The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age
    jollyroger's picture

    The voice of that woman is worth listening to

    By jollyroger on Fri, 05/24/2013 - 9:49am |

    I have seen the better angel of Obama's nature, and her name is Medea Benjamin.

     

    The odd applause line from yesterday's seminal speech which may ( we humbly pray) in future times be cited as the start of sanity's triumph over societal paranoia. By the time Prez elicited audience approval for his concession, the redoubtable Code Pink founder had been forcibly ejected (not for the first time),

    Unacustomed though I may be of late to credit Prez with an ounce of sincere self reflection, his demeanor in the face of Medea's challenge (which compares so starkly with the smug "So?" offered by Dick Cheney when similarly confronted) cannot fail to raise our flickering hopes that maybe Obama is not the phony we fear him to be, albeit he remains crippled by caution born of years of stifling his inner Dirty Old Bastard.

    Long live Code Pink! Long live the pride of San Francisco. Medea Benjamin!

    Comments

    And long live the Obama who made yesterday's speech.


    by Flavius on Fri, 05/24/2013 - 11:44am

    I heard Francis Scott Key say "I like what I see!"

    by jollyroger on Fri, 05/24/2013 - 1:33pm

    Most of the stories about Medea Benjamin are focusing on her "rude" behavior rather than the death of a 16-year old. 


    by rmrd0000 on Fri, 05/24/2013 - 1:07pm

    Yeah, what could be ruder than "I love my country and I love the rule of law"? (I love Medea Benjamin)

    by jollyroger on Fri, 05/24/2013 - 1:35pm

    Of course the Obamabots will force and focus the narrative to what ever supports them and their leader.  He is supposed to be the Commander and Chief, but he'll take the cover provided by the Congress, to avoid making a Command decision. She spoke up, as should many Americans; we're tired of the canned speeches that promise everything, but deliver nothing, WE WANT ACTION, on the problems confronting the Nation. This issue should have been resolved a long time before now, so we could have already moved beyond this point and we as a Nation could be focused on jobs, jobs jobs, the NEW crisis at this time. Tommorow will have it's own new problems   The people grow weary and suspicious as we think to ourselves; how convenient it is, to play political games and to change the Nations conversation, when it suits the administration. to deflect the ineptness of those in power. It's  as though the Administration wants to always have the ACE in the Hole, of the Gauntanamo detainees  We want leadership, Commander and Chief.  "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead" 


    by Resistance on Fri, 05/24/2013 - 1:59pm

    Can you quote the law that gives Obama the ability to transfer prisoners to Temen given that Congress provided a legal roadblock?


    by rmrd0000 on Fri, 05/24/2013 - 6:11pm

    What's the roadblock? Congress passed a law? Obama signed it?


    by PeraclesPlease on Fri, 05/24/2013 - 6:17pm

    Congress provides funding. Congress blocked funding of Gitmo transfers. The funding blockade was included in the defense authorization bill. If he rejected the entire bill, he would have been accused of not caring about national defense and the troops. The language also required Obama to promise that none of those released would become future combatants.

     


    by rmrd0000 on Fri, 05/24/2013 - 6:54pm

    Here is David Wiegel's take on what Obama was saying o Congress in Thursday's speech


    by rmrd0000 on Fri, 05/24/2013 - 7:00pm

    There ia an argument that Obama was slow to come up with a plan to close Gitmo. Rahm Emanuel is said to have felt closing Gitmo was a lower priority than economic issues and Afghanistan , for example. Under this view, Democrats who supported closing Gitmo were left twisting in the wind for lack of full WH support.

    From the standpoint of the WH, Republicans ho supported closing Gitmo changed their minds. Attorney General Holder's suggestion that Gitmo prisoners be tried in US courts met with limited public support.The attempted attack by the underwear bomber also lessened enthusiasm for closing Gitmo.

