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urbanrealtor.
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September 1, 2011 at 5:02 PM #727733September 1, 2011 at 5:02 PM #727816
briansd1
Guest[quote=Allan from Fallbrook]
Pri: Relative to torture: STOP DOING IT. Simple as that. I know from firsthand experience that torture does NOT work.
Repeal Patriots I and II, along with FISA and the NSA Carnivore and Echelon programs. You referenced an earlier Obama Executive Order directing the closure of Gitmo (and it would now appear that YOU DID know that EO was BS), why not have the Prez issue some Executive Orders undoing some of these programs (and, given the nature of these programs, an EO is exactly what is needed).
Stop extraordinary renditions. Again, simple as that.[/quote]
All of these issues will play really well on right-wing talk radio and the Republican dominated Congress.
Why don’t libertarians such as Michelle Bachmann lead on the repeal of civil liberties stifling laws?
Allan, as a conservative, you should focus first on your side of the aisle.
September 1, 2011 at 5:02 PM #728097Guest[quote=Allan from Fallbrook]
Pri: Relative to torture: STOP DOING IT. Simple as that. I know from firsthand experience that torture does NOT work.
Repeal Patriots I and II, along with FISA and the NSA Carnivore and Echelon programs. You referenced an earlier Obama Executive Order directing the closure of Gitmo (and it would now appear that YOU DID know that EO was BS), why not have the Prez issue some Executive Orders undoing some of these programs (and, given the nature of these programs, an EO is exactly what is needed).
Stop extraordinary renditions. Again, simple as that.[/quote]
All of these issues will play really well on right-wing talk radio and the Republican dominated Congress.
Why don’t libertarians such as Michelle Bachmann lead on the repeal of civil liberties stifling laws?
Allan, as a conservative, you should focus first on your side of the aisle.
September 1, 2011 at 6:21 PM #727772Allan from Fallbrook
Participant[quote=pri_dk]
[quote]undermining the US Constitution and rule of law and dangerously eroding American civil liberties.[/quote]Now you are going hyperbolic.
This stuff has been around long before Obama. Bush/Cheney took it to a new level. And there IS a difference between initiating it and choosing not to stop it when it’s already in place.
You seem to be absolutely fixated on this issue, Allan.
So what should he do? Sacrifice his second term (where he may actually have the power to do the right thing) just to demonstrate commitment to some idealistic principle, even though he’ll accomplish next to nothing?[/quote]
Pri: Hyperbolic and fixated? Yeah, I am and have no problem with being so.
Read this NYT article regarding the Obama Administration’s pursuit of whistleblowers and then tell me: (1) We all shouldn’t be fixating on this shit, and (2) Obama’s second term would feature a more “principled” stand. Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/12/us/politics/12leak.html?pagewanted=1&hp
Here’s Daniel Ellsberg (remember him?) commenting on the same thing: http://www.whistleblowersblog.org/2010/06/articles/whistleblowers-government-empl/terrorism/ellsberg-ciriticizes-obama-for-prosecution-of-whistleblowers/
Read Ellsberg’s comment in its entirety, with a special focus on the fact that this prosecution was essentially to prevent public knowledge of the massive waste going on at NSA. Anyone remember Obama’s pledge of “transparency”?
And, pri, yup, I don’t play chess at all, but I love me some checkers! I git out the shine and me and Ma play till the cows come home.
September 1, 2011 at 6:21 PM #727855Participant[quote=pri_dk]
[quote]undermining the US Constitution and rule of law and dangerously eroding American civil liberties.[/quote]Now you are going hyperbolic.
This stuff has been around long before Obama. Bush/Cheney took it to a new level. And there IS a difference between initiating it and choosing not to stop it when it’s already in place.
You seem to be absolutely fixated on this issue, Allan.
So what should he do? Sacrifice his second term (where he may actually have the power to do the right thing) just to demonstrate commitment to some idealistic principle, even though he’ll accomplish next to nothing?[/quote]
Pri: Hyperbolic and fixated? Yeah, I am and have no problem with being so.
