whitehouse
May 29, 2009
The President announces his plans for securing America’s digital future. May 29, 2009.
Day: May 29, 2009
Life After Guantánamo: Lakhdar Boumediene Speaks by Andy Worthington
by Andy Worthington
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
www.andyworthington.co.uk
29 May 2009
So many of the stories relating to Guantánamo are bleak that I thought it was worth mentioning a recent interview with Lakhdar Boumediene, who was released from Guantánamo two weeks ago after seven years and four months of pointless and brutal imprisonment.
I first reported the story of Boumediene and his five compatriots — Algerians who had settled in Bosnia in the 1990s, and who were kidnapped by US agents in January 2002, in connection with a non-existent plot to bomb the US embassy in Sarajevo, and flown to Guantánamo — in my book The Guantánamo Files. I also covered the Supreme Court case which bore Boumediene’s name — and which allowed the Guantánamo prisoners to challenge the basis of their detention in the US courts — last June, and followed up by reporting on the six men’s habeas corpus review last November, which led to the judge ordering the release of five of the men, including Boumediene, because the government had failed to establish a case against them.
Blundering Into Bankruptcy by Ralph Nader
by Ralph Nader
The Nader Page
May 29, 2009
Dear President Obama and GM Chairman Henderson,
The hour is late. You seem bent on an orchestrated bankruptcy for General Motors on June 1, 2009. Before any irreversible moves are made– the GM/task force reorganization plan should be submitted to Congress for deliberative review and decision. There are several major concerns with a precipitous bankruptcy declaration that have emerged over the last several days.
First, the previously understood rationale for bankruptcy—namely obstinate bondholders–no longer applies. Recent developments indicate that GM and the auto task force have revised the proposed allocation of equity in a restructured GM, and reached agreement with at least the most prominent bondholders. Although a June 1 bond payment is due, it certainly seems that that payment could easily be wrapped into the new bondholder offer, as effectively will be the case if GM enters bankruptcy.
Britain: The Depth Of Corruption By John Pilger
By John Pilger
May 28, 2009 “Information Clearing House”
The theft of public money by members of parliament, including government ministers, has given Britons a rare glimpse inside the tent of power and privilege. It is rare because not one political reporter or commentator, those who fill tombstones of column inches and dominate broadcast journalism, revealed a shred of this scandal. It was left to a public relations man to sell the “leak”. Why?
The answer lies in a deeper corruption, which tales of tax evasion and phantom mortgages touch upon but also conceal. Since Margaret Thatcher, British parliamentary democracy has been progressively destroyed as the two main parties have converged into a single-ideology business state, each with almost identical social, economic and foreign policies. This “project” was completed by Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, inspired by the political monoculture of the United States. That so many Labour and Tory politicians are now revealed as personally crooked is no more than a metaphor for the anti-democratic system they have forged together.
Busted, Pentagon – Why The Photos Probably Do Show Detainees Sodomized and Raped By Naomi Wolf
By Naomi Wolf
ICH
May 29, 2009 “Huffington Post”
The Telegraph of London broke the news – because the US press is in a drugged stupor — that the photos Obama is refusing to release of detainee abuse depict, among other sexual tortures, an American soldier raping a female detainee and a male translator raping a male prisoner. The paper claims the photos also show anal rape of prisoners with foreign objects such as wires and lightsticks. Major General Antonio Taguba calls the images `horrific’ and `indecent’ (but absurdly agrees that Obama should not release them – proving once again that the definition of hypocrisy is the assertion that the truth is in poor taste).
Predictably, a few hours later the Pentagon issues a formal denial.
Who will Stand Up To America and Israel? by Paul Craig Roberts
by Paul Craig Roberts
Global Research, May 29, 2009
vdare.com
“No countries on earth rival the US and Israel for barbaric murderous violence”
“Obama Calls on World to ‘Stand Up To’ North Korea” read the headline. The United States, Obama said, was determined to protect “the peace and security of the world.”
Shades of doublespeak, doublethink, 1984.
North Korea is a small place. China alone could snuff it out in a few minutes. Yet, the president of the US thinks that nothing less than the entire world is a match for North Korea.
