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Dissent in the Age of Obama
“The welfare of the people in particular has always been the alibi of tyrants, and it provides the further advantage of giving the servants of tyranny a good conscience.” - Albert Camus
Recently, the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) raided the homes of at least eight anti-war/social justice activists here in the US.
I happen to be a prominent anti-war activist myself, and have joked that I am a “little hurt” that I was not raided and perhaps I should try harder. Even though, we have the urge to try and be light-hearted in this time of an increasing police state, with civil liberties on the retreat, it really isn't funny considering that the activists could face some serious charges stemming from these raids.
I have felt this harassment on a smaller scale myself and I know that defending oneself against a police state that has unlimited resources, time and cruelty, can be quite expensive, time consuming and annoying.
There is nothing noble about an agency that has reduced itself to
being jackbooted enforcers of a neo-fascist police state, no matter how
much the FBI has been romanticised in movies, television and books.
For
example, in one instance, early in the morning of September 24, at the
home of Mick Kelly of Minneapolis, the door was battered in and flung
across the room when his partner audaciously asked to see the FBI’s
warrant through the door’s peephole. At Jessica Sundin’s home, she
walked downstairs to find seven agents ransacking her home while her
partner and child looked on in shock.
These raids have terrifying implications for dissent here in the US.
First of all, these US citizens have been long-time and devoted
anti-war activists who organised an anti-war rally that was violently
suppressed by the US police state in Minneapolis-St. Paul, during the
2008 Republican National Convention. Because the Minneapolis activists
have integrity, they had already announced that they would do the same
if the Democrats hold their convention there in 2012.
I have
observed that it was one thing to be anti-Bush, but to be anti-war in
the age of Obama is not to be tolerated by many people. If you will also
notice, the only people who seem to know about the raids are those of
us already in the movement. There has been no huge outcry over this
fresh outrage, either by the so-called movement or the corporate media.
I submit that if George Bush were still president, or if this
happened under a McCain/Palin regime, there would be tens of thousands
of people in the streets to protest. This is one of the reasons an
escalation in police state oppression is so much more dangerous under
Obama - even now, he gets a free pass from the very same people who
should be adamantly opposed to such policies.
Secondly, I
believe because the raids happened to basically ‘unsung’ and unknown,
but very active workers in the movement, that the coordinated, early
morning home invasions were designed to intimidate and frighten those of
us who are still doing the work. The Obama regime would like nothing
better than for us to shut up or go underground and to quit embarrassing
it by pointing out its abject failures and highlighting its obvious
crimes.
Just look at how the Democrats are demonising activists who are
trying to point out the inconvenient truth that the country (under a
near Democratic tyranny) is sliding further into economic collapse,
environmental decay and perpetual war for enormous profit.
Barack and Joe, the commandantes
of this police state, say that those who have the temerity to be
critical are “asleep” and just need to “buck up". White House
spokesperson, Robert Gibbs, recently stated that we on the “professional
left” need to be “drug tested” if we are not addicted to the regimes’
own drug: the Hopium of the Obama propaganda response team.
It
seems like, even though some of those that have been nailed to the cross
of national security do activism around South America, most of the
activism is anti-war and pro-Palestinian rights. Being supportive of any
Arab or Muslim, no matter how benign or courageous is a very dangerous
activity here in post-9/11 America.
The Supreme Court just
decided (Wilner v. National Security Agency) that the National Security
Agency (NSA) did not have to disclose if it was using warrantless
wiretapping to spy on attorneys representing the extra-legal detention
of prisoners in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Obtaining warrants, with cause,
and attorney-client privilege were important principles of the US
justice system, but even the neo-fascist Supreme Court is undermining
the law - talk about “activist” judges!
Not only have activists
been targeted here in the States, but Obama has ominously declared
himself judge, jury and executioner of anyone that he deems a national
security “threat". These are the actions of a tyrant and another assault
against our rights and against the rule of law from a person who
promised “complete transparency” from his administration.
We
have learned that Obama’s first victim under his presidential execution
programme is Anwar al-Awlaki, a US-born Muslim who is now in Yemen.
