Entity: The Obama Administration

[Andrew.]

[BClark]

Jeremy Scahill returns from Yemen, where Obama has been propping up an autocratic regime and blowing up Bedouin families in their villages, to the entirely unpredictable effect of stoking "terrorism."

Washington's War in Yemen Backfires

The October drone strike that killed Awlaki’s 16-year-old son, Abdulrahman, a US citizen, and his teenage cousin shocked and enraged Yemenis of all political stripes. “I firmly believe that the [military] operations implemented by the US performed a great service for Al Qaeda, because those operations gave Al Qaeda unprecedented local sympathy,” says Jamal, the Yemeni journalist. The strikes “have recruited thousands.” Yemeni tribesmen, he says, share one common goal with Al Qaeda, “which is revenge against the Americans, because those who were killed are the sons of the tribesmen, and the tribesmen never, ever give up on revenge.” Even senior officials of the Saleh regime recognize the damage the strikes have caused. “People certainly resent these [US] interventions,” Qirbi, the foreign minister and a close Saleh ally, concedes.

[...]

I ask him if he ever meets with top AQAP leaders. “Fahd al Quso is from my tribe,” he replies with a smile, referring to one of the most wanted suspects from the Cole bombing. He also says he met Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the alleged “underwear bomber” charged with attempting to blow up a passenger flight over Detroit in December 2009. “I saw [Said] al-Shihri and [Nasir] al-Wuhayshi five days ago in Shebwa,” he casually adds, referring to the two senior AQAP leaders, both of them US-designated terrorists. “We were walking, and they said, ‘Peace be upon you.’ I replied, ‘Peace be upon you too.’ We have nothing against them. In the past, it was unthinkable to run into them. They were hiding in the mountains and caves, but now they are walking in the streets and going to restaurants.” Why is that? I ask. “The regime, the ministers and officials are squandering the money allocated to fight Al Qaeda, while Al Qaeda expands,” he says. The United States “funds the Political Security and the National Security [forces], which spend money traveling here and there, in Sanaa or in the US, with their family. All the tribes get is airstrikes against us.” He adds that counterterrorism “has become like an investment” for the US-backed units. “If they fight seriously, the funds will stop. They prolonged the conflict with Al Qaeda to receive more funds” from the United States.

interesting

i read what tariq ali had to say on the yemen fiasco a year or so ago (http://www.lrb.co.uk/v32/n06/tariq-ali/unhappy-yemen). he has a funny comment about one of the NYT's leading fear-mongers, thomas friedman*.

Later [the Yemeni PM] told me that thanks to the Nigerian bomber he had been visited by the New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman. Friedman, having asked his questions, went back to the US and told his readers that the city ‘was not Kabul … yet’, but that AQAP was a ‘virus’ that needed urgent attention before the spread of the disease became uncontrollable. He didn’t speculate on the cause of the infection. But when I asked Eryani to estimate the size of AQAP, his response was a mischievous smile. ‘Three or four hundred?’ I pressed. ‘At the maximum,’ he replied, ‘the very maximum. The Americans exaggerate greatly. We have other problems, real and more important.’

it's also funny to me how obama feels it necessary to mention that, in a third world country, parts of yemen are "not fully under government control." this is an obvious fact about nearly *every* third world country, but in cases like yemen, colombia, and haiti, it becomes necessary to invoke the "failed state" paradigm and refer to "loss of government control" to invite outside intervention, while in other places like mexico (a place where the government has zero administrative reach outside of the corrupt cartel-controlled government/state-security officials), where it's important to reiterate the notion that the government is in control (to avoid panic along the borderline), hillary clinton categorically denies that the government has lost any grip whatsoever on their third world country measuring 750,000 square miles.

*who, through his relentless fear-mongering, has become one of the media's leading torture apologists; regularly appeals to the unrealistic "ticking-time bomb" scenario, and extolls the virtues of sticking objects under people's nails, waterboarding, and other "non-wounding" torture techniques

[Andrew.]

The ideological double-speak on territorial control is absolutely crucial, for sure. Great point.

