Jon Stewart on Obama's broken civil liberties promises

Here's Jon Stewart doing eight minutes on the promises that Barack Obama has broken on civil liberties since he took office -- from arresting whistleblowers to maintaining the suspension of habeas corpus to continuing warrantless wiretaps to sustaining extraordinary rendition to authorizing the execution of American citizens without trial outside of combat zones.

Like I said before: I didn't expect the guy to walk on water, but I'd love it if he wouldn't wallow in shit.

Jon Stewart on Obama's executive power record

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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nutbastard

oh and for anyone feeling completely disillusioned (and a fan of Portal), I have been proudly selling obama/”the cake is a lie” bumper stickers on zazzle.com since before the inauguration… they make wonderful birthday gifts… I wont link em here for respect of the spamming policy, but a googling will get you there.
Anonymous

Each and every day that goes by where our Government fails (I voted for Obama), and both sides continue the multi century “Yankees vs Boston” political team bullshit, and it becomes more and more apparent that the only ones with any say are the largest corporations shuffling cash here and there, is another day I become more embarrassed to be living here.

Of course, I’m taking lots of things for granted with a big pile of hyperbole like that.

But I don’t give a fuck.

I think the song “Pigs” (corporate, think Pink Floyd style Pigs) by Aesop Rock is most appropriate in describing the state of this country for the past 20 or 30 years.

“The pigs, the pigs, the dregs of what y’all aim for
The gluttonous muddy stomachs under the pudgy cakehole
Two-track braniac using the food and payroll
To chew up and consume every cookie, crumb, and peso
And place a cloven hoof on the lucrative when convenient
As the bourbon-odor smokers’ coughs smolders off the Cohiba
If Noah had the benefit of hindsight on his ship
He could’ve snatched two unicorns and left behind the motherfucking pigs.”
Lobster

That popping sound you hear is million of conservative heads exploding.
pixleshifter

Video not available in your country.
Why do they have to make it such a pain in the ass?
Even surfing through a proxy the video doesn’t load. The page does, the video doesn’t, even on the Jon Stewart website.
Anyone got an alternative url anywhere?
Brillobreaks

Awfully hard for anyone to dismantle the kind of security state we built in this country after Sept. 11th. Look at how long it took to fully rid ourselves of the various sedition type acts we enacted throughout the country’s history, generally during wartime.

With a ‘war’ on terrorism ongoing, and likely never really ending if our government has it’s way, I have a hard time seeing how we’re going to make our way back to that pre-Sept. 11th state anytime soon.
- Anonymous
  
  Nice bit of rationalization there Billo…
  
  More likely — BHO found out the war on terror is for grown ups and while it’s easy to throw darts from the campaign trail — actually governing is a bit more of a sticky wicket.
  
  The killing of American citizens by drone is murder. I think BHO should be tried by the ICC under the Rome Statute. Good for Bush Good for Obama right?
- remmelt
  
  Awfully hard
  
  You are the Leaders Of The Free WorldÂ© for crying out loud. What, the, fuck.
  - Brillobreaks
    
    I take it you’re not familiar with our occasional descent into this sort of abusive behavior in response to assorted wars, conflicts, and generic upheaval? This is hardly the first time we’ve reacted this way, it likely won’t be the last. Nor is it restricted to us.
    
    Scared people do dumb shit, putting aside important principles is a pretty common response. It’d be nice to think that our status as ‘leaders of the free world’ would somehow magically make us immune to that, but it doesn’t.
- Anonymous
  
  Right. Signing Presidential orders is pretty tough.
Anonymous

Hear, hear. It’s like Stewart took Greenwald, distilled and aged him in wooden caskets for 20 years, and served the lovely resulting liquor for the world to enjoy.
gbc

Plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose.
shadowfirebird

It will be interesting to see if the coalition government here in the UK do a better job of dismantling our own screw-up of civil liberties.

Too soon to tell, but we have at least heard them continue to talk the talk now they are in office, in regard to at least two items: the ID register and CRB checks.

Can someone enlighten me: did Obama talk the talk after he got into office as well? Because if he did, UK news didn’t cover it very well.
PaulR

Shouldn’t that link be labeled “Glenn Greenwald On Jon Stewart on Obama’s executive power record”.

