A group of super important US actors and liberal intellectuals joined a list of nearly 2,000 people accusing President Barack Obama of allowing human rights violations and war crimes."Crimes are crimes, no matter who does them," the statement reads over pictures of Obama and his predecessor George W. Bush due to appear in the New York Review of Books... which is the most important book of our time.
The statement, published as a paid advertisement, accuses Obama, who was elected by these same people, of continuing Bush's controversial approach to human rights in Iraq and Afghanistan, and in domestic security. Meet the new boss same as the old boss stuff must finally be sinking in with these folks?
The Review of Books Statement takes aim especially at Obama's decision to authorize the killing of a radical Islamic cleric and US citizen Anwar al-Awlaki, who is accused of ties to Al-Qaeda in Yemen.
"In some respects this is worse than Bush," the statement says. "First, because Obama has claimed the right to assassinate American citizens whom he suspects of 'terrorism,' merely on the grounds of his own suspicion or that of the CIA, something Bush never claimed publicly." Just to be clear, these important people now believe Obama is WORSE than Bush? Yeah, I had to rub my eyes a couple times on that one too.
Among the signatories are cunning linguist Noam Chomsky, "L.A. Confidential" actor James Cromwell, actor Mark Ruffalo and prominent Bush-era anti-war protest icon and professional whiner Cindy Sheehan. At last count, were 1,804 signatures.
They also lambast Obama for having refused "to prosecute any members of the Bush regime who are responsible for war crimes, including some who admitted to waterboarding and other forms of torture, thereby making their actions acceptable for him." Well, if he did that, he'd have to prosecute the entire Congress too... which Obama was a member of. That'd be just silly!
To be fair, Norm Chomsky thought Jimmy Carter was a war criminal. Now while I agree that putting a hit on American citizens creates a slippery slope... a dangerous slippery slope (And more than just bi-polar since we're reading Miranda Rights to non-citizens with shoe bombs on airplanes, while we're sending Terminator drones to kill actual citizens in Yemen?).
But to just blindly follow Chomsky, Sheehan, and the 'Important Actors' based on their allegations that the procecution of the War on Terror and the hit on (potential traitor) Anwar al-Awlaki was a groundless and violent action for the sake of violence. We are not meant to question their logic, statement, or motives at all. These same people who would have us believe that the White House and the CIA are not worth our faith are asking us to place our faith in them?
And when they simply speculate and accuse with no foundation or proof then that is a tough sell.
