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June 19, 2013
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 President Obama Can Redeem the White HousePosted on Nov 12, 2008By Amy Goodman Alice Walker is the first African-American woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for fiction. But Monday, I called her to talk about a true story. The Obamas had just visited the White House. The first African-American elected president of the United States had visited his soon-to-be residence, a house built by slaves. Walker told me: “Even when they were building it, you know, in chains or in desperation and in sadness, they were building it for him. Ancestors take a very long view of life, and they see what is coming.” The author of “The Color Purple,” who writes about slavery and redemption, went on, “This is a great victory of the spirit and for people who have had to live basically by faith.” Many decades ago, Alice Walker had broken anti-miscegenation laws in Mississippi by marrying a white man. She is a descendant of slaves. While Barack Obama is not—he is the son of a Kenyan man and a white Kansan woman—his wife, Michelle, is, and so, too, are their daughters, Sasha and Malia. Michelle Obama’s ancestors come from South Carolina; her grandfather was part of the great migration north to Chicago. Melissa Harris-Lacewell, associate professor of politics and African-American studies at Princeton University, reflected on the Obamas’ forthcoming move: “There are two African-American girls, little girl children, who are going to grow up with 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue as their home address. That’s an astonishing difference for our country. It does not mean the end of racial inequality. It does not mean that most little black girls growing up with their residence on the South Side of Chicago or in Harlem, or Latino boys and girls growing up at their addresses, that the world is all better for them. But it does mean that there is something possible here.” Construction of the White House started in 1792, with sandstone quarried by slaves in Aquia, Va., then transported up the Potomac River and hauled into place by slaves. The White House Historical Association lists several of the slaves on that historic construction crew: “Tom, Peter, Ben, Harry and Daniel, three of whom were slaves owned by White House architect James Hoban.” Stonecutters, or sawyers, “on government payrolls, such as ‘Jerry,’ Jess,’ ‘Charles,’ ‘Len,’ ‘Dick’, ‘Bill’ and ‘Jim’ undoubtedly were slaves leased from their masters.” Randall Robinson, in his book “The Debt,” wrote of slave labor in the construction of the U.S. Capitol: “The worn and pitted stones on which the tourists stood had doubtless been hauled into position by slaves, for whom the most arduous of tasks were reserved. They had fired and stacked the bricks. They had mixed the mortar. They had sawn the long timbers in hellishly dangerous pits with one slave out of the pit and another in, often nearly buried alive in sawdust.” Advertisement Which brings us back to slavery. When Frederick Douglass, the renowned abolitionist, was young, he was enslaved on a plantation on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, called Mount Misery, owned by Edward Covey, a notorious “slave breaker.” There, physical and psychological torture were standard. That property, today, is owned by Donald Rumsfeld, the former secretary of defense who was one of the key architects of the U.S. military’s program of torture and detention. With the stroke of a pen on Inauguration Day, President Obama could outlaw torture. It would be a tribute to those slaves who built his new home, the White House, a tribute to those slaves who built the U.S. Capitol Building, a tribute to those who were tortured at Mount Misery. © 2008 Amy Goodman Distributed by King Features Syndicate  TAGS:
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Quelle Surprise! Haiti on the Mend
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By knowbuddhau, November 19, 2008 at 11:37 am Link to this comment
Mohammed AL-Saedi, November 19 at 6:27 am http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20081112_president_obama_can_redeem_the_white_house/#200569
“Its going to be long-term struggle for the truthful people whose choice are the honourable stance for the liberty. “
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
O brother, my Brother! Truer words never have been spoken. I bow in your virtual direction (Coriolis correction requested ;-} )
“Teflon Joe” Lieberman isn’t the only war-monger being recycled.
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/11/17/obama_taps_ex_cia_officials_tied
“NPR attributed Obama’s reversal on FISA and telecom immunity to ...relying on the advice of John Brennan, an emphatic supporter of these policies.”
[...]
“Jami Miscik was…the Deputy Director of Intelligence during the run-up to the war and in the immediate postwar period. That was a period of politicized intelligence. That was a period of the corruption of the process. That was a period when all analytic trade craft, all of the rules of analytic trade craft were ignored….”
