Your tax dollars at work

[_EAllusion]

Along the same lines, here's Colbert tearing into Obama over his pushing of the NDAA that allows the executive declare any US citizen an enemy combatant and rob them of their due process rights (speedy trial, trial by jury, presumption of innocence, etc.):

http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colber ... catch-2012

(The veto threat had nothing to do with indefinite detention, by the way. Ironically, it had to do with an issue that might limit executive power.)

Yeah, that happens. It happens inbetween Colbert basically stumping for Obama in most everything else he does. Let's quote him:



To me, this is obviously highly muted criticism. I think describing criticism of Obama over issues like this as "whimper" from the left as I did is quite accurate.

[_beastie]

What is the left supposed to do, EA? Go on a full-fledged attack on Obama for this policy and inadvertantly help elect Romney, who would most likely be far, far worse?

I know, you want people to vote for Gary Johnson. But you know as well as I do that, with our current system, that's a throw-away vote. If I didn't live in a swing state, maybe I would consider Johnson. But I live in a crucial swing state, and I won't risk it. No, I don't support every single thing Obama has done, but, in my opinion, he's better than the alternative.

[_EAllusion]

What is the left supposed to do, EA? Go on a full-fledged attack on Obama for this policy and inadvertantly help elect Romney, who would most likely be far, far worse?

I doubt Romney would be far worse on issues of civil rights as it relates to the war on terror. He'll be about the same. But yeah, that sounds like a good plan. Then maybe next time, you'll get a Democrat who actually supports what you support. Many Democrats, for whatever reason, struggle with understanding the long-game in politics. If, instead, you continually vote for a Democrat because you view the Republican as a worse alternative, all you will do is give an incentive for the whole system to shift to the right. Then you'll be voting for Mitt Romney with a D after his name because you're afraid of Rick Santorum. There comes a point where a line gets drawn in the sand. You know, like when we wage a massive drone strike campaign in an undeclared war around the world whereby we call any male adults we kill militants.

I know, you want people to vote for Gary Johnson.

But you know as well as I do that, with our current system, that's a throw-away vote. If I didn't live in a swing state, maybe I would consider Johnson.

Goodness Beastie. The odds that your vote will cast the deciding vote for your state are mind-bogglingly small. Not only that, but you're in North Carolina, right? The odds that your vote will cast the deciding vote and that vote will propel Obama to victory that he otherwise would not have is obscenely small. If Obama wins North Carolina, he almost certainly has won other states that give him 270 electoral votes already. You are more likely to win the powerball lottery in two consecutive weeks than to cast the deciding vote for Obama. Failing to vote for a third party because you're worried that Romney will win if you don't is extremely irrational.

[_Ceeboo]

Goodness Beastie. The odds that your vote will cast the deciding vote for your state are mind-bogglingly small.

Not to mention mind-bogglingly scary!



Just kidding, beastie.

My small and weak effort to lighten things up a bit amongst my beloved lefty friends.

Peace,
Ceeboo

[_Bob Loblaw]

Maybe I should stick to topics that are less emotionally charged, such as religion.

[_Kevin Graham]

Well hell EA, so you're telling me this Gary Johnson fellow is a saint who fell straight from Heaven? I mean we're not supposed to support a candidate unless we agree with every single thing he or she has ever done?

Seriously??

Now you bring up drone attacks in Afghanistan. I admit I haven't really studied up on that issue, but from what I understand there is a huge difference between drone attacking hot spots in the mountains of Afghanistan, where the Taliban is actually training, and carpet bombing urban areas of Iraq, a country that never attacked us.

Now you said Obama declared young men to be enemy combatants during drone attacks. If he was saying this to justify drone attacks, then obviously he isn't attacking areas where women and children are. And areas void of women and children are likely to be military spots.

I'm not saying innocent people haven't been killed during Obama's administration. I'm just saying you're equating two different situations. Bush started a war against a country that didn't attack us, and killed tens of thousands of civilians in the process. By any standard of history, that makes him a ruthless tyrant.

Obama came in, ended that war against Iraq, and is trying to finish up in Afghanistan, which is where our enemies (the Taliban) are based.

So I'm not buying it. Obama isn't just as bad as Bush, but Romney would be, since he is already pumping up the war rhetoric with Iran. There is no way we can stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons. Military action is simply unthinkable, especially given our recent history of getting it wrong and making asses of ourselves and all the countries who supported us. Who the hell would support us this time? Can you imagine Romney going to the UN, just as Bush did, and requested military intervention in Iran because "intelligence" tells us they are developing WMDs?

BUSH 2.0 indeed! The question is, are Americans so stupid as to repeat some of our biggest mistakes?

