What killed Sgt. Gray? "He survived the war only to die at home. An exploration of his death and his combat unit's activities reveals what can happen to soldiers who feel the freedom -- or the pressure -- to do things in war they can't live with later." -- An American Radioworks documentary.
posted by empath
on Nov 11, 2008 -
29 comments
Presidential Crimes: Moving on is not an option. "In deciding about legal redress, we need to be clear about the large stakes in our decision. The very multiplicity of the apparent crimes, the sheer array of arguably broken laws, is dizzying. But that multiplicity must be faced, for in it we will see that what got in President Bush’s way was not any one law but the rule of law itself. It is the rule of law that has been put in jeopardy by a project of executive domination; it is the rule of law that will continue to be in peril; and it is only, therefore, by addressing the crimes through legal instruments—through a formal, legal arena, and not simply through the electoral repudiation of bad policy—that the grave and widespread damage stands a chance of being repaired."
posted by homunculus
on Sep 8, 2008 -
96 comments
"Only Nixon could go to China," and only
ex-Republican ex-Senator Lincoln Chafee can explain how George W. Bush set out "to preempt the Congress... on every issue", "turned his back on (his) bedrock campaign pledges", and become simultaneously America's most powerful and least popular President (and why there could never be a "surely this..." moment). NOT just another OMGBUSH commentary, this should be required reading for anybody who
honestly wants to know what went wrong.
posted by wendell
on May 2, 2008 -
46 comments
“You could almost see their dicks getting hard as they got new ideas." A
Vanity Fair reporter investigates the chain of command that tossed out the Geneva Conventions and instituted coercive interrogation techniques -- some might call them torture or even
war crimes -- in Bush's Global War on Terror. UC Berkeley law professor John Yoo's now-obsolete 81-page memo to the Pentagon in 2003 [available as PDFs
here and here] was crucial, offering a broad range of legal justifications and deniability for disregarding international law in the name of
"self-defense." Others
say that Yoo was just making "a clear point about the limits of Congress to intrude on the executive branch in its exercise of duties as Commander in Chief." [previously
here and
here.]
posted by digaman
on Apr 3, 2008 -
76 comments
In honor of the 5-year anniversary of the Iraq War, PBS'
Frontline presented a fantastic 2- part special on the issue this past Monday and Tuesday. It is now available in it's entirety online along with interview transcripts from senior officials, a video timeline of the war, and battlefield stories from soldiers.
Bush's War
posted by auralcoral
on Mar 26, 2008 -
100 comments
It's All Because. Have you ever had those days where you're wondering just why everything about your life is feeling like it's going down the toilet bowl?
Oded Gross knows, and he will tell you all about it. In a
song.
posted by brownpau
on Jul 26, 2007 -
17 comments
Tough talk about impeachment. A
public opinion poll from the American Research Group recently reported that more than four in ten Americans — 45% — favor impeachment hearings for President Bush and more than half — 54% — favored impeachment for Vice President Cheney.
In the video segment linked to here (available via javascript pop-up window from the main linked page), Bill Moyers gets perspective on the role of impeachment in American political life from Constitutional scholar
Bruce Fein, who wrote the first article of impeachment against President Bill Clinton, and THE NATION's
John Nichols, author of THE GENIUS OF IMPEACHMENT. Transcript is available
here.
posted by psmealey
on Jul 16, 2007 -
179 comments
On June 13th Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich.,
issued subpoenas to two former White House officials compelling them to provide testimony and related information as part of ongoing congressional investigations into the mass firings of well-performing federal prosecutors and the politicization of hiring and firing within the Department of Justice. Today is the deadline for handing over the requested information and the Whitehouse has stated that
it will not be complying with the request.
posted by Mr_Zero
on Jun 28, 2007 -
105 comments
The Next Attack. "Terrorists in Iraq are becoming proficient at blowing up
oil refineries. Similar plants in a handful of American
cities represent our greatest vulnerability. We could
easily be making them less dangerous. But we’re not." And one of the key players in keeping things that way happens to be
Dick Cheney’s son-in-law.
posted by homunculus
on Mar 1, 2007 -
38 comments
TPM's David Kurtz: I've gone from being open to the idea of an Imperial Vice Presidency to being convinced that historians will debate whether something approaching a Cheney-led coup d'etat has occurred, in which some of the powers of the Executive were extra-constitutionally usurped by the Office of the Vice President.
