THIS JUST IN! OAKLAND'S GOT SPINE!

BULLY BOY PRESS & CEDRIC'S BIG MIX -- THE KOOL-AID TABLE

OH FOR THE DAY WHEN CELEBRITY IN CHIEF BARRY O MOVES OUT OF THE WHITE HOUSE.  THE MASS WORSHIP OF THE CORPORATIST WAR HAWK IS MORE THAN ENOUGH TO KILL ANY ENTHUSIASM FOR HIS REPUBLICAN-LITE DOMESTIC MEASURES AND FOREIGN POLICY KILL-KILL-KILL POSTURE.

IN CHICAGO, THEY'VE PUT UP A PLAQUE NOTING WHERE BARACK AND MICHELLE FIRST KISSED.  NEXT UP,  A GOLD SEAL FOR WHERE THE TWO FIRST DRY HUMPED.


IN OAKLAND WHERE THEY ARE A LITTLE SMARTER, SEVEN PEOPLE PROTESTED INSIDE BARRY O'S CAMPAIGN OFFICE.


WHY?  AS ONE PERSON POINTED OUT EARLIER THIS WEEK OF BRADLEY MANNING, POSSIBLE WHISTLE BLOWER HELD FOR OVER 800 DAYS:

Bradley can't be blamed on Bush.  The leak takes place when Barack's in the White House.  The arrest takes place when Barack's in the White House.  The imprisonment takes place when Barack's in the White House.  The person prosecuting Bradley -- hell, he's already pronounced Brad guilty -- is Barack Obama. 

 

You can be as stupid and ridiculous as Chase Madar.  You can sound as stupid as he does -- and he does sound stupid since his speaking voice sounds like that of the late Phil Hartman voicing Troy McClure (The Simpsons).  But unless you want to bed down and wallow in stupidity, lose the red herrings.  It's got nothing to do with the draft.  It has to do with people like Chase Madar who can't call out Barack.  Grown adults who are too willing to lie to themselves.  If it weren't for Barack, Brad would be free right now.  Barack has that power.  He won't use it.

 

There's one reason and only one reason that Bradley's behind bars right now: Barack Obama.

THE 7 PROTESTERS INCLUDING PEOPLE WEARING IRAQ VETERANS AGAINST THE WAR  T-SHIRTS:

The protesters said in a statement that they are demanding that President Obama apologize for statements they said he made regarding Manning's guilt, that the president ensures soldiers are free from pre-trial punishment, alleging that Manning was held in long periods of isolation, and that Manning be pardoned.





FROM THE TCI WIRE:

 

 

We're dropping back to November 28, 2010 for a moment from the KPFA Evening News:

Anthony Fest: The whistle blower website WikiLeaks released another trove of confidential documents today. Last month WikiLeaks released thousands of Pentagon documents most associated with the US occupation of Iraq. In contrast, the documents made public today include thousands of diplomatic cables -- communications between the State Dept and Washington and US consulates all around the world. The documents cover both the George W. Bush and the Barack Obama administrations. WikiLeaks gave an advance look at the documents to several media organizations including the New York Times and the British newspaper the Guardian. Those publications now have articles on their websites analyzing the documents. WikiLeaks says it will post the documents on its own website in the coming days although it has said its site was the target of a cyber attack today. The documents release is certain to provoke tension between the US and its allies. For example, some of the cables say that Saudi donors are the largest financiers of terror groups. Other cables detail the cover-up of US military activities. One of them records a meeting last January between US Gen David Petreaus and the president of Yemen about air attacks against rebels in Yemen. The president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, tells Petraeus, "We'll continue to say they are our bombs and not yours." According to the Guardian, the documents reveal that some Arab leaders had privately urged an air attack against Iran and that US officials had been instructed to spy on the United Nations' leadership. Among the other disclosures are deep fears in Washington and London about the security of Paksitan's nuclear weapons. Another document asserts massive corruption at high levels of the Afghanistan government saying the Afghan vice president traveled to the United Arab Emirates carrying $52 million in cash. Still other documents disparage the British military in Afghanistan.