[etch]

Saw Scahill today and this bit really stood out:


"Now, there’s problems with that analysis, but the point being, Yemenis of all political stripes don’t like these bombings. They don’t like the fact that the Obama administration and the Bush administration built up the Saleh family military. So, you know, the U.S. has not generated a lot of good will in almost any quarters in Yemen, because—I mean, the demonstrators perceived it as "Why is the U.S. continuing to support this guy?" on the one hand. And then everyone is saying, "Why are you bombing civilians? You know, we don’t care if you" — a lot of people say, "We don’t care if you kill al-Qaeda people, but you’re not killing al-Qaeda people. They’re walking around in restaurants." You know, the two senior leaders of al-Qaeda, Wahishi and al-Shihri, apparently were just in a restaurant in Shabwa province the other day. And I know that because the tribal leader who saw them in the restaurant and said he said "As-Salaam Alaikum" to them, and they said "As-Salaam Alaikum" back, was like, "Oh, yeah, I see them all the time now. The U.S. doesn’t—they’re bombing the wrong places. These guys are just walking around." So the perception is that the U.S. has been wrong constantly, always gotten it wrong on Yemen. The vast majority of Yemenis see it that way."

[Andrew.]

A fan calls out Springsteen, REM, Wilco for their silence on Obama's atrocities.

Open letter to Bruce Springsteen et al
Rock stars quick to embrace Obama, but silent as he sings same old songs as Bush

[seanurban]

Afghanistans response to the Koran burning is very telling. They don't want us there. If its just an honest mistake then what's the big hoopla?
Anyway 10 years of progress and here we are.

[Model Citizen]

Afghanistans response to the Koran burning is very telling. They don't want us there. If its just an honest mistake then what's the big hoopla?
Anyway 10 years of progress and here we are.

Is it really 10 years of progress though? I'm not trying to be argumentative but it seems more to me like 10 years of a western power bombing the shit out of a small third world country. The "progress" line is just bullshit intended to make US voters feel warm and fuzzy about their sons and daughters giving their lives for such actions.

Or maybe that is argumentative, I'm no expert on the matter by any means and I may be talking out of my arse, but notions of 'progress' and 'liberty' when talking about US actions across the world seem almost childishly naive and by using them we're propagating this myth that these wars are somehow just when they obviously are not.

As for the thread, I don't believe I've voted yet but Crap.

[seanurban]

No, you're right. "progress." nothing has changed. And in this instance, we are turning our backs on a couple of our soldiers in order to appease an angry mob.

[AlBStern]

No, you're right. "progress." nothing has changed. And in this instance, we are turning our backs on a couple of our soldiers in order to appease an angry mob.

How did we turn our backs on a couple of our soldiers?

[seanurban]

Oh the investigation will appear official I'm sure. But it sounds like the outcome is decided. I don't think anyone should lose even one months pay for taking out the trash, but they're talking about more serious consequences than that.

[Andrew.]

Ah ha ha. Democratic leaders fear their people. Obama fears YOU, PRF. This is the era when our own leaders must meet in hiding from the people they claim to represent. It's always been easiest to govern from castles, after all. Fire up the oil to a boil!

G-8 summit to be held at Camp David, not Chicago

President Obama is moving one of two major world summits from Chicago to the presidential retreat near Washington, with an aide saying the president has decided he wants a more "intimate" setting than his hometown for the May gathering.

The Group of Eight meeting will be moved to Camp David, according to the White House, but the gathering of NATO allies and the International Security Assistance Force will go on in Chicago as planned in mid-May.

Camp David will more closely approximate the remote settings in which the G8 leaders prefer to gather. Summits in large cities typically see clamorous protests, while those in the countryside are calmer and more sedate.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/loca ... 7373.story

[numberthirty]

Ah ha ha. Democratic leaders fear their people. Obama fears YOU, PRF. This is the era when our own leaders must meet in hiding from the people they claim to represent. It's always been easiest to govern from castles, after all. Fire up the oil to a boil!

G-8 summit to be held at Camp David, not Chicago

President Obama is moving one of two major world summits from Chicago to the presidential retreat near Washington, with an aide saying the president has decided he wants a more "intimate" setting than his hometown for the May gathering.

The Group of Eight meeting will be moved to Camp David, according to the White House, but the gathering of NATO allies and the International Security Assistance Force will go on in Chicago as planned in mid-May.

Camp David will more closely approximate the remote settings in which the G8 leaders prefer to gather. Summits in large cities typically see clamorous protests, while those in the countryside are calmer and more sedate.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/loca ... 7373.story

In the last couple of days, Illinois' supreme court ruled a law that makes recording a public employee a felony unconstitutional for the second time. Between that and Rahm, I can see why they made the call. It's not such a great time to have juice.

[Andrew.]

It's not such a great time to have juice.

Sorry, I don't understand. Please explain(?)

[numberthirty]

It's not such a great time to have juice.

Sorry, I don't understand. Please explain(?)

Juice is pull. Daley would have just told people to sit down and shut the fuck up and, it probably would have happened.

Rahm tries to get heavy and, shit's blowing up in his face.