Without showing proof of al-Awlaki’s so-called executionable offenses
and without a trial in a court of law, Obama has unloosed his hit squads
on Awlaki. Is there anyone out there reading this who does not believe,
or fear, that this programme could quickly descend into summary
executions within the borders of the US?
Al-Awlaki’s father has filed a motion in federal court to stay the execution of his son until he gets his constitutionally guaranteed rights to due process, but Obama’s justice department has refused to cooperate stating that to do so would ‘undermine’ that fabled, exploited and ephemeral ‘national security'.
When Obama behaves like Bush, only on steroids, he amply demonstrates why other people hate our country so much. Persons in other countries are not nearly as blind as Americans. They know that even though Obama went to Cairo to blather about building understanding between the US and the Muslim world, actions speak louder than words and Obama’s actions drip with carnage and pain.
Obviously, the suppression of dissent here in the US, while outrageous and inexcusable, has not reached the level of the McCarthy witch hunts of the 1950’s - yet.
The longer we Americans remain silent in the face of these injustices, the more they will continue to occur and escalate.
Make your voice heard!
Comments
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118 Comments so far
Show AllSheehan continues to shine and not cower from saying what must be said about Obama and the continuing crimes of this government, crimes which go unchallenged by many 'liberals' who we hear from far too often.
Amen!
Sheehan's courageous, wise, and lucid opinions are always welcome, especially in contrast to the usual tepid, refried liberal-moderate received wisdom endlessly recycled here and elsewhere.
I frankly amazed that CD ran this hear. I just read this via an Al Jazeera posting on my Facebook page, and I read it I could only think what raw truth. Thank you to Cindy Sheehan and Al Jazeera.
Anybody who didn't see this coming 18yrs ago during the Births of RICO and the anti-drug ledgislation,,, can pull your heads out of your asses now!
How many Obaminations do we need to get with the program, Waco, Ruby Ridge, but you didn't agree with them and the MSM said they was doing evil things,, Evil enough to require the burninh of children, bad enough nearly the entire familty had to be whiped out! In all these cases using US MILITARY wepons personal and equipment, Bill of Rights, indeed, This has been easing into the sheeples consious as routine FBI activities for years now!
How could you miss it... How could you miss it?
>^^<
It started before that. Philly police firebombed a house while the local media there showed it live, then framed a reporter for murder because he tried to put the incident in context . He's still in prison. Most people missed that too.
Exactly right! In Philadelphia, MOVE headquarters was bombed on May 13, 1985. 11 people were killed, 5 of whom were children, and 65 homes were destroyed. If I remember correctly, a C-4 plastic bomb was dropped from a helicopter on the house -- and the authorities knew the house and the neighborhood were inhabited.
For more information on the bombing, you can go to the following link:
www.democracynow.org/2010/5/13/25_years_ago_philadelphia_police_bombs
Does anyone still think that "it can't happen here?"
Kay, I grew up in Overbrook, a West Philly neighborhood adjacent to the Cobbs Creek neighborhood that was burned down in this fiasco.
I can still picture the video footage showing the C-4 satchel being dropped from the helicopter onto the roof of the so-called "fortified compound" aka row house reinforced with wood.
And hear the infamous order: "Let the 'bunker' burn!"
The smell of smoke lingered for days.
The MOVE members at the scene were prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, and I believe some are still doing hard time.
Naturally, afterwards a blue-ribbon panel confirmed that the city officials responsible for this murder and mayhem were more to be pitied than censured.
In 1985, I was still living in the Midwest, but I have never forgotten the incident, and it was very difficult for me to find out what had really happened -- living so far away, where the newspapers of record were quite conservative, The Omaha World Herald and the Lincoln Journal & Star, both in Nebraska.
This incident should go on the list that we were discussing the other day -- police/local, state and federal killing/murdering civilians within the boundaries of the U.S.
Thanks for your response and adding your personal perspective to the story. It's so disturbing to me!
Ok I forgot that one, Sorry I also missed George Washingtons cruel suppresion of the Whisky Rebellion,
Basicly the whole Federalist System, is and has been a ponzi scheme.