“And now, for Obama to turn around, put Jami Miscik back in the CIA in transition and Brennan in the transition process, ... you know, you have to wonder, who is Obama relying on for advice on the Washington community?.. [O]bviously, he’s listening to the wrong people.” [End Dn!]
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2008/110708c.html
Ray McGovern has seen presidents be propagandized with “the particular brand of ‘shock and awe’ that can be induced by ostensibly sexy intelligence to color reactions of briefees, including presidents. [He has] seen it happen.”
My fervent hope is that Obama will cast away the vipers dripping poison in his ears.
Report thisBy knowbuddhau, November 19, 2008 at 9:42 am Link to this comment
The property qualification bar to voting could indeed be used as a myth, to misguide interlocutors away from the closest verifiable version of our history. I thank wynfinity for prodding me to re-examine my assumptions.
~~~~~~~~~~
Are you saying, it’s not a fact?
~~~~~~~~~~
That’s a better way of saying what I meant.
What are the facts of our founding? The operative principle was elite white male dominance of the public arena. White male supremacy is the basis of our founding. I’m calling for a re-founding on bedrock, not shifting sands.
I paint houses. I’ve seen entire houses jacked up and then have their entire foundations replaced. We can do this.
We ARE doing this right here and now!
Thanks again.
Report thisBy knowbuddhau, November 19, 2008 at 9:00 am Link to this comment
Thank you for replying.
First and foremost, a myth is not a lie; it’s a metaphor, for going from ignorance to understanding. You are saying it’s not a fact. Are facts the only way of being aware of becoming?
Your sources, please?
Zinn (1981) A People’s History, p. 109
~~~~~~
Nevertheless, Jefferson underscored his phrase “all men are created equal” by his statement that American women would be “too wise to wrinkle their foreheads with politics. ” And after the Revolution, none of the new state constitutions granted women the right to vote, except for New Jersey, and that state rescinded the right in 1807. New York’s constitution specifically disenfranchised women by using the word “male.”
~~~~~~~
And even having a right is much different than being able to assert it. Just ask Jim Crow.
Jefferson’s mythical yeoman farmer was pitted against Hamilton’s mythical urbane merchant. Were these absolutely white men? Of course not; but the exceptions prove the rule. Or else why do we note them to this day? For example, we just elected the first non-white male ever.
There were many thriving nations of my Iroquois ancestors, from whom Jefferson drew for much of his democratic principles, when my Euro-American ancestors arrived and commenced genocide.
Zinn (1981) pp.514-515
The autobiographies of Indians show their refusal to be absorbed by the white man’s culture. One wrote:
Oh, yes, I went to the white man’s schools. I learned to read from school books, newspapers, and the Bible. But in time I found that these were not enough. Civilized people depend too much on man-made printed pages. I turn to the Great Spirit’s book which is the whole of his creation.
515
A Hopi Indian named Sun Chief said:
I had learned many English words and could recite part of the Ten Commandments. I knew how to sleep on a bed, pray to Jesus, comb my hair, eat with a knife and fork, and use a toilet. . . . I had also learned that a person thinks with his head instead of his heart.
Chief Luther Standing Bear, in his 1933 autobiography, From the Land of the Spotted Eagle, wrote:
True, the white man brought great change. But the varied fruits of his civilization, though highly colored and inviting, are sickening and deadening. And if it be the part of civilization to maim, rob, and thwart, then what is progress?
I am going to venture that the man who sat on the ground in his tipi meditating on life and its meaning, accepting the kinship of all creatures, and acknowledging unity with the universe of things, was infusing into his being the true essence of civilization. . . .[End]
I thank you for your efforts to set me straight.
Report thisBy Mohammed AL-Saedi, November 19, 2008 at 7:27 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
What can be the outcome of the Obama’s administration ?
....... obvious fact — elections are dog and pony shows designed to trick the public into thinking they are participating in the so-called democratic process when in fact they are simply signing off on corporate and banker vetted candidates. ....... Behind the paper-thin curtain of hype and distraction is the ugly reality of predatory globalism and the New World Order ....... By Kurt Nimmo at infowars.com.
