||
NMM to Hazel Dickens
I will always remember 2008, and the rancor shown toward Appalachia because they supported Clinton over Obama. Sad we are in an age where such folk are hated by the intellectual urban left. Wasn't always so.
|>
the classified documents, which were obtained by the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks last year but provided to The Times by another source.
The NYT article is extremely squirrelly.
The Guardian, less so.
One man was transferred to the facility "because he was a mullah, who led prayers at Manu mosque in Kandahar province, Afghanistan ... which placed him in a position to have special knowledge of the Taliban". US authorities eventually released him after more than a year's captivity, deciding he had no intelligence value.
Another prisoner was shipped to the base "because of his general knowledge of activities in the areas of Khowst and Kabul based as a result of his frequent travels through the region as a taxi driver".
The files also reveal that an al-Jazeera journalist was held at Guantánamo for six years, partly in order to be interrogated about the Arabic news network.
His dossier states that one of the reasons was "to provide information on ... the al-Jazeera news network's training programme, telecommunications equipment, and newsgathering operations in Chechnya, Kosovo and Afghanistan, including the network's acquisition of a video of UBL [Osama bin Laden] and a subsequent interview with UBL".
re: 3
Some of this stuff is just gob-smacking.
Greenwald: The NYT describes the case of Omar Hamzayavich Abdulayev - placed in Guantanamo in 2002 when he was 23 (he's now 32) and one of the detainees just ordered indefinitely detained by Obama. The newly released files reveal what the NYT calls "the haunting conclusion of his 2008 assessment: 'Detainee's identity remains uncertain'." In other words, the person who has been in Guantanamo for 9 years - most of his adult life - and whom Obama just ordered detained indefinitely with no charges, very well may not even be the person we think he is.
The Times article was just awful, in terms of communicating anything.
The thing that kills me about this is the hysterical "OMG, what if we accidentally let an actual terrorist go." Even those of the detainees who actually were part of Al Qaeda aren't supervillains -- if we let them go, now or back five years ago, odds are it wouldn't change anything much.
the detainees who actually were part of Al Qaeda aren't supervillains
Or so they would have you believe!
6: Other than, "Our not having sorted out the responsibilities of the free press versus being part of the apparatus of state, let us show it to you."
I wasn't all that clear about what I was actually reacting to -- it was the Times' leading with the Mohammed Alam Shah/Abdullah Mesud story, as proof that we let some people go who were really really dangerous, so we have an excuse for keeping anyone who makes us nervous locked up forever.
And I'm sure that's happened -- Shah sounds as if he was a terrorist, assuming the facts presented are accurate (obviously, not safe). But that doesn't mean that our letting, e.g., Shah go meant that significantly more violence occurred than would have if he'd been detained, and it still doesn't justify our detaining people we don't have good evidence to think are guilty of anything.
Well, I tried to change into dry princess panties but that was the last clean pair, so you know what that means! Princess Pauly is goin' commando! Free to be you and me, tiny generals!
HA HA! Some people call their genitals privates, but I called my privates generals! GET IT?!?!? HA HA HA HA!!! Now that's what I call a promotion!
Nobody better try to look at my butt.
9 is how I read it also. Only semi-appalling, but you got the sense they were working toward being fully appalling.
10: The whole way this is played brings back memories of the Willie Horton ad stuff; these type of decisions are now all based on the potential for your opponents to use it for political advantage against you rather than any rational analysis.
I've been looking since yesterday morning, and I still haven't found a single darn Easter egg. NOT FAIR!
I'm beginning to think that the best hope for something other than permanent detention is improvements in living conditions followed by release after the 2016 elections or 2012 elections if Obama loses.
or 2012 elections if Obama loses.
You think there's a chance Obama will lose to someone less bad?
16:You must not have caught my link to Ian Welsh on why Obama is the worst option in 2012, worse than any Republican
And yes, if a Republican gets in in 2012, that'll be awful. Just awful. But it's not like a Republican is never going to be president ever again. That's not on the agenda, that's not possible. It will happen, and he will substantially cater to the Teabaggers. He will trash your country. That's baked into the cake now, all you can choose is how soon it happens, and work to replace him with someone who might do the right thing.Remember, the question is not "if" this will happen, it is when. The sooner you get it over with, the sooner you have another chance to get it right, and the less decline the US will have suffered. If President Teabag gets in after 4 years of Obama, the US will be in better shape at the start of his wrecking than it will be if he gets in after 8 years of Obama. Obama is a disaster, who is making things worse, not better. He's just making it worse more slowly than a Republican.
I love reading Welsh, but he's wrong.
You know I love all of you guys like brothers (and sisters!) but, really, Apo is my hero. I get a tingle up my leg every time he leaves a comment.