>^^<
Many, many people feel the momentum and the speed picking up for the 2 trains named d and r running almost neck and neck; I say almost because one is sneakier than the other, so in Nov. we will find out which is going to lead the charge over the cliff and that, I think, is the reason the people are so out of any thing that will detract from making enough for a roof and food for themselves and theirs. Tony
"a police state that has unlimited resources, time and cruelty"
The USan police state doesn't really have unlimited resources or time. When the people decide to break its back they will do so quickly and efficiently.
but the BIG question is:
DO the people WANT TO?
complaints from
"the people" ..comprising the LARGER segment that are needed for such changes:
Confronting in an UNCOMPROMISING way the "powers-that-be" that "the people" supposedly are variously finding reasons for the distress, and YET do so in their chaotic, parochial, self-serving ways, rather than in focusing on the COMMON CULPRITS already repeatedly defined by even INSIDERS such as General Smedley Butler, John Perkins, etc. etc. ...
mean LITTLE. they amount to a hill of beans..unless "the people" LIVE UP to the claim of being "THE PEOPLE who rule"
and ONLY if they "rule" towards the goals of JUSTICE and Truth...RATHER than their SELFISH parochialisms.
the europeans, in general, move as a MASS -- KNOWING and focusing on the "upper reaches"...even within their parochial differences...and they AIM their TARGET to the "upper reaches".
NOT SO - with the american "people". they aim it at EACH OTHER.
they aim it at a great , courageous mother Cindy Sheehan or an Iraq veteran become disillusioned, or a critic or a group speaking of the injustices....and everything that they each as individuals or as groups or movements represent as holding the MIRROR UP -- NOT JUST to the "upper reaches" BUT TO AMERICA itself as whole....
and treat these great , courageous individuals and true human beings, as somehow the CAUSE of the mistakes of the UPPER REACHES..or PART of the "unamerican way" because they DON"T represent the general IMPOTENCE and WILLING ignorance or cowardice of "the people"...rather than seeing them as the cassandras that they are..and taking to heart what the cassandras SAY :
THE TRUTH about the true nature of the United States of America in its Imperial ROT.
The last sentence says it all.And rotten it is.Too many Americans feel helpless,because they are losing their homes and hopes.Then there are the countless,who faithfully listen to the merchants of hate,fear,dissent and hellfire,those snake-oil merchants and their religious diatribe.The collusion between religion and politics is a symbiotic one.They need each other to survive.They are both parasites,who need mankind to feed on.I like Volteire`s view in this respect.He said:"The world will only be truly happy,when the last politician will be hanged with the guts of the last preacher".The thing,that scares me about Obama,he acted as a saviour to mankind and actually is worse than Bush.At least Bush you could indulge in that sweet revengeful feeling of hating the man intensely.Whereas Obama seems to be a wolf in sheepskin.But then,either you risk your own life,or that of the people,that elected you to office.There lies the difference between heroism and cowardice.A concerted effort of all the people to slay the corporate Hydra roaming around on Wallstreet,that is the only solution.Get out of other people`s countries and buy at a fair price the goods you like to acquire.America has stolen its way into prosperity,first by wholesale import of slaves and now by a neo-colonialist foreign policy,that is a total deviation of all Christian principles.Yes,rotten to the core and the core of this nation is the White House.What a shame to soil the legacy of the founding fathers this way.
Cerubus. Sorry but our founding fathers may have had good intentions, but they built this country on genocide and slavery. In the name of Christianity. Otherwise, great comment.
Whatever,, Most sheeple won't even bristle at the millions of criminal insurgents that flood this country, flaunting our laws on a moment to moment basis. Why would anyone care if their after americans who have broken no laws (except maybe the law of being unpopular?) Most of know full well the penalty for breaking those unwritten laws.
American sheeple really don't want freedom, everyone inside wants to be told what to do, what is right, what is wrong. isn't that right?
How else could this go on? Americans must like it.
>^^<
P.S oh yes Christianity, hide behind the big yet invisible god! Makes everything ok.
I'm sorry as well, sorry that you do not give more thought to your opinion. What our Founders created has led to an end to slavery and the genocide, if referring to the slaughter of the Native Americans, had not yet begun when this nation was created.
