All Males Near Drone Strike Sites are Terrorists

Obama’s kill list – all males near drone strike sites are terrorists - RT News

A New York Times article published on Tuesday unearths a lot of information about the White House’s largely secretive drone program: despite being a hallmark of the presidency of Barack Obama, authorities working under the commander-in-chief — as well as Obama himself — are for the most part mum when questions arise about the administration’s ongoing air strikes by way of unmanned robotic aircraft. In particular, the question of civilian casualties and the death toll of innocent Afghans and Pakistanis who have lost their life at the hands of Washington’s war machine are often left unanswered or, even worse, addressed differently. According to the Times’ latest write-up, though, the Obama administration has some scandalous opinions on who can and can’t be killed by its murder program.

The White House convinces itself that the Obama-ordered air strikes overseas have not killed many civilians because, according to the president, any and all men near a drone target are considered enemies of America and can be executed without being added to the count of civilian casualties.

“It in effect counts all military-age males in a strike zone as combatants, according to several administration officials, unless there is explicit intelligence posthumously proving them innocent,” is how the Times report it. “Counterterrorism officials insist this approach is one of simple logic: people in an area of known terrorist activity, or found with a top Qaeda operative, are probably up to no good.”

The Times article goes on to explain that President Obama is incredibly instrumental when it comes to targeted drone strikes and oversees counterterrorism operations involving the unmanned aerial aircraft so much so that he says who can and can’t be killed. To Newshour, Shane said, “Instead of wanting deniability and wanting to keep at a distance from this lethal program, he actually wanted to be very much part of it.” According to that Times’ report, it now makes a lot of sense why the commander-in-chief has never condemned the continuing strikes.

Speaking to an international audience during a virtual townhall earlier this year, President Obama said that drones had “not caused a huge number of civilian casualties” and he added that it’s “important for everybody to understand that this thing is kept on a very tight leash.” But when the Bureau of Investigative Journalism released the findings of a drone strike stud last year, the UK-based agency said , that the number of civilians killed in US drone strikes were probably 40 percent higher than what the American authorities were actually reporting: between 2004 and 2011, they put the estimate of civilian deaths at a figure of 385, but added in the research that the toll could actually come close to tallying 775 casualties.

Realize that the drone program is being expanded to American soil. Feel safe Americans or you are an enemy of the state:

Follow The Money Trail: The Top Donors For Each Presidential Candidate

Reposted from The Daily Paul:

A Short Analysis of the Top Donors for each Presidential Candidate:

NOTE: These are individual donors, and don’t include super-PACS. When you make a political donation, you have to state what company you work for, and that is how this is compiled. These are not the companies themselves donating, but the individuals who work for those companies. For example, in 2008, people who work for Goldman Sachs, gave over $1 Million to Obama, and were his top donor. In 2012, Mitt Romney’s top donor, is, you guessed it, people who work for Goldman Sachs, at $575,000 and counting.

Also the lists provided are the top 20 donors for each candidate.

First I will make a few observations in regards to the numbers about each candidate, and then feel free to peruse the specifics, below:

Obama 2012:

In the $3,290,000 raised so far from the top 20 companies whose employees so far have made individual donations to Obama:

$560,000, or 17%, has come from technology firms;
$794,000, or 24%, has come from Big Academia;
$1,008,000, or 31%, has come from big lobbying firms.

Of course, these lobbyists, have the usual list of clients, you might expect, from all the “Bigs”.

This is extraordinary: Almost 1/3 of all the personal donations to Obama in this top 20 block, have come from lobbyists and their firms.

Remember his 2008 campaign about promising to end special interests?

Right.

Romney 2012:

In the $4,723,000 raised so far from the top 20 companies whose employees so far have made individual donations to Romney:

Fully $3,760,000 of that, or 80%…has come from Wall Street firms.

Of those top 20 firms whose employees have donated so far $4.72 Million, to Romney, those same firms received, in the 2008 bailouts stolen from the American taxpayer (which of course both Romney and Obama supported), an estimated $335 Billion dollars in bailout money!

Infused with $335 Billion of cash taken from the backs of taxpayers?? No wonder they are able to ‘afford’ to donate so much!

Ron Paul 2012:

In the $675,000 raised so far from the top 20 companies whose employees so far have made individual donations to Dr. Paul:

$157,000, or 24%, has come from technology firms;
$73,000, or 11%, has come from government contractors
$338,000, or 50%, has come from active duty military.