 

 

In 2010, WikiLeaks was still doing major releases.  In fact, that was probably the high water mark for WikiLeaks.  Already,  Monday April 5, 2010, WikiLeaks had released US military video of a July 12, 2007 assault in Iraq. 12 people were killed in the assault including two Reuters journalists Namie Noor-Eldeen and Saeed Chmagh. Still in 2010,  June 7, 2010, the US military announced that they had arrested Bradley Manning and he stood accused of being the leaker of the video. And that was part of the change.  At that point, the head of WikiLeaks and the face of WikiLeaks to the media and the world, Julian Assange, was stating that they didn't know who the leaker was (that leaked the material to them).  Ever since, Julian Assange has lived on the defensive.

 

 

Today he's in the news cycle because Ecuador is offering him asylum. 

 

If the last four years have taught those of us on the left anything, it should have taught us that there is no excuse or justification to whore for one person, that we either stand up for what we believe in and do so truthfully or we're liars in the eyes of the whole country.

 

I like Michael Ratner but his Julian Assange commentary has been less than honest for some time.  Today Assange was the topic of a segment on the lousy show Democracy Now! and Michael Ratner fell to the program's low level.

 

Ecuador has granted asylum to Julian Assange which is pretty much conditional
 upon his getting out of England or else hoping to live in the Ecuador Embassy in the UK.  Michael Ratner wants to assert that Ecuador is "doing what was legally required here."  That is incorrect.  That is a falsehood.  As someone who has repeatedly advocated for Canada to grant asylum to US war resisters, I have never argued that Canada had to do so or that they were legally required to.  Because they weren't.  No country is required to grant someone asylum.  That is why cases for asylum are argued.

 

There are enough lies out there with regards to the Julian Assange case.  More do not need to be put out there. It is also dishonest for Michael to assert claims to legal rights of asylum when stating that the UK needs to back off.  Julian Assange was released on bail.  He is in violation of British law currently. 

 

You can assert that B means we follow the law while ignore the earlier event (A).  But when you assert that, you look like you are eithter uninformed or dishonest to anyone who knows the actual details.  In addition, you make others look foolish for believing you.  Kimberly Wilder (On The Wilder Side) is an intelligent and caring person.  And she believed she could trust that 'trusted voices' were telling the truth.  She has outraged several who have e-mailed this site about her comments regarding the accusations against Julian Assange in Sweden.  Her pithy claim that they wouldn't even be crimes in the US is embarrassing.  It appears that the Grand Idiot Naomi Wolf has influenced Wilder's take (either through reading or hearing Wolf or hearing others repeat Wofl's arguments).  Here's a tip for every woman in the US, when it comes to rape don't trust Naomi.  This is the woman who stayed silent following a gang rape -- excuse me, that's wrong.  This is a woman who stayed silent in terms of going to the authorities but who laughed with the rapists the night after a gang rape -- laughed about the victim, laughed about the victim's shoe left behind in the frat house as she escaped following her gang rape.  Why did Naomi laugh?  She didn't want to be called a lesbian.

 

Nothing could hurt the cock-driven (cock-starved?) Naomi Wolf more than to be called a lesbian.  Why didn't she call the authorities?  On that she's remained silent.  But when a professor apparently made a pass at her in the midst of a private evening (he denied it, she said it happened), she wanted the whole world to know about it, over a decade later.  (Did it happen? I have no idea.  But after you've mocked a victim of gang rape with her rapists and then been stupid enough to share that story, don't expect sympathy from me.)  Ava and I have repeatedly warned against that nutcase over the years (in terms of the nutcase and Assange, see "TV: Saboteurs"). 

 

The harm she's done on the Assange case will not go away.  That's why you don't lie.  Someone's going to believe you're on 'our side.'  When it comes to rape, however, 'our side' gets a hell of a lot smaller and any woman capable of self-honesty will admit that.  When it comes to the environment, the left is one big happy family, hugging trees and replanting forests.  When it comes to issues of violence against women, the left willing to call it out is about a quarter of what it was for the environment.

 

Michael at least says "my view" at one of his most ludicrous moments.  But he's an attorney and he should know better so the "my view" is nonsense.  He asserts that Julian "has a right to leave that embassy, get on a plane and go to Ecuador.  Will the British ever honor that . . ."? 

 

The British  right to arrest him -- he is a fugitive -- trumps the right of Ecuador.  They are on British soil.  It is not complicated and Michael knows that.  As does Julian Assange which is why Assange isn't strolling through London to an airport right now.