More about the Vice President, Richard "Dick" Cheney.
posted by nevercalm
on Feb 4, 2007 -
51 comments
This Is What Waterboarding Looks Like -- David Corn, co-author with Michael Isikoff of
HUBRIS: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal and the Selling of the Iraq War, writes about what
waterboarding is and what the torturer's tools look like. Back in the day, the Khmer Rouge, among other repressive regimes, used it. Interestingly, waterboarding typically isn't employed to gain useful information. No, this near-drowning technique is most useful for eliciting "confessions". Good times, good times.
(
via reddit via Diggdot.us)
posted by mooncrow
on Sep 29, 2006 -
167 comments
Vice President Richard Cheney, a mystery and an enigma: Joan Didion pulls together what is publicly known about
Richard Cheney--his career history, his ideas, the way he works. "He runs an office so disinclined to communicate that it routinely refuses to disclose who works there, even for updates to the
Federal Directory, which lists names and contact addresses for government officials. 'We just don't give out that kind of information,' an aide told one reporter. 'It's just not something we talk about.'"
Previously.
posted by russilwvong
on Sep 20, 2006 -
23 comments
Cheney Clarifies Iraq, Afghanistan on Meet the Press. For the first time in three years, Cheney appears on Meet the Press.
Transcript here. "We’ve never been able to confirm any connection between Iraq and 9/11[,]" but Iraq "...was a state sponsor of terror" and "while they found no stockpiles...[the Duelfer report claimed that] Saddam did in fact have the capability and that as soon as the sanctions were ended—and they were badly eroded—he would be back in business again." "[T]his was the place where, probably, there was a greater prospect of a connection between terrorists on the one hand and a terrorist-sponsoring state and weapons of mass destruction than any place else."
"...if we had to do it again, we would do exactly the same thing..."
posted by shivohum
on Sep 10, 2006 -
71 comments
[TV Guide Filter] Tonight on Frontline:
The Dark Side. An in-depth look at Dick Cheney's battle with the intelligence community to shape the War on Terror. From
Boston.com's preview:
"Frontline" delivers a devastating look tonight at the efforts of Vice President Dick Cheney to gain control of the war on terror after 9/11. In doing so, the show purports, he compromised the integrity of America's intelligence system. Check your local listings.
posted by justkevin
on Jun 20, 2006 -
37 comments
"I am copying you on this crap since I honestly believe the competitive procurement will never happen." --a multi-billion-dollar no-bid contract to KBR/Halliburton announced only after the fact, Cheney's extensive involvement, the attempted coverup of that involvement, lies, and you.
Embarrassment is not sufficient cause for exemption from the Freedom of Information Act, no matter how much some may wish.
...Appearing on NBC’s Meet the Press in September 2003 Cheney stated,
“I have absolutely no influence of, involvement of, knowledge of in any way, shape or form of contracts led by the [Army] Corps of Engineers or anybody else in the Federal Government.”
posted by amberglow
on Jun 15, 2006 -
39 comments
Cheney Pushed U.S. to Widen Eavesdropping In the weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks, Vice President Dick Cheney and his top legal adviser argued that the National Security Agency should intercept purely domestic telephone calls and e-mail messages without warrants in the hunt for terrorists, according to two senior intelligence officials.
posted by Postroad
on May 13, 2006 -
62 comments
Hungry like the wolf. In his state-of-the-nation address, Vladamir Putin took a swipe at the Bush administration, saying that Russia should build
"a strong, reliable home because we do see what's going on in the world. . . Comrade Wolf knows whom to eat. It's eating without listening to anyone. And by all appearances, it's not going to listen . . . Where is all this pathos about the need to fight for human rights and democracy when it comes to the need to pursue their own interests? Here everything is possible. There are no limits."
posted by insomnia_lj
on May 10, 2006 -
25 comments
"The job is waiting--there is no other job to do. ... Daniel Webster in the middle of the nineteenth century refused the vice presidential nomination saying 'he did not propose to be buried until he was already dead,' and Theodore Roosevelt at the beginning of the twentieth century accepted it but said he was 'taking the veil' and considered going back to finish law school to occupy his spare time."
The American Prospect investigates the workings of Cheney's
Office of the Vice President and discusses its unprecedented power. A stark contrast with the
traditional role of the vice president.
posted by russilwvong
on Apr 19, 2006 -
19 comments