So, let me get this straight:

1) The biggest donors to Obama in 2008, were the Banksters.

2) The biggest donors to Obama in 2012, are lobbyists…for the Banksters.

3) The biggest donors to Mitt Romney in 2012, by a huge majority, are the Banksters…and the lobbyists who represent them.

4) The biggest donors to Ron Paul in 2012, fully 50% in this sample of the top 20, are from the United States active duty military. You know, the military guys and gals, who are throwing their support behind the guy who is supposedly so “weak” on foreign policy.

5) Go figure.

————————————————-

Here is the breakdown of all the top donors of the candidates (all data here courtesy of opensecrets.org):

Obama’s top donors:

Microsoft $348 K

DLA Piper $298 K
(International lobbying firm with clients from defense contractors like Raytheon to big pharma Pfizer to various health care / insurance firms)

U of California $262 K

Sidley Austin LLP $240 K
(Lobbying firm that has included many Big Pharma clients, as well as the Federal Reserve).

Google $212 K
Harvard $195 K
Comcast $181 K

Skadden Arps, et al $154 K
“Lobbyists working for Skadden, Arps represent some of the largest political players outside of elected office, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and U.S. Steel. And it’s the firm’s individual employees, as well as their immediate family members, who come out in droves for Democrats. Together, they routinely help the firm rank at the top of the lawyers and lobbyists industry in terms of campaign contributions.”
- OpenSecrets.org

Morgan & Morgan $136 K
US Department of State $132 K
Time Warner $130 K

US Government $127 K
Stanford University $123 K
Kaiser Permanente $112 K

National Amusements, Inc $110 K
Columbia University $109 K
Mayer Brown, LLP $109 K
(Lobbying firm)

Wilmerhale LLP $107 K
(Lobbying firm)

Finally one of the many lobbying firms who are the top backers of Obama, willing to actually admit their clients.

http://www.wilmerhale.com/about/representativeclients/

Among Wilmerhale’s clients…are a good corporatist bunch:

Bayer
Boeing
Citigroup
Deutsche Bank
General Electric
Goldman Sachs
JP Morgan Chase
Millennium Pharmaceuticals
Monsanto
Morgan Stanley
Pfizer
Procter & Gamble
UBS

University of Chicago $105 K

Jones Day $100 K
(Lobbying firm)

ROMNEY 2012:

FIRST number: Top donors to Romney 2012.
SECOND number: How much bailout money those companies received in 2008:

Goldman Sachs $574 K $13 Billion
Bank of America $399 K $15 Billion
JP Morgan Chase $394 K $25 Billion
Morgan Stanley $374 K $107 Billion
Credit Suisse $318 K $500 Million
Citigroup $302 K $25 Billion

Kirkland & Ellis $249 K
(Lobbying firm whos clients include Big Pharma, Big Energy, Big Medical, and yes, you guessed it: Morgan Stanley, UBS, etc.)

Barclays $229 K $48 Billion

Pricewaterhouse/
Coopers $209 K
(Accounting firm darling of Wall Street)

Wells Fargo $205 K $25 Billion

HIG Capital $191K

UBS AG $191 K $75 Billion

Blackstone Group $183 K
Bain Capital $149 K
Marriot International $133 K
EMC Corp $129 K

Citadel Investment
Group $128 K $1 Billion

Elliot Management $118 K
Deloitte LLP $125 K
(Accounting firm with clients such as Morgan Stanley and Monsanto)

Bain & Co $123 K

Top donors to Ron Paul 2012:

US Army $108 K
US Air Force $84 K
US Navy $84 K
Google $42 K
US Dept. of Defense $34 K
Microsoft $29 K
US Marine Corps $28 K
Boeing $27 K
IBM Corporation $27 K
Lockheed Martin $24 K
Northrop Grumman $22 K
Intel Corporation $21 K
US Government $21 K
Rangingwire Enterprise
Solutions $20 K
Corriente Advisors $20 K
Oracle Corporation $18 K
Verizon $17 K
US Postal Service $17 K
FedEx Corp $16 K
AT&T $16 K

~Chris
May 27, 2012

P.S. Have a meaningful Memorial Day…and remember the fallen, please.

Data taken from OpenSecrets.org. Great website!

