incompetence' as well); but when it comes to the Democrats, they look at its actual record and refuse to understand it as reflecting the party's actual beliefs and policy preferences. Rather than see it as another political party which aims to please the most powerful interests (its ability to coopt and neutralize the left being probably its most valuable asset to said interests), they continue to make excuses for it, without considering that maybe they've been wrong in supposing that the party is 'really' for basically the same things they want but 'just can't risk' fighting for them.
I used to do the same myself. But once I stopped, I haven't looked back. When I look at the Republicans, I see an enemy. When I look at the Democrats I see not merely a deficient, inadequate opponent of that enemy...but another enemy--one that, in its overall thrust (notwithstanding figures like Kucinich, basically there to maintain false hopes among progressives, while consistently having no actual impact on the party's direction) is opposed to my political views and works to defeat them in collaboration with the Republicans. I'm supposed to hold out hope for them because Daschle and Leahy were targeted with anthrax? Instead of raising hell and encouraging the public to understand all that's wrong with the official account of those attacks--even after they were known to be an inside job and not the work of foreign Muslims--the Democrats show where their true priorities lie: Looking to 'cognitively infiltrate' 9/11 truth groups, while dismissing an administration advisor (Van Jones) simply for once having signed a petition supporting a real investigation of 9/11.
The article below is a little over eight years old now, and I regret to say that it has hardly faded in relevance since the time it was written (after the Republican gains in the 2002 midterm elections). Regret, since the reason for its continuing relevance is that the misconceptions about the Democrats which it critiqued have likewise hardly faded:
http://www.citypages.com/2002-11-27/news/spank-the-donkey/
EXACTLY
.
You can hold any political
You can hold any political philosophy you want, whether you think politics is only for the corrupt, or whether you think some parties try to improve the lives of working people as I do. You call me naive but my opinion is that you are jaded and cynical. Your cynicism is shared by many in this movement, and I just don't think its helpful. First of all if obama and every future us president is going to be a target of the 911 truth movement then we appear to be anti-establishment, not really driven on by science, the proper emphasis. Also, we make it hard for people with a liberal political affiliation to feel comfortable joining us. I'm not going to tell you what to believe, who to support politically, my point is that the 911 truth movement should not be telling me what politics to have either. I didn't think that there was a cost to admission at this movement, like no liberals who actually support the president need apply. I don't want us to be a bunch of NWO style conspiracists. Look I know pressure has to be applied to the democrats, but to me that doesn't mean we have no options politically. Do you think the movement can succeed without the left?
Do you think the movement can succeed without the left?
Do you think the movement can succeed without the left?
WHAT IS LEFT of THE LEFT?
THERE'S NOTHING LEFT.
I wish there was a left.
I miss the good old days.
Resisting false choices
If I'm 'jaded and cynical,' they are the fruits of experience. That doesn't mean I don't believe that people are capable of building a more just, humane society. But capable is one thing, and actually taking steps to do so is another. I continue to believe that they are capable...if only. If only they could cease once and for all to be dependent on institutions that are entrenched in corporate money and the war machine. My sense of the urgency that progressives drop their illusions about the Democratic party runs up against the reality that they continue to give them support, while offering the same old rationales for doing so, rather than consider where that has actually gotten them to this point and direct their energies toward building a truly independent left instead. (Whatever happened to 'Another world is possible,' the slogan of anti-WTO protests back in '99 and 2000? Well actually, 9/11 is what happened to it, pretty much... But for now let's just point out: That was a movement opposed to the so-called 'Washington consensus' on trade and development--not the Republican consensus, but the Washington consensus!)
Anyway, the end result is that my hopes for a better future take a heavy beating year after year; and the beating is administered in large part courtesy of people who profess to be for a number of the same things I am. And I guess that can make one cynical.
But saying that is not to charge a 'cost to admission' to this movement. Nor is the statement opposing continuation of the wars of occupation that's at the top of this thread.
You say, 'you can hold any political philosophy you want;' but then it seems you restrict options by implying that a rejection of the Democrats means believing that there are no 'parties [that] try to improve the lives of working people,' and even that 'we have no options politically.' I'm a member of the Green Party myself--and so have encountered first hand the restricted access to ballots and televised debates which the corporate-owned parties and media outlets vigorously maintain against political alternatives; restrictions which are there so that they might more easily debate the issues within a very constricted range, and better insulate themselves from whatever political pressure might result from a more open process.
Is it 'cynical' to resist such false choices?
But that's me. People in this movement come from different backgrounds politically.
You are concerned that we might 'appear to be anti-establishment, not really driven on by science.' I see no reason why science can't be compatible with being anti-establishment (brings to mind Galileo and people like that, in fact). But more to the point: If we demand--and if the public is entitled to--the truth about 9/11, no matter who is in office; and if the political establishement continues to deny us the truth, no matter who is in office; then what can a movement be (including the most scientific among us) except anti-establishment?
Now at Raw Story
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/02/prominent-liberals-pledge-oppose-obam...
the US
is still engaged in illegal oppupations -and military actions
the rest is window dressing
the illegal occupations and military actions need to be replaced with peace not a pax americana which is short for US Empire
hundreds of thousands are dead now thanks directly to the US led invasions
destability has killed many too and is a deliberate ploy in my opinion
the US needs to relinquish empire and foster cooperation back home on its own land mass
the lunatics that profit from empire the most are those profiting from commercial ventures
the same way the british empire carried the east india company
Exactly
Look at the Iraq situation. The new regime looks worse than Sadam to me. Not to mention the devastation and stone age results people have to deal with. The situation we have brought to bear is appalling and the US should be ashamed.
Just think
Sometimes I can't help but think: What might Iran be like today, if only Mossadegh had been left alone in 1953, to govern according to the wishes of his majority, instead of ousted by US and British interests? And what might Iraq be like today if only Abdel Karim Qassim had been left in place, instead of ousted by CIA-backed Baathists in 1963 (a regime which Saddam would eventually come to dominate, and we now how things went from there)? And what might Afghanistan be like if only the Taraki government (pro-Soviet, and therefore easy to demonize to the US public, no matter what its actual policies) had been left in place in 1979, instead of targeted by Mujahideen rebels fomented by the CIA, leading (as intended) to a Soviet invasion, and all the destruction since?
Fires keep flaring up in the Middle East, and we keep being told that a serial arsonist, the US government, is the solution to putting them out.