But seriously: one of Sartre’s great contribution to humanity is to point out that you are what you do, not what you say you are, or what you think you are.
So far, on the issue of justice, Obama is Bush, with better enunciation and worse policies.

Don’t pay attention to what he says, watch what he does.
Anonymous

@Brillobreaks: bullshit. He’s the President of the United States. You can’t spend two years criticizing an administration’s policies, making your slogan “Change we can believe in”, continue those very same policies and not be called a hypocrite. And then he talks about why people are disillusioned with politics. Ha!
Anonymous

It’s complicated. (TM the obama administration)
IamInnocent

A politcian, any politician, in a democracy, will do anything it feels that can get it elected. Ultimately it is up to the people and no one can vote the people out of office.
Brian Boyko

If Obama has lost Stewart, he’s lost the nation.

I can’t believe we couldn’t do better.
- ChesterS
  
  Sadly, I think the nation is quite happy to give up its civil liberties in exchange for safety.
- cinemajay
  
  That’s a tad,/i> over dramatic, dontcha think?
Hanglyman

The United States of America is over. Obama gave me some brief hope that things could be turned around, but it’s just not happening. The people are completely shut out of any meaningful decisions.

Healthcare is broken, education is broken, civil liberties, the military, the justice system, political spending, the environment, the economy… basically every aspect of the country and government imaginable is deeply flawed, utterly corrupt or in decline. What little influence the people have left to make positive change is negated by the ignorant and hateful among us. At this point so much is wrong that even if we were to start making slow steady progress (which itself looks increasingly unlikely- such a small thing, but we just can’t seem to make it happen), it would be too late.

I love this country and what it once stood for, but it’s time to move on. Better to move to another country and actively try to prevent the same mistakes from being made there while there’s still time.
- Anonymous
  
  I came to that same conclusion a while ago, it sickens me. I’ve been actively pursuing options of moving out, why? I spent 10 years of my life in the Marines and went to War for my country, I’ve done my part. People don’t care and only choose to push their agenda without any regard to the Constitution. Those in power continue to play the sides against each other and the people continue to give more power to those playing them.
Notary Sojac

Every day, in every way, I am increasingly content with the fact that I voted write-in for Ron Paul.
- nutbastard
  
  “Every day, in every way, I am increasingly content with the fact that I voted write-in for Ron Paul.”
  
  Me too, brother.
glaborous immolate

See, but if EVEN a guy like Obama, who claimed it was all a “climate of fear” not based in enough real threats, decides to backpedal, that says to me that perhaps what we know about the threats to us is more dire than an uninformed Obama could claim.

is it

1) guys who become president like powers

2) guys who become president know the reality of the threats.
- Ugly Canuck
  
  I’ll paraphrase: Bush was right, and Obama is right as long as he follows Bush’s policies.
  The rest of you ignorant-of-the-threat people shut up and follow orders.
  
  If you knew what we knew….
  
  Bullshit.
  
  Authority + Nothing(ie no new info to the public) = More Powerful Authority (ie Torture & assassination by unreveiwable & discretionary Secret Presidential Decree)?
  
  Thanks for defending our freedoms & liberties by neutering & removing them.
  
  In sum, your comment adds nothing to the debate, at all.
  - glaborous immolate
    
    Well, I’ve always been of two minds on whether “Bush was right”. How could I be sure.
    
    but now another guy, whit putatively opposite political leanings, takes a very similar position…. doesn’t that give me more information to help decide?
    
    So your paraphrase really wasn’t.
    - Notary Sojac
      
      If we had had another 9/11 type attack on Bush’s watch, he would have a glib response ready to go…”Well, you know, this stuff is really hard, y’know? And we’ve been doin’ everything we can to lock up the terrists and lock down America.”
      
      Obama knows this, and he also knows that if we had an attack on HIS watch, -after- he closed down Gitmo, vetoed the Patriot Act, etc., the media and the GOP would have all but literally eviscerated him for having “let down our guard.”
      
      So this tells me that Obama -does- think another attack (or attacks) is a real possibility.
      - bersl2
        
        So this tells me that Obama -does- think another attack (or attacks) is a real possibility.
        