Obama Appoints First Ever Assassination Czar

John Brennan, Obama’s chief counterterrorism advisor was a name that you did not see on the Mainstream media today as they continue to run stories that serve to distract the masses from stories that matter.

Most recently he publicly spoke about the drone program calling it moral and ethical and just.

According to reports from the Associated Press, “John Brennan has now seized the lead in choosing who will be targeted for drone attacks and raids and Obama has delegated him the sole authority to designate people for assassination under the United States top-secret assassination program.”

Glenn Greenwald elaborates:

“Brennan has been caught peddling serious falsehoods in highly consequential cases, including falsely telling the world that Osama bin Laden “engaged in a firefight” with U.S. forces entering his house and “used his wife as a human shield,” and then outright lying when he claimed about the prior year of drone attacks in Pakistan: “there hasn’t been a single collateral death.” Given his history, it is unsurprising that Brennan has been at the heart of many of the administration’s most radical acts, including claiming the power to target American citizens for assassination-by-CIA without due process and the more general policy of secretly targeting people for death by drone.

Now, Brennan’s power has increased even more: he’s on his way to becoming the sole arbiter of life and death, the unchecked judge, jury and executioner of whomever he wants dead (of course, when Associated Press in this report uses the words “Terrorist” or “al-Qaida operative,” what they actually mean is: a person accused by the U.S. Government, with no due process, of involvement in Terrorism).”

That Pesky Constitution gets in Congress’ and Obama’s Way Again.

When Democrats and Republicans set aside their supposed differences and convincingly passed the NDAA with overwhelming bipartisan support, legalizing indefinite detention of anyone, including American citizens, without trial, President Obama eagerly signed the bill into law – after he had promised that he would never do such a thing. Now, someone in the establishment, thank God, is standing up to this blatant example of despotism:

Federal Judge Kathleen Forrest granted a preliminary injunction on Wednesday, striking down those sections of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) of 2012 which sought to provide Barack Obama the power to indefinitely detain citizens without benefit of their 5^th Amendment rights.

Chen Guangcheng Escapes While Hillary Clinton Visits China. CNN Labels Escape an “Awkward” Inconvenience to Hillary’s Visit.

The blind human rights activist Chen Guangcheng who speaks out against China’s forced abortion and sterilization laws is apparently considered almost as much an inconvenience by Clinton and the Obama administration as he is by Communist China.

Sadly, Jon Stewart once again does a better job reporting the story than the rest of the media.

Thankfully, Life Site News has also reported on this story without getting hung up on the “inconveniences” it poses for the Obama administration:

Chen’s horrifying discovery: Obama admin just another member of the population control mafia

May 3, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com)

Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng, who has suffered years of imprisonment and beatings for objecting to forced abortions and sterilizations in his native country, thought he could find shelter and friendship in the United States embassy following his recent escape from house arrest. He is now learning the hard way that the pro-abortion Obama administration, which helps to finance the same “one-child policy” that Chen is fighting, would rather see him disappear.

Chen’s presence in the embassy during the past week was little more than a dangerous irritant for Hillary Clinton’s State Department. The main goal of the agency has long been the promotion and protection of American commercial interests abroad, and “human rights” often provide useful cover for criticizing regimes that are recalcitrant in the face of American economic pressure. The Chen affair, however, only threatens an amicable and highly profitable relationship between the U.S. and China, and presents no “upside” for the American bottom line.

Worse for Chen is his uncomfortable and embarrassing opposition to China’s population control agenda, a policy supported by the Obama administration and in particular the State Department, which is spending tens of billions of dollars on such programs worldwide. Although the administration gives lip-service against coercive abortion and sterilization, it is simultaneously helping to finance the Chinese population control machine with tens of millions of dollars in subsidies to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), which helps to administer China’s brutal one-child policy.

Perhaps that is why, according to Chen, his American “hosts” started to sound more like fellow-members of the international population-control mafia that is killing his country, than starry-eyed defenders of “human rights.”

Chen, who says he felt pressured to leave the embassy, adds that he finally decided to do so when American officials informed him that if didn’t, his wife would be beaten by vengeful Chinese officials. Embassy personnel deny the claim, although they admit that they let Chen know that his wife would be taken back to the residence where the couple had been beaten many times.

