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The More Things Change... |
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Conservative Compass Blog
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Written by Bob Sordahl
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Sunday, 12 April 2009 |
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That old axiom “The more things change, the more they stay the same” couldn’t be more true when referring to the Obama administration. As a candidate Obama promised change and transparency (whatever that means). We are today sneaking up on the third month of his Presidency, and it is interesting to note how many things look strangely familiar.
Rendition
Rendition is the unsavory practice of picking up suspected terrorists off the street and taking them to foreign countries where they can have their fingernails pulled out. America has never had the stomach to do such things, so in this program started during the Clinton administration, we farmed it out to our allies who have no compunctions about extracting information...in any way necessary. It was expanded greatly during the Bush administration after 9/11, but I believe any reasonable person must agree that it is a despicable practice worthy of retirement. Has that happened now that Bush is back at the ranch? Not exactly. As reported by the Telegraph.co.uk : According to a detailed reading of the executive orders signed by Mr. Obama on Jan 22, renditions have not been outlawed, with the new administration deciding it needs to retain some devices in Mr. Bush's anti-terror arsenal amid continued threats to US national security.
Is this a case of the Obama administration admitting that the Bush administration was right?
Wiretaps
OK, how about warrantless wiretaps? We know those are bad and will surely be ended now that the evil Bush and Cheney are no longer calling the shots. Obama told us so in one of his campaign speeches :
“For one thing, under an Obama presidency, Americans will be able to leave behind the era of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and "wiretaps without warrants.”
I guess President Obama forgot that campaign promise because The Electronic Freedom Foundation describes it like this :
Friday evening, in a motion to dismiss Jewel v. NSA, EFF's litigation against the National Security Agency for the warrantless wiretapping of countless Americans, the Obama Administration's made two deeply troubling arguments.
First, they argued, exactly as the Bush Administration did on countless occasions, that the state secrets privilege requires the court to dismiss the issue out of hand. They argue that simply allowing the case to continue "would cause exceptionally grave harm to national security." As in the past, this is a blatant ploy to dismiss the litigation without allowing the courts to consider the evidence.
Could it be that this really is an issue of national security, and not merely an attempt to listen in on your personal phone calls? Could it be that Bush was right again?
Funding The Wars
So President Obama wants war funding on the books as a part of the budget for more transparency (that word again), yet this is how he is proceeding :
President Barack Obama is seeking an additional $83.4 billion for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and other initiatives, a request that would bring the total cost of the conflicts to more than $900 billion.
Obama and other administration officials have criticized former President George W. Bush for funding the Iraq and Afghanistan wars through supplemental spending requests that are not part of Congress’s annual budget process. Lawmakers objected to the reliance on supplemental process because Congress’s annual spending limits did not apply to the funding proposals and the requests usually had to be approved quickly.
White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said yesterday Obama was forced to make his own supplemental request because the Bush administration (the devil made me do it) had provided only enough money to fund the wars through part of the current fiscal year.
So, in an ironic twist of fate, Obama the President is requesting the same funding that he opposed as a Senator . Any remote possibility here that Bush was right?
It is amazing how much difference perspective makes. When on the outside looking in, it is easy to criticize current policies. It is quite a different story however, when sitting behind the oval office desk, where responsibility for the safety, security and prosperity of this Country resides. It soon becomes clear that many of the things that had been so easy to fault, were in truth, the best options from a group of imperfect choices. This new administration has only begun to learn that though they have promised and desire change, some things by necessity must and will stay the same.
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