        Only an idiot would believe that more attacks are not a real posibility.
        
        If the political landscape of this country cannot change so that the fear of such attacks cannot decide, or is no longer thought to be able to decide, an election, then I do not see why we deserve our continued prosperity as a nation.
      - ian71
        
        “I do not see why we deserve our continued prosperity as a nation.”
        
        You call what you’ve got now ‘prosperity’? You don’t watch enough TV.
      - Notary Sojac
        
        Since it would be political suicide for an administration not to take what it considers appropriate steps to deter/prevent another attack, I have to conclude that what Obama has done so far is precisely what he thinks most appropriate.
- Pantograph
  
  Must be that mind control the CIA has been perfecting for the last five decades. They are great at making up threats to scare a simple politician witless apparently.
  
  It is much less work to control a few key figures than trying to sway a whole population. Easier too, because high ranking politicans are isolated and at the mercy of their security apparatus. Stockholm syndrome will set in within a couple of months.
Anonymous

I knew we were in trouble when Huey said “Eh?”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXMwBjjQRBs
Anonymous

Look at all these Party Hacks making excuses and attempting to justify Obama embracing and expanding the Bush Doctrine. This just goes to prove my opinion that there is no difference between the two parties and the general population are nothing but sheep.
michael holloway

Comedy Central videos are not available in Canada (DMCA restrictions). The screen offers a link to The Comedy Network, Canada’s portal to everything Comedy Central in Canada – owned by CTV. So I click the on-screen message and off I go to CTV – but the video I want to see isn’t featured there! :(
- s243a
  
  Here is the Canadian version of the video:
  http://www.thecomedynetwork.ca/Displayblog.aspx?bpid=23695146-44fa-43f7-9d04-79b8f07fd5aa
- Ugly Canuck
  
  As our civil liberties continue with the same force and effect as prior to 9/11, our inability to view Mr Stewart’s views of his Government may be a fair trade-off.
  
  After all, we have little to say to Americans on this issue, as they are very well capable of keeping their own house in order.
  If they want to be participants in a system which permits or allows the torture and killing of people in secret without any judicial or other oversight, it is their business.
- IamInnocent
  
  It wasn’t featured yet.
  Go there and choose June 15th now.
icepick method

I regret voting for Obama. More of the same.
- Ito Kagehisa
  
  Icepick, recognizing error can lead to correction. Your comment is a ray of light in a mostly nauseating thread.
  
  Ugly Canuck, I presume “the system” you are referring to is the one whereby the Canadian government frames innocent Canadian citizens and asks the US to send them overseas for imprisonment and brutal torture, then afterwards gives them lots of Canadian taxpayer dollars and says “gee, we’re really sorry?”
  
  Canada’s government is lucky they have the US right next door, so they can look good by comparison. Despite being corrupt and immoral by any other standard, they can still be righteously smug whenever they look south.
Anonymous

Making all those promises before getting elected to me is similar to a high school student gov’t elected where you have students promising better snacks in the cafeteria and cheaper sodas in the soda machine. They don’t have the ability to make those changes. Obama shouldn’t have made those promises unless if knew for certain that he could. He probably got into office and was given tons more information that he didn’t have before and he realized he didn’t have much of a choice. It sucks but I think he his a good man and probably had real reasons for breaking those promises.
geohump

Cory, Sadly Mr. Obama’s failure to follow through on his campaign promises isn’t news. It’s been going on for quite some time. After voting for him, I was very disappointed early on in his administration when he failed to stop renditions and restore habeas corpus.

Sadly few of us understand that the real danger of terrorism is not how many people the terrorists kill/buildings they destroy, (fewer deaths per year than choking on pretzels|food and/or falls in the home).

The real danger is the panicked, childish responses to it that are destroying the foundations of US law and rights. This core of essential liberty caused America to become the great nation that it is by providing freedom and justice for all better than any other place or time in history.

Sadly, that is all ending now. We have traded our country’s future and liberty for a handful of vaporous promises that can’t actually be delivered and whose public implementation are destroying the core of America’s freedom, guaranteeing that America will never be a free country again.