Even the pro-abortion “Human Rights Watch” admits, in the words of the organization’s executive director, that the “US says it didn’t convey threats to harm Chen’s family but did say they’d be returned to site of abuse. Same thing,”

The American embassy was as friendly as a mob boss who wants a favor from you—in this case, to go away. They “hugged” Chen a lot, and promised to take him on a nice ride to a Chinese hospital, where they would remain with him, he says. Instead, they abandoned him and his wife at the hospital. His desperate calls to the embassy were left unanswered. Suddenly, Chen was persona non grata in the “land of the free.”

“The embassy told me that they would have someone accompany me the whole time,” Chen told reporters. “But today when I got to the ward, I found that there was not a single embassy official here, and so I was very unsatisfied. I felt they did not tell me the truth on this issue.”

After Chen was safely outside the walls of the embassy compound, the U.S. government let him know he shouldn’t bother coming back. “This was an extraordinary case involving exceptional circumstance, we do not anticipate that it will be repeated,” an anonymous Obama administration official told reporters.

Chen says U.S. abandoned him after threats to family forced him out of Embassy: report

BEIJING, May 2, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com)

Chen Guangcheng has confirmed that he was forced to leave the Embassy because Chinese officials are threatening his family members, and says that although U.S. officials promised to accompany him at his departure, they failed to follow through on their promises, according to one British news source.

Channel 4 News reported Wednesday that it spoke directly with Chen, the forced abortion opponent who escaped abuse by the Chinese government after fleeing to the U.S. Embassy last week, who says he went to a Beijing hospital for reasons unrelated to his health.

“No. I came because of an agreement. I was worried about the safety of my family,” said Chen regarding his departure, according to Channel 4. “A gang of them have taken over our house, sitting in our room and eating at our table, waving thick sticks around.

“They’ve turned our home into a prison, with seven cameras and electric fence all around.”

Chen expressed his dismay that no one from the U.S. embassy had accompanied him. “Nobody from the (US) Embassy is here. I don’t understand why. They promised to be here,” he said.

Finally, however, Chen Guangcheng and his family may finally be allowed to flee China:

BREAKING: Chen may be allowed to fly to America: U.S. officials

BEIJING, May 4, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com)

A deal may soon be brokered to allow Chen Guangcheng and his family to leave China to take up a fellowship at an America university, according to U.S. State Department officials.

The agreement was disclosed Friday morning, after the fellowship was offered and Beijing said they would accept Chen’s application to study at a university abroad.

Chen’s wife, who reports having been tied to a chair, beaten, and threatened with death by Chinese officials following her husband’s escape, and Chen’s children would also be allowed to leave the Communist country with him.

Beijing had previously indicated that the blind human rights activist would be free to attend a university and act as a free citizen, but those affirmations seemed less than firm: officials were meanwhile keeping Chen under police lockdown at a local hospital, at one point disallowing visits from U.S. officials.

Human rights advocates and U.S. politicians, including U.S. congressmen and presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, had been placing increasing pressure on the Obama administration to ensure Chen’s safety after the whistleblower left the embassy where he had taken refuge after 19 months of brutal, extra-judicial house imprisonment at the hands of the Chinese government.

Obama and the Apparent Cookie-Cutter Diplomacy of his Foreign Policy

Maybe if we engage in real, genuine diplomatic efforts that had actual meaning then we wouldn’t have so many problems abroad. Who knows, we might even avert perpetual warfare in far off lands just to “defend our freedom” in the future.

Gloria Purvis: HHS Mandate is Anti-Woman

Gloria Purvis, a young, black woman – precisely the demographic the Democratic party caters to and claims to be the staunch defenders of – has choice words for the Obama administration and the HHS mandate, which forces all insurance companies to provide contraception to everyone and without copay:

Boom.

Obama Wants You to Believe Women Support the HHS Mandate . . .

. . . but Mickey Kaus points out an inconvenient truth:

Caught cocooning in public: Here’s what the NYT‘s story on its latest poll told readers:

In recent weeks, there has been much debate over the government’s role in guaranteeing insurance coverage for contraception, including for those who work for religious organizations. The poll found that women were split as to whether health insurance plans should cover the costs of birth control and whether employers with religious objections should be able to opt out. [E.A.]

If the Times says women were “split,” you know that must mean they were actually narrowly against the NYT‘s preferred position. Sure enough, when asked, “Should health insurance plans for all employees have to cover the full cost of birth control for female employees or should employers be able to opt out for moral or religious reasons?” women favored opting out by a 46-44 margin. The margin increased to a decisive 53-38  for “religiously affiliated employers, such as a hospital or university.”

