dagblog - Comments for "Empty Wheel & Greenwald: tag team duo"

I seem to recall one (Latin

Desider — Tue, 10 May 2011 05:13:41 +0000

In reply to Among the comments on this

I seem to recall one (Latin America?) where they even presented their workshop at an open seminar with USAID attending, but somehow the little group got the "association with terrorists" bit. Even if you're teaching them to hang laundry, it's "support", you little clothes-pins you.

The "War on Terror" isn't

Desider — Tue, 10 May 2011 04:56:12 +0000

In reply to In my mind, it is almost time

The "War on Terror" isn't that unconventional, if you followed the IRA, ETA, Shining Path, and numerous other terrorist activities around the world the last few decades.

Just with "American Exceptionalism" we have to go stark raving crazy just to show we're different.

Seems fair.For myself there

Flavius — Tue, 10 May 2011 03:39:44 +0000

In reply to I don't celebrate a death,

Seems fair.

For myself there are some deaths I do celebrate. His was one of them.

I don't celebrate a death,

rmrd0000 — Tue, 10 May 2011 01:58:06 +0000

In reply to At a certain point we'll get

I don't celebrate a death, but I have to admit I don't feel a great deal of remorse about the killing of Osama bin Laden. Obama did what was necessary.

Among the comments on this

we are stardust — Mon, 09 May 2011 23:13:04 +0000

In reply to Empty Wheel & Greenwald: tag team duo

Among the comments on this thread was the subtext of being 'an associate of', 'linked to', 'providing material support to' , la la la...terrorist organizations.

Now here comes this story about the US Treasury (Office of Foreign Assets Control) freezing the bank accoounts of Hatem Abudayyeh and his wife, Naima. Kevin Gosztola writes at Oped News:

Hatem Abudayyeh is one of 23 activists from Minnesota, Michigan, and Illinois subpoenaed to a federal grand jury in Chicago, and his home was raided by the FBI in September of last year. Neither Hatem Abudayyeh nor Naima Abudayyeh have been charged with any crime. One of the bank accounts frozen was exclusively in Naima Abudayyeh's name.

Joe Iosbaker of the National Committee to Stop FBI Repression said, "We are appalled at the government's attempt to restrict the family's access to its finances. Not only does the government's action seriously disrupt the lives of the Abudayyehs and their five-year-old daughter, but it represents an attack on Chicago's Arab community and activist community and the fundamental rights of Americans to freedom of speech."

Joe added, "Apparently OFAC can block your assets pending an investigation on charges of "material support for a foreign terrorist organization" without a hearing. It's a bit like a chapter out of George Orwell, they don't need any evidence to freeze your assets and thus far they won't even acknowledge that they are the source of the freeze. In the case of these activists, assets means money for food and rent."

Bill Chambers, of the Chicago Committee Against Political Repression said: "The persecution of the Abudayyeh family is another example of the criminalization of Palestinians, their supporters, and their movement for justice and liberation. The government's attempt to conflate the anti-war and human rights movements with terrorism is a cynical attempt to capitalize on the current political climate in order to silence Palestinians and other people of conscience who exercise their First Amendment rights in a manner which does not conform to the administration's foreign policy agenda in the Middle East."

The story smells, IMO. I hope we hear more soon. But I remember this administration calling NGOs trying to teach conflict resolution to groups in the ME (specifically Libya, if I remember correctly) as offering 'in-kind support to terrorist groups' (their services was free to the groups, and the G went with the 'money is fungible' reasoning.

In my mind, it is almost time

Ramona — Mon, 09 May 2011 22:33:00 +0000

In reply to Targeting American citizens

In my mind, it is almost time to eliminate the office of the presidency.

Really? And put what in its place? Nothing? Leave it to Congress and the Supreme Court?