Mr Obama has demonstrated that no matter how educated and aware of the Constitutional guarantees of rights and freedom a politician is, once they have power, they will never give those powers up.

As it is, can America ever recover these lost liberties without an internal armed conflict?

Imagine the extreme leftists, the armed militias of Utah and the other libertarians joining forces to fight against the Big Brotherization of US society and the restoration of Constitutional freedoms.

A fight whose physical struggle they would lose. They lack the capability to effectively combat the US military’s counter-insurgency capabilities and could not be funded by any civilian groups due to the effective intelligence the US government has on its own population.

May Bush, Cheney and, sadly, Obama too, all serve in the ninth circle of hell.

Ave America! Morituri te salutant!
Anonymous

He who sacrifices his freedom for security deserves neither.

I believe this is a quote (bastardised as it may be), can’t remember where from though.

In the UK we have stop-and-order searches (You guys in the US had something similar introduced after 9/11, ours was after 7/7); they actually do nothing to prevent, or tackle terrorism, but they do stop the odd knife crime. This apparently makes them a success; I combat this with “If we had CCTV in every home we’d stop more crimes … doesn’t mean it’s a good idea”.

Just because something works, or could work; doesn’t mean it’s the right thing to do.
- Anonymous
  
  I believe it was Franklin. He had a wonderful way with words.
pukool

Obama presciently depicted as Isildur, rather than Frodo.

http://thisishistorictimes.com/2009/02/one-ring-to-rule-them-all/
- bja009
  
  Bump. That’s a fantastic political cartoon – if only it hadn’t come true…
Anonymous

Leave Obama alone and accept his rightful authority.
Obama is definitely delivering on the one clear promise that united us all and that he emphasized in front of every audience. So get out of the way and let him change things – he told you change isn’t always easy or smooth, but you can always have hope. So if hope is suddenly not enough because you don’t understand his grand vision of the big picture, I’m sorry – but please stop whining about how he gets us there.

Right now Obama is busy and has good reasons for retaining and expanding the powers of the presidency.
He would explain it to you if he thought you could understand or couldn’t simply win you back over with some more slick marketing and rhetoric in 2012.
It’s not his fault that Bush didn’t grant him enough authority to do what he has to do.
I do have to admit – I have a little more sympathy for Bush now. It’s not his fault he is evil and got elected twice by the same dense and deaf American people who then got outraged as soon as he started being himself.
You give the guy just 1 and a half years and you’re already mad at someone else for your own unfounded, unrealistic expectations?!?
How can you elect a guy then turn so quickly? Isn’t that worse than your childish accusation that he’s defying your expectations? If you can’t stand by your misinformed choice in good conscience, maybe you shouldn’t be making such weighty choices that affect all our lives. There still is no law that says you have to vote, you know.
I’m not sure why Obama is so driven to expand his powers in order remake the world and serve a bunch of ingrates, but I’m thankful he does.
Anonymous

“But seriously: one of Sartre’s great contribution to humanity is to point out that you are what you do, not what you say you are, or what you think you are.”
Aristotle, yo.
Anonymous

We’re all pissed off, and rightfully so, but we ought to start thinking of solutions.

We could start with amending the constitution to do away with the possibility for a president to serve a second term. There might be a few leaders in the future that we’d be happy to have for eight years (I doubt it), but we would have far less mediocre politicians doing what Obama is doing now: passing toothless policies in an attempt to pander to both parties so he’ll have a chance at being reelected.
Anonymous

Here’s a link for Canadians and others outside the US:

http://watch.thecomedynetwork.ca/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart/full-episodes/#clip313192
za7ch

…or it could just be that it doesn’t matter who’s “head of state” with regards to a capitalist-imperialist country like the U.S.

If elections changed anything they would outlaw it.
k88dad

Yet another case of Stewart offering sager commentary than the “real” news shows. We didn’t impeach Bush–and call his abuses out for what they were–so we get what we deserve.

Fear and eroding rights are the opposite of freedom. The actions of our leaders are un-American.
RevEng

I’m Canadian, so I didn’t get to vote in the election (which is unfortunate, since Canada is quite directly affected by US policies), but I was still cautiously optimistic when I heard Obama speak out about everything terrible that Bush had started. I didn’t think he would be the savior that people were looking for and save the country, but at least he might start to change things back to the way they were (policy-wise).