That’s among women. Unbeknownst to those who read only the Times‘ main story, the poll asked the same question to men. They were not split. Men favored opting out by a 20 point margin (57 vs. 37), except when a “religiously affiliated employer” was involved, in which case the margin increased to 25 points. Combining men and women, a substantial majority (51-40) favors allowing an opt-out–increasing to 57-36 where religiously-affiliated institutions are involved.

These are not close results. It’s hard to read this poll and not conclude that, contrary to some accounts, Obama wasn’t such a genius to pick a fight over mandated contraception coverage–because he appears to be losing the public debate on the question. That’s a conclusion the Times story effectively hides from readers.

It’s also one possible explanation for Obama’s otherwise somewhat mystifying overall drop in approval during the period–March 7-11–when the poll was in the field. But not an approved explanation.

Gas prices are the official MSM explanation. Got it? Gas prices.

Oops, turns out American women don’t want people to be forced to pay for contraception. Women don’t want federal mandates, apparently, they want options – including options for those with religious objections. That sounds very reasonable to me . . . but considering that politicians and bureaucracy are reason-intolerant I’m quite sure that they will continue to ignore the voice of America’s women and continue to push their own agenda for as long as possible.

Which means that if you oppose the HHS mandate then you need to do something about it – because the Obama administration isn’t going to voluntarily rescind the mandate unless they come under intense popular pressure. If we allow our government to openly violate the religious freedom of those who oppose contraception then we risk a government with free reign to violate the rights of all Americans. This is your fight, take a stand:

Click the image to find out more about what you can do.

On a related note, Obama’s approval rating since February to now has dropped 4 percentage points among men and 12 among women. Either the women of America are really, really into gasoline, way more than men, or there’s another explanation for the drop in Obama’s approval ratings . . . perhaps something related specifically to women, like women’s health? Theories welcome. Also interesting, Obama’s rating according to the NYT/CBS poll has fallen in every single category except for . . . wait for it . . . those making over $75,000 a year in which is rose slightly. I’m genuinely curious about what explanations Obama’s supporters can provide as to why this is so. Personally, I think people are just sick of an economic policy that rewards the rich CEOs of failing businesses with big fat stimulus checks and forces more and more of the poor to become wards of the state.

Apologizing for America’s Mistakes is not Un-American

Columnist Gary Younge is spot on when he states that apologizing for America’s mistakes is not un-American. In fact, recognizing and working to rectify America’s shortcomings is precisely the patriotic thing to do. So when President Obama offers apologies to Afghanistan when we burn Korans, or when a U.S. soldier goes on a shooting rampage killing 16 Afghans, in an attempt to defuse escalating violence abroad I say kudos. Why do I say that? Because even though I consider Obama possibly the worst president in American history I’m not a bigot and, therefore, don’t decry the positive actions of my opponents in the name of misplaced tribal loyalties. Unfortunately, those on the right seem more interested in engaging in polarizing rhetoric than in giving credit where credit is due. In Romney’s words:

“Never before in American history has its president gone before so many foreign audiences to apologize for so many American misdeeds, both real and imagined. It is his way of signalling to foreign countries and foreign leaders that their dislike for America is something he understands and that is, at least in part, understandable. There are anti-American fires burning all across the globe; President Obama’s words are like kindling to them.”

Strange words. Am I to believe that it was Obama’s formal apology for the American military’s Koran burning that lead to the subsequent riots and violence and not, perhaps, the Koran burnings themselves? To say nothing of the remarks made by Gingrich and others like him demanding that Afghanistan should be the ones apologizing to us. Remember that, should our military ever accidentally burn a pile of Bibles like they “accidently” burned Korans then its the Christians who owe our government an apology. Ridiculous.

On the same issue of Koran burning Rick Santorum recently argued that Obama’s apology over the US military burning Korans in Afghanistan, showed weakness:

“It suggests that there is somehow blame, this is somehow that we did something wrong in the sense of doing a deliberate act wrong. I think it shows that we are – that I think it shows weakness.”

Even if our military’s Koran burning really was accidental blame still exists. The Koran is sacred to the 1.7 billion Muslims of the world just as the Bible is sacred to Christians and apologizing for their destruction shows integrity not weakness. Some things are more important than cowardly attempts at saving face.