    Hopefully, this time. the will be a more straight forward path to prisoner release and closing Gitmo.


    by rmrd0000 on Fri, 05/24/2013 - 8:55pm

    The roadblocks to prisoner release was self imposed. Congress made noises about requiring extravagant guarantees of zero recidivism from the sec. Def.and the President. (absurd on their face given that our quotidian prison system considers any rate under 75% to evidence a superb rehabilitation effort. ) In any case, presidential authority to waive the guarantees was built in, and the focus on Yemenees was an artifact of the chaos in Yemen. Obama himself authored a freeze on Yemeni repatriation. it arose from his own authority and has been lifted on his own authority. It's really a red herring. If we merely did the right thing and paid compensation for wrongful imprisonment, conditioned on good behavior, end of problem.

    by jollyroger on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 1:25am

    I think that the chaos in Yemen along with the attempted airline bombing played a larger role in halting the possibly of a transfer. We will see if the transfer actually begin now that the self imposed ban has been lifted. 

    Obviously if any of the detainees becomes involved in an act of aggression towards the US, the legal requirement for freeing people who have not been charged with a crime will be forgotten.


    by rmrd0000 on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 9:38am

    Human rights groups acknowledged problems sending Yeminis back under the control of the previous government. 


    by rmrd0000 on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 9:46am

    Transfer, schmansfer. For what we did to innocent men, instant US citizenship and a lifetime pension should be a minimum redress. And you get a car and a condo!

    by jollyroger on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 9:52am

    Listening to two lawyers for Gitmo prisoners on Melissa Harris-Perry today, the feeling I get is that the Yeminis at least just want to go home to their familes.


    by rmrd0000 on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 10:58am

    The clear first choice. I was just deconstructing what I see as a spurious cavil.

    by jollyroger on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 11:21am

    Politically, Congress does not want to be held accountable if a former detainee commits an act of aggression. Obama has lifted the ban on the transfer on Yemini prisoners. If the transfer actually occur, and violence results, he will be held responsible.Given those facts the speech was courageous. We will  see if action on sending Yeminis  back actually begins.

     


    by rmrd0000 on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 12:17pm

    its too late for them to commit an act of aggression. they can only commit an act of self defense.

    by jollyroger on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 1:00pm

    There lies the problem. The detainees should be released. After release,  if/when they retaliate, the public will feel the need to double down to prevent further attacks.The detainee release and/or closing of Gitmo will be viewed as a gigantic mistake..

    I'm not saying that Gitmo should remain open or that the prisoners should not be released. People cannot be held without charge. The public will not agree will you that a violent response is something that the US created. 

     

     


    by rmrd0000 on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 1:37pm

    The public will not agree will you that a violent response is something that the US. created So?

    by jollyroger on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 8:28pm

    Sigh. so rather than admitting a mistake, the public will feel that the detainees were justifiably incarcerated There will be less urgency to provide Constitutional rights to suspected terrorists.


    by rmrd0000 on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 9:01pm

    Ethics, not politics, determines the boundaries between aggression and self defense. WE are the aggressors wrt the innocent incarcerated.

    by jollyroger on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 9:09pm

    We both agree that Gitmo has to close. I think that the country will use any aggression by released detainees to create a mindset that they should not have been released. You seem to e saying that any retaliation would be justified on an ethical basis. I'm not sure  if Ghandhi, MLK Jr or Mandela would agree the bottom line is tat if you present to theAmerican public that any attack was justified, you would be carted out of the room.


    by rmrd0000 on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 9:26pm

    The Reconciliation sessions in South Africa were used to allow aggressor and victim to address each other.


    by rmrd0000 on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 9:31pm

    I return to my modest proposal. take (eg) the $3 million per prisoner just budgeted for illegal incarceration and instead pay them periodically dependent on good behavior. works for confidential tort settlements all the time..

    by jollyroger on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 9:38pm

    If they have been falsely imprisoned, why can't they just be paid? If they should be freed, why does the US get to place any restraints on future behavior. Over how long of a period would we dole out payments. How would we know that the funds aren't being turned over to third parties to commit acts of terror.

