An Open letter to Barack Obama

An Open Letter to Barack Obama:

You did not stand before 75,000 Oregonians & say you would vote to support warrantless wiretapping & grant immunity for those who give access to wiretap. You did not promise to shift gears to have a different war in Afghanistan, and add 10,000 troops, when speaking to the people at the historically largest gathering of a presidential candidate, or the many crowds & gahterings throughout the country.

Why now? I was following the promise of change, by the alleged Champion of Civil Rights & someone who would uphold the Constitution. Going after Al Queda is a fruitless effort.

Our country is bankrupt. We can not afford more war either financially or ethically.
I don’t want to HOPE for real change– I want REAL CHANGE. Your recent FISA vote & this announcement for war horrify me. Don’t think you have secured the progressive base & can now tap dance over the center line, into a spineless war monger, more of the same 9-11 to the world, violence based diplomacy?
Have we not learned lessons from all these years of war?

The Obama bio says you have studied Gandhi & MLK & their non violent leadership. Neither of them would support this idea of more troops in Afghanistan- or anywhere. More war, death, killing, & suffering will not yield the security we seek.

After 8 long years of the Bush regime, and perhaps the United States most deadly and unethical behavior ever, I have no tolerance or patience for any semblance of more of the same- particularly in regards to war, occupations, violence, and disregard for the Constitution. The ship has sailed for those items to have been unleashed to see just how bad and wrong things can go.

Blogger B. Perdue wrote this:
“The good news is that the antiwar movement isn’t fooled by either party’s posturing and is preparing antiwar demonstrations at the conventions of both pro-war parties. That’ll be followed up with a major organization drive beginning this December. As soon as Obama (or McCain) takes a seat in the Oval Office they’ll be on the hot seat and answerable to a militant and demanding antiwar movement with a growing GI component.

We should do all we can to support the antiwar movements determination and begin formulating our own campaigns for federal anti-discrimination and anti-violence legislation”

People are watching & listening closely. I have been an avid supporter, but these actions have me questioning my support & feeling the need to convey my grave disappointment. How could you  betray the people in this way?

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Dems sell out the Constitution again..

The friggin’ ratbastards have agreed to provide immunity to the Telco’s and institute sweeping changes as to how our government can spy upon us. They are calling it..cough..choke..a compromise. From the WSJ via The Carpetbagger Report:

After more than a year of partisan acrimony over government surveillance powers, Democratic and Republican leaders have agreed to a bipartisan deal that would be the most sweeping rewrite of spy powers in three decades. The House is likely to vote on the measure Friday, House aides said. [...]

The new agreement broadens the authority to spy on people in the U.S. and provides conditional legal immunity to companies that helped the government eavesdrop after the 2001 terrorist attacks, according to congressional aides in both parties.

The deal, if adopted, would bring the spy activities of a controversial National Security Agency surveillance program permanently under the law. That would allow the government, in certain circumstances, to eavesdrop on U.S. citizens without a specific warrant. It would also expand government spy powers to monitor communications between the U.S. and overseas to collect intelligence on topics beyond terrorism.

As Steve notes, Glen Greenwald’s pov on this is spot on. The fucking Blue Dogs were the ones championing this bullshittery to enable our government a free rein on spying without a warrant and providing the fucking Telco’s with retroactive immunity. They played the fear factor card just like the Rethugs do..and evidently it has worked..even Obama has jumped on this fucking bandwagon. From Greenwald:

So all the Attorney General has to do is recite those magic words — the President requested this eavesdropping and did it in order to save us from the Terrorists — and the minute he utters those words, the courts are required to dismiss the lawsuits against the telecoms, no matter how illegal their behavior was.

That’s the “compromise” Steny Hoyer negotiated and which he is now — according to very credible reports — pressuring every member of the Democratic caucus to support. It’s full-scale, unconditional amnesty with no inquiry into whether anyone broke the law. In the U.S. now, thanks to the Democratic Congress, we’ll have a new law based on the premise that the President has the power to order private actors to break the law, and when he issues such an order, the private actors will be protected from liability of any kind on the ground that the Leader told them to do it — the very theory that the Nuremberg Trial rejected.(emphasis Greenwalds)

With Democrats such as these in office..who is really our enemy? Seriously folks..who? The Rethugs only need to enlist the help of the fucking Blue Dogs and snap..it gets done.

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House passes FISA bill..without Telco immunity.

Bush has of course threatened to veto it, and the vote total is below the amount needed to override a veto..but the House did send BushCo a hearty ‘kiss off’ before they left town for a two-week hiatus. The Rethug members of Congress, as usual, screamed the Democrats were undermining national security.

The Democrats, as usual, said the President and his boot-lickers were using fear-mongering as an election year tool. But the Democrats did cave in on an important issue, as usual. From the Reuters writeup:

While the House-passed bill would not grant immunity, it would allow phone companies to present their cases in a closed-door court, with the judge given access to confidential documents about the surveillance and the authorization for it.

The writeup is full of verbal bitchslaps of each other from both sides of the aisle. Slog through it if you must, but we are still in a holding pattern on this one folks..

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On Surveillance Bill, Debate Postponed Till Monday

A few turncoat Democrats sided with the Republicans today to force the Surveillance Bill onto the Senate floor.

Isn’t that special? I didn’t think so either.  From TPMmuckraker:

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) moved for a vote on cloture — that would force an end to debate and trigger a simple majority vote on the underlying Senate intelligence committee version of the bill (which has retroactive immunity). To do that, he’ll need 60 votes.

Reid objected to this, said that he would vote against it, and then postponed the vote until Monday.

Reid is a pimp, plain and simple. The Democrats are so damn afraid of being called ’soft on terrah’ they will pretty much pass anything BushCo wants at this point.  If you don’t believe me, read the letter Reid’s dumbass sent up to the Pres this afternoon. I refuse to post it here, so click the link at the top of the post.

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