Read this NYT article regarding the Obama Administration’s pursuit of whistleblowers and then tell me: (1) We all shouldn’t be fixating on this shit, and (2) Obama’s second term would feature a more “principled” stand. Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/12/us/politics/12leak.html?pagewanted=1&hp
Here’s Daniel Ellsberg (remember him?) commenting on the same thing: http://www.whistleblowersblog.org/2010/06/articles/whistleblowers-government-empl/terrorism/ellsberg-ciriticizes-obama-for-prosecution-of-whistleblowers/
Read Ellsberg’s comment in its entirety, with a special focus on the fact that this prosecution was essentially to prevent public knowledge of the massive waste going on at NSA. Anyone remember Obama’s pledge of “transparency”?
And, pri, yup, I don’t play chess at all, but I love me some checkers! I git out the shine and me and Ma play till the cows come home.
September 1, 2011 at 6:21 PM #728105Participant[quote=pri_dk]
[quote]undermining the US Constitution and rule of law and dangerously eroding American civil liberties.[/quote]Now you are going hyperbolic.
This stuff has been around long before Obama. Bush/Cheney took it to a new level. And there IS a difference between initiating it and choosing not to stop it when it’s already in place.
You seem to be absolutely fixated on this issue, Allan.
So what should he do? Sacrifice his second term (where he may actually have the power to do the right thing) just to demonstrate commitment to some idealistic principle, even though he’ll accomplish next to nothing?[/quote]
Pri: Hyperbolic and fixated? Yeah, I am and have no problem with being so.
Read this NYT article regarding the Obama Administration’s pursuit of whistleblowers and then tell me: (1) We all shouldn’t be fixating on this shit, and (2) Obama’s second term would feature a more “principled” stand. Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/12/us/politics/12leak.html?pagewanted=1&hp
Here’s Daniel Ellsberg (remember him?) commenting on the same thing: http://www.whistleblowersblog.org/2010/06/articles/whistleblowers-government-empl/terrorism/ellsberg-ciriticizes-obama-for-prosecution-of-whistleblowers/
Read Ellsberg’s comment in its entirety, with a special focus on the fact that this prosecution was essentially to prevent public knowledge of the massive waste going on at NSA. Anyone remember Obama’s pledge of “transparency”?
And, pri, yup, I don’t play chess at all, but I love me some checkers! I git out the shine and me and Ma play till the cows come home.
September 1, 2011 at 11:41 PM #727951GuestSo Obama has not changed anything at the CIA. It’s business as usual. It’s kinda dissappointing but I understand the need to not rock the boat of war on terrorism while flighting other political battles. For most Americans it’s out of sight, out of mind.
September 1, 2011 at 11:41 PM #728141GuestSo Obama has not changed anything at the CIA. It’s business as usual. It’s kinda dissappointing but I understand the need to not rock the boat of war on terrorism while flighting other political battles. For most Americans it’s out of sight, out of mind.
September 2, 2011 at 2:08 PM #728235Zeitgeist
Participant“Team Obama and Team Boehner, otherwise known as The Presidency and Congress, weren’t squabbling about Twitter or Facebook, we’re they? No, they were fighting over who drives prime-time mass viewing Wednesday by nature of airing at 8 p.m. And just as a comparative pittance was spent on Internet and social media in the mid-term 2010 election, so will hundreds of millions of dollars be spent on TV advertising by Obama and whoever the GOP candidate is 2012.”
September 2, 2011 at 3:34 PM #728238Participant[quote=briansd1]So Obama has not changed anything at the CIA. It’s business as usual. It’s kinda dissappointing but I understand the need to not rock the boat of war on terrorism while flighting other political battles. For most Americans it’s out of sight, out of mind.
Brian: So let me see if I follow your logic correctly here. “It’s kinda disappointing” when Obama does it, but reprehensible when Dubya did it?
This is what I find amazing. You talk about the Tea Partiers and “redneck” America and evangelicals and the willingness of those groups to get into lockstep with the GOP, especially the wingnut branch of the GOP, but casually dismiss a truly terrifying loss of civil liberties as “kinda disappointing”? Wow. How’s that cognitive dissonance working for you?
Any thoughts on someone of Daniel Ellsberg’s status and history commenting negatively on the situation? Note that I’m not calling out Obama, but remarking that we’ve seen a marked erosion of civil liberties going back to Vietnam and beyond.
