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President Obama attended the opening ceremony for George W. Bush's presidential library in Texas in 2013. (File)
Obama Makes Bushism the New Normal
In a lot of ways, we're worse off today than we were under George W. Bush.
Back then, Bush's extremist assault on civil liberties, human rights and other core American values in the name of fighting terror felt like an aberration.
The expectation was that those policies would be quickly reversed, discredited -- and explicitly outlawed -- once he was no longer in power.
Instead, under President Barack Obama, they've become institutionalized.
Sep 03, 2014
In a lot of ways, we're worse off today than we were under George W. Bush.
Back then, Bush's extremist assault on civil liberties, human rights and other core American values in the name of fighting terror felt like an aberration.
The expectation was that those policies would be quickly reversed, discredited -- and explicitly outlawed -- once he was no longer in power.
Instead, under President Barack Obama, they've become institutionalized.
There will be no snapping back to a pre-Bush-era respect for basic human dignity and civil rights. Thanks to Obama, it's going to be a hard, long fight.
In some cases, Obama has set even darker precedents than his predecessor. Massively invasive bulk surveillance of Americans and others has been expanded, not constrained. This president secretly condemns people to death without any checks or balances, and shrugs as his errant drones massacre innocent civilians. Whistleblowers and journalists who expose national security wrongdoing face unprecedented criminal prosecution.
Read the full article at The Intercept.
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Dan Froomkin
Dan Froomkin is a political journalist and founder and editor of Press Watch, a site focusing on coverage of U.S. politics and media. Previously, Froomkin covered politics for the Washington Post, the Huffington Post, and The Intercept.
In a lot of ways, we're worse off today than we were under George W. Bush.
Back then, Bush's extremist assault on civil liberties, human rights and other core American values in the name of fighting terror felt like an aberration.
The expectation was that those policies would be quickly reversed, discredited -- and explicitly outlawed -- once he was no longer in power.
Instead, under President Barack Obama, they've become institutionalized.
There will be no snapping back to a pre-Bush-era respect for basic human dignity and civil rights. Thanks to Obama, it's going to be a hard, long fight.
In some cases, Obama has set even darker precedents than his predecessor. Massively invasive bulk surveillance of Americans and others has been expanded, not constrained. This president secretly condemns people to death without any checks or balances, and shrugs as his errant drones massacre innocent civilians. Whistleblowers and journalists who expose national security wrongdoing face unprecedented criminal prosecution.
Read the full article at The Intercept.
Dan Froomkin
Dan Froomkin is a political journalist and founder and editor of Press Watch, a site focusing on coverage of U.S. politics and media. Previously, Froomkin covered politics for the Washington Post, the Huffington Post, and The Intercept.
In a lot of ways, we're worse off today than we were under George W. Bush.
Back then, Bush's extremist assault on civil liberties, human rights and other core American values in the name of fighting terror felt like an aberration.
The expectation was that those policies would be quickly reversed, discredited -- and explicitly outlawed -- once he was no longer in power.
Instead, under President Barack Obama, they've become institutionalized.
There will be no snapping back to a pre-Bush-era respect for basic human dignity and civil rights. Thanks to Obama, it's going to be a hard, long fight.
In some cases, Obama has set even darker precedents than his predecessor. Massively invasive bulk surveillance of Americans and others has been expanded, not constrained. This president secretly condemns people to death without any checks or balances, and shrugs as his errant drones massacre innocent civilians. Whistleblowers and journalists who expose national security wrongdoing face unprecedented criminal prosecution.
Read the full article at The Intercept.
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