Holder: Americans Have No Right to a Fair Trial

Glenn Greenwald reprimands his fellow liberals for advancing the same police state previously promoted by the Bush administration. The Obama adminstration is now working hand-in-hand with GOP war-mongers like Lieberman and McCain to systematically strip you of all rights. Because in The War on Terror every American citizen must be assumed an enemy of the state and is guilty until proven innocent (assuming your lucky enough to even see a court room):

In a speech at Northwestern University yesterday, Attorney General Eric Holder provided the most detailed explanation yet for why the Obama administration believes it has the authority to secretly target U.S. citizens for execution by the CIA without even charging them with a crime, notifying them of the accusations, or affording them an opportunity to respond, instead condemning them to death without a shred of transparency or judicial oversight. The administration continues to conceal the legal memorandum it obtained to justify these killings, and, as The New York Times‘ Charlie Savage noted,Holder’s “speech contained no footnotes or specific legal citations, and it fell far short of the level of detail contained in the Office of Legal Counsel memo.” But the crux of Holder’s argument as set forth in yesterday’s speech is this:

Some have argued that the president is required to get permission from a federal court before taking action against a United States citizen who is a senior operational leader of Al Qaeda or associated forces. This is simply not accurate. “Due process” and “judicial process” are not one and the same, particularly when it comes to national security.The Constitution guarantees due process, not judicial process.

When Obama officials (like Bush officials before them) refer to someone “who is a senior operational leader of Al Qaeda or associated forces,” what they mean is this: someone the President has accused and then decreed in secret to be a Terrorist without ever proving it with evidence.The “process” used by the Obama administration to target Americans for execution-by-CIA is, as reported last October by Reuters, as follows:

American militants like Anwar al-Awlaki are placed on a kill or capture list by a secretive panel of senior government officials, which then informs the president of its decisions . . . There is no public record of the operations or decisions of the panel, which is a subset of the White House’s National Security Council . . . Neither is there any law establishing its existence or setting out the rules by which it is supposed to operate.

As Leon Panetta recently confirmed, the President makes the ultimate decision as to whether the American will be killed: “[The] President of the United States obviously reviews these cases, reviews the legal justification, and in the end says, go or no go.”

So that is the “process” which Eric Holder yesterday argued constitutes “due process” as required by the Fifth Amendment before the government can deprive of someone of their life: the President and his underlings are your accuser, your judge, your jury and your executioner all wrapped up in one, acting in total secrecy and without your even knowing that he’s accused you and sentenced you to death, and you have no opportunity even to know about, let alone confront and address, his accusations; is that not enough due process for you? At Esquire, Charles Pierce, writing about Holder’s speech, described this best: “a monumental pile of crap that should embarrass every Democrat who ever said an unkind word about John Yoo.”

* * * * *

I’ve obviously written about the Obama assassination program many times before but there are several points worth examining in light of Holder’s speech and the reaction to it:

(1) The willingness of Democrats to embrace and defend this power is especially reprehensible because of how completely, glaringly and obviously at odds it is with everything they loudly claimed to believe during the Bush years. Recall two of the most significant “scandals” of the Bush War on Terror: his asserted power merely to eavesdrop on anddetain accused Terrorists without judicial review of any kind. Remember all that? Progressives endlessly accused Bush of Assaulting Our Values and “shredding the Constitution” simply because Bush officials wanted to listen in on and detain suspected Terrorists — not kill them, just eavesdrop on and detain them — without first going to a court and proving they did anything wrong. Yet here is a Democratic administration asserting not merely the right to surveil or detain citizens without charges or judicial review, but to kill them without any of that: a far more extreme, permanent and irreversible act. Yet, withsomerighteousexceptions, the silence is deafening, or worse.

How can anyone who vocally decried Bush’s mere eavesdropping and detention powers without judicial review possibly justify Obama’sexecutions without judicial review? How can the former (far more mild powers) have been such an assault on Everything We Stand For while the latter is a tolerable and acceptable assertion of war powers? If Barack Obama has the right to order accused Terrorists executed by the CIA because We’re At War, then surely George Bush had the right to order accused Terrorists eavesdropped on and detained on the same ground.

That the same Party and political faction that endlessly shrieked about Bush’s eavesdropping and detention programs now tolerate Obama’s execution program is one of the most extreme and craven acts of dishonesty we’ve seen in quite some time.

Kudos to Glenn Greenwald for breaking ranks and standing up for our rights.