[numberthirty]

Then again, it could be Matt Pike's lyrics are finally opening people's eyes.

[Andrew.]

So yesterday Obama was in Oklahoma to celebrate the fast-tracking of the southern section of the Keystone XL (Canadian Tar Sands) pipeline. Apparently the Obama energy policy (which includes expanded Arctic drilling and hydraulic fracking, "clean coal," etc) is called, not jokingly, "all of the above."

: He’s been saying this, that any energy source, domestic energy source, is good—oil, coal, solar, wind, whatever else. It’s not—I mean, I think it’s not an intellectually very useful idea. I mean, if I told you that I was running for president, and I had an "all of the above" foreign policy, where all of our—every country in the world was going to be considered an equal ally of ours, you might think I was a bit of a lightweight. But with energy, unfortunately, it remains politic to insist that we’re never going to have to make any choices. The weather this week, I think, is demonstrating that we better start making some choices. The temperature across America in March, as we come out of winter, the temperature is—it’s not just off the charts, it’s off the wall that the charts are tacked to.

http://www.democracynow.org/2012/3/22/b ... inter_heat

Wasn't sure where to post this: the climate change thread, the Problem w/ Liberalism thread, or here.

[jimmy two hands]

The saddest/most angering thing about this Keystone business is that it's not going to figure into domestic energy very much. Most US refineries already have the capability of processing Canadian heavy crude and are already doing so (especially in the midwest), and the pipeline capcity exists to ship this stuff down to the Gulf Coast. The pipeline will make it easier to process it along the gulf coast, bu the main purpose is to ship it to terminals for export overseas. It's bad enough that we're processing it here, shipping it worldwide will be catastrophic. And framing it as a domestic energy policy is dishonest at best.

[MtHrtAttack]

The saddest/most angering thing about this Keystone business is that it's not going to figure into domestic energy very much. Most US refineries already have the capability of processing Canadian heavy crude and are already doing so (especially in the midwest), and the pipeline capcity exists to ship this stuff down to the Gulf Coast. The pipeline will make it easier to process it along the gulf coast, bu the main purpose is to ship it to terminals for export overseas. It's bad enough that we're processing it here, shipping it worldwide will be catastrophic. And framing it as a domestic energy policy is dishonest at best.

So not only are Obama and his henchmen raping our country's financial assets and such, they are also destroying our country's landscape. And here I thought things were going to get better when a Democrat was elected in '08.

[Andrew.]

So not only are Obama and his henchmen raping our country's financial assets and such, they are also destroying our country's landscape. And here I thought things were going to get better when a Democrat was elected in '08.

If it wasn't Obama it'd be someone else doing all the same shit is the real lesson, sadly. You don't become POTUS w/o being a ruthless, unprincipled agent of ruling interests. It'd be nice if the Obama presidency has at least spelled that out to true believers. A friend on FB a while ago said he was disappointed to learn Obama was "just another fucking President." What I found sad is how many intelligent people deluded themselves into thinking he wouldn't be.



From a thread in 2006.

Here's a question: is the average American voter too cynical or to idealistic.

I'd say the answer is both.

It's an uninformed cynicism. Yeah. It is both.

The average American voter seems to always want to "throw the bums out" that they put in. Republican "bums" get swapped with Democratic "bums" in an endless cycle that nobody questions. When someone "different" comes along, they always seem to buy it, because of the idealism.

[BClark]

So not only are Obama and his henchmen raping our country's financial assets and such, they are also destroying our country's landscape. And here I thought things were going to get better when a Democrat was elected in '08.

If it wasn't Obama it'd be someone else doing all the same shit is the real lesson, sadly. You don't become POTUS w/o being a ruthless, unprincipled agent of ruling interests. It'd be nice if the Obama presidency has at least spelled that out to true believers. A friend on FB a while ago said he was disappointed to learn Obama was "just another fucking President." What I found sad is how many intelligent people deluded themselves into thinking he wouldn't be.



From a thread in 2006.

Here's a question: is the average American voter too cynical or to idealistic.

I'd say the answer is both.

It's an uninformed cynicism. Yeah. It is both.

The average American voter seems to always want to "throw the bums out" that they put in. Republican "bums" get swapped with Democratic "bums" in an endless cycle that nobody questions. When someone "different" comes along, they always seem to buy it, because of the idealism.

and this is what gets me about obama. during his campaign, he certainly encouraged those who felt he would really "change" things. and now that he hasn't, all we get is this bullshit from his enduring supporters in the center about what he didn't actually, technically, *promise* in his campaign, as if his campaign didn't fully encourage the then-popular notion that it would be a whole new day with a whole new kind of president.