Report thisThis is pure fact that the people in the United States of America and the world have witness. Taking a simple look at the works of, what will be, the previous regime or what will be called Bush regime, and in specific after the tragic event of 9.11. What happened were series of prolonged and ongoing tragedies all out around the world. The latest documentary film, Fabled Enimies, By Jason Bermas that has exposed the most important facts that to be known today. The series of prolonged tragic events that followed the 9.11 tragedy event were carefully engineered and manufactured to drive the world to where it is today. Limiting the liberty of the free people around the world, wars were ignited, Iraq was invaded and more than million of the civilians were brutally murdered, a burtal and sectarian based regime was installed and was empowered under the influential of the death squads in Iraq. Thousands of U.S.A citizens as well as many other had lost their lifes in this ongoing war, the economy in the United State of America and in the world were damaged. In additional to all of that, the evidences that are indicating to the involvement of various criminal elements that ranged from weapons selling and mercenaries companies such as black-water.
All of those events were not happened coincidentally but were engineered by the criminal elements, global-elites, whose objectives to establish the sorrow new world order.
The legitimate question is that, Will Obama’s administration going to be or to offer the solution to all of that ? taking a look at the Obama’s administration agenda and staffs can simply tell the answer. However, the most important things are that, the people in the congress shall be the eyes for the public to monitoring and to observing every move inside the regime and then reporting them to the public. The truthful and the independent media shall continuing its message for educating the public and thats by exposing every practices by the regime. Its going to be long-term struggle for the truthful people whose choice are the honourable stance for the liberty.
By wynfinity, November 18, 2008 at 9:17 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
@ knowbuddhau, et. al.
That only white property holding men could vote is a myth that is commonly held. I seem to recall thinking that from an early age.
The facts don’t agree however. Who could vote was left to the states by the Constitution. In many states women and black - and whites - who owned no property were voting the year after the Constitution’s ratification.
Some states did have property owning requirements…
In many states women were voting before the 19th amendment was ratified in 1920.
Until the 19th amendment, voting rights were determined by the states. After the 19th amendment voting rights are federally determined.
My understanding of the 3/5th rule was to limit the influence of the slave states in the House of Representatives. Since the number or Reps is dependent on population, counting slaves as 3/5 meant fewer slave supporting Reps in Congress.
Report thisBy knowbuddhau, November 15, 2008 at 4:22 pm Link to this comment
@boredwell
No she didn’t, mention those groups, and for very good reason: white supremacy has been our national credo from beginning, or do you not remember the 3/5ths rule? or that women, of any race or class, had no political say at all? or that even white men had to own sufficient property, or be properly pedigreed, to vote or hold office?
We white males already have a club: it’s called the ‘US Government.” A casual observance of our history reveals a zealous willingness to use this club on anyone insufficiently like our white male selves. Genocide and the reservations for American Indians; slavery for Aficans, Chinese, and Irish; de facto wage and debt slavery exists to this very day.
You could say, of any one word or sentence, that it doesn’t contain the Whole, but that would be to deny the truth of Being aware of Becoming. We share being aware of this right here: our shared becoming. We whites, we Euro-Americans, have committed genocide as the primary means of stealing the land upon which we have erected this empire.
No, she doesn’t mention our ancestors, the perpetrators of the sins of racist violence for which we must now atone;
It won’t be over in one term, two terms, or untold terms; not until mentioning the need for redemption of racist actions becomes as odd as the need itself.
Report thisBy boredwell, November 15, 2008 at 12:06 pm Link to this comment
When you talk about a better world for blacks and latinos vis a vis “two little African-American girl children” growing up on 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, you neglected to include Asian, Native American, gays, Jews, Muslims, the physically challenged and every other member who does not indentify with the dominant culture. I parse this because Obama means a change for ALL. Not some. That change may not come in a package of federal benefices but it does come in the idea of Hope. That is something that should be extended to ALL Americans. Indeed, Louisianna’s governor Jindal, a Native America, is already being vetted by the RNC for 2012! Now THAT is CHANGE!!!