At this point, it’s clear that he will never do so. The telcos got their immunity over the NSA warrantless wiretaps (and nobody even thought to slap the NSA on the wrist). Gitmo is still around and now they are resorting to even dirtier tactics. There is still a strong American presence in Afghanistan and Iraq with casualties likely in the tens of thousands that the American people (who are losing their homes) are paying billions of dollars to support.

Why? We’ll never know. Maybe he has all of the details now and believes what they are doing is necessary. Maybe he’s being fed bad information which makes him think it’s necessary. Maybe he was full of hot air and was just saying those things to get into office (he is a politician, after all). Maybe power corrupts even the most noble of men. Or maybe somebody got to him and turned him.

No matter why he’s doing it, he is still an elected official who was elected on promises that he has failed to uphold. Unless this is really what Americans want, he must never see another term. It’s too bad your system doesn’t make it possible to kick him out mid-term — at least that might be some motivation to stick to his word. Promises mean nothing if you’re guaranteed a luxurious 4 year term regardless of what you do.
sic transit gloria C.F.A.

#7 – well, goody for you. Be sure to pray a lot, take placebos, clean off oil-soaked birds, and buy lots of carbon credits, too. Just like voting for a third-party candidate in America, these don’t actually accomplish anything, but they make you feel like you’re doing something to help.
Anonymous

Did it ever occur to you that Obama changed his mind when shown the threats (info not seen by us)
and decided it was the smart thing to keep the security measures ?
- pixleshifter
  
  Did it ever occur to you that Obama changed his mind when shown the campaign contributors’ invoices (info not seen by us)
  and decided it was the smart thing to keep the security measures ?
robgotabingbang

Wow, a red-letter day in the Boingosphere! You mean Barack Obama really is just another self-serving politician elected solely on the strength of an advertising campaign with slick packaging? You mean to tell me that all that “hope and change” stuff was just focus group-tested-and- approved copy designed to play memory loop in the minds of dualistic American voters who were so fed up with the policies of another career politician they’d vote for anyone? No shit, really?
sdmikev

I voted for Obama because he wound up being the “best choice”. Which is to say the lesser of two evils.
I supported Kucinich up till his end, however and I think he was the real answer for a leader. But what the hell does this liberal know?
No matter who got in if they were a democrat, they’d have a target on their back from the crazy side of the right wing. Obama STILL hasn’t got this part yet and continues to try and operate as if he can work in a bipartisan manner. Clinton made that same mistake.
nygenxer

This is the left wing at its best, and why progressives ideas are so much better than what spews from the GOP: liberals criticize each other. That never happens on the right.

Case in point: eight years of Bush fuck-ups, lies and disasters, but never ONCE being called on the “fair and balanced” Fox “news”.

The propaganda on the right also says liberals think of Obama as a messiah. Obviously, this is not the case.
- adammtlx
  
  This is the left wing at its best, and why progressives ideas are so much better than what spews from the GOP: liberals criticize each other. That never happens on the right.
  
  That’s just not true. And if you bothered to do anything other than dwelling on your hatred of anything you disagree with, you’d know that.
- Ito Kagehisa
  
  I hope that was irony?
  
  If not, you may have a career opportunity at the Huffington Post.
flink

What a dolt.

If you can’t do it and keep it secret, then you’d better find another line of work.
sic transit gloria C.F.A.

Maybe if we thought of him as a messiah, he’d be struck by lightning? Worth a try :)
MadRat

For the past year I’ve been thinking to myself, “And he’s also promised us there has been no prisoner abuse under his command.”
joey

Can’t wait until the next election. If it is a clusterfuck and if another member of the “establishment” gets elected, i will move to another country. I want to be patriotic, but lately it seems our government is a huge shit hole and does not listen to the people. Whether its war, drugs, healthcare, the economy, patriot act, etc, it is PROVEN that Americans disagree with the decisions made by top officials. Politicians are not the problem, the system breeds the politicians. No one who is excited and motivated by true change will ever have a chance, not even a chance to run for president. you need multi billion dollar corporations to support your campaign if you even want a shot. What a shame…. It makes me wish the world was ending. There’s no way for it to get better until it gets ALOT worse.
- robgotabingbang
  
  If it is a clusterfuck and if another member of the “establishment” gets elected, i will move to another country.
  