We are witnessing the Washington gangsters construct yet another threat like Slobodan Milosevic, Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, John Walker Lindh, Hamdi, Padilla, Sami Al-Arian, Hamas, Mahkmoud Ahmadinejad, and the hapless detainees demonized by the US Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld as “the 700 most dangerous terrorists on the face of the earth,” who were tortured for six years at Gitmo only to be quietly released. Just another mistake, sorry.
Do Americans Have a Moral Conscience? By Paul Craig Roberts
By Paul Craig Roberts
May 28, 2009 “Information Clearing House”
Torture is a violation of US and international law. Yet, president George W. Bush and vice president Dick Cheney, on the basis of legally incompetent memos prepared by Justice Department officials, gave the OK to interrogators to violate US and international law.
The new Obama administration shows no inclination to uphold the rule of law by prosecuting those who abused their offices and broke the law.
Cheney claims, absurdly, that torture was necessary in order to save American cities from nuclear weapons in the hands of terrorists. Many Americans have bought the argument that torture is morally justified in order to make terrorists reveal where ticking nuclear bombs are before they explode.
However, there were no hidden ticking nuclear bombs. Hypothetical scenarios were used to justify torture for other purposes.
Dr. Ron Paul: Torturing the Rule of Law
By Paul Craig Roberts
May 26, 2009 “Information Clearing House“
While Congress is sidetracked by who said what to whom and when, our nation finds itself at a crossroads on the issue of torture. We are at a point where we must decide if torture is something that is now going to be considered justifiable and reasonable under certain circumstances, or is America better than that?
Vodpod videos no longer available.
more about “Dr. Ron Paul: Torturing the Rule of Law“, posted with vodpod
“Enhanced interrogation” as some prefer to call it, has been used throughout history, usually by despotic governments, to cruelly punish or to extract politically useful statements from prisoners. Governments that do these things invariably bring shame on themselves.
Countdown: Jesse Ventura Interview
VOTERSTHINKdotORG
May 28, 2009
May 28, 2009 MSNBC Keith Olbermann
Vodpod videos no longer available.
more about “Countdown: Jesse Venture Interview“, posted with vodpod
see
Jesse Ventura: The 9/11 Commission Didn’t Investigate NOTHING!
Jesse Ventura: You Give Me a Water Board, Dick Cheney and One Hour + Cheney hedges on memos
Abu Ghraib Abuse Photos ‘Show Rape’ + Was Rape an Enhanced Interrogation Technique?
Torture? What Torture? We Need More Torture! By Gary Corseri
Former Interrogator Rebukes Cheney for Torture Speech
Tortured Logic, Why ‘It Doesn’t Work’ Doesn’t Work by Steven Jonas, MD, MPH
Guantánamo And The Many Failures Of US Politicians by Andy Worthington
Pepe Escobar: “Mr. Obama, do we have your attention?”
North Korea wants to be respected by the US as a nuclear power
President Obama Meets with President Abbas of Palestinian Authority + Hamas’s exclusion from Middle East peace talks
whitehouse
May 28, 2009
May 28, 2009
President Obama and President Mahmoud Abbas speak with reporters after their meetings together on May 28, 2009.
(public domain)
Vodpod videos no longer available.
more about “President Obama Meets with President …“, posted with vodpod
***
Meeting with Abbas
The White House
The White House – Blog Post
Thursday, May 28th, 2009 at 7:25 pm
This afternoon the President held a one-on-one meeting, and then an expanded meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, read the President’s opening remarks when they spoke to the press together afterwards:
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Hello, everybody. Well, it is a great pleasure to welcome President Abbas to the Oval Office. We had — we just completed an extensive conversation, both privately as well as with our delegations, about how we can advance peace in the Middle East and how we can reaffirm some core principles that I think can result in Palestinians and Israelis living side by side in peace and security.
As I’ve said before, I’ve been a strong believer in a two-state solution that would provide the Israelis and Palestinians the peace and security that they need. I am very appreciative that President Abbas shares that view. And when Prime Minister Netanyahu was here last week I reiterated to him that the framework that’s been provided by the road map is one that can advance the interests of Israel, can advance the interests of the Palestinian people, and can also advance the interests of the United States.
Dandelion Salad 