Report thisBy knowbuddhau, November 15, 2008 at 9:57 am Link to this comment
Word to you, cann4ing! I remember hearing Brother Bill say that.
Who’s really in charge of our democratic republic: We, the People? or our representatives? We are.
Sad to say, the vast majority of us don’t understand how our democratic republic needs to function.
THE RELEVANCE OF ORIENTAL PHILOSOPHY
The late Alan Watts, in a series of podcasts entitled “The Relevance of Oriental Thinking,” points out the jarring contrast between our dominant mythology and genuine democracy. We worship a King of Kings, Lord of Lords (titles borrowed from Persia), yet American democracy requires that we govern ourselves as sovereign citizens.
(http://alanwatts.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=401115# Latest series: “The Religion of No Religion.”)
Joseph Campbell called it “mythic dissociation:” mistaken belief that we are forever apart from the divine. In that world, the best you can hope for is to stand in the proper relation to the proper authorities. :-]
Christ preached the greatest heresy of all: “I and the Father are One.” Campbell called this “mythic identification.” Christ’s good news, Watts says, still hasn’t gotten out.
Compare the following graphic illustrations of the feudal world view and our new worldview.
[[[Supremacy / Common Weal///[[[{{{Subjugation}}}]]]]]
As we can all plainly see, a dominant group asserts privileged access to our Common Weal, simultaneously denying access to a subjugated group. We can see all the illusory walls that divide Us, the indivisible. The original wall is the illusory self / other divide. From there, it’s just a matter of density.
beloved/UNION/Beloved
As we can also plainly see, this is our more perfect Union; the basis for a genuinely American America.
OUR HUBRIS EXPLAINED
The late Stephen Jay Gould beautifully described
our hubris over 8 years ago.
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/19/opinion/19GOUL.html?pagewanted=2&ei=5070&en=f7655ce4049eba50&ex=1226466000
“From its late 17th century inception in modern form, science has strongly privileged the reductionist mode of thought that breaks overt complexity into constituent parts and then tries to explain the totality by the properties of these parts and simple interactions fully predictable from the parts… The reductionist method works triumphantly for simple systems—predicting eclipses or the motion of planets (but not the histories of their complex surfaces)... [But] we fell victim to hubris, as we imagined that, in discovering how to unlock some systems, we had found the key for ***the conquest of all natural phenomena.***” (emphasis added)
Propagandists use words in only a mechanical fashion, shooting message pellets with the violent intention of forcing changes in behavior in the direction they dictate.
Compare MFMP to deploying snipers. Hide intentions; shoot mouths off; and kill just as directly as pulling a trigger, dropping a bomb or launching a rocket-propelled grenade.
Or is “command responsibility” no longer operative?
Let’s face it, America: we are being treated AS subjects of experiments in the manufacture of consent. What have the APA members at Gitmo ***really*** been up to?
Hacking human psyches as if they were mere machines, that’s what.
What do I recommend? “Changing the way society changes.”
http://www.buddhistethics.org/6/hershock991.html#Change
Report thisBy cann4ing, November 15, 2008 at 9:22 am Link to this comment
“Thinking historically, Lyndon Johnson wasn’t the civil rights movement, but he was an effective politician who passed civil rights legislation. FDR wasn’t a labor leader. Lincoln didn’t belong to an abolitionist party. They all responded to something going on on the ground. And in a lot of ways…progressive people have to get beyond the idea that we’re waiting for a savior. We’re not waiting for a savior. We need to transform ourselves, transform our movements, reach out to one another and build an irresistible social force for change.”
Bill Ayers, Nov. 14, 2008
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/11/14/exclusive_in_first_joint_broadcast_interview
Report thisBy shz, November 15, 2008 at 12:41 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
What a lot of immodest blather from our learned readers! Yes, we get it…..you’re all brilliant thinkers! I had to go back to the article be reminded of the subject.
So Obama isn’t a great orator? Hmmm, how could you tell that from a campaign?
Is he black, white, bi, Kenyan/Kansan? Well, I guess so, to the extent that it means anything. I’m a mutt, too….a Euro mutt with dabs of many nationalities, none of which define my being. All I really am is ME. All Obama is is OBAMA.