  Calm down, Baldwin. Members of the “establishment” are always elected. As George Carlin said, “it’s a club, and you’re not invited.”
  - joey
    
    And it’s bullshit and i’m tired of it. I’m almost sad to admit im american. I can understand why the world hates us. We’re a bunch of arrogant dusche bags who break the law willingly and don’t give a fuck. Imagen you are innocent, and the govt mistakes you for a terrorist just because of some bureaucratic fuck up. You’re abducted and tortured in syria for a year until they decide your not really a terrorist. Then the president convinces the supreme court not to hear your case because of “state secrets” and they act as if nothing happened. I’d fucking blow up the white house if that happened to me. That would turn me into a terrorist. i would do everything i could to destroy those who did that to me.
    - robgotabingbang
      
      Don’t worry, young man. The lights will go out soon.
      - joey
        
        haha what does that mean?
      - robgotabingbang
        
        It means everything is illusory, transitive. Every empire crumbles eventually. Everyone dies, but before they do, they live a life. And for the most part, that life is not largely affected by what asshole occupies the head office of their country. It means live your life, young man, because it’s all a big joke that no one understands.
      - joey
        
        that’s actually really good advice and i struggle to do that every day.
    - Daedalus
      
      If it is a clusterfuck and if another member of the “establishment” gets elected, i will move to another country.
      
      Thankfully, there are alternatives…
      
      Barry’s had to handle a lot of shit since he got elected, so I wouldn’t be too shocked if the right hand didn’t know what the left hand was doing half the time. Still, that’s not an excuse. He’s doing horrible things. I’m glad Stewart is taking him to task on it.
      
      Of course, the only thing that terrifies me more than Barry at the helm is what a Tea Party wackadoo like Palin might do given half a shot. It’s tragic and terrify that it’s entirely possible that those two will be our choices (and that Palin has a half-decent shot at it).
    - grichens
      
      “I’m almost sad to admit im american. I can understand why the world hates us.”
      
      I am a Canadian and can view the clip because I live in the Cayman Islands. FYI, the rest of the world has its own dirty little secrets which it chooses not to share with Americans. Right UglyCanuck?
ill lich

The right wing likes to say that Stewart/Colbert are left wing toadies who fawn over Obama and the Democrats. . . .

Clearly they don’t actually watch the Daily show or Colbert Report.
Hools Verne

“After youâ€™re elected you are ushered into this smoke-filled room with the twelve industrialist capitalist scum-fucks that got you elected, a screen comes down and you are shown a film of the Kennedy assassination from an angle youâ€™ve never seen before, looking suspiciously off the grassy knoll. The lights come up and they [say] to the new President, â€˜Any questions?”

–Bill Hicks
Jackasimov

It’s amazing how infuriating things can get when the world doesn’t go exactly how you want it to.

What I’ve always wonder about was why someone would crave power (that is what many are claiming Obama has succumbed to after all). I don’t understand how NOT closing Gitmo – for instance (even when it was one of his supposed “promises” – equates power grabbing. Power, to me, would be more like shutting up dissent and carving a path for your party to remain in power for eternity while millions or billions of dollars line your many bank accounts thus keeping you rich and in some form of power for a lifetime. That’s how the other dictators do it. I don’t see that in Obama. Maybe though he’s just so crafty and so well-educated that I can’t see it.

I think at worst he’s presented with issues that cannot be easily solved. Some of them are of the “national security” nature while others are probably somewhere between saving his own ass from a further public opinion spiral and trying to not rouse the ridiculous rabble in the courtyard with the funny hats and misspelled signs.

As a steampunk veterinarian and part-time exotic dancer I’m no political expert, and I definitely am among the disillusioned but I’m also cautious of the need to have my personal agendas satisfied within my own time frame (even by the messiah).

Right now it seems like we’ve got a situation where promises aren’t as easy granted as we’d once hoped making us the unrealistic idealists and Obama maybe just more optimistic and/or naive than we would have liked. But would we have voted for him if he’d said he wouldn’t be able to do much of anything right away and the process would be so infernally slow as to seem almost immobile?

