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Longwood Gardens. May, 2013. Photo by: joanneleon
Longwood Gardens. May, 2013. Photo by: joanneleon
Longwood Gardens. May, 2013. Photo by: joanneleon
Tunes
Fortunate Son - Creedence Clearwater Revival - Bruce Springsteen & John Fogerty
News & Opinion
Marcy Wheeler at Salon. She notes that Medea Benjamin asked Pres. Obama about Awlaki's assassinated teenaged son Abdulrahman, he paused, but never addressed that question at all. Instead, if I recall correctly, he said that she had some good questions, then he began to talk about the shoe bomber and then it was all flags and freedom from there. I'm told that there was a pre-speech conference call at noon (information from it was embargoed until 2pm) and White House aides were also asked about Abdulrahman, and they gave no answers.
Closing Gitmo is not enough
Obama admits "No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare” -- but fails to offer way out
But in spite of all the lip service to new transparency, neither the president nor his aides had answers for CodePink’s Medea Benjamin, who interrupted the president’s speech calling to remember Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, the 16-year-old American citizen son of Anwar al-Awlaki, who was killed two weeks after his father in October 2011.
In Eric Holder’s letter yesterday declassifying the names of the four Americans we’ve killed with drones, he explained only that Abdulrahman and two others were “not specifically targeted.” In a briefing prior to the speech, a senior administration official hemmed and hawed when asked about Abdulrahman, refusing to explain why he was killed. “I don’t want to get into the details of each of those instances. What I will say generally is that there are times when there are individuals who are present at al-Qaida and associated forces facilities, and in that regard they are subject to the lethal action that we take. There are other instances when there are tragic cases of civilian casualties and people that the United States does not in any way intend to target — because, again, as in any war, there are tragic consequences that come with the decision to use force, including civilian casualties.”
Obama, though, just paused while Benjamin cried out about the younger Awlaki.
Ultimately, he turned her ability to raise concerns about the teenager killed by a drone strike as another form of strength.
I’m going off script as you might expect here. The voice of that woman is worth paying attention to. [Applause] Obviously I do not agree with much of what she said. And obviously she wasn’t listening to me in much of what I said. But these are tough issues and the suggestion that we can gloss over them is wrong.
The drone "rule book" was first reported before the 2012 election and at the time it was stated that John Brennan (doing his killing via strikes carried out by the CIA) would be exempted from these rules. I haven't heard anything indicating that this has changed. A number of well informed people who write about military activities and drone strikes have serious doubts that the CIA will stop doing drone strikes, and as far as I know, the talk of transferring drone strikes over to the military from the CIA are always vague and not absolute. In other words they don't talk about moving all targeted drone assassinations to the military and, as always, leave a lot of wiggle room and a lot of room for parsing of words. And as in all of these things, what this administration says has no correlation with what they actually do.
Obama Frames Covert Drone War as Necessary Evil
In a major speech the US president also announced that he has signed into force a new – and secret – rule book for lethal action that provides ‘clear guidelines, oversight and accountability’ for covert drone strikes.
Journalists briefed on the contents of the Presidential Policy Guidance reported that much-criticised attacks on groups of men based on their patterns of behaviour – so-called ‘signature strikes’ – may come to an end. And counter-terrorism officials indicated that control of covert drone strikes will progressively pass from the Central Intelligence Agency to the Pentagon.
According to the New York Times, the rules will also ’impose the same standard for strikes on foreign enemies now used only for American citizens deemed to be terrorists’.
In this hyperpartisan bizarro world that we now live in, this opinion from a right-leaning publication sounds more reasonable than the hyperpartisan defenses that we so often read or the silence on the subject that is also a norm. Who would have ever thought...
Obama's Empty Rhetoric
Like the "War on Drugs," a rhetorical phrase that the Obama administration has rejected even while continuing to wage the policy it describes, many ongoing activities of the government he presides over came under verbal attack from President Barack Obama this afternoon.
So the president says "journalists should not be at legal risk for doing their jobs," even though journalists are at legal risk—from his administration—for doing their jobs.
[...]
There was much to like in Obama's speech today if you like words [...] After 52 months in office, it's long since past time to stop judging the man by his words alone.
This op-ed is a BFD, by an influential former executive editor of the Washington Post from 1991-2008, and 44 years at the Washington Post from intern to investigative journalist to executive editor and almost everything in between. FSM only knows how many times Downie's communications would have been spied upon and how many times he would have been prosecuted if Obama's rules had been in place during his career. Downie was heavily involved in the Watergage coverage and supervised Woodward and Bernstein, and he was one of the few people who knew the identity of Deep Throat. So yes, this op-ed is a really big deal. And I find it fascinating that, during his speech, Obama talked of his war on journalism as if he was not participating in it. I seriously doubt that someone like Downie is going to fall for that, nor is any investigative journalist. It was rather bizarre, as was most of the speech. Downie lays out the facts and condemns in a very clear way, cutting through the administration's signature Orwellian rhetoric and spin and it's a must read and take note of the very strong language that he deliberately chose to use.