I trust the man. I believe he’s a grown up….like we haven’t had since Carter. I think he means well.
Of course I realize he’s to be the president of the US, and is, therefore, limited to our peculiar style of democracy.
He can’t walk on water….no one ever has.
Report thisBy Mike Varady, November 14, 2008 at 10:56 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
Clearly Obama’s going to have a tough presidency, slogging through all the detritus and the diabtribes and doo-doo left for him by Bush’s compadres, who’ll do everything they can to make him a failure. As much as they’ll attempt to use soothing, noble words, being evil before the election will not lead to nobility after it.
But there’s another standard he’ll have to show—one that’s unfair: That he’s done so good a job that another African American can easily run for president.
It’s a shame we have to celebrate a First
Report thisAfrican American astronaut (or first woman, or . . .) or such a president and all that much doo-doo about nothing. Without any necessary comment, they should have been in the running from the very beginning.
By knowbuddhau, November 14, 2008 at 11:19 am Link to this comment
MELISSA HARRIS-LACEWELL: I do agree with Adolph that there is no question, Barack Obama does not walk on water. It’s not even clear to me that that would be the standard by which we would choose a president. I do think that there is a very easy place to stand as a progressive intellectual, and that is on the sidelines of American politics, shaking an angry fist at how the process works. And I understand and respect it. I—I mean, no one is a more beautiful, critical writer than Adolph Reed. I appreciate the ways in which he pushes us and hopefully drags us towards the left in this country.
On the other hand, here are our options: John McCain, a conservative Republican who has moved to the right in order to win his party’s nomination; Hillary Rodham Clinton, who is part of this Clinton administration, which Adolph Reed has just told us was part of this kind of entire process of moving the Democratic Party towards the right and who has ruthlessly deployed race and gender in this campaign towards her own benefit; and then there’s Barack Obama. Does he walk on water? Certainly not.
But are those of us who have decided to be part of the process, to engage in the questions of American electoral politics, simply hoodwinked and bamboozled and drinking the Kool-Aid? Absolutely not. We’re making a choice about what we believe is possible in our country. And my only point is that, of course, it is an authentic African American experience to stand without hope on the sidelines, angry about the choices, but it is also an authentic African American experience and an authentic— ADOLPH REED, JR.: I resent that characterization by—
MELISSA HARRIS-LACEWELL: —American one to make a choice to be part of the process to choose a candidate, for good or for evil, and to support a campaign, believing that it is the best option that we have within a difficult, difficult American process.
JUAN GONZALEZ: Adolph Reed, last word, about a minute?
ADOLPH REED, JR.: Yeah, well, look, in the first place, I mean, I find that characterization unacceptable, alright? The only two options aren’t, you know, nothing or accept the two sorry choices that one has at one’s disposal. I mean, I think it’s possible to put the electoral domain in its proper place and to do what everyone has to do in that context, however frequently one has to do it, without losing sight of the fact that what we need to be trying to do at the same time is building beyond the election cycle—
MELISSA HARRIS-LACEWELL: Absolutely.
ADOLPH REED, JR.:—for the kind of movement that we need in this country.
MELISSA HARRIS-LACEWELL: I would agree with that. I would join with you in that, absolutely.
ADOLPH REED, JR.: And frankly, I mean, you know, I think that the game is over at this point. I don’t think that either one of these candidates actually is going to be able to beat McCain….
[...]
MELISSA HARRIS-LACEWELL: Come on, Adolph. You need a little hope. Come on. [End DN! quote; retrieved from ]http://www.democracynow.org/2008/4/30/the_politics_of_the_rev_wright]
Yeah, Folktruther: c’mon! Your absurd comment above, “You have to stop before the smoke from that stuff you are puffing on turns into a mushroom cloud,” echoes the propaganda of Condi Rice and the very regime you denounce.
What’s up with that?
Report thisBy Folktruther, November 14, 2008 at 8:39 am Link to this comment
Amy Goodman and Alice Walker may be interested in redeeming the White House, since it is one of the historical functions of establishment Progressives to legitimate authorized power, but this redemption of presidential power is inimincable to redeeming the country. The color ofthe House, or the face of its occupant, doesn’t make much difference if one is still enslaved by power.