    Decisions in life are not always easy. Is it moral to release a man that you know committed acts of terror, but because of illegal interrogation cannot be tried in court? If he commits or directs an act that kills others were we moral in demanding his release?

    If you were President would you go before the nation and say that you are unilaterally releasing people who committed acts of terror because they cannot be tried in court? Do you think the public would trust your statement that you would do everything in your power to prevent these terrorists from committing futures violent acts?

    Do you think Congress would have your back? Do you think the press would have your back?


    by rmrd0000 on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 11:12pm

    I'd pay them unconditionally- the periodic ( lifetime ) installments are in response to your point vis-a-vis political fallout from a subsequent act of (righteous) revenge (NB, tribal "honor" societies, paradoxically, frequently embrace the reparative transfer of cash as fulfilling the demands of justice for the wronged.

    by jollyroger on Sun, 05/26/2013 - 1:48am

    If the righteous revenge act was successful, the US response would be to seek revenge. A President would have to do something violent in response. Would ou as President explain that the terrorist was justified because it was a righteous act of revenge?


    by rmrd0000 on Sun, 05/26/2013 - 9:56am

    no, if I were president I would move to erase the ongoing projection of force that stimulates worldwide hatred of us ( hint, it aint on account of our freedom) and I would redress, to the extent possible, the prior crimes. As for the irredentists, their individual spasms of retaliation I would isolate from the impulse to inflict collective punishment. and treat them as the law enforcement issue that they are.

    by jollyroger on Sun, 05/26/2013 - 4:58pm

    We need the "apology tour" that the Repugnants fantasize has occurred under Obama.

    by jollyroger on Sun, 05/26/2013 - 5:05pm

    Response below 

     


    by rmrd0000 on Sun, 05/26/2013 - 7:07pm

    Except, it is Congress's problem, The President should have sent the mesage long ago, A letter to Congress or the Courts, "you have a choice, either you charge these folks in a timely manner or; as Commander and Chief, with the ability to Pardon, he was going to exercise his right.....  Instead Obama let others jerk his chain. He was afraid to use his power. But we already know that, right?


    by Resistance on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 7:35pm

    Here on planet Earth, no President was going to unilaterally release people who could possibly commit violent acts against the US or it's allies without Congressional cover.


    by rmrd0000 on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 9:03pm

    The President could have acted and let the Congress take him to court, charging him with overstepping his Constitutional authority..... Obama has no problem channeling his inner Cheney.....    "In just the last week alone, he refused a supoena to share Justice department emails with Congress, told the courts he doesnt have to justify his claimed powers to assassinate suspected terrorist, and decided to stop deporting certain illegal immigrnts, even though Congress has refused to enact a law to do that"     Here on the planet I live on, we are innocent till proven guilty; now you would have everyone held indefinitely, unless; they can prove they couldnt possibly commit violent acts against the US.   What Bizaro World do you live on? 


    by Resistance on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 9:52pm

    Fortunately, I don't have to live in yours.


    by rmrd0000 on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 9:56pm

    Are you going back to your home in La La land?


    by Resistance on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 10:27pm

    The reason that I really don't take you seriously is because you are all over the map. If we question how atheists, Catholics and Muslims stand in the full scope of things, we might find suggestions that these individuals do not meet muster.

    If we ask what will happen those those ho don't agree with your view of how government should operate, we are told that we slaves will be swept aside.

    When we point out your words, we are told that we have misconstrued what you said. You are all over the map.

    So do I think that you have deep concerns about Muslim aggressors in Guantanamo Bay? No. Do I think that you would use drones in an aggressive fashion against non-Christian Muslim heathens? Yes.

    I simply don't know where you are going to be or what you are going to say on any given day.