16,17: It looks to me like Welsh is making an argument that in the long-run it will be better if Obama loses to a Republican in 2012, not arguing that the Republican elected in 2012 will be less bad than Obama as President. Maybe it would be more accurate to say that Welsh thinks we would have some small hope that a genuine progressive could be elected in 2016 if Obama loses in 2012, while he sees no hope of this at all if Obama wins.
20:nuances
a) Welsh's 1st preference is of course that Obama lose in the primary to a more progressive Democrat, but that is not in the cards
b) Obama is very very bad, both on policy and politics. For instance, facing the Republican boogeyman, it is very very hard for the left to organize now, or the remainder of Obama's term(s), in opposition to Obama or "centrist" policies
c) So the country and the party will be in a much weaker condition after 4 more years of Obama than even under 4 years of Romney. I have mentioned before the utterly demoralizing and dispiriting effects of Obama on liberalism.
|?
h/t Ezra
New Yorker profile of Paul Krugman, entitled "What's Left of the Left"
|>
21 )a -- agreed
b) agree mostly
c) not sure I agree at all -- I suspect if Obama loses in 2012, the lesson learned by the dems will be that next time we better nominate a white person with an "American" name.
But all of this is beside the point of my disagreement with the last part of togolosh's 15. I just can't see anybody at all likely to be elected in 2012 releasing the Guantanamo detainees.
we better nominate a white person with an "American" name.
If nominated, I will not run (very effectively). If elected, I will not serve (anyone but myself).
Obama is very very bad, both on policy and politics.
This is true of every Democratic president of the past four decades. And yet still completely better than the Republicans over the same period. If Obama is defeated in 2012, the next Democratic president won't be a more progressive version of Russ Feingold. It will be a more conservative version of Evan Bayh.
21b: it is very very hard for the left to organize now
Well, maybe if you are talking about the residue of the Great Society left, but it's been pretty hard for that lot to organize a piss-up in a brewery for some time now.
My left is actually doing pretty well. Starbucks Workers Union, Jimmy Johns Workers Union, hundreds of new DIY projects, more people interested in fighting back than there have been in my lifetime. And all that without either an MLK-esque figure at the head, or the threat of a draft hanging over the heads of several million young men. Sunday marks 125 years since the beginning of the Haymarket Affair. We haven't seen the end of it yet!
28: While I can't for a second imagine the policies they'd agree on, surely Al Franken would choose Ben Stein as his VP candidate, just for the hilarious bumper sticker.
30: Slogan: "It's Alive!!!"
Maybe "Reanimate America" would be better.
He could go with Kentucky State Senator Kathy Stein instead.
North Carolina State Senator Josh Stein? Not that I know anything about him.
Eh, he sounds pretty blue dog to me. Dana Stein of MD or Kathy sound way better.
God, I have no sense of humor at all. People, Obama is our best option right now. I entirely disagree with Welsh, quoted upthread (at 17), that the political climate will be better for .. what? ... a progressive agenda? if we subject ourselves to the Teaparty flavor now, in 2012. What is this, some kind of self-flagellation routine?
That is just stupid. If nothing else, the Tea Party will have played itself out by 2016; and the damage it would do in 2012 is far too great.
Gawd.
Just like the eight years of Bush discredited Republicans for a generation, amiright?
If nothing else, the Know Nothings Sons of the Confederacy John Birch Society Moral Majority Christian Coalition militia movement Tea Party will have played itself out by 2016
They'll probably have moved to a new branding strategy by then, but they're always with us.
39: Don't try that near the highway in the winter. It is more "salt of the department of public works" and it tastes like diesel.
The New International Version of the Bible is hereby shown to be terrible beyond measure: "But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again?"
38: Sir, I guess you're right, I suppose. Hrmph. But the question was whether we should give up to them now, and I don't think so.
You don't think the Tea Party is something new(ish) and different?
No, not new and different. I mean, the faces and costumes change because old people die and young people become adults but it's more or less the same demographic over the decades. And there's no giving up to them ever.
38: If nothing else, the Know Nothings Sons of the Confederacy John Birch Society Moral Majority Christian Coalition militia movement Tea Party will have played itself out by 2016
WHAT ARE WE, CHOPPED LIVER?
Further to Apo's point: the current Koch brothers dad - the dude who patented his refining techniques, started the company, helped the bolsheviks install all their stuff (for some...reason?) before becoming a radical right wing crazy man - actually founded the John Birch Society!
for some...reason?
Money.
Or as Vlad Ilyason said:
"The Capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang them"
47: actually founded the John Birch Society!
Actually that would be Robert W. Welch, Jr. (candy dude - Sugar Daddies, Sugar Babies and Junior Mints ). Koch was one of the 12 "founding members" at the initial meeting.
45: I mean, the faces and costumes change because old people die and young people become adults but it's more or less the same demographic over the decades.
Imagine an old white person's foot in a variety of different footwear stomping on the ground in a fit of pique--forever.