Leonard Downie: Obama’s war on leaks undermines investigative journalism
For the past five years, beginning with his first presidential campaign, Barack Obama has promised that his government would be the most open and transparent in American history. Recently, while stating that he makes “no apologies” for his Justice Department’s investigations into suspected leaks of classified information, the president added that “a free press, free expression and the open flow of information helps hold me accountable, helps hold our government accountable and helps our democracy function.” Then, in his National Defense University speech Thursday, Obama said he was “troubled by the possibility that leak investigations may chill the investigative journalism that holds government accountable.”
But the Obama administration’s steadily escalating war on leaks, the most militant I have seen since the Nixon administration, has disregarded the First Amendment and intimidated a growing number of government sources of information — most of which would not be classified — that is vital for journalists to hold leaders accountable. The White House has tightened its control over officials’ contacts with the news media, and federal agencies have increasingly denied Freedom of Information Act requests on the grounds of national security or protection of internal deliberations.
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This appeared to journalists to put Rosen in unprecedented jeopardy for doing his job. Although the president said in his speech Thursday that “journalists should not be at legal risk for doing their jobs,” he was nevertheless adamant about pursuing government officials who he said “break the law,” presumably by discussing national security matters and other classified information with reporters, even if that scares off officials from becoming whistle-blowers or even having any contact with reporters.
[...]
Decades-old Justice Department guidelines restrict federal subpoenas for reporters or their phone records, saying they should be used only as a last resort in an investigation. Justice officials have contended that this was the case with the Associated Press leak. But while claiming that it first conducted hundreds of interviews and reviewed tens of thousands of documents, Justice has not explained why it needed to undertake what appears to be a menacing and unjustified fishing expedition.
This is the document that Obama mentioned in the speech yesterday. David Swanson calls this the "new Constitution". (This is a PDF, now available on the White House web site). If it is meant to describe previous operations (and it does seem to do that in some cases) I find it to be thoroughly dishonest, based on what we know of past operations. Rather than codifying a program of assassinations, it would be good if assassinations were rare, as was the case during the Clinton administration who, according to Scahill's "Dirty Wars" book, was loathe to carry out proposed assassination plans and almost always ended up, in the end, not signing off on them. Instead, this administration has carried out thousands of them and is now setting the precedent for future administrations. And as you can see right in this document, assassinating U.S. citizens is now policy, and it's right there in black and white. Your government can assassinate you and it only takes a DoJ review to do it. No court. No due process. Just a permission slip from the DoJ and maybe the White House lawyers. Also, note that the "Reservation of Authority" section essentially nullifies the rest of it and says the president can do whatever he wants if he, as the decider, decides there are "extraordinary circumstances". So he can throw all of these rules right out the window if he feels like it.
U.S. Policy Standards and Procedures for the Use of Force in Counterterrorism Operations Outside the United States and Areas of Active Hostilities
U.S. Persons. If the United States considers an operation against a terrorist identified as a U.S. person, the Department of Justice will conduct an additional legal analysis to ensure that such action may be conducted against the individual consistent with the Constitution and laws of the United States.
Reservation of Authority. These new standards and procedures do not limit the President’s authority to take action in extraordinary circumstances when doing so is both lawful and necessary to protect the United States or its allies.
Action
First, a message from Cornel West, one of the many prominent intellectuals, artists, musicians, and voices of conscience who signed the Close Guantanamo ad:
“I am so glad to join with my dear brothers and sisters in calling for Guantanamo to be closed, and for the brothers on hunger strike to receive justice so long denied them.”
Thanks to the hundreds of you who donated for, signed, circulated, and are helping make this ad in The New York Times happen this week (click to download final version).
World Can't Wait, with 500+ donors, succeeded in getting the Close Guantanamo ad sent to The Times. We hope that it is printed Thursday morning in the national section just as Obama is about to make his national security speech about Guantanamo and drones.
We borrowed $6,000 to get the ad to The Times quickly so that you could send this message to 4 million readers of The New York Times across the world.
$5 to $500 YOU can make the difference. Please donate now.
To Those Who Have Supported My Coverage of Bradley Manning’s Court Martial (So Far)
Every dollar donated to help fund coverage of Bradley Manning has helped transform me into a foremost journalist on one of the biggest cases in military justice history.
Every post of mine shared on Facebook or Twitter has helped amplify critical coverage that is keeping the world informed of how the government is prosecuting Manning as if he is a traitor that aided terrorists.
[...]
I hope you will keep sharing my reporting with family, friends or those in your social network, and, when possible, make donations so I can remain a fixture in the press pool at Meade and keep up my coverage of the Manning case.
With gratitude,
Kevin Gosztola
Firedoglake.com Journalist
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Blog Posts and Tweets of Interest
Evening Blues
May you stay forever young – Happy 72nd birthday Bob Dylan by BOHICA
Gang of 10,000 attacks 50 LGBT activists in the country of Georgia by rserven
amphibians & earth - very bad news by Don Midwest
Stuff That Really Matters™☮ ♥ ☺ 5.24.13 by Words in Action
More Tunes
John Fogerty, Bruce Springsteen, Robbie Robertson - Green River