Trevor Timm at Freedom of the Press Foundation: "In the wake of the government's secret legal rationale for the targeted killing of American citizens leaking to the press, President Obama has now twice vowed to bring more transparency to national security issues, and in particular, drone strikes. Yet since his two statements, his administration has instead moved to prevent more information from reaching Congress, the courts, and the public."

  • http://www.askbryan.com/ Bryan Davis

    Hey, where’s the tweet this/share this button?

    • http://twitter.com/LeeroyBerlin Leeroy Berlin

      What part of SECRECY was unclear?

  • saint_al

    Obama = G. W. Bush lite.
    /both major parties can suck it
    //Libertarians are Ayn Rand worshipers, not much more

    • http://twitter.com/LeeroyBerlin Leeroy Berlin

      Some of us are more like anarcho-syndicalists, thank you very much.

    • class_enemy

      Only those who did not vote for Obama the second time around are entitled to whinge.

      Anyone with three functioning brain cells could see by 2012 that he was Dubya Junior.

      There are always other choices.

      • Antinous / Moderator

        There are always other choices.

        And they’re noted for being racist, sexist, homophobic demagogues.

        • class_enemy

          Well yeah, I voted for Gary Johnson, who publicly endorsed gay marriage a year before the jug-eared phony did.

          Gary too bigoted for ya?  Jill Stein was on my ballot too.  She was not my first choice, but I sure as heck would have voted for her over either of the Wall Street, surveillance state candidates.

          If Jill’s too “racist, sexist, homophobic”, you maybe wrote in yourself for president?? Hard to go wrong there I guess.

          • Antinous / Moderator

            In other words, you threw your vote away on candidates that didn’t have a chance. That worked really well in 2000. In fact, that’s what got us into Iraq and Afghanistan in the first place.

          • aikimoe

            So, putting aside that Jill Stein and Gary Johnson are most certainly not “noted for being racist, sexist, homophobic demagogues” (you forgot to mention that you were mistaken in asserting that), the idea that everyone who voted for Ralph Nader in 2000 “got us into Iraq and Afghanistan in the first place” is highly questionable.

            Certainly the people who were not in swing states who voted for Nader had nothing to do with the actions of the Bush administration.  And it can reasonably be argued that even the folks in Florida who voted for Nader are less responsible for invading Iraq and Afghanistan (not to mention the Patriot Act) than all the leading Democrats who supported those actions.

            Finally, the idea that voting one’s conscience is “throwing your vote away” is statistically questionable and philosophically shallow.

          • class_enemy

            In other words, you put party in front of principle.

            I don’t criticize anyone who voted for Obama in 2008.  There was at least reason to hope he would end some wars, prosecute some bankers, and stop some civil liberties violations.

            By 2012, it was incontrovertibly crystal fucking clear that -none- of those things were ever going to happen.

          • Antinous / Moderator

            In other words, you put party in front of principle.

            I’m not a Democrat. I’ve consistently criticized Obama, since before his first election. The alternatives are vastly worse for those of us who don’t enjoy the triple crown of privilege of being white, male and heterosexual.

          • Diogenes

             ”…threw your vote away…”

            But you didn’t throw your vote away, right?

          • Antinous / Moderator

            I kept Mitt Romney out of the White House, so no, I didn’t throw my vote away. I used it in the best possible way.

          • Diogenes

            Thanks for the drones and the kill list.

          • donovan acree

            You are right Antinous. We should only vote for winners. After all, why would we vote for someone who shares our ideas and values unless they can also win?

            It’s that kind of thinking that got us in to this two party rut to begin with. If everyone continues to vote for their favorite side of the same coin, we will never see change. 

        • class_enemy

          What you appear to be saying is that the anonymous, mechanized killing of US citizens is something you decided (with your vote) to tolerate, because Obama’s other policies outweighed it.

          Fair enough as long as you are candid about that.

          • Antinous / Moderator

            There is no viable candidate who would be less violent than President Obama. And they would also fight vigorously against rights for women, LGBT people and non-white people. You keep pretending that voting for Roseanne is a viable strategy. It isn’t.

            Your dream candidates are never, ever, ever, ever, ever going to win. So you’ll end up putting a right-wing Republican in office, and you can feel smug and satisfied knowing that you appeased your conscience while those of us who live as second class citizens see our quest for human rights bulldozed.

            Your ideas are just selfishness masquerading as principle.

          • class_enemy

             What you just said amounts to:

            “Obama is doing enough good on the issues which are most important to me, that I’m willing to accept all the evil and corruption he engages in on the issues that are not so important to me”.

            Selfishness is as selfishness does, Antinous.

          • Antinous / Moderator

            You persistently base your arguments on the deceit that anyone who could possibly win an election would have been better on any of those other issues. It’s disingenuous. We would have had murder from the sky and a roll-back of rights for people who don’t enjoy your cocoon of privilege.