 

The dishonesty is so disappointing because we don't need more of it on the left.  If you want to make a case for Julian Assange going to Ecuador, you should be able to do so without resorting to falsehoods.  When Michael Ratner, an intelligent and usually thoughtful person, presents the sloppy throw-everything-at-the-wall-and-hope-something-sticks faux legal argument that he has, anyone paying attention is going to wonder: "If Michael Ratner can't make a plausible legal case, does that mean that there's not one?"

 

In fairness to Michael, he's not speaking as a legal analyst and shouldn't have been presented as such.  He's working for Assange.  A real public affairs program that operated under journalistic standards would have presented him with another guest who took a different opinion.  And the back-and-forth of such an exchange probably would have greatly sharpened Michael's own argument.

 

He makes assertions on aslyum that are puzzling at best.  He asserts that "once you've been given asylum, it's not like you can be then picked up by a country and sent into the hands of your persecutor.  Whether it's in the car, whether it's on the streets, wherever you are, it's illegal to do so."  There's no UK case law that backs that up.  If there's an international law that states that, I'm unfamiliar with it -- I am unfamiliar with it and many countries are also unfamiliar with it because this standard he's applying has not been the standard.  If you are wanted for murder and you claim you're a political target and Spain agrees to give you asylum, unless you are in Spain, the authorities have the right and will attempt to arrest you.  This is not a new development. 

 

Michael Ratner is incorrect when he says it's the law.  Asylum isn't a floating space in the midst of a game of tag-you're-it.  You're granted asylum at an embassy or in that host country.  By Michael's logic, Julian can remain in London, he can travel all over and, if anyone tries to arrest him, he just says, "Uh-uh, I've got asylum from Ecuador."  That's not how it works.

 

Michael asserts that, "It's illegal for them to stop Julian Assange trying to get to Ecuador."  In what world?  Does he not know any of the asylum cases during the lead up to WWII?  I cannot believe anyone would make such a claim.

 

We deserve better than that from Michael Ratner or from anyone.  What was broadcast today was a bunch of cheery, beat off material.  I believe the left has self-pleasured enough for the last four years.  Let's try reality and honesty instead.

 

We can discuss this again tomorrow but for now I am tired of people lying to make their political cases, I am tired of all the whoring.  I realize it's ingrained in some, certainly a number were more than willing to repeat as gospel whatever the party line was out of the mouth of Joseph Stalin.  It needs to stop.  Kimberly Wilder is a smart and caring person.  She's repeated a false claim because the left media whored.  They refused to tell the truth.  That needs to stop right now.  On the left we need to be smarter and more factual.  We're not helping anyone by dumbing ourselves down.  (And Bob Somerby tries to make that argument every day at The Daily Howler.  I wonder how many of us even listen?)

 

In addition, Michael sounded like the best little Joe Stalin groupie as he attacked the US and the UK and Sweden while praising Ecuador (CCR has also issued an embarrassing press release, Talk Radio News reports on it here).  Ecuador, despite their whoring, is not Mecca.  Click here for Human Rights Watch and here for Amnesty International.  Or go to Huffington Post to read about Ecuador's "Lesbian Torture Clinics."  (To be clear, the US can be criticized and I do so every day here.  That's not the issue.  The issue is presenting Ecuador as some wonderful savior when indigenous people, gays and lesbians and many, many more would beg to differ with your portrayal of their country.)

 

The left needs to grow the hell up, all of us.  And that includes losing the need to paint anyone who thinks as we do (or appears to) as marvelous, wonderful and 100% pure.  There is a growing number of people (possibly a small number but it's out there, we encounter them when we speak to college audiences especially) who feel Assange distracts from political prisoner Bradley Manning (I agree) and that Assange should turn himself in already because with his talk show and his this and his that he's become a joke (it's his decision to turn himself in or not, I have no opinon on that).  I would like that to be the end of it this week on Assange and hope that Monday, when the latest Law and Disorder Radio, rolls around -- which is hosted by  Heidi Boghosian, Michael S. Smith and, yes,  Michael Ratner -- that Michael will have sharpened his argument regarding to Julian Assange and we can open the snapshot with his explaining to us why the amnesty must take place.  He can, for example, present the same claims as the ethical (or "moral" -- but I refrain from the use of that term whenever possible) choice.  That's fine.  But don't claim something's the law when it's not.  We can't afford to be any more ill-informed or mis-informed in this country.  And we can't afford to lose someone as smart as Michael Ratner to the easy-bake punditry that has afflicted so many on the left.

 

 

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