And we are. It’s obviously business as usual in the morning in America no matter how the imperialist Dems and pseudo-progressives spin it.
Report thisBy elianita55, November 14, 2008 at 2:16 am Link to this comment
Sue, you bring up a valid point. The mainstream media has been very reticent about calling Obama bi-racial or of mixed race. By preferring to use the label “black”, they
a) deny Obama’s mother her race, as is so rightly pointed out by David Aaronovitch of the Times of London on Tuesday (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists) and
b) reinforce a polarized view of society, one that functions on oppositions and on an us-and-them mentality. For more on this: http://www.ilpodesta.org/2008/11/race.html
Dave in Big Pine - yours is an interesting prediction. We’ll see what happens if Clinton is appointed Secretary of State as is being currently reported: this would give her co-responsibility notably for foreign policy errors.
Report thisBy LQ, November 13, 2008 at 5:01 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
HE ALREADY HAS JUST BY BEING ELECTED. OUR FELLOW EUROPEANS CERTAINLY LOOK AT US IN A BETTER LIGHT. AND ALTHOUGH MANY ARE IMPATIENT, HE REALLY CAN’T PASS OR REPEAL ANYTHING UNTIL HE IS SWORN IN. BUSH IS STILL THE PRES.SO STOP GRIPPING. HE WILL DO WHAT HE SAID HE WOULD AS SOON AS HE IS LEGALLY ABLE.
Report thisBy Folktruther, November 13, 2008 at 2:03 pm Link to this comment
Obama “fully and completely’ investigating the crimes of the Bushites, Cann4ing? You have to stop before the smoke from that stuff you are puffing on turns into a mushroom cloud.
Report thisBy Sue Cook, November 13, 2008 at 11:05 am Link to this comment
Bi-racial, bi-racial is what Barack Obama is. Not full african-american.
Why is all emphasis being put on his skin color?
Why just african-american?
He has both black and white blood running through his veins. He even called himself “a mutt” at last weeks press conference.
He won historically as an african-american in part only.
Why not call it like it is? First Bi-racial to win the white house?
Report thisBy Nara52, November 13, 2008 at 8:39 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
cruxpuppy siad:
“.....from the policy perspective, Obama is
establishment white….”
True, but do you think he would have won otherwise. Just for suggesting he is different from the faces we see on dollar bills Obama was accused of racism and the MSM went along with it (what a shame).
You also said:
“We’ll see if there’s any real leader behind
the dark skin and brilliant smile of this
Obama. So far, it doesn’t look good. “
I agree… we will see soon enough with the choices he will make for his cabinet. If we see faces like Summers, Gates, et al. it would be clear all we have is the same old same old….
Report thisBy Dave Schwab, November 13, 2008 at 7:45 am Link to this comment
Can we redeem Congress too?
Elections aren’t over yet - Rep. William Jefferson, who is facing trial for 16 counts of corruption, is up for reelection on Dec. 6th.
Malik Rahim, who organized thousands of Common Ground volunteers to provide free healthcare and basic services to victims of Hurricane Katrina, is running against Jefferson.
Malik Rahim is a hero to many in New Orleans. He can beat Jefferson, but his grassroots campaign needs all the support he can get. Find out more at http://tinyurl.com/5686o2
Report thisBy Dave in Big Pine, November 13, 2008 at 5:15 am Link to this comment
andrew young may have been satirical, but he was right.
given that presidents are selected and not elected, why is it now that a black one is in place? a black one who wrested the job from a certain presumptive shoe-in mamed Clinton?
Could this be planned? of course it is. the economy is in ruins (planned), we are a militerist warmongering nation(planned), civil liberties are evaporating before our eyse(planned), and the constitution is now a work of fiction(planned).
these are unfixable things now because the elits who decide these things don’t want them fixed. so bring in the expendable, out of the loop, minority president who can and will be blamed for not fixing anything, and excoriate him for it, while protecting the established power broker clinton whose credibility will remain intact as obamas is shredded. Clinton will remain a player, obama will be buried.
wait and see.