I wouldn’t call it lied to. I’d call it stroked.
jo3lr0ck5

Obama did bring change. Wait for it…wait…wait…wait…wait a little more…

He brought change of people and a change of clothes into the White House.

I wonder if the puppeteer for Obama is the same as the one for Bush…
- joey
  
  the puppeteer is indeed the same. The richest corporations in the world, not just america, our the puppeteers. They run our country. The “elections” are jokes.
SKR

The Obamapologists are in rare form today. He’s expanding the evil of Bush and because you think he is a good guy, it must obviously be in our best interest. Unfucking believeable. That must be some damn good Kool-aid. He’s a lying sack-of-shit politician just like the rest but because he can string three words together to form a coherent sentence they sit there entranced defending him.
- s243a
  
  It’s called liberal fascism. That is that people will accept fascism if it puts on a happy face. Someone once wrote a book about this.
JoshuaZ

Claims that Obama’s response is due to new information that he didn’t’ have as a senator doesn’t hold water. For example, it would not explain why he’s gone after whistleblowers which has nothing to do with the threats in question.
Anonymous

“But would we have voted for him if he’d said he wouldn’t be able to do much of anything right away and the process would be so infernally slow as to seem almost immobile?”

It’s disturbing how many people ignore that what Stewart and Greenwald are explicitly pointing out is Obama moving in the opposite direction of his promised actions with regards to state secrets and civil liberties. The complaint isn’t that things are slow, or imperceptibly moving. It’s that he’s moving backwards and actively making things worse.
sprockety

I thought I wanted a president who would restore respect to the constitution and country.

Turns out I just wanted one who could speak in complete sentences.
- Nelson.C
  
  Baby steps, Sprockety, baby steps.
Notary Sojac

“Obama’s belief in the rule of law apparently takes the back seat to Obama’s belief in his own ability to make the right call as executive.” – Scott Horton

“If you could buy him for what he’s worth, and sell him for what he thinks he’s worth, you could retire tomorrow” – My old man
ultranaut

I don’t think moving to another country will gain you much, the crisis is systemic. At best it’s like sneaking into the first class cabin on the crashing airplane of our civilization.

I think the idea of civil war in America is increasingly plausible, but don’t see how it could do anything but perpetuate the dysfunction. American culture is fundamentally a corporate product now. Violence will not capture the territory they control.
Anonymous

I love Jon – this is great!!!
Anonymous

In Canada, Stephen Harper is seen as far right-wing by his many critics. In the United States, Barack Obama is seen as a communist by his many critics. In reality, their policies and political philosophies seem pretty similar: moderately authoritarian and nominally laissez-faire but sympathetic to corporate welfare. Curiously, a lot of Canadians seem to despise Harper but love Obama. Maybe it’s because Obama has real hair and Harper has Lego hair, or because Obama comes across as caring and Harper comes across as mean spirited. But any perceived policy differences are largely due to where they stand relative to the other political forces in their respective countries.

The unfortunate fact is the zeitgeist of the time is one of increasing authoritarianism, tribalism, and siege mentality, and pretty much no matter where you go, times are tough for people who value liberty and progressiveness. The pendulum always swings back and forth between authoritarianism and liberalism (in the 19th Century sense of the word) but the silver lining is that it tends to swing a little farther in the liberal direction each time. Provided that you aren’t one of the unfortunates who becomes a casualty of extraordinary rendition or indefinite detention/enhanced interrogation (not legally torture, according to the definition our attorneys made up)/casualty of the valiant effort to liberate your country from the people who at least never killed you as long as you kept your mouth shut, in the long run, things will get better. They just might have to continue to get worse for a little while longer.

FWIW, neither Obama nor Harper, nor Bush are anywhere near the worst we’ve seen in the past century. The worst excesses of Bush’s regin are still misdemeanors in comparison to Stalin’s, Hitler’s, and many others. We may not be proud of our current leaders, but I don’t think they represent the worst humanity has to offer, even if we are ashamed that they ascended to power on our watch.
Anonymous

People who voted for Obama, who are now surprised by his mimicry of Bush, never bothered to examine his voting record in the Senate.