    So if I am in La La Land, it is preferable to whatever you envision.


    by rmrd0000 on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 11:01pm

    Get off the koolaid and you won't have to remain in your state of confusion. It is your bias that projects things into my words that are not really there.  You want them there, so you can knock down strawmen, and it gets particularly worse when I counter your arguments, with sound reasonings and then in your rage, you resort to personal attacks. But no matter sometimes we do have good discusions.  


    by Resistance on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 11:22pm

    Yet again, you are blaming the wrong person. Obama inherited a ridiculous situation. People and cases were handled in a way that a "fair" trial was impossible. Yet they are dangerous people, made more dangerous because of the injustices they endured.

    If you're going to try them in civil courts, you might as well just cut them loose. The cases cannot be won unless the juries are willing to overlook the tainted evidence. If you let them go, chances are excellent they will come back at us in some way. We are damned if we do, damned if we don't. So we do nothing. I don't know that I have a better suggestion. Except maybe keep them in custody until a Republican takes over the White House and let them clean up their own mess. It's not fair, but we're waaaaaay beyond fair, here.


    by stillidealistic on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 9:41pm

    According to a friend of mine, who said of WWll  "America took no Japanese prisoners..... In Vietnam they took prisoners on helicopter rides. Deal with the problem. This is nothing but a festering wound..... If they are tried in civil court and you strongly believe we might as well cut them lose, then the President should grow a pair and announce  "The buck stops here" 


    by Resistance on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 10:05pm

    I'm sure he has a large pair already - he proved that in giving the order to go after Bin Laden. He is in a situation where there is no good outcome. No matter what he does, he's wrong. Yeah, that's what he get paid the big bucks for, but in his position, I'm not sure what I'd do. Nothing seems like a reasonable option from where I sit. At least for as long as I could get away with it.


    by stillidealistic on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 10:45pm

        Pardon people who may be out to kill Americans? No president would ever do that.


    by Aaron Carine on Sun, 05/26/2013 - 9:14pm

    Not to speak for Res, I think he merely used the pardon power to illuminate the broad scope of ( unused) presidential authority, not as a tactical suggestion.

    by jollyroger on Sun, 05/26/2013 - 9:22pm

    (openheadexplosion) Res has it cold (closeheadexplosion). Commanders in Chief don't snivel, they command. There is no way that the institutional equities would cut against a transfer to stateside military brig, and any congressional attempt to fuck with CinC authority would fizzle ingloriously. Scuse me now, gotta scrape my brains off the walls and ladle them back into my poor shattered cognitively dissonent skull.

    by jollyroger on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 2:05am

    Section 2. Clause 1 ..... Commander and Chief .........He shall have power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for offenses against the United States......


    by Resistance on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 8:53am

    correctamundo...

    by jollyroger on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 9:47am

       I liked his words about Gitmo. Although Glenn Greenwald says that nothing will change for the prisoners if Gitmo is closed, Obama says that things will change. If Congress ever lets him close the place, we can see.

      I didn't care for the stuff about the drones. A number of the drone attacks have been war crimes, and Obama could probably be prosecuted. It was also rather funny to hear Obama say that no one should be detained without due process when he signed the National Defense Authorization Act, which allows such detentions(albeit only for people arrested outside the United States).


    by Aaron Carine (not verified) on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 7:49am

    Well, of course the *atrocity of Gitmo is irrelevant to the venue, and Star Chamber kill list drone bullshit is murderous bullshit, always and everywhere. ( let alone "signature. murder" which should put you straight in the Hague dock..).

    * Once you embrace the fear, the detention in preventive detention swallows up the prevention.


    by jollyroger on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 9:45am

      First, Obama didn't say Gitmo was irrelevant; he said the detainees should get due process(I'm not certain that detention without trial is an "atrocity"; that word is usually reserved for killing, maiming, or rape).