          • class_enemy

             Why don’t you try whingeing about the “cocoon of privilege” – a concept which you seem to think is a 100 percent guaranteed Acme Industries Argument Quasher – to people whose race, gender, and orientation, you, like, actually know?

          • Antinous / Moderator

            Fine. Are you a straight white man?

          • donovan acree

            You seem to think that the purpose of an election and our votes would be to elect a winner. Some of us think otherwise. Some of us think our vote is best used to express the direction and values we believe represent a better view of what we can do as a nation. We choose not to add the the tally of the masses but instead to express our individual choice.
            You seem to think that your vote is best applied to one of the pre-determined ‘winners’, and you call what we do throwing our vote away. I submit that it is you sir who is throwing their vote away.

          • Antinous / Moderator

            Once again, you skate on privilege. Do you belong to a demographic that doesn’t enjoy equal rights before the law?

          • class_enemy

            I’m always proud to say that I’m of 100% Cambodian origin.

            Except when I say it to pass some sort of creepy discussion-forum apartheid screening in which a moderator has determined that certain opinions are apparently only validly expressable by those with a particular DNA configuration.

            Then I feel a little bit scummy about it.

          • Antinous / Moderator

            Can you marry the person of your choice and have it federally recognized?

          • class_enemy

            Yes I can.

            And I voted for a candidate who was in favor of your being allowed to marry the person of your choice, too.

            So I concede not a millimeter of moral high ground to you on that point.

            All I’m asking you to do is say “I understand that Obama may interpret my vote for him as an endorsement of his military and civil liberties policies, even though I don’t agree with them.”

            You say that, and we have no argument with one another.

          • Antinous / Moderator

            I’ve criticized President Obama many times on that issue. And he reads comments at BB. The alternative was Mitt Romney. He would have been no better on military issues and much worse on social issues. When you have the same lack of legal equality as me, then we can talk as equals.

            As it stands, I’m a second class citizen. I reserve the right to consider that in my voting choices. You can continue your gormless strategy to put more right wing Republicans in government.

          • donovan acree

            “Once again, you skate on privilege. Do you belong to a demographic that doesn’t enjoy equal rights before the law?”
            That old trope of yours again Antinous? Do you filter the entire world through your social/race divisionist goggles or just BB?
            Here’s where I come from. My family comes from slaves. We were not welcome in public spaces. We had genocide committed on us. And we still suffer bigotry and hatred. 
            That does not change the fact that I believe in voting for who I think best reflects my views. Despite your noise and bluster to the contrary, you seem to support the establishment.
            Your vote ‘against’ the republicans was a wasted vote. The current democratic regime is the most conservative, right wing, secretive government we’ve had in a very long time. Clearly, that’s what you support.
            Your entire “skating on privilege” view is reductionist, dismissive, and is divisive sophistry of the worst kind.

          • Antinous / Moderator

            Your entire “skating on privilege” view is reductionist, dismissive, and is divisive sophistry of the worst kind.

            No, it’s reality. Do you have legal rights that I don’t have? Then you have privilege.

          • class_enemy

            Sounds as if you are hoping that Obama will stand tall on the LGBT issues.

            Just like he did on Gitmo, bank fraudsters and the “Patriot” Act.

            Who knows????  It may work out for you.

            One thing’s for sure.  He got your vote.  Second time round – he won’t need to ask for that again.

          • Antinous / Moderator

            Sounds as if you are hoping that Obama will stand tall on the LGBT issues.

            He’s already done more than all previous presidents put together on that score. Which was completely unexpected. I thought that he’d be reticent on those issues and maybe get us out of the bombing wedding parties industry. At least he did something meaningful. Romney would have plowed us under while fapping to Gitmo torture videos.

  • euansmith

    More drone transparency? What are they going to use? Wonder Woman’s Invisiplane?

  • http://www.facebook.com/postelwait Cameron Postelwait

    why not go full-transparency and just crowd-source drone control to the internet?  cats would probably be the only ones losing out on privacy.

  • class_enemy

    It’s really pretty straightforward, Xeni.

    We can either piss and moan about “drones” and “transparency” on a web forum or we can fork over five hundred large apiece to get some time to press our case with the People’s Friend in person.

    Take your choice, am I right??

    • Diogenes

       And he’ll listen real closely to your complaints in person.

  • msbpodcast

    What were you expecting? He’s as honest as the day is long, but the file clerk is a night owl…

  • Atomic Cow

     I voted for Jill Stein because she came closest to matching my beliefs.  We’re not 100% on the same page, but there wasn’t another candidate that came anywhere close.

    If you’re choosing your candidate using other criteria then you are part of the problem in my opinion.

  • Adam Smith

    it’s almost like he’s lying to us…