September 2, 2011 at 3:55 PM #728239ParticipantPresident Zero: “It took the Republican National Committee exactly 94 minutes to coin a new, demeaning title for Barack Obama: President Zero.”
“In an e-mail to reporters, the committee took note of the worst jobs report in nearly a year, saying that there has been ‘two and a half years of Obamanomics and nothing to show for it.’”
September 2, 2011 at 4:08 PM #728240Guest[quote=Allan from Fallbrook]
Brian: So let me see if I follow your logic correctly here. “It’s kinda disappointing” when Obama does it, but reprehensible when Dubya did it?
[/quote]Again, I believe there is a qualitative difference between Obama and the Republicans.
But given that the Patriot acts have been law for years now, and a huge apparatus has been developed to implement those laws by Bush, repealing the laws is a whole different story.
Yes, I’m disappointed Obama has not changed the status quo at CIA. But I understand that he’s had other priorities. For example, I would rather Obama concentrate on withdrawal from Iraq first.
Gays in the military was a campaign promise; and Obama has delivered. That, in itself, was not an easy task. He was up against an old fashioned military establishment and a Republican opposition hell-bent on seeing him fail, no matter the merits of the policy.
One thing at a time. Progress comes one thing at at time, one day at a time.
September 2, 2011 at 8:07 PM #728257Participant[quote=briansd1]
Again, I believe there is a qualitative difference between Obama and the Republicans.
But given that the Patriot acts have been law for years now, and a huge apparatus has been developed to implement those laws by Bush, repealing the laws is a whole different story.
Yes, I’m disappointed Obama has not changed the status quo at CIA. But I understand that he’s had other priorities. For example, I would rather Obama concentrate on withdrawal from Iraq first.
Gays in the military was a campaign promise; and Obama has delivered. That, in itself, was not an easy task. He was up against an old fashioned military establishment and a Republican opposition hell-bent on seeing him fail, no matter the merits of the policy.
One thing at a time. Progress comes one thing at at time, one day at a time.[/quote]
Brian: You realize that the post above is just excuses, right?
Knowing what we now know about Obama and the CIA, that means Obama delivered that Cairo speech in 2009 knowing full well it had the substance of wind.
As to qualitative difference: Bullshit. Obama is not only continuing the policies of his predecessor, in some cases he’s expanded them.
Progress, even one step at a time, means moving forward, even incrementally. This is NOT progress, this is regression. This is the loss of civil liberties, this is a contravened Constitution and Bill of Rights and you’re content to throw out excuses (that really don’t have a basis in reality, if you’re truly willing to be honest and confront the facts).
There is NO progress here. You know that. And there is NO qualitative difference, either. As a country we’ve gotten so willing and able to blame the “other guy”, that we’ve been completely gulled into ignoring the TRUE FACTS about how this country is truly run. Whether its the criminal banksters of Wall Street getting a pass from BOTH Dubya AND Obama, whether its the creation and implementation of a National Security State that dates back to the end of WWII, or the fact that both parties have sold America down the river, we’re content to be happy with the repeal of DADT and call it “progress”.
C’mon, Brian, wake up and smell the cordite.
September 3, 2011 at 10:08 AM #728292Guest[quote=Allan from Fallbrook]
There is NO progress here. You know that. And there is NO qualitative difference, either. As a country we’ve gotten so willing and able to blame the “other guy”, that we’ve been completely gulled into ignoring the TRUE FACTS about how this country is truly run. Whether its the criminal banksters of Wall Street getting a pass from BOTH Dubya AND Obama, whether its the creation and implementation of a National Security State that dates back to the end of WWII, or the fact that both parties have sold America down the river, we’re content to be happy with the repeal of DADT and call it “progress”.C’mon, Brian, wake up and smell the cordite.[/quote]
Yeah, I agree with you. Smelling the cordite has made me depressed now.
But, still, I have no choice but to support Obama over the Republican alternative.
September 3, 2011 at 6:53 PM #728317Veritas
ParticipantAllan,
Does huffing cordite kill brain cells or is that brian cells?
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