      The drone attacks aren't "always and everywhere" murderous. The laws of war allow you to kill combatants, and you aren't required to give them a trial. The war crimes involve the killing of noncombatants.


    by Aaron Carine (not verified) on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 3:06pm

    (1) : a state of usually open and declared armed hostile conflict between states or nations (emphasis added. ) Just because we have found it convenient to elide the requirements of geographic contiguity defining the free fire zone don't make it legal. Unless you like the idea of Battleground Earth. In which case, keep a wary eye on the sky over your city...

    by jollyroger on Sat, 05/25/2013 - 8:24pm

       Come on, Roger, the secondary definition in the source you cited doesn't have a requirement that both parties be states or nations.  Is no one  allowed to defend themselves  against Al Qaeda, Hamas, or Hezbollah because they aren't states?


    by Aaron Carine on Mon, 05/27/2013 - 9:19am

    the key distinction " secondary ". Lets go to a more specialized authority. Black's citing Grotius:A state of forcible contention; an armed contest between nations; a state of hostility between two or more nations or states. Gro. de Jur. B. lib. 1, c. 1. Every connection by force between two nations, in external matters, under the authhority of their respective governments, is a public war. If war is declared in form, It is called “solemn,” and is of the perfect kind; because the whole nation is at war with another whole nation. When the hostilities are limited as respects places, persons, and things, the war is properly termed “imperfect war.” Bas v. Tingy, 4 Dall. 37, 40 1 L. Ed. 731.

    No one says that a state may not defend itself. But the essence of a state of war is to put an entire population at risk of collective punishment, attributing to all citizens equally the responsibility for the harms inflicted upon the aggrieved population, without regard to individual action. ( think Hiroshima, Dresden, etc.) where a population includes criminal elements the self defending state must distinguish the guilty from the innocent, and only if the sovereign authority of the state in which the guilty are to be found refuses extradition may case be made to impute collective guilt and impose collective punishment. BTW, the existence of failed states is why we need a world government, which h would have legitimacy when pursuing transnational criminals.


    by jollyroger on Mon, 05/27/2013 - 11:53am

       The Geneva Convention requires you to make distinctions between civilians and soldiers, and not to treat everyone as equally responsible.


    by Aaron Carine on Mon, 05/27/2013 - 9:05pm

    well, that certainly solves that problem.. now all we need to do is enforce the convention! Oh, wait! that would involve that tiresome looking backward ...

    by jollyroger on Mon, 05/27/2013 - 9:22pm

       The Convention is followed  often enough that we're better off with it than without it.  Anyway, if people used to think of war as being "between states or nations", things are different now. (civil wars weren't between states).


    by Aaron Carine on Mon, 05/27/2013 - 9:51pm

    The Convention is followed often enough Not by us… Also, civil wars have zero to do with our drone murders, and the illegality thereof. But thank you for the helpful distinction.

    by jollyroger on Mon, 05/27/2013 - 10:12pm

      I mentioned civil wars because I got the impression--maybe I misunderstood--that you were saying it only counts as a war if it is between states or nations. I would argue that not all the drone  attacks are illegal, although certainly the war crimes committed by the drone operators are.


    by Aaron Carine on Tue, 05/28/2013 - 7:00am

    No, I was saying ( vis-a-vis) the" free fire" vs. due process paradigm as applied to our current efforts that civil war was not a relevant category for analysing the morality OR legality of extrajudicial killing.

    by jollyroger on Tue, 05/28/2013 - 10:40am

      Okay, but killing combatants isn't extrajudicial killing.


    by Aaron Carine on Tue, 05/28/2013 - 6:13pm

    There's a judge involved? Oh, well, carry on then...

    by jollyroger on Tue, 05/28/2013 - 8:13pm

      Dude, when you're killing combatants, there doesn't have to be a judge involved. Would you complain that no judge was involved in the killing of German soldiers in Normandy? The two best sources, The Bureau for Investigative Journalism and the New America Foundation, say that a majority of those killed by drones have been combatants.


    by Aaron Carine on Tue, 05/28/2013 - 8:58pm

    Circular reason much?

    by jollyroger on Tue, 05/28/2013 - 9:09pm

      Circular reason? Bull. I'm giving you a fact; in war, combatants don't have to get a trial before you kill them. If you don't believe the government, believe the non-governmental sources I cited.