Report thisBy cann4ing, November 12, 2008 at 10:20 pm Link to this comment
“As President, he [Obama] cannot remain silent and do nothing, otherwise he will inherit the war crimes of Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney and become soon thereafter a war criminal himself. Inaction cannot be an option.”
—Ralph Nader
Obama must do much more than unravel the many eleventh hour Bush de-regulations. The only cure to the fascist disease that has crippled our body politic is the disinfectant known as truth. While Obama and the new Congress will have their hands full in reinstating our manufacturing base, rebuilding our infrastructure, creating a green technology and dismantling the corporate security state, we should not lose sight of the need to fully and completely investigate the crimes of the Bush/Cheney regime. That means not only a full and complete investigation of torture, extraordinary rendition and the illegal corporate pilfering of the national treasury, but an opening up of a full and complete investigation of just what occurred on 9/11/01.
The Military Commissions Act and Patriot Act must be repealed. If the rule of law is to mean anything, it must be that those who committed crimes in service of the so-called “war on terror” must be brought before the bar of justice.
Report thisBy Outraged, November 12, 2008 at 9:40 pm Link to this comment
Re: 911truthdotorg
In reference to your link:
“Zirin pointed out that the final report which exposed the state’s anti-constitutional behavior recommended future safeguards but held no one accountable. “We either have a Constitution or we don’t,” he stated. “Either our rights were violated or they weren’t.”
“They’re talking about expanding this nationwide,” Maddow commented, “and what they will say in order to argue for it is, ‘Oh, what’s the harm done?’”
Thank you for cross-referencing this. This has happened to me, in fact it continues. My premise would be that Bush’s stance is only to cover up PAST and EXISTING crimes. Of course that’s par for the course with this administration….is it not? I would also like to thank Rachel Maddow and Dave Zirin for bringing this to the forefront.
Article quote: “When Frederick Douglass, the renowned abolitionist, was young, he was enslaved on a plantation on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, called Mount Misery, owned by Edward Covey, a notorious “slave breaker.” There, physical and psychological torture were standard. That property, today, is owned by Donald Rumsfeld, the former secretary of defense who was one of the key architects of the U.S. military’s program of torture and detention.”
This is unreal. Somehow I feel there’s more to this story. Could this plausibly be coincidence? Degenerates, all of them.
Report thisBy Folktruther, November 12, 2008 at 9:36 pm Link to this comment
Cruxpuppy- You speak bitter, but wise, truths.
Report thisBy cruxpuppy, November 12, 2008 at 8:39 pm Link to this comment
Last week, Andrew Young, former UN Ambassador, comrade to ML King Jr, and eminence gris with a sense of humor, quipped to Stephan Colbert on “The Colbert Report” that the white man has screwed things up so badly that a black man has to be called in to take the blame.
Colbert laughed so hard, his garters snapped and his socks fell down.
It’s a little surreal to have a black man in the White House and Alice Walker can be forgiven her smug little romantic excesses and her invocation of the Dalai Lama, but when a little time passes “Barrack Obama” will be as familiar as “Coca Cola” and the novelty of his skin color won’t mean much when the Superpower files for bankruptcy.
It’s difficult to focus on policy at this moment of racial transcendentalism but from the policy perspective, Obama is establishment white. His color is only skin deep after all and his pronouncements do not reflect an abiding concern for the poor and disenfranchised, just the middle class. FDR was blacker than he is.
But we’ll see, won’t we? Like we’ve seen Colin Powell, Condoleeza Rice, and that coal black curmudgeon on the Supreme Court. We’ll see just how much skin color relates to social and economic justice.
We’ll see if there’s any real leader behind the dark skin and brilliant smile of this Obama. So far, it doesn’t look good.
Report thisBy 911truthdotorg, November 12, 2008 at 7:51 pm Link to this comment
Not if the monster-in-chief has anything to say about it….read it and weep
The Bush administration has been planning since last spring to issue a final burst of federal regulations just before leaving office. It was recently announced that over 90 new regulations would be finalized before November 22—60 days prior to the end of Bush’s term—making them difficult, though not impossible, for President Obama to reverse.
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Spying_victim_New_Bush_rules_are_1112.html
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