As to gray areas and targeting American citizens: What constitutes appropriate actions when it comes to a war as elusive and unconventional as the War on Terror? There have been numerous instances of American insurgents signing up with al Qaeda, training to do grave damage in their own country. Why should they be treated differently because they're Americans? I don't understand your anger here.

At a certain point we'll get

Flavius — Mon, 09 May 2011 21:19:00 +0000

In reply to Hm. Just speculating but here

At a certain point we'll get evidence from the Seals which I will accept.

In the interim as Juan Cole reports as I quote in the blog listed to the left, because the room was dark they were so unsure whom they had shot that one of them lay down next to the corpse as a way of trying to establish whether he was 6 feet 4 inches tall. .That suggests the Seal shot someone who appeared to be threatening rather than someone whom appeared to be surrendering..

But when we get facts I'll accept them

What I won't do in the interim is criticize Obama for some act which might possibly have been taken by the Seals.If I'm going to criticize him it will be for something they or he actually did not something I've made up..

Clearly, currently on Dagblog doing that , making up something that the Osama might have done, is not just speculating , it's accusing. And the accusation will morph into a " fact" with the next commenter.

Personally I remember the sickening sight of pairs of people holding hands as they jumped from the World Trade Center , and Congress passing a law a week later authorizing the President to

use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001

I'm delighted OBL is now dead. And if he were shot when trying to surrender , well as Clark Gable told Vivian Leigh Frankly I don't give a damn.

But then I don't hate Obama.

Your second paragraph is

acanuck — Mon, 09 May 2011 19:59:44 +0000

In reply to Sure - of course there'll be

Your second paragraph is spot-on. The killing of bin Laden has shone a wecome light on the issue of targeted killing, but is definitely not the case we want to take to the court of public opinion -- or any court.

The Predators are the real problem. They are just too (relatively) cheap and risk-free. An operation like Abbottabad, which required perhaps a quarter-billion dollars worth of super-high-tech helicopters, is necessarily going to be well-planned and target the baddest of the bad guys. But it sometimes looks like the drones are being tossed at anything that moves "suspiciously." Certainly that's how it looks to Pakistanis, Afghans and Yemenis. It's worse than unlawful; it's stupid and counterproductive.

Maybe, given the free hand Obama temporarily has within the U.S., he could cut a deal with the ICRC: formally reject its authority, but agree to "co-operate" with it by explaining fully the U.S. rules of engagement and "seeking out" its guidance on whether those rules are being stringently followed. He could then explain to the American public that he has ensured an exemption that allows drone attacks to continue "within a legal framework." Think something like that might fly?

The ultimate solution, of course, is to wind down the whole GWOT, and pull the troops out entirely across the Greater Middle East. Maybe first the ISI can be talked into "tracking down" Zawahiri (and extraditing him) in exchange for not being outed as the doublecrossers they are. A few key members of the intelligence hierarchy could be permitted to retire quietly with full pensions. Those are my best-case scenarios; I'm probably wrong.

That's my story

Resistance — Mon, 09 May 2011 19:33:42 +0000

In reply to Hm. Just speculating but here

That's my story .......Today

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbxLbDdfhbY

Hm. Just speculating but here

Obey — Mon, 09 May 2011 19:23:22 +0000

In reply to I am also taking

Hm. Just speculating but here goes:

- Here's a guy expecting an attack - he's prepared, with phone numbers in his pockets, money sewed into his clothes. A couple of helicopters land in his backyard. Firefight. They then blast their way through three walls (at least in the version I heard). Takes some time. Then inside the house they go upstairs. Blast or shoot down his door, his wife rushes the intruders, gets shot. ... and through all that time he still hasn't reached out for the guns sitting ... right next to him. So he's.just.sitting.there. For minutes. Waiting.

Doesn't sound like a guy resisting to me. Sure, maybe he goes for the gun when he sees his wife shot or something like that. Or he deliberately provokes them to avoid getting captured alive - suicide by enemy or some such. But given the evidence, I'd say surrender is at least as plausible as 'resisting'.