[_beastie]

Goodness Beastie. The odds that your vote will cast the deciding vote for your state are mind-bogglingly small. Not only that, but you're in North Carolina, right? The odds that your vote will cast the deciding vote and that vote will propel Obama to victory that he otherwise would not have is obscenely small. If Obama wins North Carolina, he almost certainly has won other states that give him 270 electoral votes already. You are more likely to win the powerball lottery in two consecutive weeks than to cast the deciding vote for Obama. Failing to vote for a third party because you're worried that Romney will win if you don't is extremely irrational.

I don't live in NC. I live in a state that is essentially tied.

But besides that, I am not a libertarian and don't agree with most of their stances.

[_EAllusion]

Well hell EA, so you're telling me this Gary Johnson fellow is a saint who fell straight from Heaven? I mean we're not supposed to support a candidate unless we agree with every single thing he or she has ever done?

That's a strawman reading of what I'm asserting. It's so bad, in fact, that it could be used in response to any criticism of any candidate. I am instead arguing that the Obama admin's actions are far enough from the ideals of Beastie that voting for him represents creating an incentive to shift the whole system in a direction she opposes. I'm also asserting that you cannot in good conscience vote for a candidate who goes too far on certain issues. Obama should be impeached for his role in assassinating US citizens without due process. I think committing impeachable offenses is a good criteria for not giving your vote.

Finally, with respect to you, I'm mocking your intense concern for the blood of innocents when contrasted against the Obama admin's killing of innocents and retroactively declaring them militants if only because we killed them. Unsurprisingly, your deep concern evaporated when it came to that.

Now you bring up drone attacks in Afghanistan.

Actually, our strikes are concentrated in Pakistan and Yemen. We're waging an undeclared war in both nations and using tremendous pressure to be allowed by the governments to do so.

On a related note, in 2009 the US military used Tomahawk cruise missiles and cluster bombs (whose use is globally derided along with landmines) on the village of al Majala in Yemen. The strike ended the lives of 14 women and 21 children. The US pressured the Yemeni government, a relatively brutal, totalitarian regime, to take credit for the attack, which is how it was reported here. A Yemeni journalist was able to bring forward highly persuasive evidence that it was the US, not Yemen, that was responsible for the attack by going to Amnesty International. The Wikileaks diplomatic cable release later corroborated this. This was after numerous other reports form the same journalist discrediting American claims about what was happening on the ground in Yemen. How did the Obama admin act? It declared the journalist a mouthpiece of Al Queda and pressured the Yemeni government to jail him, which it did. All the available evidence indicates that he's no such thing and jailing him is because of his debunking of US propaganda. To quote A.I., "There is no publicly available evidence to suggest that Abdulelah was anything other than a journalist attempting to do his job.” Obama is personally responsible for this one, by the way.

Jailing journalists who try to discredit US lies about cluster-bombing villages and killing innocents. That's the kind of guy you work to back on an almost daily basis.

Now you said Obama declared young men to be enemy combatants during drone attacks. If he was saying this to justify drone attacks, then obviously he isn't attacking areas where women and children are. And areas void of women and children are likely to be military spots.

You mean like when the Obama admin has carried out indiscriminate drone attacks on funerals and those who attempt to rescue victims of attacks with the hope that maybe some of the people coming will have terrorist connections? Yeah, women and children don't go to funerals or try to provide aid to the injured. We've even attacked people with the red cross emblem on. All of this is a violation of international law we've signed onto and constitutes "war crimes".

These drone strikes aren't concentrated on military bases, by the way. They are concentrated in rural villages. The Obama admin just has adopted a policy of declaring the males killed in those villages, of military age, to be by definition militants unless there is conclusive proof they were not. Pretty evil of them, eh?

Here's an example of one such "militant".

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/04/opini ... html?_r=3&

Here's an article worth reading about what it's like to live in a territory that we are bombarding:

http://www.theatlantic.com/internationa ... n/262814/#

So I'm not buying it. Obama isn't just as bad as Bush,

He's worse, actually, when it comes to civil rights abuses related to the war on terror and its prosecution in foreign policy.

[_EAllusion]

I don't live in NC. I live in a state that is essentially tied.

Virginia then? Even then, the odds of you casting the tie-breaking vote are extremely small. "Hit by lightning" small. Making your voting decision on that basis is not rational.

But besides that, I am not a libertarian and don't agree with most of their stances.

Jill Stein is running for office.

[_EAllusion]

Hey Beastie, here's a question for you:

If the left's opposition to Obama's "war on terror" abuses is anything above a whimper, why is it that Kevin G. doesn't even have basic awareness of what's going on? I mean, Kevin clearly is highly motivated to be politically engaged and obviously spends lots of time reading Democrat/left-wing online sources. So how is this information escaping him? My answer is because there isn't much chatter about it from that area of the spectrum. The occasional Maddow comment and Glen Greenwald's of the world are the exception, not the rule.