That the world was a much different place in 1775 is moot, that Jefferson tried to free his slaves while still serving in the Virginia Legislature is fact.The system that these men created was far,far ahead of its time. That it has been corrupted by another system, Capitalism, should not diminish that creation. That there is the potential to undo the bad leaving only the good is one reason why comments like yours are not at all helpful.
Blanket indictments without showing which path you think should be taken mark only an excuse for inaction and a shallow interpretation as well.
Beg to differ. The 'people' in my state, UT, are still buying the" My son is fighting for your freedoms" or that the wars are to keep us safe for the invisible bin laden. The people will not rise up quickly. They are blindly following along with the MIC's rape and murdering of the heathens. Even our TV dramas like the Unit , the NCISes and other shows are supporting the MIC's bullshit that we are fighting them over there so we don't have to fight them here.
The coup has happened and no one has noticed or cares. I do wish Cindy wouldn't lump ALl of in on giving Obama a free pass. Many of us are so disgusted with him and his worthless cabinet and even more worthless Congress. The Dems have let the thugs water down every important bill then hide behind the party of No to disguise the fact that both parties do not give a shit about we the people.right now I am watching NCIS LA and of course the are playing the Al Quada card.
This comment was in response to rtdurt. Sorry if I have you user name wrong.
"I have observed that it was one thing to be anti-Bush, but to be anti-war in the age of Obama is not to be tolerated by many people."
Is it REALLY a surprise that 3/4 of Demoks and their supporters in Follywood and elsewhere have chosen to co-opt leftist principles for classist/imperial ends? Seems rather complex that they would have so much in common with their so-called political opponents on the conservative side. Spectacular illusions, Follywood! Intricate!
Welcome back to CD, Cindy.
...by way of Al Jazeera.
Cindy's banning from CD under the Obama election purges is still in place. She cannot comment here unless she has set up another account under a different anonymous name.
Really? Cindy Sheehan was banned from commenting on this site? Whatever for?
For being critical of Obama perhaps? Of course many CD readers are (me too!).
God's they'd have banned most of us!
>^^<
The price of dissent has risen. Unless paid now, the costs will escalate.
Right on Stone, the longer we wait the higher the price we pay. Cindy, we have made our voices heard but few in power are listening. It is time to take to the streets, shut down business and take what lumps may come.
Frank Cash:
Thanks for the link.
I wonder though if there truly is a global elite acting in some sort of concert, .. would they not step gingerly to the brink of another world war?
Perhaps the leading thinkers are so in love with their theories with the global economic worlds numerous actors pulling in thousands of different directions to the desired invisible hand, ... a kind of laissez faire with the main outcome being the destruction of the global commons.
glendon wayne
Yes and the global elite are working on population control through vaccinations and pharmaceuticals. Search depopulation/rense. com and see what the Gates and the banks have in store for us.
That and the manipulation of opinion thru the fake, Global Warming Movement, and the wars that nobody really wants to stop, they eliminate a few thousand a month, and the lead-toys out of China, It all works down the line.
>^^<
Interesting paradox there, eh? The people who are trying to avoid confrontation, trying to find a pleasant and safe course, afraid of "getting too radical" are actually leading us into a more and more dangerous situation eventually. The more radical we get, and the sooner, the less pain and the less chance of violence. Yet the moderates attack the radicals for "advocating violence."
Cindy Sheehan is the most moral person in the u.s., and a real do-er like John Brown, but without the guns.
Everyone, except the capitalist war mongering whores, would do well by following her lead. I dream of her and people like her, real people, running the government. How telling is it that she lost the race against the "off the table" demo-corporate slime.
Thank you, Cindy Sheehan, for speaking clearly and truly! You have my undivided admiration, as always.