    http://natsec.newamerica.net/drones/pakistan/analysis

    http://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/category/projects/drones/


    by Aaron Carine on Tue, 05/28/2013 - 9:25pm

    Dude, the crux of the issue was war or not war...remember?

    by jollyroger on Tue, 05/28/2013 - 9:30pm

      Then I'll settle the issue: this is war. When you're overseas fighting a hostile army(Al Qaeda and the Taliban forces are armies), it's a war.


    by Aaron Carine on Tue, 05/28/2013 - 10:04pm

    International law to the contrary notwithstanding ...

    by jollyroger on Tue, 05/28/2013 - 10:21pm

    Nothing so complicates communication as does words. Legality is a concept that exists within realms. Laws are arbitrary and thinking/believing/ acting, as if the U.S. government can pass a law in D.C. that justifies, that makes legal, any action anywhere in the world, is possibly the highest form of governmental hubris. In a democracy, such hubris can eventually be put down as a societal sickness.
     The U.S. government has the ‘right’ to pass laws which have authority within the U.S.  We do not have any legal or moral or ethical ‘right’ to pass laws giving us the power of life or death over anyone  that we can get away with killing anywhere in the world, based on arbitrary decisions by a small group acting secretly.

     Drones are so far a weapon that can only be used over undeveloped countries whose military has already been largely destroyed. Even Syria could almost certainly shoot down any drone which loitered over its territory waiting for a target to appear. If Chechnya was a bit further from big brother Russia I have little doubt that we would find targets there which our national security demanded we neutralize.
    Our President says that his military actions which are [apparent and  quite obvious] violations of U.S. law, U.S. treaties, international law, and the amorphous laws of  “Just War” are all legal. He says that he has lawyers who have written secret legal  briefs that say so and so it is. Like Bush, if he wants to make something legal he tells a lawyer to ‘make it so’.  I do not accept that and it is apparent that in at least some instances you do not either. If Democrats cannot, and do not even try to, influence a semi-rational Democratic President who is a supposed authority on Constitutional law to obey our laws governing war,  international law, and the laws of ‘Just War’, how many clicks of the ratchet can we expect the next Republican President to notch, especially after the completely predictable episodes of small scale, and the possibility of large scale, blowback. And what will our arguments be if we oppose his/her responses which will almost certainly be more war? If more war is necessary we should at the very least be able to do it within our own legal code even if our 'enemies' of the moment do not recognize that code.

     I would argue that not all the drone  attacks are illegal, although certainly the war crimes committed by the drone operators are.

    Which drone attacks do you consider to be legal?

    Our Congress should set an arbitrary time limit after which the AUMF would expire. It should be a span much shorter than a Friedman unit. During the interim a new narrower and more restrictive authorization should be debated and then passed. I cannot imagine the most ardent Obama supporter, assuming they also have several brain cells working, being comfortable with passing on to any potential future President the powers that he has assumed and which we learn of when the power is acted on, and then often times only then when the information is leaked. Then we accept the persecution of the leaker even if the leak was justified by an adherence to higher principles. As much as I hope the President listens to what "that woman" said, I hope the American public begins to recognize the validity of her attitude.


    by LULU (not verified) on Tue, 05/28/2013 - 12:17pm

    I think that the situation in Pakistan is complicated by the fact theft the Government does not control parts of the country inhabited by the Taliban. The Pakistani government likely cooperates with some of the drone strikes. Even Medea Benjamin's peace caravan did not enter into the Taliban region.  

    Osama was living in the midst of Pakistani military officials. Is it really believe able that the Pakistanis did not know he was there? Drones were not used, but a special forces team went in and were apparently ready to shot their way out if needed. Should the US have demanded that Osama be turned over to the US rather than use the military assault. Wouldn't the shooting of Pakistani military and civilians have been as bad as the drone strikes? 

    What would you have done if you knew that Osama was the likely person in the house.

