Mad_Machine76
Mad_Machine76's JournalAccountable for what?
Any evidence of law-breaking (past or present)? You want to have a debate about surveillance and curtailing some of these data collection operations, fine. You want to have Congress alter or abolish some of them, fine. But what do you expect Dems to do in terms of "holding him accountable"? Appoint a special prosecutor? Hold impeachment hearings? What? 
AFAIK he's not been accused of nor implicated in any law-breaking. The NSA programs are LEGAL. Loathsome as they may be to some of us.
These problems didn't even start under President Obama, so why is he being dumped on over this? That's what I don't get. This was passed by Congress and signed into law under Bush/Cheney as I recall back in 2006-2007.
Let's have the debate
we should have had in 2001, 2005, 2007, etc. and then let's decide what we're willing to live with for a safe and free society. I'm simply not getting the vapors over this that some other people are getting over this because at the end of the day, what has been implemented was AFAIK legalized, which, of course, doesn't necessarily make it *right* but instead of lionizing the leaker in this matter (funny how some people complain about people blindly worshipping President Obama but treating Snowden like he's a hero in all of this) why aren't the people upset/opposed to this pushing for Congress to change the laws, put in more safeguards, dismantle some of the "security state" that Bush/Cheney built up in response to 9/11.
It's just that when President Obama does *anything*
it's always THE WORST THING EVER!!!! It's hard not to feel like the media has it out for him, which makes me laugh whenever I hear teabaggers complain about the media being "in the tank" for him.
Maybe China or other totalitarian-style surveillance States
Surely, nobody is suggesting that that's what were dealing with here in the US (probably not even under Bush/Cheney)? Is our internet access being monitored/censored by the government? ARE people listening into our calls without probable cause? If people want to get rid of the Patriot Act and the stuff that legalized what the NSA is doing, then we need to organize and get Congress to act. Anybody who is in Congress upset about all this ought to, at least in theory, be submitting a bill, right?
He can't handle democracy?
Too bad for him. If he wants to take his ball and go home, then that's on HIM, not anybody else. Personally, I've long believed that he is really looking for an excuse, any excuse, to back out of the whole venture anyway.
Also, immigration reform isn't all about him either and it's not up to him to decide whether or not immigration reform succeeds or not. That's *supposed* to be up to us citizens? It's really arrogant for him to make this all about him.
He can't handle democracy?
Too bad for him. If he wants to take his ball and go home, then that's on HIM, not anybody else. Personally, I've long believed that he is really looking for an excuse, any excuse, to back out of the whole venture anyway.
Also, immigration reform isn't all about him either and it's not up to him to decide whether or not immigration reform succeeds or not. That's *supposed* to be up to us citizens? It's really arrogant for him to make this all about him.
They were "fixing the intelligence around the policy"
They wanted to get their war on and they weren't going to let "facts" (or anything or anybody else) get in their way
Seriously? O.k. I'll play
The intel itself wasn't conclusive or, to put it another way, a "slam dunk" like Tenet called it but Bush, Cheney, et. al appear to have cherry-picked only the bits of intel- most of which was raw or uncorroborated or of questionable origin- and used it to make the "threat" from Iraq look much worse than it actually was. To me, it was a bunch of lies of omission at the very least in a zeal to rush the country to war for reasons I'm still not entirely clear on but it's very likely that there was stuff that we were told that were almost certainly lies but we may never be able to fully sort it out. Iraq clearly did NOT have any WMDs that could threaten us in Baghdad let alone Ohio and the UN Weapon Inspectors- before they were unceremoniously booted out of Iraq- told us that they weren't finding anything but Bush/Cheney wanted to invade so badly that they repeatedly ignored evidence that didn't tell them what they seemed to want to hear and went to war against anybody whom had the slightest hesitation about the war and its costs, benefits, etc. We never got a real "debate" about Iraq because the only evidence that we were allowed to hear was that which promoted the invasion and almost nothing that questioned and/or undermine the rationale for it.
I think that it's time to make the following rule: If a country can't fully control it's own airspace and/or territory, it's NOT a threat to the US.
Yup
My standard reply to teabaggers talking about impeaching President Obama is: "
P)resident George W. Bush". If nothing he did warranted impeachment to Republican teabaggers, then nothing President Obama has done does either. In fact, President Obama has been a freakin' Saint compared to George W. Bush and his (mis-)Administration (except, of course, in the fevered imaginations of the teabaggers). The level of chutzpah, cognitive dissonance, and hypocrisy shown by Republican teabaggers when talking about President Obama is simply astounding.
They defended Bush/Cheney to the bitter end and for things that are on the order of thousands times worse: They defended him being asleep at the wheel prior to 9/11 and helped fight against an establishment of a commission to investigate what happened on 9/11, they gleefully cheered his rush to invade Iraq, they defended and justified torture (stuff we put people to death for back in WW2), they ardently supported him for re-election in 2004, they never questioned the 60 Embassy deaths that occurred during Bush's (P)residency, they supported him over his warrantless wiretapping (before it was legalized by Congress), they still blame minorities and the poor for the financial meltdown in 2008 instead of Bush's economic policies that encouraged, if not promoted, reckless and unregulated capitalism.
Now, they're howling about 4 people dying at an consulate in a volatile part of the world, a local IRS branch- at the direction of a Republican no less- scrutinizing groups that didn't appear to them to be legitimate "social welfare organizations", an AP reporter being investigated for a leak that Republicans were outraged about happening in the first place, and wiretapping/data collection that congressional Republicans and Democrats made legal several years ago.
Executive Orders are a band-aid IMHO
It can be effective in some areas (i.e. regulations) but what can be done with a stroke of a pen can quickly be undone as well. Building Congressional support for a long-term legislative change for an issue like employment non-discrimination is a far more effective strategy IMHO (see: DADT).
Obama will sign ENDA if it comes up for his signature. I think that it was introduced in the Congress after President Obama was first elected but it hit an unresolved snag over protections for transgender individuals if I remember correctly. Now, we just need to clear out the teabagger infested House and get a few more LGBT-friendly Senators and re-introduce it. I will say that a lot of corporations and state/local governments have been pretty progressive on the non-discrimination front and a lot of them have already voluntarily adopted non-discrimination policies that cover LGBTs, even in states that have no official non-discrimination laws. Still, having a national law would be preferable but I also believe that it is inevitable, just like full 50-state recognition of marriage equality.
Profile Information
Name: Mara Alis ButlerGender: Female
Hometown: Indianapolis, Indiana
Home country: USA
Current location: Indianapolis, Indiana
Member since: Sat Feb 28, 2004, 01:13 AM
Number of posts: 24,412
