“Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”
– Benjamin Franklin
The Obama Administration is Afraid of You
Snowden: “In the end the Obama administration is not afraid of whistleblowers like me, Bradley Manning or Thomas Drake. We are stateless, imprisoned, or powerless. No, the Obama administration is afraid of you. It is afraid of an informed, angry public demanding the constitutional government it was promised — and it should be.”
Read the Full Statement at Wikileaks: Statement from Edward Snowden in Moscow.
I Am Bradley Manning
If you saw incredible things – awful things – what would you do?
Is truth the enemy?
Learn more at IAM.BRADLEYMANNING.ORG.
Is This Just?
Those of us who are comfortable – and by that, I mean we who live in a decent home, have enough to eat, have access to medical care when we need it, who can offer a good education to our children, who are kept relatively safe and have a sense of stability and continuity in our lives – are able to enjoy our comforts only because of a system that subjects millions of other people in our country and around the globe to violence, illness, poverty, hunger, insecurity and despair each and every day.
To acknowledge this is the beginning.
Glenn Greenwald on the NSA Story
Glenn Greenwald appeared on Morning Joe to discuss recent revelations concerning the NSA’s surveillance programs. I would urge you to watch the first 17 minutes.
You can see the full interview with Edward Snowden on the Guardian Website.
Don’t Surrender! A Report From Turkey
Turkish Journalist Ece Temelkuran writes at New Statesman.
My friend, who was completely uninterested in politics until six days ago, had never been in conflict with the police before. Now, like hundreds of thousands of others in Turkey, she has become a warrior with goggles around her neck, an oxygen mask on her face and an anti-acid solution bottle in her hand. It is like a civil war between the police and the people. Yet nobody expected this when, six days ago, a group of protesters organised a sit-in at Istanbuls Gezi Park to protect trees that were to be cut down for the governments urban redevelopment project.
In Taksim Square, on the building of Atatürk Cultural Center, some people are hanging a huge banner. There are only two words on it: “Don’t surrender!”
READ MORE: People have killed their fear of authority – and the protests are growing.
We Remember
As always as we observe Memorial Day I especially remember Wallace Malcolm Hirstein, who served with great valor and courage in World War II.
Benghazi: The Real Scandal
Last week, I posted an update on Facebook noting that Congressional critics and the news media are fundamentally asking the wrong questions about Benghazi. Though it is obvious that the GOP’s focus on the “scandal” represents the worst sort of partisan opportunism – there is, I believe, another story here. It’s not a story about security at the compound, or the military response to the attacks, or what may have been said on television afterward. It’s a story about our government’s complicity to (and culpability for) the attacks themselves.
There is an excellent essay out today from Bill Van Auken that unpacks the situation in great detail.
In its intervention in Libya, Washington utilized Al Qaeda-linked fighters as a proxy ground force in the war to topple the secular regime of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, arming and advising them and using them to follow up the massive US-NATO bombing campaign. Christopher Stevens was very much the point man in this relationship, having carefully studied the Islamist opponents of Gaddafi before the launching of the war for regime-change. He was deployed in April 2011 to Benghazi, where he coordinated the arming, funding and training of the so-called rebels, elements previously denounced by the US as terrorists and, in some cases, abducted, imprisoned and tortured by the CIA.
So all of the reported “confusion” within the State Department and the Intelligence Community in the wake of the attacks is complete and utter nonsense, as is the portrayal of their interactions as simple bureaucratic interagency bickering. They knew from the very beginning what had happened – that their own assets were involved. The purpose of all the frantic scrambling and deception after the fact was to conceal our government’s relationships with their supposed Al-Qaeda terrorist enemies. There is simply no other way it all makes sense.
The circus sideshow being orchestrated by the GOP is not merely cynical political maneuvering. It misses the point. It helps to conceal from public view the true nature of the events at Benghazi, and ensures that there will be no discussion of the more serious and important issues involved.
READ MORE: Benghazi and the deepening crisis of the Obama administration – WSWS.
this looks like a nice area
it sounded more like a compliment
than an inquiry
i felt uneasy
no gangs? he asked
and i’m thinking
no, not really – are you joking?
and then i’m imagining menacing groups of teenage boys in do-rags
galloping
through the streets of
the gracefield subdivision
i tell him
no, not really, but of course they’re kind of everywhere
i’m trying to say that we’re all the same
and that nobody is really secure
and that
well, also, gangsters are just people
i mean, if they were around here
i wouldn’t be
uh, terrified, or anything
i drive through some pretty
rough neighborhoods
every day
hey – it may look like we’re doing well
but i’m not like the rest of these people
it’s just good luck at the moment
and it could change
i wonder where he lives
and what it’s like there
but i don’t ask
why
am
i
ashamed?
at his own hands
you people
i don’t know what to say to you
you expect some sort of
explanation
or
justification
or insight concerning my state
of mind
at the time
you can talk all you want
about cries for help
or
brain chemistry or
family history
and some things being overdetermined
but i swear
to christ
some days i am just
disgusted with you
disgusted with myself
disgusted
with this world…
ps:
but, honestly
mostly with you