These raids are part an ongoing attack on the peace movement. Some more Food Not Bombs volunteers go on trial at the end of the month Minneapolis-St. Paul. Our three cook houses were raided the day before the RNC. Our bank account was frozen for seven months and website and internet closed down. Food Not Bombs has several volunteers in prison. One is doing 19 years. Visit supporteric.org We are just one of a number of peace groups under attack in the U.S. We should band together. We are working on a campaign to show how the government disrupts the peace movement through infiltration and the framing of activists. Our office never gets a seconds break from the dirty tricks. Last year they paid of our staff person and she disrupted the 30th anniversary tour and smeared me in the media. We have never recovered. I am broken down right now in Oklahoma City broke and not able to continue on this years tour. Any help would be fantastic. Visit www.foodnotbombs.net to donate or book a presentation. This is a great way to help the peace movement.
Thanks Keith McHenry
cofounder of Food Not Bombs
I am truly saddened to hear of this.
Probably the most effective direct strategy I have heard of.
I hope you are able to recover, and trust that the disorginaztion (for lack of a better word) that you help found recovers from this setback stronger than ever.
I am grateful for the courageous, those like Sheehan, who speak fearlessly. The disappointment of those of us who believed that there just might be change for the better when Obama was elected is so deep. Was I wide-eyed hopeful? Nope.
On Inauguration Day 2009 I was on a working trip to New Zealand. When people heard my American accent, they smiled, congratulated and hugged me, thrilled for what the change in administration might mean for our country. For the world. It was hard not to catch that enthusiasm... the good will pouring out of the hearts of people in every city I visited.
If I were there now, I am sure the sentiment of those I met in stores, post offices, cafes, etc. would be different. They are as disappointed as we are I am certain.
My own financial downturn (I make less now as a professional in the non-profit sector than I have since 1987, even with some moonlighting to earn extra) means that all my efforts are in keeping a roof over my head and food on the table and my kids in shoes, clothes and books. It means that basic survival is about all I have time to do these days. I think that is part of the design of the corporatocracy... a busy, overworked and overwhelmed people are a quiet people.
I do what I can, but I am glad there are those who are able to raise their voices and attempt to be heard. Thank you Cindy Sheehan. I don't agree with everything you say, but I am so appreciative that you have not allowed yourself to be silenced.
"For the world. It was hard not to catch that enthusiasm... the good will pouring out of the hearts of people in every city I visited"
"all my efforts are in keeping a roof over my head and food on the table and my kids in shoes, clothes and books. It means that basic survival is about all I have time to do these days."
These are two statements of Truth about the general state of humanity that shouldn't be strayed from. I wouldn't go into the "corporatocracy" theory except to recognize that the main people carrying out the corporate mind set are themselves operating with such fast flow of "excitement" that they lose their humanity in a fantasy whirled, as opposed to losing their humanity via poverty.
I haven't been reading Michael Moore for a few years, but his recent piece on Dwight being right kept being fwd to me. It's a good review of how all pervasive and influential the MICC has become; along with the movie Why We Fight, which depicts that each and every Congressional district is replete with the businesses of war, are other Truths that should be continually recognized. Why? Because it means the main people needed to be engaged in turning the seemingly endless tide of war to an ebbing of peace are the people living in the same home, next door and working in the local jobs and shopping at the local market(especially those going to the local sporting arena!).
Of course at CD you won't find many people ready to make the necessary human effort and human contact for peace. Here most people are anti-war(not peace), you are considered a Pathetic Sheeple, and on the other side of the Bigger Better Boys and Girls commenting(sitting in non-merciful judgement) here are the Thug Storm Troopers; neither you nor the Troopers are worthy of the Bigger Betterness of actual human contact and human conversation, except by electronic means, where the conversation will be washed out by flood of I Told You So...look at me: I'm a Bigger Better Girl, I'm a Bigger Better Boy. No, better not to get too enmeshed in CD sentiments, better to go with the sentiments of your recognized Truths...and attempt to make truly human contact with EVERY human you meet, especially the people in your home and home town.
