Barack Obama: The Surveillance President

Glenn Greenwald points to three extraordinary events this week that earn Barack Obama the title of Surveillance President. These events dovetail with the President's previous conduct aimed at furthering government secrecy at the expense of an informed citizenry. These events also need to be seen in the context of Obama's War on whistleblowers, as reported by Jane Mayer of The New Yorker.  "[T]he Obama Administration has pursued leak prosecutions with a surprising relentlessness. . . . [I]t has been using the Espionage Act to press criminal charges in five alleged instances of national-security leaks—more such prosecutions than have occurred in all previous Administrations combined."  But that is just the beginning.  Here's one more excerpt from The New Yorker:

Jack Balkin, a liberal law professor at Yale, agrees that the increase in leak prosecutions is part of a larger transformation. “We are witnessing the bipartisan normalization and legitimization of a national-surveillance state,” he says. In his view, zealous leak prosecutions are consonant with other political shifts since 9/11: the emergence of a vast new security bureaucracy, in which at least two and a half million people hold confidential, secret, or top-secret clearances; huge expenditures on electronic monitoring, along with a reinterpretation of the law in order to sanction it; and corporate partnerships with the government that have transformed the counterterrorism industry into a powerful lobbying force. Obama, Balkin says, has “systematically adopted policies consistent with the second term of the Bush Administration.”

[caption id="attachment_18134" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Image by Kgtoh at Dreamstime (with permission)"][/caption] But back to the three recent events: 1. Top congressional leaders agreed Thursday to a four-year extension of the Patriot Act; 2. The Obama administration is seeking to make it easier for the FBI to compel companies to turn over records of an individual's Internet activity without a court order if agents deem the information relevant to a terrorism or intelligence investigation; and 3. The nonprofit Electronic Frontier Foundation alleges in a lawsuit filed Thursday that the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel violated federal open-records laws by refusing to release its legal opinion that concludes that the FBI may obtain telephone records of international calls made from the U.S. without any formal legal process, a watchdog group asserts. Welcome to the United States of Surveillance.

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Climate Denial Meltdown

As we seem to be discussing conspiracy theories here lately, let's take a look at Climate-gate, the oft repeated Fox News banner of climate change denialism. This video is a good and detailed look at not only the emergence and initial rallying cry of Climate-gate, but also how a thoroughly disproved lie emerges again later as a new rallying cry. It is a pity that this video does not even bother to go into the criminal activity used to gather the misleading information. The forces of anti-reason are tireless, and this is just one of many subjects in which it manifests.

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The lesson we learn from Birtherism

This insightful passage was published by Think Progress:

HOW DID WE GET HERE: If the endurance of the birther myth teaches us anything, it's the power of repetition. Any claim, no matter how outrageous, can take hold over time if it gets enough media exposure. A recent New York Times/CBS News poll found that nearly 25 percent of Americans, and 45 percent of Republicans, believed Mr. Obama was born in another country. The shocking fact that a quarter of all Americans now believe the lie -- and an additional 18 percent say they don't know where he was born -- illustrates just how successful birther conspiracists have been at sowing doubt and attracting attention from mainstream news outlets.

Epilogue: This episode on Birtherism also demonstrates the power of a vigorous and self-critical media to advance the public good. I will adhere to one of my personal articles of faith: That most people will think in admirable ways and act decently if given accurate information and if treated with at least a modicum of respect by their leaders.

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Who is the United States killing with its drone attacks in Pakistan?

Have you ever wondered who the United States is killing with its drone attacks in Pakistan? I have. Here's a comprehensive source of information from New America Foundation. The map will show you the drone attack sites and numbers of deaths. From 2004 - 2011 it is reported that the United States has killed a total of 2,290 people. You can also see that the military claims that 1,829 of these people were "militants." The above web page offers this link for an expanded view of the locations of the drone attacks. If you click that expanded view, you'll see some fascinating information. Click this link for recent drone-killings.   The most recent reported attack occurred on April 13, 2011. If you click on it, you'll see that 4-7 "militants" were killed, and an unknown number of "others." By clicking on the link, you can then view various news sources regarding the attack. [More . . . ]

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Translated: “Because we are torturing Bradley Manning and we don’t want people outside the prison to know about it.”

Why is it so hard for the public at large to learn how Bradley Manning is being treated? You won't hear a straight answer from Mark Toner, spokesman for Barack Obama's State Department. Here's a translation for all you are hearing: "Because we are torturing Bradley Manning and we don't want people outside the military prison to know about it."

Continue ReadingTranslated: “Because we are torturing Bradley Manning and we don’t want people outside the prison to know about it.”