CHOMSKY: “Bush and his cohorts addressed the world as “our lieutenants.” Thus in announcing the invasion of Iraq, they informed the UN that it could follow US orders, or be “irrelevant.” Such brazen arrogance naturally aroused hostility. Obama adopts a different course. He politely greets the leaders and people of the world as “partners,” and only in private continues to treat them as “lieutenants.” Foreign leaders much prefer this stance, and the public too is sometimes mesmerized by it. But it is wise to attend to deeds, not rhetoric and pleasant demeanor. Deeds commonly tell a different story, in this case too. “
- failix
  
  Each time I see a recent Chomsky quote I’m reminded of how old he has gotten. He’s really starting to bore the crap out of me.
nutbastard

i hate to – no wait, i love it. i told you so.

obama is bush is clinton is bush. there’s no demonstrable difference that actually matters to any of us.
- Ito Kagehisa
  
  obama is bush is clinton is bush. there’s no demonstrable difference that actually matters to any of us.
  
  Oh, so not so, my illegitimate legume!
  
  I am reasonably happy with Obama’s performance as president. You see, I didn’t think he would stop the wars, stop the torture, stop the oppression of immigrants, fix the economy, or any of the other wonderful stuff he promised to do, so I’m not disappointed.
  
  However, I wanted a President that would be able to construct a grammatically correct sentence all by himself, and Obama has more than fulfilled my expectations in this regard. BIG difference from George Bush, and a difference that matters a great deal to me as a parent. When the Shrub was in office, I always felt stupid telling my children that they needed to learn to speak properly in order to succeed in life.
  
  I did not vote for Obama (despite strongly supporting him early in his campaign) because I saw the writing on the wall before the election, when he completely and shamelessly reneged on his promises regarding telco immunity and campaign financing. He’s just another Clinton-type pragmatist with ideals for sale.
  
  I did not vote for McCain, either, because he chose Palin as his running mate. That egregiously ignorant lunatic is worse than Joe RIAA/MPAA Biden!
  
  In both cases, seeing the major candidates’ behaviour post-election, I am very glad I voted for McKinney instead. I could have happily written in Ron Paul, Dennis Kucinich, or Howard Dean, but I decided to help the Green Party retain their ballot status by voting for their candidate (even though she had no chance of winning my state).
  
  Hopefully people moaning about BP and MMS will remember the Green Party next time around…
  - nutbastard
    
    ok, you got me – the jokes no longer write themselves. we were all getting a bit tired of old fish-in-a-barrel bush, and it’s nice to see comedians really having to work to earn their money again.
    
    with bush sr, we had the barf jokes, and the lip reading jokes.
    
    with clinton, we had blowjob jokes.
    
    with bush jr we had fucking carte blanche with everything he said, did, or breathed on.
    
    with obama…? my favorite so far is “obama is just like clinton – only slightly less black.” but race jokes aren’t really all that funny or scything, since the man was, you know, born that way (on the other hand, no one had any problem making jokes regarding the possibly-legally-retarded W, who was presumably didn’t have a choice in the matter)
    
    my whole beef: ever since 9/11, our country has increasingly resembled those of the islamic fundamentalists so im not sure what kind of tally the O man is using to keep score, but according to the rules, the terrorists are sort of winning.
  - middleclass
    
    Please don’t insult nuts by calling them legumes. They are fruits of an entirely different nature.
    - Ito Kagehisa
      
      What of Arachis hypogaea, the noble pea-nut, then?
      - middleclass
        
        Merely an inaptly named legume. The alternative “goober peas” is more appropriate for a member of the Fabaceae family, and it’s fun for the kids.
  - Notary Sojac
    
    “I wanted a President that would be able to construct a grammatically correct sentence”…………”I am very glad I voted for McKinney”
    
    Now THAT is an interesting disconnect.
    - Ito Kagehisa
      
      I knew McKinney couldn’t win; she was not on enough states’ ballots. I voted for her because I want the Green Party to continue to be viable enough to remain on the ballot in my state.
      
      It was clear to me well before the election that Obama would win my tiny state, so I chose to take a longer view.