Well...they may be hanging a sign around their neck stating War Pig and walking around the White House, but I haven't run into any at a meeting for and of peace(note: I didn't write meeting for and of anti-war). Plus two more points: the dry medium of electronics is not a substantial contact on the biological(wet) human level, unless one is greatly tuned into the ESP realm, and perhaps one person alive right now is dialed in that way, and, this is like that because that is like this: the tonality and focus of projections gives a pretty good clue to the foundation of activities to which they are attached. And they're really not "bad" things, just pretty much the way things are things; and when one recognizes the way things are they have a much better chance of influencing them in the direction in which they have hope; on a human level this is very similar. So I'm focusing on the first two sentiments the writer I replied to mentioned, and looking for some hands to shake; and not a liberal hand, conservative hand, or progressive hand...a human hand...oh, that and carrying some pictures of exploding oil trucks and DU Babies, and some ideas for how we could be spending trillions of dollars differently...along with anecdotes of how the new emerging form of recognizing humans is helping the lame to walk and the mute to speak.
Me; I've been trying to find a Giant Inflatable rat like they use back east to mark SCAB worksites, I want to put one in front of the CA State Capitol.
Wars are not something I have a ability to act against, so I go smaller wher I can make an impact.
>^^<
Cindy, I don't think that those people cared about their leader being principally progressive so much as they only cared about "winning" elections for the Democrats. If you look up most other supposedly progressive sites, the blind loyalty there stinks. As long as it doesn't happen to them personally, they will remain in blissful ignorance. But even if it does happen to them, some of them will still cling to hoping that Obama and the Democrats will save them no matter how many times or how badly their "hope" gets shattered.
I would think that several factors led to the election of Obama, democratic loyalists being only one small part thereof. The reaction to the previous administration played a large part , I would imagine, just as the election of Jimmy Carter was a reaction to the excesses of the Nixon crew.The election of the first African American to that office is probably high on the list as well.
Statistics show that roughly 40% of our electorate vote Dem. and roughly the same number always vote Repug, thus elections generally hinge on the 10%. Elections in this nation are controlled by a media given over to propaganda and not truth. Our climate , here in 'the land of the free' is one of control and manipulation in my own opinion.
Blaming the people , however accurate that might be, is actually counter productive if only because it is these folks that we need to retake our nation. Just one opinion, Jennifer.
I didn't mean to blame the people but the conditioning is what I am targeting. I apologize if I sounded a little too harsh.
None necessary
C'mon he was a lying, empty suit, if you couldn't see that. do us a favor and never vote again.
Also not buying the lesser of two evils crap! Evil is Evil.
>^^<
Um, I already know that and I voted for Nader a third time.
Thank you! (me too)
>^^<
This article belongs in the newspaper that brags on its front page that it supposedly publishes All The News That's Fit to Print. But it it remains to be seen if The New York Times actually gives a damn about questioning authority and allowing writers to be heard who speak the truth in a land where dissent is being frowned upon more and more.
"In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act."-George Orwell
If the N.Y. Times was honest, it would change its banner to: ALL THE NEWS THAT IT SEES FIT TO PRINT.
McCarthy was pickled in the gallons of alcohol he imbibed. Francis Spellman could not get Joe to cooperate with treatment of his alcoholism. He was already attending enough Meetings.
After school I watched the McCarthy hearings on television while my chums were watching Howdy Doody, Kukla Fran & Ollie, and Capt. Kangaroo.
Let me understand something, RichM:
This:
" Everyone is always yakking about how cruel the Nazis were. But their cruelty arose partly because there was a very powerful labor movement in Germany at that time, that couldn't be crushed except by extreme ruthlessness. If the Germans of 1933 were as docile & obedient as the Americans of 2010, the Nazis could have probably banged them into line with just a few "terror alerts," rather than having to kill lots of them, & send them off to concentration camps"
justifies the Nazis having sent millions of innocent people to concentration camps for extermination? I think not. The fact that many, if not most of the people who were exterminated in the camps were of the "wrong" religion was the real reason tney were killed in the first place.
For those who are interested, here is a petition that people can sign from the web site The World Can't Wait which they hope will be printed in The New York Times urging and demanding that the Obama and Bush administration be indicted and prosecuted for the war crimes and the crimes against humanity that they have committed against so many people, both foreign and domestic.
http://www.worldcantwait.net/index.php/features-mainmenu-220/the-war-of-terror/6280-crimes-are-crimes-no-matter-who-does-them
Thanks for the link.
Signed it and passed it on.