    I agree that Presidential war powers have to be curtailed. I do see some choices as complex. If the Syrian government used gas on the rebels is the US obligated to aid rebels that are likely Islamists? If the US plays no role in Syria, what happens when the rebels receive arms from the EU? Is the future US role to be stand by and watch what happens? 


    by rmrd0000 on Tue, 05/28/2013 - 5:47pm

    "I agree that Presidential war powers have to be curtailed. I do see some choices as complex"

    First, lets try to understand each others reasons for the thing we seem to agree on.
    Why do you believe that Presidential war powers have to be curtailed?  And, for the sake of clarity, do you mean “have to be curtailed” as in the curtailment is a necessity to avoid some great harm or do you instead mean that the powers just should be curtailed for some reason, maybe of pragmatic purpose or to align with some value, either abstract or codified as in the Constitution? I assume that you have seen our President assume and use military powers over the last five years in some unacceptable way or else you would not see a reason to curtail them.


    by LULU (not verified) on Tue, 05/28/2013 - 7:00pm

    I went to a board meeting were we decided that the board lawyer should write the message that went out announcing something all the board members agree was the proper thing to do. So before we get into this are you making a legal argument? If so, just lay out your pertinent beliefs and I'll say yea or nay in response.

    When I say have to be curtailed I mean that Congress, as big a bunch of worthless carbon atoms as the Republicans in general may be, has to have a say in what acts of aggression we take. The forever war on terror is not rational.

     


    by rmrd0000 on Tue, 05/28/2013 - 8:43pm

    One structural problem that exists is that the media focuses on the nonsensical rather than the important. Because she was loud in her protest the killing of a 16-year old was lost. When Medea Benjamin appeared on CNN, anchor Carol Costello noted that Benjamin was characterized as rude and crazy in the emails that Costello received.

    every picture that I have of the protest shows Benjamin wide- eyed and mouth open, The images are geared to suggest mental instability. As long as we have a media focused on entertainment rather than issues. It will be difficult to have the public informed about so-called collateral damage.


    by rmrd0000 on Sun, 05/26/2013 - 7:16pm

    I'll tell you what's " mentally unstable " ( as measured by concern for personal safety). Being part of Imran Khan's peace caravan into Waziristan! THAT'S fuckin' nuts!

    by jollyroger on Sun, 05/26/2013 - 7:26pm

    The idea that the caravan could not cross into Taliban territory for fear of an attack does not coincide with the idea that the area would be peaceful if there were no drone attacks., but it is not our country to control. 


    by rmrd0000 on Sun, 05/26/2013 - 10:15pm

    it'll take a lot more than cessation of drones to pacify the pashtun.they fight for fun.

    by jollyroger on Sun, 05/26/2013 - 10:26pm

    They don't want outside help and then be forever beholden to a group, who in the future would say "remember us, we helped you, and this is how you repay us"  Maybe this is how Bin Laden  must have felt after accepting guns and assistance from the US then the US expected something more in return?  Maybe this groups sponsors thinking; let us sneak into their camp and when the time is right and we've gained their trust; we'll betray them to the CIA, who will reward us for any information.  Maybe the protestors could have a camera crew available to take  pictures; just like when they killed that other popular rebel leader. Perhaps the caravan, is seen as a Trojan Horse?


    by Resistance on Sun, 05/26/2013 - 11:03pm

    Bear in mind that Imran Khan got his start as a star cricket " bowler" ( whatever the fuck THAT is..). Imagine a peace caravan to Texas led by Yogi Berra...

    by jollyroger on Sun, 05/26/2013 - 11:37pm

    Rick Perry asking  "why is Yogi Bear coming to Texas'?


    by Resistance on Mon, 05/27/2013 - 12:10am

    And why does he have Honey Boo-Boo with him? (parenthetically, if I ever retire as the spokesman for Adderall ("Treat your A.D.D., people. TREAT IT!") Rick Perry would be exhibit (a) for what happens if you don't...)

    by jollyroger on Mon, 05/27/2013 - 12:17am